# Jack Bauer's Russian Towel Torture: Any basis in fact? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 10, 2002, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803 "2002-12-10T18:06:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![silverfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e480ec/32.png) [@silverfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silverfish)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/1 "2002-12-10T18:06:15Z")
In series one of 24, Jack Bauer describes one painful method of torture, that works like this: The torturer would force a towel down the victims throat, holding on to a bit at the end, then when the stomach starts to digest it, the towel is pulled back up, taking the stomach lining with it. This was supposedly done in the Russian Gulags. So, did the Russian do anything like this (or would it even be possible), or was Jack bluffing (He was threatening to do this, by the way). ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/2 "2002-12-10T18:27:15Z")
Googling “Russian towel torture” and “towel torture” returned nothing of interest. Also, I’m certain that pulling partially-digested material from the stomach would not rip out the stomach lining. Maybe introducing stomach acids into the esophagus would cause great discomfort, but the stomach lining itself would remain intact. Was the idea that the towel would more or less absorb or wipe away the stomach lining’s mucus coating? ---
**Author:** ![dalovindj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/65b543/32.png) [@dalovindj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalovindj)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/3 "2002-12-10T18:42:43Z")
If Jack Bauer said it it MUST BE TRUE. Heathens. DaLovin’ Dj ---
**Author:** ![silverfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e480ec/32.png) [@silverfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silverfish)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/4 "2002-12-10T18:43:30Z")
I don’t member any mention of the stomach’s mocus coating, just the stomach lining. I’ve found a website with what I assume is the whole of the particular scene I’m talking about > [@](#): > > Did you ever hear about the Russian gulag? A string of prisons in Northern Siberia. The Russians didnt have a lot of high-tech equipment out there, so they kind of had to make do with what was around. Sort of like what Im doing right now. You probably dont think that I can force this towel down your throat. But trust me I can. All the way. Except I’d hold onto this one little bit at the end. When your stomach starts to digest it, I pull it out. Taking your stomach lining with it. For most people it would take about a week to die. Its very painful." The website is here: [http://www.24-uk.net/answers/cine.htm](http://www.24-uk.net/answers/cine.htm) The implication seems to be that as the towel is pulled up, it catches the stomach lining, pulling it out. ---
**Author:** ![tiny\_ham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a183cd/32.png) [@tiny\_ham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tiny_ham)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/5 "2002-12-10T18:48:23Z")
Jack Bauer gets me all hot when he talks about screwing with bad guy’s digestive tracts. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/6 "2002-12-10T18:51:08Z")
If you pulled out the lining of the stomach, the stomach acids would escape and digest the rest of the body – I don’t see how that would take a week. ---
**Author:** ![\_etalhea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/_/779978/32.png) [@\_etalhea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/_etalhea)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/7 "2002-12-10T19:11:30Z")
IIRC, You shed the lining in your stomach every 5 hours or so. I think Jack is full of shit. ---
**Author:** ![tiny\_ham](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a183cd/32.png) [@tiny\_ham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tiny_ham)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/8 "2002-12-10T19:17:28Z")
TAKE IT BACK. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/9 "2002-12-10T19:55:45Z")
If Jack is full of shit, you can fix that by shoving a towel up his ass, but hold onto a little bit at the end … ---
**Author:** ![slortar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6bbea6/32.png) [@slortar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slortar)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/10 "2002-12-10T20:57:05Z")
Wouldn’t it make more sense just to put on a pair of rubber gloves, reach down the throat and do it yourself? Sheesh. If it worth doing, it’s worth doing yourself. ---
**Author:** ![NicePete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee7513/32.png) [@NicePete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NicePete)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/11 "2002-12-10T21:53:23Z")
Anybody else reminded of R. Crumb’s brother, who swallowed the string… ---
