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Time: Bush Approved Use of Insects in al-Qaeda Interrogations

Califan007 The Constipated

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Califan007 The Constipated

Califan007 The Constipated

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599189181200

The Bush Administration approved the use of "insects placed in a confinement box" during the interrogation of top Al Qaeda official Abu Zubaydah, according to a 2002 document that President Obama declassified for release Thursday.

The legal memorandum for the CIA, prepared by Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, reviewed 10 enhanced techniques for interrogating Zubaydah, and determined that none of them constituted torture under U.S. criminal law. The techniques were: attention grasp, walling (hitting a detainee against a flexible wall), facial hold, facial slap, cramped confinement, wall standing, stress positions, sleep deprivation, insects placed in a confinement box, and waterboarding.(View pictures of life inside Guantanamo.)

The CIA desire to use insects during interrogations has not previously been disclosed, according to two civil liberties experts contacted by TIME. The Bybee memorandum, which was written on August 1, 2002, described the CIA's plans for using insects this way:

"You [the CIA] would like to place Zubaydah in a cramped confinement box with an insect. You have informed us [the Department of Justice] that he appears to have a fear of insects. In particular, you would like to tell Zubaydah that you intend to place a stinging insect into the box with him. You would, however, place a harmless insect in the box. You have orally informed us that you would in fact place a harmless insect such as a catapiller in the box with him."

An additional sentence at the end of this paragraph is redacted in the copy made public Thursday. Later in the same memo, Bybee concludes that "an individual placed in a box, even an individual with a fear of insects, would not reasonably feel threatened with severe physical pain or suffering if a caterpiller was placed in the box." Bybee adds, however, that the interrogators should not tell Zubaydah that the insect sting "would produce death or severe pain."

The insect interrogation technique, as it turned out, was never used by the CIA, according to a second declassified memo released Thursday. "We understand that - for reasons unrelated to any concerns that it might violate the [criminal] statute - the CIA never used the technique and has removed it from the list of authorized interrogation techniques," wrote Steven Bradbury, a principal deputy assistant attorney general, in the footnote to a on May 10, 2005 document.

If they used spiders instead, they'd get all the info they'd ever want to know lol :paranoid:

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Larry

Larry

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I'm usually one of the most vocal anti-torture people on this board. But I have to admit that I can at least come up with some justification for this. (Don't know if I think the justification is enough. But I can see the validity of the argument.)

I think everybody (even me) would agree that interrogators are allowed to lie to a prisoner. Just as they're allowed to use deception.

OTOH, am I allowed to pull my service automatic, point it an inch away from your hear, discharge a round that just misses your head, (it's a blank, but you don't know that), then point the gun between your eyes and demand that you answer me?

Is a lie the same as a death threat (to pick two extreme examples.)?

Or to pick a different, hypothetical example:

I think everybody (Well,
almost
everybody. This
is
Tailgate, where tough talk is not only cheap, it's free.) would agree that pouring gasoline on a prisoner, setting it on fire, and watching him rolling on the floor, burning alive, would be excessive.

Now, suppose I have an "agonizer": An electronic device which causes the victim to experience something which is identical in every way to being burned alive, but which doesn't produce permanent damage. Strap the guy to a table, hook up some electrodes, push a button, and he
feels
everything that the guy on fire feels.

Am I allowed to do that? After all, all I'm doing is "fooling" his brain into thinking that he's on fire. It's just a simulation, right?

Suppose I even
tell
the prisoner "This is only a simulation. It's not real. It just
feels
like it's real." Am I allowed to do that?

OTOH, if you don't allow "simulated" burning alive, then how do you justify "simulated drowning"?

To me, the standard is "would a reasonable person have feared that he was about to suffer death, or unbearable agony".

Obviously, if you tell the prisoner that you're about to "torture" him with a caterpillar, then yeah, it's allowed. (Although: If the prisoner has exhibited some well known phobia, then should the standard be "would a person with the same phobia . . . "?)

Summary: As presented, I don't have a problem with this. I can see why I might. (And, maybe, why I should.)

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Larry

Larry

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I approve of torture if it means potentially saving the lives of Americans.

Problem is, everything means potentially saving the lives of Americans.

(And there's that pesky Constitution thingey, too. But no doubt you've decided that that's just some unimportant diversion.)

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Califan007 The Constipated

Califan007 The Constipated

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OTOH, if you don't allow "simulated" burning alive, then how do you justify "simulated drowning"?

Is the difference how we view physical pain as compared to emotional pain, perhaps? I would imagine the "simulated" burning alive would not be a fear of dying, but just the intense physical pain and the desire to have it stop. The "simulated" drowning, though, might be more the fear of dying and less the physical pain that accompanies it.

Just guessin', though lol...

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zoony

zoony

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In some ways that big spider scares me a lot less than smaller bugs. I can see it coming a mile away.

okay, completely pitch black cell. 10x10. You're wearing nothing but shorts. Barefoot, no shirt, you can't see anything.

And that thing is in the cell with you... somewhere.

"Ummm, gentlemen, I'm ready to talk now"

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Larry

Larry

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Not making any argument for either side, just asking because I don't know the answer... Does the Constitution protect non-citizens?

The Constitution doesn't protect anybody.

The Constitution specifies which powers the US Government does and does not have.

It's called a Constitution because it's purpose was to constitute a government.

Edit: To put it a different way:

The First Amendment doesn't say "US Citizens are hereby granted Freedom of Speech". US Citizens had Freedom of Speech before there was a government.

The First Amendment says "The US Government may not infringe on Freedom of Speech".

It doesn't say what citizens can do. It says what the government can't do.

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NavyDave

NavyDave

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Posted

And the result of airing this probably lead to changing a mission of capturing three terrorist leaders to sending in armed drones to bomb them, which to me is always best option.

Heck liberals are sniveling and whining about what they call Gitmo 2 over there.

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ACW

ACW

Posted
Posted
The Constitution doesn't protect anybody.

The Constitution specifies which powers the US Government does and does not have.

It's called a Constitution because it's purpose was to constitute a government.

Edit: To put it a different way:

The First Amendment doesn't say "US Citizens are hereby granted Freedom of Speech". US Citizens had Freedom of Speech before there was a government.

The First Amendment says "The US Government may not infringe on Freedom of Speech".

It doesn't say what citizens can do. It says what the government can't do.

QFT. It PROTECTS RIGHTS, not GRANTING PRIVILEGES.
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RedlightG20

RedlightG20

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Posted
Problem is, everything means potentially saving the lives of Americans.

(And there's that pesky Constitution thingey, too. But no doubt you've decided that that's just some unimportant diversion.)

And the problem is, doing nothing means potentially getting innocent Americans murdered. I don't know about you, but I tend to side with caution.

As for the Constitution... Cruel and unusual punishment? I take it you know the full extent of what that means? As open-ended as it is (and literally impossible to comprehend what precisely is covered by it), it is also the responsibility of the government to protect its citizens at all costs. Please don't act like the Constitution is "worldly law" or that it has never been bent or even broken entirely before. Our leaders take national security very seriously. Every election candidate, and every subsequent elected president, takes plenty of time to assure us, the citizens, that we are protected, and further go on to say that the government will continually protect us while threats to us in the world still exist.

I know that the Consitution wasn't meant to be broken, and if we break it once, when will it end? But to fit the changing times, the consitution has been modified over and over again, has it not? Perhaps this is just another reason that it should be looked at again and decide what falls under the tree of the 8th.

Now, as for UN's take on torture... that's a tougher nut to crack ;)

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