Separating The Moral From the Practical Argument Against Torture

Three weeks ago, The New York Times vented a secret Department of Justice memo approving the use of torture as a means of interrogation. President Bush shrugged the memo off insisting, "This government does not torture people." Times columnist Frank Rich, who begs to differ with the president, published an opinion piece Sunday (10/14) in which he insisted that, with the latest wink and nod at water-boarding, the U.S. has crossed the Rubicon from an incompetent to an immoral democracy. As the title of his article suggests, "The Good Germans Among Us," Rich reasons that at this point, those of us who do not scream out to our congressperson are as complicit in evil as the "Germans who professed ignorance of their own Gestapo."

In his brief against torture, Rich recalls a meeting with Americans who, during World War II, extracted important information from prominent Nazis without lifting a fist. I suspect that Rich has other grounds for insisting that we put the electrodes away, but many of the arguments he and others voice today against the use of torture as truth serum are based on the claim that torture is simply not efficacious.

There is, I believe, a serious flaw with this line of argument, for it in effect states that if we could in fact beat the truth out of people on a consistent basis then we might be justified in doing just that.

The Israelis, from whom we seem to take a lot of cues on these issues, have been practicing so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques" for generations. There are members of their intelligence community who believe that there are situations in which pain and threats can be used to elicit life-saving information. Human rights groups reported that between 1988-1994 Israel detained more the 100,000 Palestinians. A third of them were violently interrogated. As for those who fret that a person in severe duress will say anything, just make it plain that if the information is misguided the authorities will be making a visit to the detainee's family.

In the mid-'90s, legislation was proposed in Israel to make torture legal and thus, more humane, as it would then be open to government scrutiny. During the debate, Andre Rosenthal, the lawyer who pressed for the suspension of the injunction against the rack said: "No enlightened nation would agree that hundreds of people should lose their lives because of a rule saying torture is forbidden." Upon learning that one of the High Court judges was playing Pilate and would not offer a ruling either for or against the use of physical force, Rosenthal fumed, "That's the most immoral and extreme position I have heard in my life....[A] thousand people are about to be killed and you propose that we don't do anything." According to Rosenthal and others, when you have someone in custody who may be able to tell you the whereabouts of a bomb, it is the moral obligation of the state to do anything necessary to make him or her speak.

For all of the intelligence officers who have come forward to talk about the unreliability of torture techniques, there are others who swear that it sometimes works, and sometimes is more than enough. As the supporters of the harrowing machine would have it, if a few innocents are banged around, that's unfortunate -- as unfortunate as other forms of collateral damage.

It is not enough to raise doubts about torture as a method. When the critics of Gestapo techniques base their condemnation on statistics and the testimony of selected experts, they are in peril of conceding that under certain circumstances it might be appropriate, or even obligatory, for the defenders of freedom to take out their tongs. Those of us who would swear off the kinds of practices that we have been sub-contracting to other nations have to separate the moral from the practical arguments. We have to maintain that there are some practices, like slavery, that are wrong unconditionally. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides the premises for this position and clearly instructs us that there are limits to what one human being can do to another, without losing his or her humanity.

Professor of Philosophy Gordon Marino teaches ethics at St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN.

Comments

[CriminallySane]

Most of you who responded to my post missed the point. The torture would not work, by the terms of the question (which was in fact cribbed from the original article) and that leaves us with a ticking bomb and no means of divining its location.

And yes, torture is immoral. Those who would inflict it should do so only after experiencing it in an exact measure.

Immoral on the one hand, ineffective on the other. Sums up our policies in the Middle East pretty well, doesn't it?

[Norge]

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is totally clear without any ambiguity.
United Nations

It is all that we as a human specie need to learn and live our live by and our lives accordingly.

It applies to every man woman and child on earth.
Domestic violence for example, would be nonexistant if citizens even knew of their human rights in very large numbers of cases.

www.amnesty.org

[Mr.Fitz]

So you are a professor of philosophy? I'm surprised that you didn't notice the fallaciousness of your reasoning. Based on your portrayal of the article:

"If torture is ineffective, then we should not torture."

