FBI considers torture as suspects stay silent

The Times-UK ^ | Oct. 22, 2001 | Damien Whitworth

[Alouette]

Well, whaddaya think? Should they go for it?

[TomServo]

Already posted here and here.

[Sans-Culotte]

I am: a.) surprised this story was leaked; and b.) surprised torture and/or truth drugs were not used from the outset.

[boris]

Feed them pork.

--Boris

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Pen them up with some well fed hogs.

[CatoRenasci]

No, our police and the FBI cannot use torture as it would compromise our laws.

I do suppose, however, we can give these guys the choice of talking to us or talking to the Israeli Shin Bet....

[Labyrinthos]

Remember the technique they used in The Marathon Man?

[Question_Assumptions]

If an attack on one NATO country is an attack on all, extradite them to Turkey and let them take over the interrogation. I'm sure they have a lot of experience with Islamic extremists like this...

[billybudd]

Torture should not be used, since it's completely useless. Either you have the right guy or you don't. Using torture to extract a confession won't tell you anything because the prisoner's ONLY concern is how to stop the torture. That means the information you get would have a very high chance of being false. Think about it, who would be more likely to "confess"? An innocent who values his life or a suicidal jihadist who has been trained by alQuaeda to resist torture? Mind-numbing drugs or extreme psychological techniques, which induce the prisoner to DIVULGE information rather than attempting to EXTRACT it, would be the best option. And there's also the fact that you could very possibly be damaging or killing innocents.

[billybudd]

Another thing, I don't think it's legitimate to refrain from using torture ourselves but to expect some other government to use it. If we extradite these guys to some other country with the express intent or having them tortured, which is what is implied in the article, then we are morally culpable for that torture, regardless of whether we ourselves do it or not.

[surfer]

Here is a concept!

Replace the torch on lady liberty with a sword...and drop the bastards out of huey's onto the sword until they start talking! And if they don't talk well at least they are not eating up taxpayer money anymore!

[Geezerette]

I really like the idea of replacing "Lady Liberty"'s torch with a sword. Also do away with the "send me the wretched refuse of your teeming shores".

America FIRST!!

g

[Zionist Conspirator]

Aside from the moral question (which of course is the most important issue), torture is now, has always been, and forever will be absolutely useless for one very simple reason: if you hurt somebody enough you can get him to say anything you want him to say just to get the pain to stop. This "insight" is pure common sense, requiring absolutely no historical "moral progress" whatsoever. In other words, there was never any excuse for torture as a means of getting at "the truth" in any culture, at any point in history.

Moreover, halakhah does not even accept confessions but requires eyewitnesses (at least two for Jews, one for non-Jews). While the secular mind reels at the possibility of guilty people slipping through the cracks due to an absence of eyewitnesses, the whole idea is that G-d actually exists and if we obey His laws He will Himself execute judgment on those we ourselves weren't permitted to punish.

Also, doesn't justification of torture "to save lives" smack of moral utilitarianism?

All that being said, I certainly understand the frustration of the authorities at encountering such disciplined evil.

[ScreamingFist]

"Torture should not be used, since it's completely useless"

Right. Budd, once they start popping your toes off with a pair of lineman dikes, or start castrating you REAL slow, I guarantee you'll tell everything you know. You'll start making things up when you've found you've spilled your guts (pun intended) and the torture just keeps right on going. Don't believe all the B.S. you see in the movies. NO ONE is immune to torture.

[MotherSpector]

I understood it was just a shot of "truth serum." Is this torture?

[neutrino]

Truth be told, torture does work, and we do use it. We're just more subtle about it, and make sure there aren't any marks. Or we contract it out.

To deal with this guy, send him to some miserable jail - Louisiana has some interesting ones - and intern him in a cell with 20 or so other prisoners. Get the word out that there will be extra privileges if the guy breaks....pizza, hamburgers maybe, ice cream, whatever. And then just walk away.

We have some creative people in jail....

I recall an article, years ago, from the Wall Street Journal. They discussed that in one Atlanta prison, only ONE prisoner had not been raped - and he was the toughest, meanest fellow the warden had ever met. Somehow, I think the suspect would fail to thrive in such an environment.

[Reo]

"Remember the technique they used in The Marathon Man?"

How thoughtful of us to provide our prisoners with free dental care....

[Camerican]

"We are known for humanitarian treatment, so basically we are stuck" - HORSE S**T!! Who cares whether or not what they tell us is admissible in court. Do we really want these animals ever brought into a U.S. courtroom where some ACLU scumbag can plead them down to a Class 2 Midemeanor and have them sentenced to time served?! You want them to talk?! Drill their teeth! Cut their fingers and toes off one by one. Insert bamboo shoots up their urethras! Force raw pork down their throats! If none of this works - then use sleep deprivation - probably the most useful form because it renders the subject so weak and disoriented he is unable to fabricate rational lies.

[CatoRenasci]

Sure, it might involve some moral culpability to turn these perps over to the Israeli's after they've been given a chance to sing to us, but not much, and no legal culpability. Lincoln was acting illegally when he suspended habeus corpus during the Civil War, but was he wrong? I' not so sure. We're not talking about ordinary criminals here, we're talking about terrorist suspects. I'd be willing to take them to court, give them personal use immunity for 100% honest, complete testimony, and compel them to testify. Then, if they don't, turn them over to the Israeli's or one of the other European secret services that have less than squeamish standards.