Torture versus collateral damage; the bigger evil?

[Bill Moore]

There is a big difference between extremely limited (assuming it ever happened prior to the Bush administration) exceptions to policy that are not overtly advertised as a change in policy by an administration.

We're discussing the possibility for an exception to policy, not a change to policy, and keeping it on the low. I still agree it is a method the weak and twisted, but I still allow for a potential exception.

[Kiwigrunt]

New title:

Torture versus taxation; the bigger evil?

That should make for a short thread.

- - - - - - -

Torture is intentional, collateral damage is accidental.

The first part seems obvious. But I’m not sure that the intentionality of the act is what makes it intrinsically immoral. Going to war in the sandbox was also intentional, and so is the death penalty.

Collateral damage may be unintended, but I should think that in many cases it is clearly possible and probable. So it would seem an accepted side effect to the intentional action.
Is the acceptability contingent on the (un)predictability of its scope? Does that provide a smoke screen over the morality of it?
Craphappencidental seems to hover somewhere between accidental and intentional.

[Dayuhan]

I think your point about moral degradation having nothing to do with our current economic problems is about as far from reality as one can drift and not disappear into a black hole. It certainly wasn't the sole factor, but it definitely contributed to it.

Again, setting up circumstances that seem almost designed to reward and encourage "immoral" financial behavour and then blaming "moral degradation" for the consequences seems... well, see the analogy above with the dog and the ground beef.

The first part seems obvious. But I’m not sure that the intentionality of the act is what makes it intrinsically immoral. Going to war in the sandbox was also intentional, and so is the death penalty.

Collateral damage may be unintended, but I should think that in many cases it is clearly possible and probable. So it would seem an accepted side effect to the intentional action.
Is the acceptability contingent on the (un)predictability of its scope? Does that provide a smoke screen over the morality of it?
Craphappencidental seems to hover somewhere between accidental and intentional.

Has there ever been a war that was not marked by accusations of torture, atrocity, etc? One might call those parts of collateral damages, as they inevitably seem to accompany war. Of course it was... clumsy, to put it mildly, for the administration to openly sanction that behaviour, rather than expressing shock and carrying on, as the habit of the past has generally been.

Going to war brings a host of miseries, torture and collateral damage among them. It guts the finances too, if we want to get taxes back into he picture. Still we do it... because we believe we must? Because we know it's right? Because we have the "moral courage" to stiffen our upper lips and take on the grim tasks that we know, or maybe believe, must be done?

[davidbfpo]

An academic paper 'The (in)effectiveness of torture for combating insurgency' by an American academic; the abstract is quite long, so this is from the opening passage:

It is commonly believed that torture is an effective tool for combating an insurgent threat. Yet while torture is practiced in nearly all counterinsurgency campaigns, the evidence documenting torture’s effects remains severely limited. This study provides the first micro-level statistical analysis of torture’s relation to subsequent killings committed by insurgent and counterinsurgent forces. The theoretical arguments contend that torture is ineffective for reducing killings perpetrated by insurgents both because it fails to reduce insurgent capacities for violence and because it can increase the incentives for insurgents to commit future killings. The theory also links torture to other forms of state violence. Specifically, engaging in torture is expected to be associated with increased killings perpetrated by counterinsurgents. Monthly municipal-level data on political violence are used to analyze torture committed by counterinsurgents during the Guatemalan civil war (1977–94). Using a matched-sample, difference-in-difference identification strategy and data compiled from 22 different press and NGO sources as well as thousands of interviews, the study estimates how torture is related to short-term changes in killings perpetrated by both insurgents and counterinsurgents. Killings by counterinsurgents are shown to increase significantly following torture. However, torture appears to have no robust correlation with subsequent killings by insurgents. Based on this evidence the study concludes that torture is ineffective for reducing insurgent perpetrated killings.

Link:http://jpr.sagepub.com/content/early...313520023.full

[davidbfpo]

I am sure SWC readers, many of them in the USA, have seen the media flurry over the US Senate report on the CIA's use of torture. There are many arguments over the report's contents, whether it should have been released and what has been / is the impact.

