Mohamed Bashmilah, a suspected terrorist, was held in a CIA prison for 19 months where he was subjected to an extremely cold jail cell and loud music for up to 24 hours a day. Loud music, temperature extremes, sleep deprivation, waterboarding, canine intimidation, and other uncomfortable or threatening measures are all examples of enhanced interrogation techniques, methods used by the United States or other governments to extract information from terrorists and others who pose a threat to public safety; it is torture. Torture should not be used when interrogating suspects due to its proven ineffectiveness in providing reliable information, unethical damage toward the subject, and risk of harming innocent civilians.

Despite popular belief, torture is ineffective in producing accurate intelligence. This is due to a combination of the subject being desperate for the torture to stop and the torture causing mental confusion which skews the subject’s memory. Ali Soufan, a former FBI Special Agent who has experience with torturing terrorists admits that “when they are in pain, people will say anything to get the pain to stop. Most of the time, they will lie, make up anything to make you stop hurting them.” Torturers expect that causing the subject intense physical and mental anguish will prompt a confession of truth.  However, torture victims will fabricate testimonies to diminish the pain, whether those words are fact or fiction. If false details are given convincingly, the pain will ease, thus providing no genuine motive to give truthful information. In addition to this, human memory is unreliable as  “73 percent of the 239 convictions overturned through DNA testing were based on eyewitness testimony” (Arkowitz). The eyewitnesses were not even under duress, they simply did not remember details accurately.  Humans naturally have imperfect memories; “even less reliable is to deprive them of sleep, or put them under great stress, or otherwise confuse them” as one would do during torture (Robbins). Enhanced interrogation techniques not only goad the suspect to lie, but also warp the memory of the subject, thus making the results of the torture questionable.

In addition, torture is unethical because it scars the subject not only physically, but also emotionally or mentally. Forms of torture, including burnings, cuttings, and beatings can leave physical scars on the victim that never disappear. Humans have rights, “the ‘unalienable rights’ explicitly protected by the Bill of Rights include...protection from cruel and unusual punishment.” (Hawkins). Torture strips humans, whether innocent or guilty, of these rights.  The torture victim also carries mental scars of the injustice they have suffered, leading to a longer emotional recovery, if a recovery is even possible. Mental scars from “chronic stress such as from PTSD,” post traumatic stress disorder, which can develop in torture subjects, “can shrink regions involved with memory and attention that usually moderate fear responses.” (Neergaard). These long-lasting disorders may never be cured, forever haunting the tortured victims with a cruel and unusual punishment. The United Nations has declared that “no one may be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment,” (United Nations). Torture has been declared inhumane, and although the United States did not sign this treaty, 25 others countries have agreed, constituting a resounding ethical world opinion that torture is immoral. The physical and mental scars of torture have led many governments to abandon it as an interrogation method.

Furthermore, the likelihood of torturing an innocent person is too great to risk torturing at all. Many victims have been tormented in interrogation and later been proven innocent. At Guantanamo Bay, while the CIA was interrogating 9/11 alleged terrorists, “25% turned out to be innocent.”(Friedersdorf). One in every four people tortured there were scarred for life, and they were uninvolved. As evidenced earlier, many people will give false confessions under painful coercion. This is even true of people who are completely unrelated to the offense in question.  For example, “to stop the torture, [Maher Arar] falsely confessed to having received terrorist training in Afghanistan, a country he had never even visited.” (Costanzo 184). The torture of innocent people can elicit false information, prolonging their suffering, and in addition, will lead to lost time and resources of government agencies because they are acting on false information. It is not only unjustified, but also unwise, to use torture in interrogations .

Some, such as former Vice President Dick Cheney, may argue that it is prudent to torture people because the possibility of preventing future terrorist attacks is worth the ‘discomfort’ of a few, inconsequential individuals. Cheney fears that without torture methods used, guilty persons will fearlessly return to the the terrorist battlefield and cause intentional harm to Americans. He states that “of the 600 and some people who were released out of Guantanamo, 30% roughly ended up back on the battlefield.” Ultimately, his stance is ‘better safe than sorry’. One man, Gul Rahman, “was chained to the wall of his cell, doused with water, froze to death in CIA custody and it turned out it was a case of mistaken identity.” (Friedersdorf). An innocent man died at the hands of the CIA because of interrogation methods that are proven ineffective. No one even said they were sorry and America is not any safer. The chance that a released, unharmed terrorist may hurt an American in battle is not worth torturing, scarring, and murdering innocent civilians.

In prison, Mohamed Bashmilah attempted to take his own life three times. He was later proven innocent and released without an apology and without compensation, destined to be tormented by physical and emotional scars for the rest of his life. Torture is proven to be ineffective in gaining truthful information, determined to be immoral in its disregard of human rights, and judged to be too risky in its possibility of maring innocent people; it should not be practiced by the United States or other governments to extract information from a suspect.

Works Cited

Arkowitz, Hal, and Scott O. Lilienfeld. "Why Science Tells Us Not to Rely on Eyewitness
Accounts." Scientific American Global RSS. N.p., 8 Jan. 2009. Web. 23 Feb. 2015.

Costanzo, Mark A., and Ellen Gerrity. "The Effects and Effectiveness of Using Torture as an
Interrogation Device: Using Research to Inform the Policy Debate." Social Issues and Policy Review 3.1 (2009): 179-210. 1 Nov. 2009. Web. 23 Feb. 2015.

Friedersdorf, Conor. "Dick Cheney Defends the Torture of Innocents." The Atlantic. Atlantic
Media Company, 15 Dec. 2014. Web. 22 Feb. 2015.

Hawkins, Awr. "What Thomas Jefferson Meant by 'Unalienable Rights' - Breitbart." Breitbart.
N.p., 23 Sept. 2013. Web. 23 Feb. 2015.

Neergaard, Lauren. "Torture Can Affect the Brain, Leaving Long-term Psychological Scars." PBS.
PBS, 23 Dec. 2014. Web. 20 Feb. 2015.

Robbins, Martin. "Does Torture Work?" The Guardian. N.p., 4 Nov. 2010. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.

United Nations. UN Convention Against Torture. By United Nations. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Feb.
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