Enhanced interrogation: US and SS compared

Conservative writer Andrew Sullivan has an interesting piece in The Atlantic, comparing the Bush regime’s “enhanced interrogation techniques” with the “Verschärfte Vernehmung” (“enhanced interrogation techniques” — yes, it’s the same term) of Hitler’s regime.

Both Bush and the Nazis approved exactly the same torture methods, which include “stress positions,” hypothermia, sleep deprivation, and semi-starvation. The US administration of course denies that these amount to torture, hence the euphemism “enhanced interrogation.” The administration’s assertion is that for interrogation to become torture it has to involve pain that, in the words of a “Justice” Department memo (really that name is now so Orwellian) “must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death.”

Sullivan points out that the Nazis did not abide by the limits originally set for them and that “Once you start torturing, it has a life of its own.” This is the case with US torture techniques as well. Inmates in Iraq and Afghanistan have died at the hands of their captors, some having been beaten to death.

A notable example was the mistreatment and death of a 22-year-old Afghan taxi driver called Dilawar, who was assaulted by four army interrogators. The interrogators subjected Dilawar to “kicks to the groin and leg, shoving or slamming him into walls/table, forcing the detainee to maintain painful, contorted body positions during interview and forcing water into his mouth until he could not breathe,” according to an army report. Mr Dilawar’s legs were beaten so badly that they were reduced to pulp. He died of “blunt force trauma to the lower extremities complicating coronary artery disease,” but had he survived his legs would have required amputation. More details of Dilawar’s mistreatment can be found in this New York Times article.

According to the Times, “Most of the interrogators had believed Mr. Dilawar was an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the American base at the wrong time.”

Torture has a life of its own.

Sullivan points out that cases of Nazi torture involving the same “enhanced interrogation” torture techniques used by the US were prosecuted as war crimes after the end of World War II.

He’s careful to point out that he’s not “accusing the Bush administration of being Hitler,” and says, “There is no comparison between the political system in Germany in 1937 and the U.S. in 2007.”

Rather, Sullivan concludes, “The interrogation methods approved and defended by this president are not new. Many have been used in the past. The very phrase used by the president to describe torture-that-isn’t-somehow-torture – “enhanced interrogation techniques” – is a term originally coined by the Nazis. The techniques are indistinguishable. The methods were clearly understood in 1948 as war-crimes. The punishment for them was death.”

We must remember that these acts have been perpetrated under the rule of a man who aimed to bring “decency” to the White House. Isn’t it time to impeach Bush?

One Response to “Enhanced interrogation: US and SS compared”

bodhipaksa says:

June 2, 2007 at 11:06 am

PS. I recently added Google ads to my blog to help pay the hosting costs. One ad that’s showing as I write says “Interogation (sic) Get a Criminal Justice Degree. Learn interrogation today!” Is it a spoof? I’m not allowed to click on the ads to see. If anyone does click on that ad can you tell me what it’s about?