**Author:** ![js\_africanus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/87869e/32.png) [@js\_africanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/js_africanus)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/12 "2002-12-10T21:57:04Z")
Towel torture for fun or information? Accounts that I’ve read suggest that torture really isn’t that creative: everybody has a pain threshhold and the goal is to get the victim past it as quickly as possible. A good account of torture in practice comes from Frantz Fanon’s book [The Wretched of the Earth](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0802150837/qid=1039554896/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-0051087-1032968?v=glance&s=books). He was a psychiatrist in Algeria during the revolution in '62, if I have my year correct. Anyway, it’s a great book, but, like so many French philosophical texts, difficult to understand. The book ends with a number of case studies of the psychological impacts of the war & of torture. Another good field account of torture by fmr. S.S. soldiers fighting for the French in Indochina is in George Elfman’s book “The Devil’s Guard.” It is out of print, you’ll have to go to inter-library loan. This book is _outstanding_ by the way. It is a real, first-hand account of a German combat officer (not all S.S. were concentration camp guards, many were just soldiers, like the Army Rangers, maybe) who joined the Foreign Legion to avoid prison camp in the Soviet Union. You won’t be the same after reading it. The Israelis torture alot, though they call it physical interrogation or something equally cowardly, and convince themselves that they aren’t evil if they merely use sleep deprivation or bend someone in unnatural & painful postions instead of using beatings or electricity. I’m not sure where to find info on that, but I would start w/ B’Tselem an Israeli human rights group. Another account of a few Russian tortures used in WWII against P.O.W.s is in the book [The Forgotten Soldier](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1574882856/qid=1039556507/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-0051087-1032968?v=glance&s=books) by Guy Sajer. As an example, the Soviets would have a P.O.W. stand nude in a bucket of water and sing patriotic songs until freezing to death. Another excellent book that will change you. I also new a fmr. special forces guy who fought in Vietnam. He said that if you wanted info, take a few people up in a heliocopter to about 1,000 feet, blow one guy’s brains out and toss the body, and everybody else will tell you all you want to know. Oh, of course! Check up on the Inquistion for lots of nasty tourture devices. There’s also the Torture Museum Traveling Exhibit, man those Inquisitors had too much time on their hands. And here is a page of links. Jeez, people can be really sick. Anyway, back to topic, if they were looking for information, then I’d say it was bullstuff. I wouldn’t waste my time with games–I’d just start digging one of your eyes out with a spoon. The provided links are probably better for info than me thought. Sorry for prattling rather than answering your question. I guess I have too much free time, too. Anybody know an Inquisition I could join… ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/13 "2002-12-10T22:10:09Z")
Wouldn’t a towel from the mouth to the stomach prevent you from breathing? I think that would kill you before you started to digest the towel. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2002, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/14 "2002-12-10T23:19:34Z")
Do not google “russian towel torture” while children are looking over your shoulder. Mommy, what’s “bondage”? * * * Anyway… [ul][li] Things that are sent down to your stomach to digest don’t stick to the stomach lining. The stomach muscles churn that spaghetti and meatballs around–it doesn’t stick to it. Why would a towel stick to the lining?[/li] [li]Also, cotton (let alone polyester) is not “digestible”, since it is cellulose.[/li] [http://www.bios.niu.edu/johns/bios103/carbon.htm](http://www.bios.niu.edu/johns/bios103/carbon.htm) > [@](#): > > polysaccharides: many simple sugars together. Food storage and structure. Good examples: cellulose (multiple glucose units) is plant structure material: cotton fibers, etc. We cant’ digest it: don’t have the proper enzyme–some bacteria, in guts of cows and termites, etc have a cellulose-digesting enzyme. So you could wait as long as you wanted for it to “digest” and you’d be waiting, literally, forever. [li]Finally, if you had a towel forced down your esophagus, you would suffocate. Your esophagus and trachea lie side by side in your neck. When you swallow, a complicated system of little flaps closes off the trachea completely and allows the food to slide past the opening of the trachea, down the esophagus. If you had fabric being forced down your throat to your stomach, it would be holding that system of little flaps closed, and your trachea would be permanently closed off, and you would suffocate.