...Are Enhanced Interrogation Techniques Effective and Should the United States Government Use Them? James A. Bradley II Having grown up in the age of the internet, I have seen the news stories and videos of 9/11. It has made me wonder several questions such as “Why pick America, of all places, to attack?” or “What did we do to retaliate?” To this day we still aren’t sure of the actual reasoning behind it, but we still have theories. As for retaliation, the government sought out those who did this to our country. I first became interested in this topic this past semester for political science. In groups of two, we had to write a paper based on a topic that we could select. Before doing extensive research into the topic, more questions were forming in my mind. I wanted to know what our government did to seek out justice against those who participated in 9/11. Even though my partner and I collectively had to choose a side, I wasn’t quite sure what side I choosing. Then the research continued. I researched deeper in to the subject. With what little research I had done, I started into the paper. Enhanced interrogation techniques are what the conservatives call it. Liberals call it torture. The more important question is this: Does it work? Liberals say no, while the conservatives say yes. In the eyes of a conservative it might read something like this: We believe that enhanced interrogation techniques work and provide results faster than sting operations that could take years...
Words: 1564 - Pages: 7
...The current debate regarding torture being used as an interrogation measure stands whether or not forms of torture are being masked as “enhanced” interrogation techniques to extract information from suspected terrorists. The argument in Essay 161 is that waterboarding and other severe interrogation methods constitute as torture, and are not effective. Therefore, we should find alternative solutions to extract information. The argument in Essay 172 is that severe interrogation methods are necessary to save the lives of hundreds or thousands of innocent lives. Therefore, we should reject the arguments made by those against severe interrogation methods. In this paper, I will evaluate each of these arguments and furthermore say which argument is stronger with evidence. Enhanced interrogation methods refers to the U.S government’s program of systematic torture of detainees by the Central Intelligence Agency (and others) authorized by the George W. Bush administration.3 Waterboarding is a form of torture in which water is poured over a cloth covering the face and breathing passages of an immobilized suspect, causing the individual to experience the sensation of drowning. Waterboarding can cause extreme pain, dry drowning, damage to lungs, brain damage from oxygen deprivation, and other physical injuries including broken bones due to struggling against restraints, lasting psychological damage, and death.3 Whether waterboarding should be classified as a method of torture or not since...
Words: 1066 - Pages: 5
...the policy differences that has plagued this country when, as a nation, our young men are sent to war. Everything, in this author’s view needs to be on the table, and transparent. Of course, troops strength, strategy, and general war plans should be kept from the enemy, the need of informing our own people has been a tight rope that is not easy to balance on for any one person. This was especially true of the “enhanced interrogations” used by the Bush administration at the beginning of the War on Terror. What this paper plans to do is to explain the four greatest players in this policy of enhanced interrogations, what each player brought to the table, and how each player impacted the final policy of the administration. One of the biggest problems of the war on terror has been what to do with the battle field detainees. The questions faced by those in charge were, and are, how to balance the need for timely, accurate information from those that would do us harm, and still follow treaties this country is signed on to and our own law when it comes to interrogation. The 8th Amendment of the constitution reads in whole: Excessive bail shall not be required nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted, (U.S. Const. amend. VIII) This Amendment to our Constitution is the basis for crime and punishment in the United States. It is one of the first places we look when setting up a structure for dealing with imprisonment in the United States. The Constitution...
Words: 1307 - Pages: 6
...Waterboarding, sleep deprivation, and dietary manipulation. Those three techniques is just a few examples of a long list of ways people have been tortured, or in some cases interrogated. The use of torture, or enhanced interrogation techniques have been a big controversy in the United States. It does not change the way society and economic powers in the world basically encourage the use of these techniques, no matter how many people say that it is terrible or unjust. About 3,000 casualties happened on 9/11 (9/11 Attacks), 12 deaths during the Charlie Hebdo shooting (Hebdo Shooting), and there were 31 victims and at least 100 other people wounded in an attack in Turkey (CNN). Thus being capable to catch, capture, or do away with said government’s hateful groups dead set against them is needed. Torture to some people is a means of preventing terrorism....
Words: 1455 - Pages: 6
...protect their homeland from terrorist attacks. They believe that torture is the answer to any question that they might have. Harris, thus believes that the benefits outweigh the disadvantages to torture. He references what was gained from torture in finding Osama Bin Laden and that his ethics were lost when he decided to bomb the US (Harris, 2005). A report was released from the Senate on the tactics used by the CIA in interrogation. The report discusses all of the flaws that come with torturing human beings. The CIA has been investigating into the attack of 9/11 ever since it has occurred, but what they have told the US on how they received their information is all a scandal. In the report, it references the interrogation tactics that were used but was more like torture than an interrogation. The CIA had lied to the people of the US to gather information through the use of torture and secret cites off the books (Mitchell, 2014). The report filed by the Senate discusses over 119 cases where people were wrongfully imprisoned and improper means of interrogation. Torture methods included in the report include waterboarding, making detainees stay awake for 180 hours, and other gruesome techniques (Mitchell, 2014). An incident in the report was noted that one detainee was put through so much pain that certain CIA operatives began to get tears and choke up. Another case identified is where a man being waterboard began to foam out of his mouth because he was being drowned. Other...
