Torture and Interrogation Essay

The Rationale for and the Efficacy of Torture during Interrogation

Although information from interrogational torture is unreliable, it is likely to be used frequently and harshly. ==John W. Schiemann, 2012

The epigraph above is indicative of the growing consensus concerning the lack of efficacy of torture in providing interrogators with reliable concealed information Concealed information is the foundation of the majority of security issues. In most cases, concealed information is a situation wherein one individual knows something that someone else does not know. Consequently, the majority of security issues could be resolved if there was a dependable method of determining those cases in which an individual was concealing information and extracting that information effectively. To date, though, there has not been a dependable method developed.1 For instance, polygraph research has been unable to achieve an accuracy level that would make the results acceptable in courtrooms in the United States even though the federal government continues to use polygraph screening.2 These limitations have resulted in the reintroduction of various types of physical and mental torture during interrogations of terrorist suspects, despite the practice being outlawed in the United States for centuries. From a strictly pragmatic perspective, it is therefore important to determine if torture is producing the desired outcomes given the violative nature of the practice. To this end, this paper reviews the relevant literature to describe what practices constitute torture during interrogations and whether these practices are efficacious in producing reliable intelligence information. A summary of the research and important findings concerning these issues are presented in the conclusion.

A number of aspects of the global war on terrorism, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the infamous prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and the use of torture, represent major issues for concerned American citizens.3 Likewise, the use of torture for intelligence-gathering purposes has become the increasing focus for researchers as well. For instance, Schiemann emphasizes, “To the degree that political philosophy is concerned with the proper balance between legitimate state authority, including violence, on one hand, and individual autonomy, including autonomy of the body, on the other hand, then interrogational torture is also an important problem in normative political theory.”4 

Despite these growing concerns, proponents of the global war on terrorism maintain that the use of torture is justified given the potential for future terrorist attacks on the scale of those of September 11, 2001 and the need to protect the country’s interests at home and abroad. For example, former Vice President Dick Cheney acknowledged in an exit interview that he was directly responsible for authorizing the CIA’s use of torture. When questioned concerning the CIA’s treatment of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a terrorist suspect incarcerated in a clandestine CIA prison who was waterboarded more than 100 times, Cheney conceded that he was not only aware of the program, he had authorized the use of these torture methods. According to the former vice president, “I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared. That is, the agency, in effect, came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do. And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it.”5 When asked if he believed the CIA’s methods were too extreme, the former vice president simply replied, “I don't.”6 

Although the former vice president supported the use of torture in these instances because of the importance of the intelligence to national security, the harsh reality is that even the more benign types of torture that have been used in the global war on terrorism can be regarded as inhumane and humiliating. For instance, according to the former chief of training at the Navy's Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) school, waterboarding is a "controlled drowning" that "occurs under the watch of a doctor, a psychologist, an interrogator and a trained strap-in/strap-out team."7 

The severity of this interrogation method may not be well understood by the general public but a description of the practice provides some indication of what the experience must be like for suspects. In those cases where waterboarding is used as part of mock interrogations during SERE training, Wynia reports that, “A team doctor watches the quantity of water that is ingested and for the physiological signs which show when the drowning effect goes from painful psychological experience to horrific, suffocating punishment, to the final death spiral."8 While these more benign techniques may not rise to the level of the rack or thumb screws, it is clear that any practice that can produce these levels of reaction must be regarded as torture. In this regard, Howes points out that, “We know that the reasons for torture's ineffectiveness stem from the fact that it is different from other forms of coercion. Consider some of the techniques used against detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (techniques that have been called ‘torture light’ to indicate that they are relatively low on the scale of human horrors).”9

There are also numerous venues for CIA-sponsored torture to take place, all out of the sight of ordinary citizens. Some of these facilities such as Guantanamo have become widely known due to high-profile media reports, but there are several others that are less well known, including the CIA interrogation center near Kabul; an airbase on British Diego Garcia, as well as a sea-borne interrogation facility on a US naval vessel in the Indian Ocean which is casually referred to as “Hotel California” by CIA operatives. Even these facilities, though, are not the worst of the lot. In this regard, Grey emphasizes that, “Of those operated by America's allies, the worst prisons include the Scorpion jail and the Lazoghly Square secret police headquarters in Cairo, and the Far' Falastin interrogation centre in Damascus, Syria.”10