[/ul][/li] Paper on “The Physiology of Swallowing”. [http://www.new-vis.com/fym/papers/p-feed10.htm](http://www.new-vis.com/fym/papers/p-feed10.htm) > [@](#): > > The soft palate elevates to prevent the bolus from refluxing into the nasal cavity. > > The hyoid and larynx elevate and the epiglottis moves downward to protect the entrance to the airway. This movement of the hyoid also initiates relaxation of the cricopharyngeus muscle and opening of the esophagus. > > The aryepiglotic folds and the true and false vocal folds contract, providing additional airway protection. > > The bolus moves through the cricopharyngeal sphincter into the esophagus. This sphincter closes, preventing upward movement of the bolus. And if you haven’t had enough… (I’m cruel) [http://www.d.umn.edu/~mmizuko/5200/anat.htm](http://www.d.umn.edu/~mmizuko/5200/anat.htm) > [@](#): > > Triggering of the swallowing response occurs at the anterior faucial arch. > > elevation and retraction of the velum and complete closure of > velopharyngeal port to prevent material from entering the nasal cavity. > > initiation of pharyngeal peristalis to pick up the bolus as it passes the anterior faucial arch and carry it by sequential peristalic (squeezing) action of the pharyngeal constrictors into and through the pharynx to the cricopharyngeal sphincter at the top of the esophagus. > > elevation and closure of the larynx at all three sphincters (epiglottis/aryepiglottic folds, false vocal folds, and true vocal folds) to prevent material from entering the airway. > > relaxation of the cricopharyngeal sphincter to allow material to pass from pharynx into the esophagus. I love the Internet. One vote here for Urban Legend. Or, what Cisco said. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![silverfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e480ec/32.png) [@silverfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silverfish)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/15 "2002-12-11T22:00:59Z")
I’ve realised that Jack doesn’t actually say the Russian did this thing with a towel, only that they would improve with whatever was to hand, like he was, with the suggestion that what he was suggesting with the towel was something they might have done if they had thought about it. However, as it seems that it is biologically impossible for the towel thing to work, for a number of reasons, I would agree with the consensus here, that it wouldn’t work, and that it was a bluff on Jack’s part. Thanks for all the responses. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2002, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/16 "2002-12-11T22:27:23Z")
I found something, attributed to the inquisition, that I’m hesitant to post links to, because all the places I’ve found describing it are either rabidly anti-Catholic, or a lot more fascinated with torture than might be healthy, but apparently, there was a torture where you stuck a piece of linen into someone’s throat, and then filled his mouth with water. He’d have to swallow the water to breathe, but that would make the linen stick to the inside of the throat, and burst blood vessels. ---
**Author:** ![effac3d](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@effac3d](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/effac3d)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/17 "2002-12-12T01:26:53Z")
Why would cloth burst blood vessels? ---
**Author:** ![Mandarax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@Mandarax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mandarax)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/18 "2002-12-12T01:35:46Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Captain Amazing \* > **I found something, attributed to the inquisition … you stuck a piece of linen into someone’s throat, and then filled his mouth with water.** I remember this one from a Michener book, and I think it was _The Source_. My impression was that it was intended to almost suffocate the victim, but not quite. It seems that I remember an aside in the book about there having been years of experimentation to find the right density of cloth and the right amount of water that would not quite kill the victim, but make him pretty sure that he was going to suffocate. ---
**Author:** ![Padeye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@Padeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Padeye)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/19 "2002-12-12T01:58:25Z")
Cap’n Amazing, I’m pretty sure you’re talking about Jack Chick’s site and if so he’s already well known here. ---
**Author:** ![femtosecond](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f08c70/32.png) [@femtosecond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/femtosecond)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2002, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803/20 "2002-12-12T12:57:45Z")
It can’t be _too_ bad, if these people voluntarily do something similar. Cecil: [Can yogas swallow a cloth and have it come out the (urk) other end?](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_050.html) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jack-bauers-russian-towel-torture-any-basis-in-fact/141803.md?page=2)