Words: 2186 - Pages: 9
...modern day, and forms of torture can vary greatly in duration from only a few minutes to several days or even longer. Reasons for torture can include punishment, revenge, political re-education, deterrence, interrogation or coercion of the victim or a third party, or simply the sadistic gratification of those carrying out or observing the torture. The need to torture another is thought to be the result of internal psychological pressure in the psyche of the torturer. The torturer may or may not intend to kill or injure the victim, but sometimes torture is deliberately fatal and...
Words: 593 - Pages: 3
...are times when it should be allowed but then again there are times where it is unnecessary. There is no question that the U.S government does use the enhanced interrogation techniques.When it comes to the victims that they have caught or even innocent victims that they assume has to be a terrorist and is out for trouble. Enhanced interrogation or different kind of techniques basically torture that the CIA does on captured victims in order to get information out of them. This types of interrogation should be allowed on only some circumstances. The CIA’s way of getting valuable information from these captured terrorists or possible terrorists they use enhanced interrogation on the terrorists. They use...
Words: 1092 - Pages: 5
...James Mitchell was the first CIA agent to actually use waterboarding. He admitted to using enhanced interrogation techniques such as waterboarding on several suspected Al-Qaeda members. Mitchell interrogated “14 of the most senior so called high value detainees in U.S custody.” Him and his partner Jessen personally waterboarded Abu Zubaydah, who was the first prisoner to enter the CIA CIA torture program. Former president Barrack Obama banned torture in 2009, however president Donald Trump said in his campaigns that he plans to bring back torture. We were not the only ones trying to fight and stop terrorist attacks, and we worked alongside some of those other countries in order to try and stop the next...
Words: 812 - Pages: 4
...Contemplating Realities and Paradoxes in the Global War on Terror John B. Alexander, Ph.D. Introduction The approach of this monograph is to examine paradoxes encountered in the Global War on Terror (GWOT). The intent is to spark debate on disputatious issues. Clearly, many of the existing situations appear intractable given the emotional investment that has been made by the public, and exacerbated by political manipulation of elected officials. Also unavoidable are the fiscal constraints that are becoming increasingly binding. Examined in Section One are problematic premises related to the four fundamental approaches to countering terrorism; increased security, eliminating the terrorists, attacking the support infrastructure, and altering conditions that breed discontent. Despite trite, albeit politically popular, commentary proposing those methods, execution of those concepts is extremely difficult, often controversial, and sometimes counterproductive. Section Two of this monograph addresses several other policy decisions that generate problems that are difficult to resolve, but directly impact the forces involved. Among those topics are; roles of contractors, individual loyalties versus national interests, alliances of convenience, foreign response to our policy on preemption of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), the consequences of our stated objective of spreading democracy, the impact of U.S. presence in the Gulf region, and quandary associated with defining...
Words: 28095 - Pages: 113
...United States have impacted the use of coercive interrogation techniques. Then discuss what we lose and what we gain from these legal constraints. Laws and legal limitations in the United States have impacted coercive interrogation techniques greatly, especially in the following years after 9/11. Shortly after 9/11, the United States was accused of torturing potential terrorists held in detainee camps and various other holding environments. The torturing of the detainees was bringing fear upon the federal investigators that it was not working and producing the positive results they were seeking. After investigating these claims by the Department of Defense, clear standards and guidelines were established to ensure proper techniques and standards were in place and abided by (Executive Order 13491, n.d.). Following the guidelines, a memo was written by the United States Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel known as the “Torture Memo” (Darmer, 2004). The memo was sent to Guantanamo Bay and implemented in early 2003 and suspended the previously approved interrogation tactics in question. In a found to be hidden manner, a legal counsel named John Yoo wrote a opinion in early March 2003, just before the invasion into Iraq that any laws or mandates in place in regards to torture or abuse did not apply to investigators and interrogators stationed overseas, with this Guantanamo Bay was included as well as Iraq (Enhanced Interrogation Techniques, n.d.). With these laws and legal...