Your claim is that this implies:

"If torture is effective, then we should torture."

This is denying the antecedent, and it does not follow.

[SteveParadis]

From Wiki:
"In the foreword of the Argentine National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons report on the Argentine Dirty War, General Carlo Dalla Chiesa was cited as having rejected the use of torture in Italy in response to the kidnapping of Aldo Moro.
In response to a suggestion that torture be used in the investigation, Chiesa stated "Italy can survive the loss of Aldo Moro. It would not survive the introduction of torture."

[MajorKong]

Former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro was kidnapped by the Red Brigades in 1978.

During the investigation, a member of the security services suggested torturing a suspect.

General Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa famously replied: "Italy can survive the loss of Aldo Moro. It would not survive the introduction of torture."

[zjr909]

Thank you, Professor Marino - and most of those commenting herein - for making it crystal clear that torture is exclusively a moral issue. Those who tip-toe around that absolutely obvious conclusion are only greasing the Bush torture machine. By saying it may be necessary sometimes, all they're doing is deodorizing the stench of evil emanating from this administration. It's as clear as anything that's happened in the last seven years that Bush condones torture because it sends the very message he and his cohorts have been trying to send since day one: be afraid of us, be very afraid. Because we can do it to you too - we're just that all powerful. Why would anyone willingly become a part of such sickness? Why would anyone willingly enable it? Why would anyone give these monsters the benefit of the doubt?

[JCP]

Yes - exactly. Too many times I've heard, in counter-argument to torture proponents that "torture doesn't work, anyway . . ." If you find yourself saying that, you've lost the debate. To push the argument along, inquire as to whether a torture proponent would be willing to sacrifice the 8 year old daughter of a suspected terrorist, if there was a strong likelihood that the information elicited could save 1,000 innocent people. If they agree to that (and they might), ask them this old bioethics chestnut: if one healthy person's organs could be harvested to save 20 dying children, don't we have a moral obligation to kill the unwilling donor, and harvest his organs for the good of the many? If not, why not?

People also seem to conflate torture for informational value vs. torture as punishment for being a terrorist. The only problem is that I am unaware of any torture we've perpetrated against a convict. Rather, we only ever seem interested in torturing suspects. I have suspicions about certain members of our own government being terrorists - poof - they're a terrorist suspect! See? Like magic!

Remember 'innocent until proven guilty'? And if someone is guilty, are we agreeing to torture as another mode of punishment? I mean, we have capital punishment, so why not? Maybe we should do public torture?

That we debate these things in America provides further proof that there are no gods.

[RumiSouth]

I don't think it serves us to argue against torture solely on its immorality. We need ALL three arguments against torture:

1.) It is immoral.
2.) It doesn't work.
3.) It makes the problem worse.

[BernieO]

I agree.If you really want to eliminate torture not just debate it, you need to push the last two arguments. Obviously a large number of conservatives don't give a damn about morality. There whole view of life is based on self interest, courtesy of Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman.
Same goes for arguments about helping the poor. These people don't care unless you can show that it is in their best interests to reduce poverty. Forget doing the right thing. The party of faux Christians really worships sefishness and greed.

[RealSoft]

Everything is legal when the nation is threatened. If not, make it legal.

Not that it is all moral.

To thump ones chest that we are winning the war is one thing. The heart should go out to those who die - to give the other party "victory".

Time for a reformat of the hard drive of "civilization".

Let the wars be acceptable only when fought digitally - of words, ideas, concepts. Well, that may be impractical.

[retarius]

To CriminallySane and others: There is a major problem with the debate about torture. In the ticking bomb problem, we are offered a false choice between torturing or not, someone who knows the whereabouts of a lethal bomb and could therefore save the lives of innocents...this causes most people a dilemma...we don't want to torture, but we don't want large numbers of innocent people to die if we could prevent it. This is a rhetoric contrivance that takes a particular circumstance, and then generalizes it to other situations.

