Torture and America

While the law itself condemns use of torture for any purpose, torture becomes necessary to be used in particular critical instances. According to Miles, the United States senate allowed the use of enhanced interrogation techniques on a number of cases and detainees. The human rights should be considered first in any event whether in interrogation or any other course of action1. The policy makers have found themselves between hard and difficult decisions to make on the techniques for obtaining vital information from terrorists who are trained heavily on resisting from giving information when caught in the wrong side of the law.

“The one lesson we 've learned from history is that we have not learned any of history 's lessons” (Unknown Author, n.d.). The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the use of Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EITs) such as “waterboarding” and extraordinary rendition (aka “black sites”) by CIA agents for American intelligence interests and to analyze the drastically apposing views of the legalities, morality, and effectiveness of these methods. Is the CIA’s use of EITs and extraordinary rendition equivalent to torture, and therefore, acts in violation of international law? The definition of “torture” under statute 18 U.S.C. 2340 states, “torture” means an act committed by a person acting under the color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control” (United States Code, 2011). This definition expands with specific identifying characteristics of an act and varies to include humiliation of an individual. Of course, pain and suffering is a subjective experience. The worlds historical practice of “torture” reinforces lessons that human’s imaginative capacity for inflicting pain and terror on our fellow human is disgracefully boundless; yet, parallel behaviors of violence and humiliation reemerge with disturbing regularity (Smith, 2013).

Accordingly, Americans on the previous Bush administration are apprehensive about that lack of enhanced interrogation in the US and the safety of the American people. In Israel there is a prison called the administrative detention, which is detention without trial. This allows undetected interrogations to occur under the newly elected prime minister. Meaning that there were loopholes found to go around laws that were put in place.

The United States is considered one of the most powerful countries in the world. They have a well organized and trained armed forces. But, they were built with principles and moral standards. According to those rules, people could not do what they pleased all the time. The paper signed by the founding Fathers is, the Constitution of the United States, which prohibits the enforcers of the law to torture. Yet, it is still done. There is no straight statement that prohibits torture. An arguement of whether it can be legal or not is made, for the use of, retriving important information, the use of the 8th amendment and how 9/ 11 change some perspectives.

Torture has long been used by law enforcement agencies and governments to questions criminals and terrorists. It is used to coax confessions or to find out any sort of information that may lead to the arrest or capture of other criminals. Although the torturing of prisoners in the United States is strictly prohibited by the constitution, the government started using the tactic waterboarding against terrorists. Although the government says waterboarding has led to prevention on mass terrorist attacks on U.S soil, it is not accepted by all of this country’s citizens. It is believed by certain people that waterboarding is torture and others do not believe it is. It is my goal to explore why the United States deemed this

Bush, Dick Cheney, etc are in change for the use of torture, and they refused the expression ‘torture’ or argued that the action of CIA was patriotic. It seems like they are proving themselves that they are apart from the standard of civilization. But their resistance is fiercer than we thought, and they are trying to use terror to justify the use of torture. This is why we cannot entrust this issue to own solving abilities of the U.S. The United Nations human rights body turned out to solve the issue, and some countries presented criticism.

The appeal of the McCain-Feinstein amendment is its comparatively restrictive nature. In the words of constitutional law professor, David Cole, with particular reference to the past actions of the Bush administration, ‘the new legislation seems designed to prevent future administrations from interpreting existing laws to permit what they were plainly designed to prohibit’ (Cole, D 2015). In other words, the amendment approaches the problem from a different perspective in contrast to previous prohibitions. Rather than expressing a broad prohibition, it restricts interrogators to a definitive list of approved techniques (Feinstein, D 2015). This approach, thus, essentially avoids the ambiguity that has become an enduring quality of international human rights law in relation to torture (Cole, D 2015; Levinson, S 2015, pp. 2017-2018). In succinct terms, if a technique is not authorised, it is affirmatively prohibited. To this avail, in stark contrast with its predecessors, this legislation may yet prove to be instrumental in the prevention of torture.

