4 ms·

Inside the CIA’s black site torture room

83 points by nwrk 9y ago

KGIII 9y ago
It's a long article but worth reading, though not easy to stomach. What irks me most use of phrases like 'enhanced interrogation.' Bullshit. Call it what it is. It is torture. Anything less minimizes it.
- AceJohnny2 9y ago
  > Anything less minimizes it. and that's exactly the point.
  - KGIII 9y ago
    And that's why it irks me. I'm usually fairly unflappable, but this is something worthy of my outrage. Torture is unacceptable, and is even less acceptable when done in my name.
- rhizome 9y ago
  The Euphemism Treadmill: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphemism#Evolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphemism#Evolution
civilian 9y ago
I've visited the Stazi jail in Berlin. It was a pre-trial jail, you would go there to await trial. During that time you were interrogated. The Stazi jail had something like a 98% success rate for extracting confessions. They used similar techniques. Dark sound proof cells. Hypothermia and exposure in outside cells. You were referred to by a number, and when walking down hallways you were not allowed to look up. A series of red/green lights allowed the guards transporting prisoners to make it so that prisoners never saw each other. On the rare occasions that you shared a cell with another prisoner, there was a 50% chance that they were an informant, and the rooms were bugged. So. I live in a country that has a Stazi-style prison. :-[ What does one do with that information?
- Waterluvian 9y ago
  Invoke second amendment rights? If not now, when? I know what I said here is extreme. But I'm genuinely curious. Where is the line? Or is there not one and it is never okay to truly challenge the status quo? Maybe you're supposed to write to your congressperson and then go back to your Netflix.
  - stevenwoo 9y ago
    I'm having trouble of thinking of anyone trying to use the threat of violence to change the government in the USA in the past 30 years except for the Unabomber (because he wrote that manifesto) or the usual white supremacist separatist movements that refuse to recognize the federal government so 2nd amendment doesn't really matter to them anyways.
    - user982 9y ago
      The system works.
      - krapp 9y ago
        More likely, common decency and humanity works. Some Americans like to talk a good game about "watering the Tree of Liberty with the blood of tyrants," but not many are really willing to cross that moral threshold of looking their neighbor square in the eye and shooting them dead where they stand. Not because they're sheep, or cowards, or collaborators with the system, but because the thesis of the Second Amendment is no longer compatible with what most people consider to be the principles of civilized society. Killing is no longer the privilege of gentlemen.
    - Waterluvian 9y ago
      Maybe progress looks like the moonwalk. Things are getting better while constantly looking like they're getting worse? Maybe it's the pessimist in me but I'm surprised how little awful vigilantism occurs. It's kind of reassuring: there's a huge amount of rhetoric (free speech) compared to actual criminal action.
dsfyu404ed 9y ago
Keep in mind that this is based on info the CIA released. This could be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to bad things these guys presided over or they could be scapegoats. This is an organization that manages truth, half truth and lies.
- user982 9y ago
  There is no question about that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_tapes_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_tapes_d...
Overtonwindow 9y ago
Torture is wrong, but I have a hard time finding sympathy, or disgust. People did what they thought they had to do. I prefer not to question and Monday morning quarterback what was correct, or just. We do not have all of the information but we are easily swayed by emotions.
justboxing 9y ago
How useful (if at all) are these torture techniques in extracting useful information though? I would have to guess little, if any, at all. It's well documented in the media that Guatanamo Bay prisoners would routinely mislead the interrogators on the whereabouts of Bin Laden and send them off on wild goose chases and waste their resources. During World War 2, Hanns Scharff, a "Master Interrogator" was so good at getting information out of prisoners that he became a legend. His methods were so effective at extracting useful, accurate info that the US also (allegedly) ended up adopting them. Hanns Scharff's techniques did not involve any kind of duress or torture. Instead, he befriended the prisoners and used kindness and empathy. > Hanns had another secret weapon – kindness. He would befriend them, bring them food, and take them on walks in the surrounding woods. Sometimes, he’d even take them to the local zoo. One POW was even allowed to test drive a plane. None tried to escape. > His method, now called the Scharff Technique, was made up of four strategies: > (1) befriend the prisoner, > (2) let them talk but don’t press them for information, > (3) pretend to know everything, and > (4) use confirmation/discontinuation. Source: Hanns Scharff – Nazi Germany’s POW “Master Interrogator” Who Used Kindness Not Brutality => https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/hanns-scharff-nazi-germanys-master-interrogator-used-kindness-not_brutality-x.html https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/hanns-scharff-... What happened to these techniques that the US allegedly adopted after WW2? Or would the Scharff Technique not be effective in this type of situation i.e. Radicalized individuals who have been brainwashed and conditioned to hate their captors ( "infidels") so much that they wouldn't let any American interrogator befriend them and put up a wall around their emotions ?
- notacoward 9y ago
  > What happened to these techniques that the US allegedly adopted after WW2? What happened was the war against reason. Having empirical knowledge about what works didn't count for squat with the people who were making those appointments. It might even have been a negative. The people who got ahead were the ones who could project the "real American tough guy" image, no matter how fake it was or what obvious psychopathic tendencies came attached to it. Now for the really bad news. The same kind of people (if not worse) are in charge again, and they're focused on domestic "threats" instead of international ones.
- 9y ago

83 points by nwrk 9y ago

It's a long article but worth reading, though not easy to stomach. What irks me most use of phrases like 'enhanced interrogation.' Bullshit. Call it what it is. It is torture. Anything less minimizes it.