Notwithstanding the former vice president’s admitted support of torture by the CIA in prosecuting the global war on terrorism, other public authorities have characterized the use of torture by the federal government as being “disgraceful conduct” that cannot be condoned by a civilized society. For example, in April 2003, the American public witnessed a series of shocking photographs from Abu Ghraib prison, 20 miles west of Baghdad.11 An investigation by Major General Antonio Taguba of the 800th Military Police Brigade responsible for these tactics identified the following methods were used at this prison:

* Punching, slapping, and kicking detainees; jumping on their naked feet.
* Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees.
* Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing.
* Forcing detainees to remove their clothing and keeping them naked for several days at a time.
* Forcing naked male detainees to wear women's underwear.
* Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped.
* Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them.
* Positioning a naked detainee on a box, with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wires to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture.
* Writing "I am a Rapest (sic)" on the leg of a detainee accused of rape, and then photographing him naked.
* Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee's neck and having a female soldier pose for a picture.
* A male MP guard having sex with a female detainee.
* Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case biting and severely injuring a detainee.
* Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees.12

Clearly, these torture tactics went far beyond the more benign waterboarding methods that were approved by the former vice president. Moreover, the photographs shown to the American public were shocking, of course, but even more shocking was the fact that these torture methods were developed by the United States’ own Central Intelligence Agency over the past 50 years. According to Hodge and Cooper, “The Bush administration worked overtime to convince Americans that what they were seeing was the work of a ‘few bad apples,’ whom the president said exhibited ‘disgraceful conduct’ that ‘dishonored our country and disregarded our values.’”13 Likewise, in July 2003, the U.S. Army Inspector General, Paul Mikolashek, characterized the Abu Ghraib prison incidents as “abuses [that] should be viewed as what they are: unauthorized actions taken by a few individuals."14 

According to Human Rights Watch, despite the fact that President Bush issued an apology for the torture incidents at Abu Ghraib prison and military investigations were launched against the individuals who were suspected of being involved, the United States has not made any formal commitment to prosecute them and these incidents may just be the tip of the torture iceberg because there are other venues in which these methods can be applied with little or no scrutiny by international organizations or the media. In this regard, Human Rights Watch emphasizes that, “The number of such incidents reported in the media since 2002, confidential and internal reports of abuse to superior officers with responsibility for prison policies, and statements that guards were instructed to ‘soften up’ prisoners for interrogation, all suggest that these incidents are indicative of a policy condoning or tolerant of torture, official denials notwithstanding.”15

In August 2003, two additional federal government reports, one from an Army panel headed by Major General George Fay and the second by a commissioned headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger confirmed that the seven military policemen who were implicated in these episodes were just the tip of the torture iceberg. The results of the report from General Fay indicated that there were more than two dozen military intelligence officers involved as well as a number of military contractors. The Fay report catalogued 44 specific torture incidents, including those outlined above as well as some truly extreme situations. For instance, the Fay report cited “the stripping, hooding and sodomizing of detainees; subjecting them to temperature extremes; leading them around naked on leashes; and attaching electrical wires to their genitals. In one case, two naked youths were terrorized by snarling, unmuzzled military dogs held by military personnel who competed to try to make the teenagers defecate.”16

Not surprisingly, the Fay and Schlesinger reports have been widely regarded as confirmation of the ongoing use of torture by the federal government, but some observers maintain that even these damning reports failed to expose the true extent of the problem. In this regard, Hodge and Cooper note that, “Human Rights Watch, the largest U.S. human rights group, said the reports utterly fail to assess the obvious: the role that official government policies played in bringing about the horrendous abuse.”17 Even when these two reports did identify the source of the problem, they failed to explore how the abuses were allowed to occur in the first place. For instance, according to Hodge and Cooper, “While the Schlesinger report notes administration policies--such as the August 1, 2002, Justice Department opinion that redefined torture as pain ‘equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death’ -- it fails to evaluate whether the policies played a role in contributing to the abuses.”18

