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Wanted - Impartial evidence on the effectiveness of torture as an Interrogation technique

25/11/2010 - 10:38

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These are important moral issues, but setting morality aside, there is the purely pragmatic question as to whether torture actually works. Obviously it is ethically impossible to perform scientific experiments on this topic, and we have to rely on empirical evidence; evidence based on observation and experience rather than experimentation.

A 2006 report by the US National Defence Intelligence College entitled the "Science and Art of Interrogation" reveals that in the last 50 years there have been almost no social and behavioural studies on the effectiveness of interrogation, either in general or in relation to specific techniques. Current knowledge is based entirely on feedback and field experience.

However, the reliability of this feedback is in doubt, since the people who do the interrogating are the same ones who assess how effective it is. Interrogators have a subconscious tendency to look for evidence which agrees with their current beliefs, while ignoring or under-weighting evidence to the contrary. (See article in XAD "My mind is made up. Don't Confuse me with the facts" 31/05/2010 about this phenomenon, known as "confirmation bias".) Their judgement is therefore biased in favour of the effectiveness of the interrogation techniques they employ.

In the absence of direct research, it is necessary to look at information from related fields, and psychology and human behavioural studies provide several clues as to why torture may not work.

Firstly, fear may motivate a detainee to "talk", but not necessarily to provide accurate intelligence. The US Army Training Manual's section on interrogation notes:

...Experience indicates that the use of force is not necessary to gain the cooperation of sources for interrogation. Therefore, the use of force is a poor technique, as it yields unreliable results, may damage subsequent collection efforts, and can induce the source to say whatever he thinks the interrogator wants to hear."

This observation is hardly new. Eight hundred years ago Jean Delumeau described a 13th century inquisitorial prison:

"And thus coerced, they say that what is false is true, choosing to die once rather than to endure more torture. As a result of these false and coerced confessions not only do those making confessions perish, but so do the innocent people named by them."

Secondly, stress, fatigue and distraction can impair a person's ability to remember things properly. Randy Borham, Doctor of Psychology writes:

"Interrogation tactics can lead the source to provide information that is inaccurate (intentionally or unintentionally) even though the information may seem to conform to the interrogator's expectations, and also that the process of interrogation itself can affect a source's ability to recall known information accurately."

There are documented cases of people confessing to crimes they did not commit. After long hours of interrogation, suspects reinterpret what they think they remember and come to agree with the scenario provided by interrogators. In a close examination of 125 police cases in the USA in which prisoners were later exonerated despite having given false confessions, more than 80% had been questioned for more than 6 hours non-stop, half for more than twelve hours and some almost continuously for two days.

Thirdly, coercion or pressure can actually increase a person's resistance and determination not to comply. Although pain is commonly assumed to "break" people, there is no available scientific or systematic research to suggest that coercion has provided accurate useful information from otherwise uncooperative sources.

How can the effectiveness of torture as an interrogation technique be evaluated impartially? Psychologist and mathematician Paul Lehner points out that torture-based interrogation was commonly practised against US Prisoners in World War II and in the Vietnam War, and that there is a wealth of information available through POW records and de-briefing reports. He suggests a method of analysing these data to test the assertion that subjects can be "broken" to a point when they "tell all". The claim that torture results in unreliable information can also be tested, provided there is an independent evaluation of the information obtained.

While this type of objective analysis is unlikely to generate definitive results, it will provide some scientific feedback on claims about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of coercive techniques.

Why is this type of study important when we already know that torture is inhumane, and has been banned by a UN Convention?

Because firstly, some governments re-classify extreme forms of coercion as something other than torture and make exaggerated claims about their effectiveness. For example, the CIA labels waterboarding as an "Enhanced Interrogation Technique" - EIT. (See box for a description of waterboarding) In George Bush's recently released memoirs "Decision Points" he asserts that information "educed" by the waterboarding of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaik Mohammed and two other Al Qaeda suspects helped to foil a number of terrorist plots and thus save innocent lives. The plots included an attack on Los Angeles International Airport in 2002, as well as attacks on London's Heathrow Airport and Canary Wharf.

However, Mohammed was arrested in Pakistan in March 2003, after the date of the alleged Los Angeles plot and the London terrorist alert occurred a month before his arrest. According to press reports he was waterboarded 183 times and described 31 plots under interrogation. The British Government has stated that there is no evidence to support the Bush claims.

Secondly, a significant number of people feel that torture is a valid interrogation technique under certain circumstances. A recent survey asked 742 U.S. adults whether the use of torture against suspected terrorists can be justified. In this sample, 15% said "yes, often," and a further 34% said "yes, sometimes."

These attitudes cannot be changed unless it can be established, through evidence, that torture and extreme coercion do not work, or are no more effective at obtaining useful intelligence than other forms of interrogation. At the same time, modern, humane techniques of interrogation need to be developed. Lehner notes that despite all the advances in neurological research and scans of brain activity, there is currently no viable technical alternative to the polygraph lie detector test, a technology which has significant drawbacks and which is now 100 years old.

by Christine Betterton Jones -BSc. (Zoology), PhD (Parasitology)

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Bibliography:

EDUCING INFORMATION - Interrogation: Science and Art

Foundations for the Future Intelligence Science Board Phase 1 Report, December 2006

http://www.fas.org/irp/dni/educing.pdf

Options for Scientiﬁc Research on Eduction Practices

Paul Lehner, Ph.D., The MITRE Corporation November 2005- (in "Educing information")

Approaching Truth: Behavioral Science Lessons on Educing

Information from Human Sources Randy Borum, Psy.D. University of South Florida

November 2005 (in "Educing information")

Waterboarding.org