The document discusses arguments around when, if ever, torture is acceptable. It summarizes views from Charles Krauthammer, who argues torture may be permissible in rare "ticking time bomb" scenarios to prevent mass casualty attacks, and Andrew Sullivan, who argues torture is never acceptable and will undermine security goals. The document also examines debates around what constitutes torture and issues with normalizing its use.

1. Sharnah McLeod
Plsc 341
3/1/06
Torturing Few or Torturing Many
Recently, the Senate passed an amendment proposed by Senator John McCain to
ban all torture, only to be threatened with a veto by President George W. Bush. This
sparked a discussion regarding when, if at all, torture is an acceptable option in the War
on Terrorism. On the side inclined to preserving human rights, torture is an inhumane
action with ends that are never worth the means. On the side of preserving national
security, the government needs to be allowed to do whatever is necessary to keep the
security of the United States intact.
There are several definitions of torture. The Justice Department of the United
States formally defines torture as “physical pain that is induced in a prisoner [that] must
be comparable to the intense suffering associated with organ failure or death” (Gordon).
An Army field manual that forbids torture also forbids “inhumane treatment,” including
beatings, insults, and other various activities such as tying up prisoners to punish them
(Gordon). Andrew Sullivan, author of the article “The Abolition of Torture,” claims
torture is using one’s body against one’s soul, the “banishment of all freedom from a
human body” and that it removes “from his own control his conscience, his thoughts, his
faith, his selfhood.” Finally, the Justice Department lawyers maintain that in order for
something to be deemed as torture, it must leave “psychological disorders that endure for
months or even years” (Gordon). Presumably, any such actions would be used to gain

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valuable information from a detainee that would not expose that information with other,
less intense incentives. Multiple definitions confuse the topic of torture; what one may
consider torture, another may not. The narrow definition of torture by the Justice
Department may allow for “inhumane” actions that may not be torture per se, but the
loose definition by Sullivan may cause traditional, but less violent, interrogation
practices, such as isolation or food deprivation, to be labeled as torture when they may
not be severe enough to cause significant mental or physical anguish.
In Charles Krauthammer’s article, “The Truth about Torture,” he gives three
different scenarios involving various types of war prisoners and explains when he thinks
torture is permissible. In the first situation, an ordinary soldier is caught, but the main
reason for holding him is to keep him off the battlefield; torture is not acceptable in such
a situation because the soldier has committed no crime and it is unlikely that he has any
vital information that could necessitate the use of torture. The second scenario exists
when a terrorist (note: not a terrorist with information), who may be just a fierce
nationalist or religious fanatic, is captured. According to Krauthammer, the Geneva
Conventions exist to promise combatants that treat other noncombatants well, the same
respect and dignity if they suffer the misfortune of being captured. Simply, they require
nations to follow the “golden rule” of treating others how one wishes to be treated.
Because terrorists harm innocents, they are not entitled to such conscientious treatment.
However, American soldiers and officials as a whole treat captured terrorists well
because “it is in our nature as moral and human people” (22).
Krauthammer’s final scenario is the volatile epitome of a nation’s security
nightmare. In this situation, a terrorist with information regarding a “ticking time bomb

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problem” is captured. The interrogators need information quickly, leaving no time for
normal practices. In this situation, in the addition to the circumstance when a high-end
commanding official of a terrorist group has not broken under normal techniques, then
torture may be permissible. It is important to note that these are very rare occurrences,
and Krauthammer proposes that the only individuals who have clearance to commit such
actions would be “highly specialized agents who are experts and experienced in
interrogation, and who are known not to abuse it for the satisfaction of a kind of sick
sadomasochis[t]” need (24). In addition, written permission from the highest-ranking
officials possible would be legally necessary. If a situation arises when there is no time
to obtain written permission, then it must be obtained after the fact so the torturer knows
he will be held accountable for his actions if he acts irresponsibly. In an article in
Newsweek, even anti-torture advocate Senator John McCain, who was tormented when
serving as a soldier, agrees that in a similar situation, the president should disobey a law
banning torture of any kind, although he thinks the president should also face the legal
consequences of his actions (Krauthammer, 25). In Krauthammer’s opinion, torture is
only tolerable in order to keep the country safe and secure in desperate situations.
In response to Krauthammer’s article, Andrew Sullivan published one entitled
“Saving the United States from a Totalitarian Future: The Abolition of Torture.” In his
article, Sullivan explains several reasons why he thinks torture is unacceptable. The first
reason is that it is simply inhumane. The act of torture is meant to “break” a person, and
“when you break a human being, you turn him into something subhuman” (20).
Furthermore, to make an enemy that is guilty of an atrocious crime such as terrorism
subhuman is actually exonerating them because it reduces them to a level similar to