A special counsel for Human Rights Watch, Reed Brody, suggested that the Schlesinger panel which was comprised of members selected by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, intentionally avoided making any connections between the abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison and the interrogation policies that were approved by the defense secretary. In this regard, Hodge and Cooper point out that the Schlesinger report “seems to go out of its way not to find any relationship between Rumsfeld's approval of interrogation techniques designed to inflict pain and humiliation and the widespread mistreatment and torture of detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo.”19

A professor of history at the University of Wisconsin Madison and author of "Closer Than Brothers," an analysis of the effects of the CIA's torture methods on the Philippine military, Alfred McCoy, suggested that the Fay and Schlesinger reports confirmed what many people already believed – that the CIA is torturing suspects with virtual impunity. For example, McCoy characterized the photographs from at Abu Ghraib as “snapshots of CIA torture techniques that have metastasized over the last 50 years like an undetected cancer inside the U.S. intelligence community.”20

According to McCoy, the CIA has been refining its torture techniques since the 1950s, and an enormous amount of resources have been devoted to the enterprise. In fact, by the late 1950s, investments in torture research by the CIA amounted to more than $1 billion a year with a half dozen research firms actively involved. All of this money did pay off in terms of identifying new interrogation and torture methods. In this regard, Hodge and Cooper note that:
The research ranged from using electric shock, to giving LSD to unsuspecting subjects, to employing sensory deprivation. It was the latter experiments that bore fruit, producing a revolutionary new psychological torture paradigm that was superior to various physical methods that had been used for 2,000 years, from ancient Rome's hot irons to the medieval rack and wheel.21 

The CIA reduced its findings to writing in 1963 in a manual entitled, “KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation.” The 125-page manual includes instructions on using various forms of interrogation and torture, including the use of so-called “silent drugs” which are administered to detainees without their knowledge or permission to coerce information from them as well as other psychological techniques. Although psychological interrogation and torture methods may appear less harmful compared to physical methods, the harsh reality is that these methods can produce long-term adverse effects in both detainees as well as their interrogators.22 In this regard, Hodge and Cooper report that, “The basic techniques--the use of stress positions, sensory deprivation and sexual humiliation--are aimed at making victims feel responsible for their own pain and suffering. But McCoy added that while it appears less abusive than physical torture, the psychological torture paradigm causes deep psychological damage to both victims and their Interrogators, who can become capable of unspeakable physical cruelties.” 

Following the publication of the KUBARK manual, the CIA has installed at least 40 interrogation centers through South Vietnam pursuant to its Phoenix Program. From these beginnings, the CIA’s interrogation centers have been installed in countries around the world through the U.S. Army Mobile Training Teams and U.S. Agency for International Development's Public Safety program.23 In 1983, the KUBARK manual incorporated a "Human Resource Exploitation Training” component that outlined physical torture methods that were employed by the U.S.-trained Honduran Battalion 3-16. At this point in time, the CIA also published the "Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare" manual for the Nicaraguan contra commandos to facilitate their defeat of the Sandinista government with the assistance of the Reagan administration.24 During the 1980s, six other manuals were published by the CIA that were used at the U.S. Army's School of the Americas and distributed throughout Latin America by Army Mobile Training Teams. According to Hodge and Cooper, these manuals “advocated everything from executions of guerrillas to extortion, coercion and false imprisonment.”25  The results of a 1992 investigation by the Department of Defense were kept secret at the order of Dick Cheney, who was then secretary of defense.26

As a result, both the Fay and Schlesinger commissions were unable to assess the actual role played by the CIA in the Abu Ghraib prison incidents because they lacked access to the agency. Both reports, though, do make the connection between these high-profile incidents and the CIA. For example, the Fay report pointed out that “the CIA's detention and interrogation practices led to a loss of accountability, abuse, reduced interagency cooperation, and an unhealthy mystique that further poisoned the atmosphere at Abu Ghraib.”27 In addition, the Fay report also noted that CIA officers held so-called "Ghost Detainees" that included an Iraqi detainee who was subsequently died in a shower, who as found “handcuffed with a sandbag over his head,” and "three Saudi national medical personnel working for the coalition in Iraq" who were detained using fake names.28  The U.S. Army also permitted the CIA to detain unaccounted for and unidentified individuals which allowed them to avoid the "reporting requirements under the Geneva Conventions."29

