And let's not forget that most of the reports I've read talk about one of the two main subjects of torture revealing "good" information. The other suspect, apparently, was tortured for nearly as much time in exactly the same ways because he did NOT say what the interrogators wanted him to say: That there was a link between Iraq and al 'Queda. So was this an example of how sometimes subjects of torture do NOT tell interrogators anything they want to hear, even under severe torture? Wouldn't that count against its effectiveness?
Or, more sinisterly, was perhaps the torture done believing that it WOULD eventually yield anything the torturer wanted the subject to say, including that there was a strong link between Iraq and al Queda that proved to be completely false? Did the administration torture HOPING to get false information that would allow it to conduct a war it had already decided to conduct? And when the first 10, the first 20, the first 30 sessions did not produce the desired results, was the reason for SO MANY sessions the hope that eventually the subject would say what the administration wanted him to say from the start? Was THAT why he was tortured so much?7
Robert Paul wrote:
I think that lurking here is the false assumption that if we don't torture people we'll never find out anything worthwhile; that there are no real alternatives to it; and that one can be a torturer for a couple of months and not be marked forever: 'It's just a job; now I work for Mercy Corps.' Well, maybe the last clause, although it is, I think, a common assumption, doesn't belong with these others.That something useful has been gained by waterboarding someone over 80 times, is so fanciful that it makes the tenets of the Warren Harding Benevolent Society look like exemplars of sweet reason.
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