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The original purpose of torture was to get people to admit to things the government needed them to admit to. For example, the Templars were taken down by the k
by flyinRyan 13y ago
The original purpose of torture was to get people to admit to things the government needed them to admit to. For example, the Templars were taken down by the king of France by torturing them until they "admitted" committing heresy. That allowed him to execute them, and avoid paying the huge sum of money they were owed.
Getting information, I'd say not very effective. The issue is, what if the person really doesn't know? How do you tell the difference? You listed some examples, but how did you confirm that this information was true and not just bullshit these people were saying to make the torture stop? In the end, weren't the "loyalists" just killed anyway? Maybe they weren't actually loyal so they were simply killed and logged as loyalists. Since the main "evidence" is testimony under extreme duress there's no way to know for sure.
- mercurial 13y agoThat's the point. Torture can cause collateral damage. These people were not guilty of what they were accused of. But at the same time, you can find out a number of examples of torture giving results.
- flyinRyan 13y agoBut again, for all the examples you can name of "giving results" how many can you prove gave accurate results? And if you can prove the torture produced accurate results that means you have a reliable outside verification mechanism, at which point the question becomes: why didn't you just use that mechanism instead of torture?
- mercurial 13y agoFollowing the arrest, torture (often followed by extra-judicial executions) of numerous FLN members in Algiers and civilian collaborators, the FLN organization in the area was destroyed, and its bombing campaign ended.