Likewise, the Schlesinger panel determined that the "CIA's detention and interrogation practices contributed to a loss of accountability at Abu Ghraib"; however, this report maintains that it did not have a mandate or "sufficient access to CIA information" to investigate this issue.30  The Fay report characterized some of the torture methods used at Abu Ghraib (including "removing clothing, isolating people for long periods of time, using stress positions, exploiting fear of dogs and implementing sleep and light deprivation") as being “new ideas” that were learned on the job by U.S. interrogators.31  These methods, though, are certainly not new and their origins can be traced to the CIA’s role in the Vietnam War, and the only “new” aspect of the Abu Ghraib prison incidents was the fact that they were captured on film and made public.32 Given that the federal government is actively promoting the use of coercive interrogation methods that may be tantamount to torture, it is important to determine whether these methods are achieving their desired outcomes as discussed further below.

Since time immemorial, a number of methods have been used in an attempt to obtain reliable information from individuals who are unwilling to provide it, including interrogation, torture, polygraphs and even brain imaging technologies. All of these techniques, though, have their respective disadvantages and limitations in extracting concealed information and verifying it.33 The Spanish Inquisition proved that it is possible to compel people to confess to virtually anything if sufficiently painful torture techniques are involved and that remains the case today as well. As Hodge and Cooper point out, “People will say anything to stop pain. The information extracted is inherently unreliable. And that's the problem the CIA solved with these psychological methods” (emphasis added).34 

More importantly, even when detainees are compelled to divulge information, it may not be reliable, timely or actionable. For instance, Wynia emphasizes that, “When the victims of torture do ‘talk,’ they often--and perhaps intentionally--provide unreliable as well as true information. In fact, there is very little evidence that torture is effective as an interrogation technique, and some evidence that it can backfire dramatically.”35 Therefore, even when the rationale in support of torture during interrogations is based on the overarching need to prevent future terrorist attacks on the level of the September 11, 2001 attacks, the efficacy of these torture methods must be taken into account. As Schiemann points out, “The pragmatic defense of limited, last-resort interrogational torture rests on certain constraints on the way in which torture is employed as well as the expectation it will be effective in revealing valuable information.”36

In order for torture to be regarded as effective, it must satisfy four fundamental conditions:

1. The information must be true; 
2. The information must be current; 
3. The information must be actionable; and,
4. There are not alternative, equally efficient, means available of gathering the intelligence.37 

Taken together, these are legitimate criteria for evaluating the efficacy of drastic practices such as torture, but it is unlikely that intelligence-gathering agencies take all of these factors into account when weighing the appropriateness of torture or the value of the information that is gained in the process. 

The overarching constraint involved is that any information derived through torture may simply be an attempt by detainees to say anything that will stop the pain, including outdated or false information that does not satisfy the foregoing criteria. As the Bard pointed out, “Therein lies the rub.” As noted above, not only does information extracted through torture have to be true in order for torture to be regarded as effective, it must also be current. As Wisnewski points out, “Quite obviously, it is not sufficient that one speaks when tortured. It is highly likely that this will happen. If the information given is false, however, this can hardly be considered an instance of torture ‘working.’”38 Moreover, the second criterion, information must be current, means that even if intelligence gathered through torture during interrogation is true, the torture cannot be regarded as being effective without the other qualifying criteria. In this regard, Wisnewski emphasizes that, “The truth of what a person says, though, is not sufficient for showing that torture works. The information acquired must also be current information – not simply something that used to be true.”39 

The penultimate qualifying condition for torture to be considered effective is for any information obtained thereby to be actionable. It is certainly conceivable that detainees will try first to provide outdated and inaccurate information, as well as information that has little or no value for the interrogators in the hopes of ending the torture without unnecessarily compromising their cohorts. As Wisnewski notes, “For torture to ‘work,’ the intelligence acquired must also be actionable – that is, one must be able to act on the information acquired in such a way that the action in question would make the torture worth the serious wrong committed to acquire the information.”40