AceJohnny2 9y ago
> Anything less minimizes it. and that's exactly the point.
- KGIII 9y ago
  And that's why it irks me. I'm usually fairly unflappable, but this is something worthy of my outrage. Torture is unacceptable, and is even less acceptable when done in my name.
rhizome 9y ago
The Euphemism Treadmill: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphemism#Evolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphemism#Evolution

civilian 9y ago

I've visited the Stazi jail in Berlin. It was a pre-trial jail, you would go there to await trial. During that time you were interrogated. The Stazi jail had something like a 98% success rate for extracting confessions. They used similar techniques. Dark sound proof cells. Hypothermia and exposure in outside cells. You were referred to by a number, and when walking down hallways you were not allowed to look up. A series of red/green lights allowed the guards transporting prisoners to make it so that prisoners never saw each other. On the rare occasions that you shared a cell with another prisoner, there was a 50% chance that they were an informant, and the rooms were bugged. So. I live in a country that has a Stazi-style prison. :-[ What does one do with that information?

Waterluvian 9y ago
Invoke second amendment rights? If not now, when? I know what I said here is extreme. But I'm genuinely curious. Where is the line? Or is there not one and it is never okay to truly challenge the status quo? Maybe you're supposed to write to your congressperson and then go back to your Netflix.
- stevenwoo 9y ago
  I'm having trouble of thinking of anyone trying to use the threat of violence to change the government in the USA in the past 30 years except for the Unabomber (because he wrote that manifesto) or the usual white supremacist separatist movements that refuse to recognize the federal government so 2nd amendment doesn't really matter to them anyways.
  - user982 9y ago
    The system works.
    - krapp 9y ago
      More likely, common decency and humanity works. Some Americans like to talk a good game about "watering the Tree of Liberty with the blood of tyrants," but not many are really willing to cross that moral threshold of looking their neighbor square in the eye and shooting them dead where they stand. Not because they're sheep, or cowards, or collaborators with the system, but because the thesis of the Second Amendment is no longer compatible with what most people consider to be the principles of civilized society. Killing is no longer the privilege of gentlemen.
  - Waterluvian 9y ago
    Maybe progress looks like the moonwalk. Things are getting better while constantly looking like they're getting worse? Maybe it's the pessimist in me but I'm surprised how little awful vigilantism occurs. It's kind of reassuring: there's a huge amount of rhetoric (free speech) compared to actual criminal action.

dsfyu404ed 9y ago

Keep in mind that this is based on info the CIA released. This could be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to bad things these guys presided over or they could be scapegoats. This is an organization that manages truth, half truth and lies.

user982 9y ago
There is no question about that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_tapes_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_tapes_d...

Overtonwindow 9y ago

Torture is wrong, but I have a hard time finding sympathy, or disgust. People did what they thought they had to do. I prefer not to question and Monday morning quarterback what was correct, or just. We do not have all of the information but we are easily swayed by emotions.

justboxing 9y ago

How useful (if at all) are these torture techniques in extracting useful information though? I would have to guess little, if any, at all. It's well documented in the media that Guatanamo Bay prisoners would routinely mislead the interrogators on the whereabouts of Bin Laden and send them off on wild goose chases and waste their resources. During World War 2, Hanns Scharff, a "Master Interrogator" was so good at getting information out of prisoners that he became a legend. His methods were so effective at extracting useful, accurate info that the US also (allegedly) ended up adopting them. Hanns Scharff's techniques did not involve any kind of duress or torture. Instead, he befriended the prisoners and used kindness and empathy. > Hanns had another secret weapon – kindness. He would befriend them, bring them food, and take them on walks in the surrounding woods. Sometimes, he’d even take them to the local zoo. One POW was even allowed to test drive a plane. None tried to escape. > His method, now called the Scharff Technique, was made up of four strategies: > (1) befriend the prisoner, > (2) let them talk but don’t press them for information, > (3) pretend to know everything, and > (4) use confirmation/discontinuation. Source: Hanns Scharff – Nazi Germany’s POW “Master Interrogator” Who Used Kindness Not Brutality => https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/hanns-scharff-nazi-germanys-master-interrogator-used-kindness-not_brutality-x.html https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/hanns-scharff-... What happened to these techniques that the US allegedly adopted after WW2? Or would the Scharff Technique not be effective in this type of situation i.e. Radicalized individuals who have been brainwashed and conditioned to hate their captors ( "infidels") so much that they wouldn't let any American interrogator befriend them and put up a wall around their emotions ?

notacoward 9y ago
> What happened to these techniques that the US allegedly adopted after WW2? What happened was the war against reason. Having empirical knowledge about what works didn't count for squat with the people who were making those appointments. It might even have been a negative. The people who got ahead were the ones who could project the "real American tough guy" image, no matter how fake it was or what obvious psychopathic tendencies came attached to it. Now for the really bad news. The same kind of people (if not worse) are in charge again, and they're focused on domestic "threats" instead of international ones.
9y ago