The fact is that the vast majority of people tortured don't know anything worth telling...they are innocents themselves...detained by bozos who shoot first and ask questions afterward (think Blackwater...or Rumsfeld "We know they've got WMDs...we've got the intelligence".) The vast majority of those in Guantanamo or Abu Graib who were/are being tortured are totally innocent...if they weren't then the Administration would be trumpeting their crimes and guilt for all the world to see....the reason we don't have public trials is that if the evidence was public, we would see through the whole charade....

Anyway, I have a real problem with so-called Christians torturing innocent people. The anti-torture lobby has to re-frame this debate to be about torturing innocent people.


Remember the Hypocrite-in-Chief telling us how he often asks himself 'what would Jesus do?'...well Jesus says it's all right to torture people if you can call them a name first...something like terrorist...or maybe change the definition of torture...that makes it just peachy and all-righty with the Almighty...and which of course, means that the pious Chimp will get into heaven...
or maybe, if there is any justice, he'll be tortured along with Cheney et al in the fires of hell. (for the record, I don't believe in any of this mumbo-jumbo about god, hell or heaven, and I think organized religion is evil).

[AsaNisMasa]

if a suspect knows the location of a ticking bomb that is going to go off in a few hours and the only way to get the information out of him is to torture him...well we've already lost.

this is why terrorism is NOT a military job but an intelligence operation. if we spent as much on new forms of intel, undercover operations, etc. as we're spending on Iraq, we'd be in the position to stop the ticking time bomb before it ever begins ticking.

this is just another ploy by the right wingers to distract us from the real issues at hand, mainly how we should be combating terrorism.

[CitizenE]

I am against torture. It is in violation of our Constitution that demands we adhere to our treaties to continue its use.
However, isn't the hard core heart of the matter war itself. Isn't torture an obvious outcome of an environment in which tens of thousands of civilians are killed, hundreds of thousands wounded, hundreds of thousands if not millions displaced. Certainly atrocities happen daily; are they not a form of torture? Isn't partaking of the organized murder that is war that soldiers are required to partake of--a form of torture? If not, how come so many soldiers--the ones that survive--come back with all the symptoms of having been tortured?
Once we accept war as our mode of exchange, isn't torture inevitable?

[dougster]

Mr. Marino-

Your argument, could only hold water (pun very much intended) if it existed in a vacuum.

The only moral thread that underlies the argument for possible "collateral damage" in torture is the knowledge that there is a process for assessing culpability beforehand. As you know, the Bush Imperial Machine has stripped detainees of any right to challenge their detention. Therefore, any "enemy combatant" may be tortured, solely because they bear that meaningless and shifting title.

There is no monitor, no control, no recourse, no sane way to gauge whether torture is even merited as a way of possibly extracting information.

In case you haven't been paying attention for the past 7 years, this administration has been making unilateral, unconstitutional leaps- solely for the purpose of creating a unitary executive. Torturing people, with no recourse or right to habeas corpus, is about as necessary as "updating" the FISA rule to extend warrantless searches past 45 days.

Also, you conveniently leave out the fact that torturing people from other countries invites other countries to do the same with our soldiers. Gee, didn't McCain point that out, before he rapturously endorsed the Military Commission Act?

[Dap]

Dear Professor Marino,

One just cannot express it any more eloquent than that, We (you and I) are in the exact same stream of consciousness on this issue.

Great to have your input once again. Agape.

[tmss]

I wish you'd make your point more clearly. Moral vs practical? The important distinction to make is one between ordinary and extraordinary use of torture or military aggression, for that matter. We ought to admit that a nation will resort to doing pretty awful things to itself and others if its vitality is seriously endangered. Whether those things are lawful or not. What is important is to allow such extreme measures only in extraordinary circumstances and not make them routine matter of policy - like Gestapo.