I shall link only one UK press report:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...t-summary.html and one desscriptive piece on the abuses:http://www.vox.com/2014/12/9/7360823...orture-roundup

I did find the remarks of John McCain worth reading in full; his stance on torture is well known and he does ask questions the USA should get answers to:http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/...1-a58f984db996

Instead of citing Ali Soufan, the ex-FBI Agent, I have chosen an ex-British Army interrogator. His short piece ends with:

I personally think that one of the key weapons which will defeat Islamic fundamentalism is the moral superiority of the plurality of those who oppose it, whether Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, secular or whatever, and what the Senate Intelligence Committee has told us today suggests that, for a time, the CIA gave up that superiority. How can we now claim that we are better than they are?

Link:http://adrianweale.com/2014/12/09/in...n-and-torture/

(Added later) A detailed riposte by:

....former CIA Directors George J. Tenet, Porter J. Goss and Michael V. Hayden (a retired Air Force general), and former CIA Deputy Directors John E. McLaughlin, Albert M. Calland (a retired Navy vice admiral) and Stephen R. Kappes.

Link to WSJ article:http://www.wsj.com/articles/cia-inte...ves-1418142644

[OUTLAW 09]

I am sure SWC readers, many of them in the USA, have seen the media flurry over the US Senate report on the CIA's use of torture. There are many arguments over the report's contents, whether it should have been released and what has been / is the impact.

I shall link only one UK press report:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...t-summary.html and one desscriptive piece on the abuses:http://www.vox.com/2014/12/9/7360823...orture-roundup

I did find the remarks of John McCain worth reading in full; his stance on torture is well known and he does ask questions the USA should get answers to:http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/...1-a58f984db996

Instead of citing Ali Soufan, the ex-FBI Agent, I have chosen an ex-British Army interrogator. His short piece ends with:Link:http://adrianweale.com/2014/12/09/in...n-and-torture/

(Added later) A detailed riposte by:
Link to WSJ article:http://www.wsj.com/articles/cia-inte...ves-1418142644

David---an interesting and timely thread which ties into two other ongoing threads.

I will comment more later when I have read through the main document but as someone who was a strategic debriefer here in Berlin for over 15 years at eight hours per day five days a week and year after year working in two languages and using interpreters for four others.

And having been a CWO Interrogation Technican and having been an a defense contractor interrogator in both Abu Ghraib and in the field with the 3/3 BCT in Baqubah Diyala AND having been in the IC when the Nixon years forced the system to use effectively for years the "intelligence bible" as what one could and could not do--people need to go to jail.

Why--we sent young soldiers to military prison for their actions in Abu G but not a single senior personality went with them---and now what we just look the other way again?

I spent hours talking with some of the hardest of the hardest Salafists in Abu G, Bucca and in the field---and regardless of their and my personal biases using rapport and respect I had conversations that would raise the eyes and ears of the current senior civilian leadership.

Mistakes that were serious from the beginning;

1. we use often unexperienced interrogators on the military side who where often under the age of 22

2. they had absolutely no understanding of Salafism, insurgency and or it's TTPs and only simply wanted to put people in prison

3. large numbers of these interrogators had never worked with interpreters at all before Iraq

4. a large number of Intel analysts spoke no Arabic and were under the rank of SGT

[davidbfpo]

Strangely and from Twitter:

Remember this: to date, only CIA officer jailed over torture program is guy who helped reveal it.

From the cited, long report:

In January of this year, the 15-year CIA veteran was sentenced to two and a half years in prison on charges of revealing classified information, including the name of a covert CIA operative. But he and his supporters claim that the government's case against him was a matter of political retaliation, part of an aggressive targeting that began when he became the first CIA employee to speak publicly, in 2007, about the CIA's use of waterboarding.

Link:http://motherboard.vice.com/en_uk/bl...-john-kiriakou

[OUTLAW 09]

David---an interesting and timely thread which ties into two other ongoing threads.

I will comment more later when I have read through the main document but as someone who was a strategic debriefer here in Berlin for over 15 years at eight hours per day five days a week and year after year working in two languages and using interpreters for four others.

And having been a CWO Interrogation Technican and having been an a defense contractor interrogator in both Abu Ghraib and in the field with the 3/3 BCT in Baqubah Diyala AND having been in the IC when the Nixon years forced the system to use effectively for years the "intelligence bible" as what one could and could not do--people need to go to jail.