A major reason that Enhanced Interrogation Techniques are not seen as beneficial to society is the fact that all people have human rights that protect them from torture. Human rights are in place in order to set an outline of how

The current policies on interrogation standards are per “Executive Order 13491—Ensuring Lawful Interrogations states on Sec. 2. Definitions. “Convention Against Torture, means the convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, December 10, 1984, 1465 U.N.T.S. 85, S. Treaty Doc. No. 100 20 (1988).” OBAMA 2009

Torture is the action or practice of inflicting severe pain on someone as a punishment or to force them to do or say something, or for the pleasure of the person inflicting the pain. The Central Intelligence Agency of the US is known for its torture methods, or “enhanced interrogation techniques.” These various torture methods have led to a lot of backlash from the public and added resistance from the opposing organizations. Legally, Torture, done by Americans, has been banned under various acts. However, with a new, pro-torture administration in The White House, reinstatement of torture may take place. By observing and analyzing the groups that will be affected, Reinstatement of torture will be a detrimental decision that will negatively affect

Supporters of the legalization say that the interrogations are justified because enhanced interrogations are used to prevent future killings by obtaining important information on terrorist plots (Cheney). Henry Mark claims that torture in defense of self is justified and isn't immoral. Additionally, the people that are under enhanced interrogations are not innocent nor are they victims (Cheney). Enhanced interrogations are justified because it is for the safety of the people and those subject under the interrogations are not innocent victims (Cheney). Hence, such interrogation methods are justified. In addition to that, the necessity of enhanced interrogations is expressed by the importance of saving lives. More precisely, enhanced interrogation methods have saved lives and resulted in the foiling of enemy plans, along with diversions of terrorist plots, though memos of diverted terrorist plots have not been released (Cheney).Cheney argues that the only way to get specific information is by using enhanced interrogation methods. Cheney says that "the key to any strategy is accurate intelligence, and skilled professionals to get that information in time to use it". Therefore, the use of enhanced interrogation techniques is necessary because it saves lives (Mark). Thus, enhanced interrogation methods are necessary in order to protect citizens against enemy forces. Therefore,

Even though there is international law, torture is practiced in over 100 countries. These countries often justify this doing by saying they need to extract confessions, identify terrorists, and obtain intelligence critical to preventing attacks. The UN does not tolerate any torture, no matter the circumstances. When Guantanamo Bay was found of violating human rights and international law, President Bush insisted that “all detainees were well cared for and that none of the enhanced interrogation techniques employed on some prisoners were torturous”. According to US officials the use of these techniques has revealed valuable intelligence on the

The evolution of definitions used in international and domestic communities is critical to acknowledging modernization and willingness to act fairly. Although the Justice Department authorized questionable techniques used for intelligence collection and CIA agents ensured that professionals were present during interrogation sessions, a strong question of ethics used and how this was viewed in relation to crimes against human rights during the interrogation sessions has persisted for years as unanswerable. After extensive research for the final definitions decided upon for this paper, the lack of international and national consensus on multiple topics, even down to definitions, was obvious. The modern-day U.S. definition for torture was redefined

Costanzo et al. (2007) implore military authorities to issue clear directives regarding unacceptable practices in the interrogation of prisoners, as well as employ effective monitoring procedures of their detention facilities, especially during times of war. It is their opinion that, unless high-ranking officials directly prohibit the use of torture as an

The fight against the “war on terrorism” has initiated a debate in the United States over the use of torture and advanced interrogation techniques to extract information needed to protect the safety of its citizens. In lieu of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, government officials believed that using extensive force against suspected is justified, especially if such force results in the prevention of future planned attacks. Others reject torture and the methods used by the government agencies, especially the CIA, as both “unreliable and an affront to legal and civilized norms of behavior.” In December of 2014, The Senate Intelligence Committee Report on CIA torture, drafted by the bipartisan United States Select Committee on Intelligence, brought light to the controversy by unearthing the methods and techniques used to interrogate detainees, prisoners of war, and suspected terrorists. The findings have ignited strong opposition and outcry among the citizens, critics of the government, and foreign nations. The aftermath of this report have prompted two important questions: Should the CIA be held responsible for its actions and face investigations, prosecution, and full legal action or should the CIA have the ability to act and determine policies they seem fit to protect the U.S. from any threats and outside forces?