# Krauthammer defends torture **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 21, 2005, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699 "2005-12-21T23:00:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/41 "2005-12-22T14:26:42Z")
> [@Charles Krauthammer](#): > > If you have the slightest belief that hanging this man by his thumbs will get you the information to save a million people, are you permitted to do it? Whether or not you are “permitted” to do it is irrelevant. You do it, and then you present yourself for judgment afterwards. Whining for an automatic get-out-of-jail-free card up front betrays a lack of confidence in your “dire necessity” defense. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/42 "2005-12-22T14:32:51Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Krauthammer says torture should be OK in extremely rare events and McCain says it should be OK in the same extremely rare event. To say that those two positions are different in any meaningful way is highly disingenuous. Nope. McCain says that if the President wants to allow exceptions, then he should take personal responsibility for them (presumably by issuing a pardon to the people who do the actual lawbreaking). Krauthammer says there should just be a loophole granting an automatic free pass. The two positions are profoundly different. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/43 "2005-12-22T14:37:08Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Meanwhile, of course, it’s not the president who’s going to be doing the torturing-- it’ll be some lower level guy. What’s that guy suppose to think? I want him to be thinking, “I had damn well better be right, and there had better damn well not be any other way to deal with this situation, because if I can’t convince a jury to nullify or the President to take the heat for issuing a pardon I’m screwed.” Oh, and it would help if cooperation from the minions required them to have confidence that he would stand behind them rather than hanging them out to dry. That would create an incentive for the President to behave in a manner that inspires credibility. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/44 "2005-12-22T14:40:08Z")
> [@furt](#): > > McCain’s solution essentially makes a criminal of someone acting with direct presidential authorization and in good faith thinking it will save multiple lives. I find that an unacceptable position. What on earth is wrong with that situation? We accept it every day in all sorts of situations (e.g. we don’t have a special loophole in the law to allow people to steal survival supplies in situations like Katrina; we judge individual cases after the fact as to whether or not the lawbreaking should really be punished). ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/45 "2005-12-22T14:42:59Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > That’s easy for you to say because you won’t be the guy who has to make that critical decision within a few minutes. Again, people have to make critical decisions that involve breaking the law out of desperation all the time. Why should **trained professionals** at this stuff be exempt? > [@](#): > > If that’s true, then let’s not make sone low level CIA operative put his future on the line making that decision himself. Heaven forfend that a CIA operative should put his future on the line to protect the country. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![GSV\_Consolation\_of\_Dreams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f1d935/32.png) [@GSV\_Consolation\_of\_Dreams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GSV_Consolation_of_Dreams)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/46 "2005-12-22T14:43:00Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > That’s why you don’t announce his capture right away. It gives you a very short period of time to interrogate him before his friends know he’s been compromised. That’s also why these questions are so important. Quick decisions need to be made and pragmatism needs to rule the day. After his intelligence value has been exhausted, announce his capture and treat him accordning to law and custom. Really, how do you determine how short that timeframe is? Presumably, he would know this timeframe himself and would just have to hold out long enough to reach it, or simply lie through his teeth for that long. You can’t take action on the intel he provides in that time anyway, that might alert the bad guys that you have him. Is it really reasonable to suppose that this guy, so instrumental to the plans of AQ, is going to be isolated for long enough to snatch him and torture some useful intel out of him? Without ANY of his fellow AQ operatives catching on? Yes, there are hypothetical situations you can construct that make torturing someone worthwhile for the greater good (in the short term) but there is so far no evidence at all that such a situation has ever or will ever arise. > [@Evil One](#): > > I’m not squeamish at all. To me, “coercive interrogation” is exactly what it is. Torture is verbal shorthand. I also distinguish the two in my mind as this…torture is done to amuse the captor or punish the captured. Coercive interrogation is done to extract vital information. Noted. Sounds like hair-splitting to me though. The interrogatee still gets the hot poker treatment whatever euphemism you choose to give it. > [@Evil One](#): > > This question had been debated ad nauseum here and elsewhere. How effective you think the Clinton administration was against terrorism depends on your ideological viewpoint. I will say in defense of Clinton and company that they did not have the 9/11 attacks as justification for the kind of policy shifts necessary to effectively fight AQ. How does it depend on ones viewpoint? A simple count of the number of US citizens killed by terrorists per year in the Clinton admin, compared with same under other admininstrations, including GW Bush’s should do the trick. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/47 "2005-12-22T14:46:52Z")
> [@Rune](#): > > Blair recently had to face some critic for allegedly having had some prior (if very vague) knowledge of the bombings in London. However apparently the knowledge came about as a result of interrogation of al-Qaeda former second in command, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Interrogations which seems to have included forms which are by some considered torture. But the British judges have decided that all information obtained through torture are invalid and are to be discarded. So if Blair had followed the courts order and had the information been more precise, that would have prevented him from taking action to prevent the London terrorism. Nonsense. Judicial bans on the use of certain information in the Anglo-American criminal prosecution system pertain to just that – criminal prosecution. Are you seriously attempting to assert that (for example) if the police discover plans for a future bank robbery through an illegal search, they can’t tip off the bank and beef up protection? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/48 "2005-12-22T15:00:53Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > I notice that none of you so far have dealt with one of Krauthammers central questions. Wrong. Several people have addressed that question square-on, and come up with the correct answer (the agents do what they think they gotta do, and accept accountability for their actions afterwards – if they can’t convince a court of law that they had a genuine dire-necessity defense, or the President to pardon them and take responsibility for doing so, they go to jail). ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/49 "2005-12-22T15:15:57Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Colour me as supporting the **availability** of torture. Sometimes it’s necessary. How many here read the second page of the article? That suitable cases are rare does not mean they don’t exist. Should the cop on the street or CIA agent be allowed to use it at his own discretion? No, but they should be able to ask for its use. Further, the mere fact that we can use torture will act as a deterrent. In Krauthammer’s hypothetical time is of the essence. The bomb is set to go off in one hour (He doesn’t say how the questioner knows that) and there isn’t time to go through channels. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/50 "2005-12-22T15:18:09Z")
> [@Steve MB](#): > > What on earth is wrong with that situation? We accept it every day in all sorts of situations (e.g. we don’t have a special loophole in the law to allow people to steal survival supplies in situations like Katrina; we judge individual cases after the fact as to whether or not the lawbreaking should really be punished). Actually, I’m not sure we don’t. Be that as it may, you’re right in asserting that laws can’t provide for every possible unforseen contingiency; at the same time, I don’t think it follows that we can’t tailor laws for _forseen_ contingiencies. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/51 "2005-12-22T15:57:39Z")
> [@David Simmons](#): > > In Krauthammer’s hypothetical time is of the essence. The bomb is set to go off in one hour (He doesn’t say how the questioner knows that) and there isn’t time to go through channels. Somebody’s been watching too many episodes of “24”. Seems like the same people whose view of warfare was shaped by Tom Clancy have a view of terrorism shaped by Jack Bauer. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/52 "2005-12-22T16:22:53Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Further, the mere fact that we can use torture will act as a deterrent. Hardly. It will simply promote revenge, make people will be less likely to surrender, and make it clear to the world we are the enemy of everyone. I notice the pro torture people are ignoring the likelyhood that the torture victim will be innocent. Frankly, I think the fact that this is even a debate shows that America is morally bankrupt. > [@Evil One](#): > > I’m not squeamish at all. To me, “coercive interrogation” is exactly what it is. Torture is verbal shorthand. I also distinguish the two in my mind as this…torture is done to amuse the captor or punish the captured. Coercive interrogation is done to extract vital information. The victim ( and the world ) won’t care about your word games. Torture is torture. Since you are so willing to be “practical” how far are you willing to go ? Will you rape his wife in front of him ? How about his children ? Or perhaps you’ll cut his kids up and force feed them to him ? After all, you’re the one who dismisses moral considerations, so why not ? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/53 "2005-12-22T16:42:17Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > Again, you are trying to give me an impossible task. Have I been present in interrogation rooms and taken note so I can relate an eyewitness account? No. > > Do I have a high enough security clearance to know about such an incident and the courage to post it on the internet? No. > > Knowing the governments penchant for keeping lunch menus classified, do I think that such information is in the public domain? No. > > If it were, and I spent days finding it, do I think it would be discounted out of hand? That depends on the ideological fervor of the reader. This is why I’m giving you the last 500 years to meet the demand, anywhere on earth (remember, we’re looking for a single instance in which someone’s torture led to information that prevened a tragedy). If you can give us an example, then we’ve got some specifics to debate. I won’t discount it out of hand, but I might point out reasons why a relevantly similar situation could never arise in modern times, or should not be a model to us: for example, if you bring up a case in which a person was tortured into revealing information that led to **the torturer’s decision** not to massacre all the Jews in Warsaw’s Ghetto, I’ll point out that the US is not going to be making a decision to massacre an entire population of civilians, so that’s not a relevant example. (Please let’s not argue this hypothetical hypothetical; if you disagree about the US’s willingness ot massacre civilians, I accept your disagreement in advance). If you can’t find a single example in the last five centuries anywhere on earth of a person’s torture leading to information that prevented a tragedy, don’t you consider that to be significant to the debate? I don’t know whether you can come up with an example. I’m honestly curious. My stand on this issue is somewhere between Torture Is Never Okay, and Torture Is So Rarely Okay That The Torturer Should Always Be Punished Regardless Of the Merit Of The Torture. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/54 "2005-12-22T17:49:56Z")
[During Algeria’s fight for independence in the 1950s, French Resistance fighter Paul Aussaresses felt it was his duty to inflict electric shocks on Arab nationalists. Like many former torturers, he still believes it is the most effective way to gather intelligence in a so called “ticking bomb” case. He claims to have stopped Algerian bomb makers from killing French civilians by extracting confessions though electric shocks and suffocation with a water saturated towel. They were methods he’d adapted from the Nazis.]([http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4412065.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4412065.stm)) ---
**Author:** ![AFAIKnow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a6a055/32.png) [@AFAIKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AFAIKnow)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/55 "2005-12-22T19:01:44Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > That’s easy for you to say because you won’t be the guy who has to make that critical decision within a few minutes. > > I’d have more respect if McCain just said “no torture ever, period”. Instead he hems and haws a bit and says that under certain extreme circumstances it might be OK. If that’s true, then let’s not make sone low level CIA operative put his future on the line making that decision himself. If the person cannot make such a decision, then he sure as hell shouldn’t be torturing anyone. If the person making the decision isn’t 100% sure what he is about to do is defensible to the powers that be, then he is torturing “just in case”. No one can rightly advocate that. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/56 "2005-12-22T20:24:11Z")
> [@GSV Consolation of Dreams](#): > > Really, how do you determine how short that timeframe is? Presumably, he would know this timeframe himself and would just have to hold out long enough to reach it, or simply lie through his teeth for that long. You can’t take action on the intel he provides in that time anyway, that might alert the bad guys that you have him. I would hold him incommunicado for as long as possible. If I were in his position, I would set up a set of “I’m OK” calls at certain intervals so if I wasn’t heard from, assume the worst and bug out. If they did that, time is of the essence. If not, squeeze all the info you can at your leisure. He would still be a valuable source of background and organizational information even if current plots were already disrupted. Finally, by announcing his capture, you have the added benefit of making his pals wonder what he’s telling and forcing them to scale back and hide. > [@GSV Consolation of Dreams](#): > > How does it depend on ones viewpoint? A simple count of the number of US citizens killed by terrorists per year in the Clinton admin, compared with same under other admininstrations, including GW Bush’s should do the trick. Many people cannot get past their ideology to find fault with those on their side of the fence. Your notion of a count is flawed on it’s face because it does not address the question of who allowed the 9/11 attacks to be planned and executed. I’m sure fault can be found with both administrations. Also, by your measure of who is in office when deaths occur, you would have to give GWB credit for no american deaths over the past four years. I await your praise of him. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/57 "2005-12-22T20:27:40Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > Since you are so willing to be “practical” how far are you willing to go ? Will you rape his wife in front of him ? How about his children ? Or perhaps you’ll cut his kids up and force feed them to him ? After all, you’re the one who dismisses moral considerations, so why not ? I would limit the mental and physical stress to the individual himself. And I would extract the information needed to help save american lives without batting an eye. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/58 "2005-12-22T20:38:41Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > This is why I’m giving you the last 500 years to meet the demand, anywhere on earth (remember, we’re looking for a single instance in which someone’s torture led to information that prevened a tragedy). It depends on your definition of “tragedy”. If damage to your people or interests is tragedy, then I’m sure examples abound. I’m quite sure that a lot of torture went on during WWII, for example. Germans torturing Jews, Russians torturing Germans, Japanese torturing Americans…and on and on. 500 years brings us to the Spanish Inquisition and all the other drama associated with the RCC. You can’t possibly expect to assert with any sort of intellectual honesty that the interests of one side have not been furthered by the torturing of another. And since some of that information precluded damage to people or property, it therefore prevented what one side would view as a tragedy. “Torture never works” is shaky intellectual ground. None of us will ever know for sure unless we are on the inside of the intelligence apparatus and be able to see firsthand. We are certainly not going to get a press release saying “Abu wouldn’t talk until we tortured him, and then he told us where the sleeper cell was hiding and we rolled them up before they could act.” ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/59 "2005-12-22T20:53:39Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > You can’t possibly expect to assert with any sort of intellectual honesty that the interests of one side have not been furthered by the torturing of another. And I’ve not asserted that: let me try to make this clear once again. **I am asking a question**. I want to know whether there are any cases that we can point to in which torture has prevented a tragedy. Since you’re asking to define “tragedy,” allow me to tighten up the request, so that we can be fairly sure we’re talking about something legitimate. I’m looking for examples: 1. In the last 500 years 2. in which a government **or an army** (i.e., including rebel forces) 3. tortures 4. someone in their custody as a prisoner 5. who has knowledge of enemy activities 6. designed to kill those that the government/army is trying to protect 7. and the torture results in the prisoner’s providing information about the activities 8. that directly leads to the prevention of the deaths of those targeted. No, I’m not counting Spanish Inquisition torture that prevented the tragedy of someone going unconfessed to the stake. It needs to fulfill the eight requirements above. If you think that any one of those requirements is unreasonable, I’m open to discussion on them; just explain why you think I should relax the requirements for an historical precedent for the efficacy of torture. If you can find an example that fulfills all eight, then we can talk. **furt** , you may have found an example. I hope you understand, though, that I’m not being pedantic or snarky when I point out that those assertions come from the mouths of torturers. Paul Aussaresses is using techniques “adapted from the Nazis,” and in the story, he doesn’t refer to a specific historical incident for us to look at. Folks who have tortured have an extremely strong reason to justify the utility of torture. I’d be interested in seeing the observations of disinterested parties who can corroborate the testimony of torturers. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699/60 "2005-12-22T21:09:14Z")
LHoD, your example is so broad that my point is that an example must have happened at some point in the past. Do you think that all examples have been documented? And your criteria are so broad that any example I find is open to an unending spiral of point and counterpoint. I am not willing to spend the time to come up with an example to serve as the first ball over the net. Feel free to declare victory if you like. Forgive me if I’ve annoyed you, but I have assumed that the reason you are asking me this is to try and teach me that torture doesn’t work. That’s why I wrote the last paragraph in my last post. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/krauthammer-defends-torture/336699.md?page=4)