Why--we sent young soldiers to military prison for their actions in Abu G but not a single senior personality went with them---and now what we just look the other way again?

I spent hours talking with some of the hardest of the hardest Salafists in Abu G, Bucca and in the field---and regardless of their and my personal biases using rapport and respect I had conversations that would raise the eyes and ears of the current senior civilian leadership.

Mistakes that were serious from the beginning;

1. we use often unexperienced interrogators on the military side who where often under the age of 22

2. they had absolutely no understanding of Salafism, insurgency and or it's TTPs and only simply wanted to put people in prison

3. large numbers of these interrogators had never worked with interpreters at all before Iraq

4. a large number of Intel analysts spoke no Arabic and were under the rank of SGT

After reading in excess of 500 pages it struck me that a number of things came out that even surprised me;

1. many of those CIA personnel conducting interrogations were not even trained interrogators or even strategic debriefers

2. and actually how little they themselves even knew of the Salaifst movements

3. how little those involved in the actual interrogations actually raised their voices and stated this is not working--almost to a degree a cognitive dissonance thing

What is not discussed is that after the Abu G scandal and until this released document no one has seen fit to go back and look at the enhanced interrogation techniques being used at Abu G and what was ongoing in the CIA program---it was one and the same thing--AND this is key just how did the military side fully understand them and or felt they were "allowed" to use them? We sent low ranking military personnel to jail for what the CIA was doing and yet none of them have been charged.

There were some serious rumors that CIA civilians were also in Abu G at the same time as the scandal but never verified which is easy of one takes the time to investigate as a number of civilian contract interrogators can verify it.

I arrived at Abu G right after the scandal and the lines of what were allowed and what were not was strictly enforced---came back in early 2006 and presto there were again "enhanced measures" in play that I even asked questions about and everyone pointed upwards and stated---they have been approved from MNF-I---but still they were a "modified enhanced concept" that pushed my GC buttons.

One of the most serious mistakes made by the Bush administration was the definition they used to define who was and was not an "enemy combatant"--as that determined whether one was a POW and or just a "civilian" with no rights.

By denying thousands POW status the Bush administration basically under cut the GC which in the end is the only protection a US soldier has when captured.

Yes POWs can refuse to answer questions---so what --it makes the job a little harder but it still can work and did work well with those interrogators who knew what they were doing.

Again back to US Army interrogators---most Americans would be totally surprised if they knew the interrogators often had absolutely no idea about any of the Iraq insurgent groups, understood very little about guerrilla warfare ie the TTPs and just about anything else in Iraq---even up to 2010 they were still having problems in the field and at Abu G.

Example---with a prison holding 6000 prisoners one would expect to find similar ongoing issues that one sees in US prisons but with an insurgency focus--there was ongoing "rock mail" where the detainees knew everything that was ongoing in the camp and what questions were being asked and held recruitment, indoctrination training and IED training all within the prison and under the noses of the guards---when I brought that to the attention of the IC and asked for collection guidance--was told we are not interested.

Only after forcing on to the IC several reports about the ongoing insurgent training inside Abu G ---then finally the national level IC sent down collection guidance---this was early 2006 three years into the war.

Another example--in 2006 due to the extreme shortage of trained interrogators the Army in all of it's wisdom sent a strategic debriefing BN from of all places Korea-- who spoke only Korean and had not an earthly idea even where Iraq was and or who was QJBR/AQI? It took them almost six months to get settle in and then they were mentally "going home" three months later.

OR the other services would send volunteers ie Navy and AF to the Army interrogation school and then off to Iraq where they went home after six months creating a massive amount of churn and instability in the collection processes.

It just was not the CIA--the entire US intelligence interrogation system had serious issues and yet no one talks about it.

The overall failures of the Army interrogation program in Iraq is a little know disaster that no one wants the rug lifted on because someone might just ask-- Why?

[carl]

We're discussing the possibility for an exception to policy, not a change to policy, and keeping it on the low. I still agree it is a method the weak and twisted, but I still allow for a potential exception.

That isn't an exception to policy. It is still a policy to torture. If we torture but only sometimes and keep it quiet, we still torture. That is just an attempt to convince ourselves we aren't weak and twisted