The final qualifying condition for torture to be regarded as effective involves the rationale that is used to support the selected method. If torture during interrogation is used to extract intelligence that could have otherwise been obtained, then torture cannot be considered an effective approach. As Wisnewski emphasizes, “Torture ‘working’ could not possibly be justified if there were other means of acquiring the same intelligence that did not involve the use of this dark method.”41 Even if the information that is extracted through torture is true, current and actionable, it is not possible to characterize torture as being effective if this information could have been obtained in some other equally effective fashion. According to Wisnewski, though, “By ‘equally effective’ we do not simply mean that said information could be acquired (after a terrorist attack has occurred, we have a great deal of information that is ‘actionable,’ though in a different sense). To be ‘equally effective,’ the alternative means of intelligence gathering must be such that it could also prevent what is putatively prevented by the use of torture.”42

Based on the foregoing constraints and considerations, it is reasonable to posit that few incidents of torture can be truly regarded as being effective. Despite the assertions by law enforcement authorities and the federal government that the coercive interrogation methods used on terrorist suspects have produced actionable information that prevented terrorist attacks at home and abroad, the fact remains that this information may have been available elsewhere and the use of torture to obtain it means that the practice cannot be regarded as being effective. For example, in response to the question of whether or not he thought ‘enhanced interrogation’ had saved lives former Vice President Dick Cheney told a CNN interviewer:  “I think those programs were absolutely essential to the success we enjoyed of being able to collect the intelligence that let us defeat all further attempts to launch attacks against the United States since 9/11. I think that’s a great success story.”43 

Certainly, it is difficult to argue with success but the former vice president’s characterization of the effectiveness of the torture methods used by federal government authorities against terrorist suspects must be viewed in light of the criteria for effectiveness. In fact, many security analysts believe that this information could either have been developed through other sources or other methods besides torture. In this regard, Wisnewski concludes that:
In assessing the effectiveness of torture, are we to believe that practitioners of torture have considered the available alternatives to intelligence-gathering (such as standard interrogation techniques, which have been shown to work in many cases), and have determined with sufficient assurance that these will be ineffective in this case? This seems possible, but doubtful.44

In this context, what is torture? According to Article 1 of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984): 

[T]he term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes of obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions. 

Likewise, according to the definition provided by Black’s Law Dictionary, torture is “to inflict intense pain to body or mind for purposes of punishment, or to extract a confession or information, or for sadistic pleasure.”45 The foregoing definitions are congruent with the guidance provided by Faulkes who advises, “Interrogation or torture are rational attempts to get or verify information.”46 As the historical record shows, though, torture is typically not used in rational ways and frequently escalates with dire consequences for both the tortured and their interrogators. As Faulkes emphasizes, “Unfortunately, torture is rarely used in detached, rational ways; claiming that its only purpose is to elicit information is ‘the interrogation fallacy.’”47 Likewise, Howes emphasizes that not only is torture likely to be ineffective when intelligence is most desperately needed such as on the battlefield or during times of emergency, a growing body of evidence indicates that the intelligence that is gathered through torture techniques is not only unreliable, it can have serious consequences for interrogators and their victims alike. In this regard, Howes points out that, “The sources of error in organized torture are systematic and ineradicable . . . [torture] yields poor information, sweeps up many innocents, degrades organizational capabilities, and destroys interrogators.”48

Indeed, torture is also intentionally used to create fear and terror in groups of people, or simply to satisfy the sadism of those involved in the torturing, which is also consistent with the legal definition.49 Any information that is extracted during torture, though, is not admissible in American courts, causing many observers to question its utility as well as its legality.50 According to Faulkes, “Even a strict utilitarian argument hinges on the idea that useful information can be gained from torture. There is little research on the effectiveness of torture to elicit information from unwilling participants and there are no rigorous laboratory studies, for obvious reasons.”51 

Despite the paucity of relevant research, scientific studies have provided a number of reasons why information derived from torture is not reliable. Not only will people say anything to stop the pain, torture produces impaired cognitive functions that may skew any information that is obtained. The global war on terrorism has been the catalyst for the use of torture, but in many ways, this practice places the United States on the same level as those they are trying to defeat. As Faulkes points out, “Furthermore, human rights declarations by the United Nations (UN) (1984) also prohibit torture and banning torture, rather than trying to justify it, is regarded as a mark of civilized society.”52 Given these adverse views about torture, it is little wonder that many American citizens and policymakers who believed that the United States is in fact a “civilized society” are concerned about the practice.     