Words: 601 - Pages: 3
...The trail that led to the doorstep of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan began years earlier with aggressive interrogations of al-Qaida detainees at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay and CIA “black site" prisons overseas. It was with the use of enhanced interrogations that first led us to the descriptions of members of bin Laden’s network, including those that were protecting bin Laden at his heavily fortified compound in Abbottabad. On Sunday U.S. Special Forces killed May 2, 2011 bin Laden, in a dramatic raid. Although, torture techniques were used during interrogation to extract information that led to the mission's success. There are many Critics that oppose the use of torture on terrorist, saying that its both impractical ineffective. And the information given is often falsified. And those who perform these tactics are seen as evil and immoral. Or so the argument goes. Yet as a result of terrorist attacks many people believe the use of torture on terrorists should be used in order to obtain information to prevent future attacks. Critics against enhanced interrogation say that the use of these tactics removes us from the moral high ground. As well as the information obtained is invalid. and that the use of other methods can be just as effective. We have seen the brutality and utter lack of regard for human life through torture by the Saddam Hussein regime, and Osama bin Laden. What put us above these terrorists are our high values we put on human rights. That...
Words: 1159 - Pages: 5
...findings to the Central Intelligence Agency in 2007. The report concluded that American’s interrogation methods should be categorized as torture, violating both American law and international law; the report also notifies that the abuse constituted of war crimes and threatened the highest officials of the US government of being prosecuted. Red Cross representatives were not allowed access to the actual room interrogation of high level prisoners and secret prisons, however several CIA officers confirmed parts of the Red Cross report, and a CIA spokesman confirmed to the New York Times that the Red Cross Committee’s interrogation was based on detailed legal guidance from the Justice Department of the United States. As a response to these accusations, certain memos providing the legal basis for certain interrogation techniques were released by the president Obama administration to the public eye. In a speech at the CIA headquarters, president Obama emphasized that he acted primarily because of the exceptional circumstances that surrounded these memos, particularly because of the fact that so much of the information had been publically acknowledged and reassured to CIA members that they have his full support. He also assured that the techniques described in those memos are no longer in action. The so called “torture memos” were filled with detailed descriptions of controversial interrogation techniques, such as waterboard, walling, cramped confinement,...
Words: 1060 - Pages: 5
...“He better bring his own bucket.” This is how former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director Mike Hayden responded to then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump publicly pledging to use torture against terrorism suspects, including the infamous tactic of waterboarding. Hayden is a strong advocate for the CIA’s post-9/11 program of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” a variety of torture tactics, including waterboarding. However, since the CIA officers and contractors employed these techniques, executive order and law now ban their use. Does Hayden’s remark signify a long-term change in CIA attitude towards coercive interrogation techniques, or is it indicative of another lull before parts of the Agency revive the practice?...
Words: 726 - Pages: 3
...torture amongst terrorist detainees help the United States in fighting the war on terror? Al Qaeda started its war against America by carrying out the simultaneous bombings of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August 2008, the bombing of the USS Cole in October 2000 and what pulled the United States into the global war on terrorism, September 11, 2001. What I will be discussing will be the political atmosphere after September 11th and the roles of our government officials and intelligence agencies. America is supposed to be a country of human rights and not to inflict cruel and unusual punishment on criminals sentenced in our own penal system. Where have we as a nation fallen? I do not believe that torturing or using “enhanced interrogation techniques” will give us the upper hand in the global war on terror. Who ultimately authorized the United States to enter into torturing another human being? The United States became aware of abuses and torturing of detainees from the Abu Ghraib scandal in Afghanistan in April 2004. Detainees underwent serious mistreatment, torture, threatened with dogs and other degrading situations. The photography of the military captors were released to the press and made public. The United States government was handling the situation as an “isolated” incident. This as we know was now are aware, this was not an isolated incident. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was operating top secret “Black Sites” and Guantanamo Bay,...
Words: 1440 - Pages: 6
...inflicting excruciating pains, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information”. Torture has been here for a long time and people have gotten good and bad results from it. The debate centers around whether or not this act is humane and if it is worth the violation of civil rights that belong to every person in a civilized society. If we continue to use barbaric methods only to receive a mixed bag of results, is the implementation worth the abuse of fellow human beings? My goal is to prove that my research has found that torture is unacceptable in all cases. Torture is never justified because there are many reasons for this position US capacity to lead internationally on issues of having security importance is enhanced when our leaders are seen to be acting with integrity and consistent with international law, moreover, information obtained by torture is often not reliable and, if we torture, our actions serve as a recruiting tool extremist groups intent on harming the united states, finally, torture is immoral and undermines values that define our national identity (Schwartz). Torture is never justifiable. In the real life as well as in experimental where people can be brave with ethical dilemmas in which torture might look as if it were the best solution to prevent even greater damage and human suffering nevertheless, torture is never justifiable (schnyder torture is never justifiable). In the ticking bomb scenario,secondly concerns with the effectiveness...
Words: 1036 - Pages: 5