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animals, which cannot be held responsible for killing. Therefore, in essence, the act of
torture liberates blameworthy terrorists from their guilt.
Sullivan’s second argument is that torture produces information that may be
unreliable. According to an Army manual, “torture is an unreliable technique since a
prisoner will say anything to end his suffering” (Gordon). In his article, Sullivan quotes
French essayist Michel de Montaigne as saying, “even the greatest philosophers have
difficult thinking clearly when they have a toothache” (20). In addition, for the most part,
detainees will not have very useful information, so if torture is legalized many
information-less prisoners could be tortured.
A major argument Sullivan uses against Krauthammer is the proof that torture is
hard to contain; “it has a habit of spreading” (22). For example, torture traveled from
Guantanamo Bay to Abu Ghraib. Torture was supposed to be used rarely against some
detainees at Guantanamo Bay, per administrative memos. However, the use of torture
spread quickly, becoming “endemic throughout Iraq” (22). Once the order is given that it
is acceptable to torture certain detainees, then what detainees and what exactly constitutes
torture becomes less clear. In Sullivan’s opinion, “The only way to control torture is to
ban it outright. Everywhere” (22).
Sullivan’s most convincing argument regarding why torture should not be allowed
is his comparison with the current situation in Iraq with the occupation of Germany and
Japan by Allied forces after World War II. During WWII, when American soldiers were
captured by the Japanese, they were often tortured, but Franklin D. Roosevelt would not
allow torture on captured Japanese soldiers “because he knew that the goal of the war
was…Japan’s transformation into a democracy” (23). The situation in Iraq is similar

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since the War on Terrorism is meant to “advance freedom and democracy in the Arab
world” (23). In order to win that war, Sullivan claims, there must be a clear distinction
between the actions of terrorists and those of American soldiers and their respective
policies. The approved use of torture makes that distinction harder to decipher.
Additionally, Sullivan believes that if that distinction had remained clear, then
sympathetic Iraqis would have been more likely to provide American forces with
information to further their cause. However, because, in his opinion, it has not, “what
miniscule intelligence we might have plausibly gained from torturing and abusing
detainees is vastly outweighed by the intelligence we have forfeited by alienation” (23).
In a situation where a nuclear bomb is to be set off in Las Vegas and terrorists that
participated in its plotting have been captured with only a short time to gain information
from them before the bomb explodes, the president has a strict responsibility to protect
the people of the United States above everything else. The president is given the power
to order torture “lawfully” under his position as commander-in-chief, and if it were not
just the only way, but also the most likely way that the information needed to save
thousands of lives would be pried from the terrorists apprehended, then it would
irresponsible for the president not to permit the use torture (Gordon). Sullivan says rather
disapprovingly, that “we must extinguish human freedom in a few cases in order to
maintain it for everyone else.” In this situation, preserving the freedom and dignities of a
few detainees is not worth letting a nuclear bomb detonate when there is a chance to
prevent it. In addition, the detainees are attempting to attack the very freedom that
Sullivan desires for them. Krauthammer describes such a situation as the “weighing of
the lesser of two evils: the undeniable inhumanity of torture versus the abdication of the

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duty to protect the victims of a potentially mass murder” (Krauthammer, 23).
Sometimes, those who have the power to stop a horrible incident from occurring must do
something horrible in order to succeed; torturing an individual to gain information that
will save many lives is one such situation. Not to do so is to torture many more by
allowing the detonation of a nuclear bomb.

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duty to protect the victims of a potentially mass murder” (Krauthammer, 23).
Sometimes, those who have the power to stop a horrible incident from occurring must do
something horrible in order to succeed; torturing an individual to gain information that
will save many lives is one such situation. Not to do so is to torture many more by
allowing the detonation of a nuclear bomb.