The efficacy of torture during interrogations must also be viewed in light of controlling domestic and international law on the issue. In fact, the use of torture has long been outlawed in the United States.53 Since 1984, the legal definition of torture in the United States has been "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession."54 Moreover, since the United States is a signatory to the several Geneva Conventions, U.S. troops are required to comply with Common Article III that not only outlaws torture, but bans any “humiliating and degrading treatment" of prisoners as well. 55 In this regard, Common Article III reads in part:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed ' hors de combat ' by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

    (a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
    (b) taking of hostages;
    *c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment; and,
    (d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.56

Paradoxically, despite the trends over the past 50 years, the U.S. was in the vanguard of countries promoting the protection of prisoners in time of war. Some indication of these priorities can be discerned from General George Washington admonition to grant quarter to all British solders:  "Treat them with humanity, and let them have no reason to complain of our copying the brutal example of the British Army in their treatment of our unfortunate brethren who have fallen into their hands."57 In very sharp contrast to the incidents at Abu Ghraib prison and others that may not be so well publicized, this American policy towards prisoners has paid major dividends in terms of international goodwill and national security. As Wynia notes, “For more than two hundred years, defining torture during interrogations had not posed much of a problem for the United States; our military has proudly set a worldwide example not merely by declining to torture our captives, but by treating them with humanity and dignity--and the policy has had good results.”58

Likewise, the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the “Torture Convention”) was adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 10, 1984 (resolution 39/46).59 The Convention became effective on June 26, 1987 following its ratification by 20 Member States of the United Nations. The UN Torture Convention, Article 2, provides in part:

1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction.
2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.
3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture.

Clearly, even the justification of the global war on terrorism does not conform to these provisions. In a subsequent second resolution, enacted on December 9, 1975, the UN General Assembly tasked the Commission on Human Rights with the requirement to further analyze the issue of torture and to take all steps needed to ensure the effective implementation of the Torture Declaration. As a result, on December 8, 1977, the UN General Assembly made a request of the Commission on Human Rights to develop a draft convention concerning torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment based on the principles codified in the Torture Declaration (resolution 32/62). Most of the provisions of the UN Torture Convention concern the respective obligations of the Member States which are summarized as follows:

    (i)   Each State party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture. The prohibition against torture shall be absolute and shall be upheld also in a state of war and in other exceptional circumstances (article 2);
     (ii)  No State party may expel or extradite a person to a State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture (article 3);
     (iii) Each State party shall ensure that acts of torture are serious criminal offences within its legal system (article 4);
     (iv) Each State party shall, on certain conditions, take a person suspected of the offence of torture into custody and make a preliminary inquiry into the facts (article 6);
     (v)  Each State party shall either extradite a person suspected of the offence of torture or submit the case to its own authorities for prosecution (article 7);
     (vi) Each State party shall ensure that its authorities make investigations when there is reasonable ground to believe that an act of torture has been committed (article 12);
     (vii) Each State party shall ensure that an individual who alleges that he has been subjected to torture will have his case examined by the competent authorities (article 13);
     (viii) Each State party shall ensure to victims of torture an enforceable right to fair and adequate compensation (article 14).

In February 1977, the European Court of Human Rights determined that Great Britain had practiced "inhuman and degrading treatment" against Irish Republican Army suspects accused of terrorism. Although the British attorney general claimed that the specific "five techniques" that were applied to IRA suspects "will not in any circumstances be reintroduced as an aid to interrogation," these five techniques have been revived by the CIA pursuant to the global war on terrorism in interrogations in a number of cases. These five techniques, which have long been condemned by the international community, are as follows:

* Wall-standing:  Forcing the detainees to remain for periods of some hours in a "stress position," described by those who underwent it as being "spread-eagled against the wall, with their fingers put high above the head against the wall, the legs spread apart and the feet back, causing them to stand on their toes with the weight of the body mainly on the fingers."
* Hooding:  Putting a black or navy colored bag over the detainees' heads and . . . keeping it there all the time except during interrogation.
* Subjection to noise:  Pending their interrogations, holding the detainees in a room where there was a continuous loud and hissing noise.
* Deprivation of sleep: Pending their interrogations, depriving the detainees of sleep.
* Deprivation of food and drink:  Subjecting the detainees to a reduced diet during their stay at the center and pending interrogations.60

