Maybe Torture Worked Better Than We Thought?

Maybe Torture Worked Better Than We Thought?

Torture has one purpose and one purpose only—and it’s not to extract critical intelligence from high-priority detainees. You know how in 24 neoconservative dreamboat Jack Bauer will bring the pain down on some terrorist who is the only one who knows the code to shut down the doomsday device that’s parked directly under Disney World or whatever? Yeah, that’s just patriotic, pop-cultural Viagra for the paranoid and impotent. Much has been written about how ineffective torture is when it comes to extracting actionable intelligence. Under duress of pain, people will admit anything. Terrorist wedgies in high school gym class clearly proves this. It’s basically common sense.

The purpose of torture is to scare the shit out of people. And the real reason American soldiers and intelligence operative’s tortured “enemy combatants” was to make them scream for their god in terror. And hey, I’m inclined to think it worked. That it was done in my name, and your name, should frighten the lunch out of you.

Don’t get me wrong, torture is morally repellent, the antithesis of civilized behavior, and an act of wild-eyed sadism masquerading as national security. It is a deep-set rot in our national soul, and no legal circus prosecuting a few will clean the decay out of the cavity—at least not anytime soon. But it is important to understand that torture worked, and it is wrong because it works.

The Obama Administration recently released controversial CIA memos antiseptically detailing Bush era “enhanced interrogation” techniques, which was their cuddly way of saying everything-but-thumbscrews-and-hot-pokers-to-the-nipples. These techniques are very, very scary. One of the shocking revelations was that two high-priority Al Queda captives were together waterboarded an unbelievable 266 times. Apparently, waterboarding is one of those things—like skydiving or barbecue—that never gets old.

This gratuitousness reveals one thing: The CIA wanted these terrorists to squeeze out teardrops of fear-pee every time they heard a leaky faucet. The intent of waterboarding, of sleep deprivation, of hanging a man from a ceiling and allowing him to defecate all over himself is to emotionally cripple. It hobbles the spirit and permanently vandalizes the self-worth of the abused.

I’m no conspiracy theory buff—I firmly believe that the world is one or two bad decisions away from total Road Warrior anarchy, and that no single person, cabal or Star Chamber is in control of anything. But it would not surprise me to find out 50 years from now that those infamous Abu Ghraib photos of naked Iraq man-piles were actually leaked as a deterrent. A grotesque advertisement aimed at angry young men spoiling for a fight against the Great Satan and desirous of a noble, fiery, painless Jihadist death. If you mess with America, you won’t go down in a blaze of glory. You’ll just disappear. And instead of making a flashy exit, maybe a picture of you naked, being poked and prodded by a woman will circulate on the internet.

It is easy to imagine a Dick Cheney utterly petrified of a world that does not fear America. This logic was simple for the doughy, tough-guy neoconservatives who felt that America ran like cowards from Somalia. It was important to show our enemies we were willing to spill our blood—and theirs. The only thing thugs understand, goes this logic, is brutality. Maybe the right-wing intellectuals who helped write Torture For Dummies manuals, build Big Brother pain-cation resorts and twist the law to suit their bleak, criminal worldview came up with the idea of America as hardass gangster while beating off to Goodfellas.

We intended to terrify the world, intimidate and cow it into submission, and we ended up scaring ourselves. And here we are. I’d suggest we prosecute those individuals responsible for conceiving and executing dark deeds, but the truth is, we’re all a little at fault.

Our union is not a fair-weather collective of tribes, mobs, and fiefdoms. We are a nation; we are victorious as a nation and we fail as a nation. We share our virtues and our sins. And we failed epically in this case. From panicked White House officials fronting like He-Men, to hack lawyers playing fast and loose with the rule of law, to the rank-and-file doing what they were told to do, right on down through both parties, and a citizenry so enraged by an attack on their way of life that fear and bloodlust trumped moral vigilance. Thus, we went all Roman on the world.

Actually, the Romans do have us when it comes to keeping the savages in line. There are few more effective historical examples of deterrents against insurrection, invasion and other threats to empire than a road lined with moaning men slowly dying, lashed to crucifixes. If you’re going to go all the way, and rule by fear, then go all the way. If not, there has to be a more enlightened way to earn respect, without freaking the world the fuck out. And yours truly in the process.