“These "carefully chosen and measured techniques” are designed to evoke extreme physical, mental, and psychological suffering on the part of detainees, but they also cause a concomitant negative social and political impact on nations, including the United States, that continue to employ torture methods regardless of the justification.61

There are some fundamental differences between the types of interrogation methods that are used by law enforcement agencies and similar interrogation activities in the global war on terror. The overarching purpose of modern law enforcement interrogation methods is to extract incriminating evidence from suspects that can subsequently be used in courts of law to obtain criminal convictions; by contrast, the objective of interrogation in the global war on terrorism is to identify salient national security threats.62 This means that even terrorist suspects are being subjected to interrogation methods that the police community could not use because the results of such interrogations would not be admissible in court. As Welch points out, “While domestic police use sophisticated psychological interrogation methods that have been developed as an alternative to the third degree, military interrogators appear to use highly coercive techniques that include both physical and psychological torture.”63 According to Black’s, the third degree is “the term used to describe the process of securing a confession or information from a suspect or prisoner by prolonged questioning [or] the use of threats or actual violence.”64

Beyond the foregoing distinctions, interrogations by law enforcement authorities and the type of torture used in the global war on terrorism have some similarities. In this regard, Welch notes that, “Above all, both strategies are geared toward getting their subjects to comply and talk, but with some important differences.”65 One of the most important and fundamental differences is the illegality of one approach compared to the other. For example, according to Welch, “With the spread of scientific forms of crime detection as well as new training and education requirements, American police soon came to see the third degree as not only unprofessional and illegal, but also less effective at eliciting confessions than modern interrogation techniques, and thus dispensable.”66

Despite domestic and international laws to the contrary, the global war on terrorism launched by the Bush administration has routinely depended on brutal physical methods and torture to exact information from reluctant detainees despite the availability of other techniques with proven efficacy.67 These other psychological interrogation methods have been used to obtain reliable information from detainees include simply promising them better treatment or avoiding the threat of being transferred to one of the more infamous detention centers. It must be noted, though, that these alternative methods were only effective because of the potential for other, more drastic torture methods being used.68

The costs that are associated with torture must also be weighed in the analysis as to whether they are effective or not. Despite assurances from the federal government that their methods do not actually harm detainees, there is an abundance of evidence to the contrary, including the following findings from scientific studies of torture victims:
* Prolonged standing can increase the risk that blood clots will form in the leg veins, with the consequent possibility of pulmonary emboli, which can be fatal.69
* The medical literature indicates that brief oxygen deprivation due to waterboarding can generate neurological damage; moreover, breathing fluid into the lungs can lead to aspiration pneumonia, which can be fatal. 
* Near-suffocation can also create severe psychological effects, including panic attacks, depression, and prolonged post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
* Beatings, even those delivered with an open palm, can lead to blunt trauma, and when applied to sensitive areas of the body may produce long-term musculoskeletal pain.
* When subjected to temperature manipulation, detainees risk hypothermia and heat stroke, which can be fatal; additionally, those conditions can cause cognitive problems such as amnesia.70
* Detainees threatened with harm (to themselves and their family) can experience long-lasting psychological damage such as extreme fear and anxiety and loss of control and flashbacks, which are strongly associated with PTSD. 
* Sleep deprivation causes significant cognitive impairment, including deficits in memory, learning, logical reasoning, complex verbal processing, and decision-making. Sensory (audio and visual) bombardment throws the body into extreme disorientation and withdrawal from reality as a defense; those danger signals induce the release of stress hormones that increase the risk of heart disease or heart attack.71
* Finally, detainees subjected to prolonged isolation, together with sensory deprivation, develop extreme disorientation, anxiety, and even hallucinations.72 

Taken together, the minimal intelligence that has been derived from these practices must be weighed against the toll these practices have exacted on victims and interrogators alike. As Wech points out, “Dispelling the illusion that "enhanced" interrogation is relatively harmless is important as the rule of law aimed at enforcing international and U.S. federal laws against torture and the mistreatment of detainees is considered.