The release of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program detailing not only the circumstances of the detention of prisoners by the CIA but also the euphemistically called “enhanced interrogation techniques” by CIA officers and contractors is a stunning confirmation of concerns raised over time about the treatment of detained persons in the “war on terrorism.” The careful bureaucratic language (based on careful bureaucratic recordkeeping, ironically enough) details what most people would call torture, rape, deprivation, abuse, and violence under the color of authority.
The summary report reveals a systemic abuse of human rights which happened because not just the legal and intelligence systems but also thousands of people lost their moral compass. It confirms the worst expectations of many and has ignited yet another storm of opposing perspectives. And a lot of ugly words.
The study reveals stunning lapses— violations, really— when it comes to the moral and humane treatment of persons no longer combatants according to international law and according to just war theory.
Clearly, the basic rationale for the mistreatment of persons was that the urgency of obtaining actionable intelligence to prevent or apprehend those responsible for terroristic activities, especially right after the 9/11 attacks, was extraordinary and that it justified unusual tactics. The takeaway lesson of the study is that even by a brutal pragmatic analysis, the techniques did not advance their stated purpose. So even the exponents of [philosophical] pragmatism (the disciples of William James, John Dewey, W.V.O. Quine, Wilfred Sellars, and others) would have concluded that the abuses were not justified. That is, the results were not justifiable even on a brutal cost-benefit analysis. For those of us with theologies and philosophies having absolute values, the approach cannot be morally justified (unless your central values are fear, retribution, violence, greed, and subjugation of others).
Violence begets violence, even by “nice” U.S. personnel, and it appears to me that rage and retribution fueled far more of the interrogations than we thought. Oddly, those who object to the release of the document because it will inflame anti-U.S. sentiment are supporting that era’s U.S. anti-arab sentiment, that, so inflamed, led to abuses being so easily justified. A less emotional calculation would have suggested to the CIA that the fallout of the abuses would have been far greater than the gains, leading to a pragmatic decision not to use torture. To say nothing of avoiding charges of human rights violations in international tribunals and public opinion. To say nothing of a moral decision not to use torture.
Moral theologians and philosophers have long warned of the slippery slope of looking to future harm not caused as a basis for decisions, because the human ability to predict circumstance that have not yet happened is limited at best, and it cannot be used as a primary term. In this case, there should have been calculations of how likely future terrorism might be, and whether that likelihood greatly exceeded the real harm caused in preventing it. In retrospect, in both pragmatic and just war theories, the program did not meet that threshold.
The report also raised concerns that official legal opinions and permissions somehow make something legal or moral. In short, does declaring that certain enhanced techniques are legal and not torture, in fact, mean they are not, or is there another standard against which techniques must be evaluated, such as violating U.S. or international law or as meeting the accepted definition of torture. Or, more broadly, does “legal” actually mean moral and permissible. I expect there will be lots of discussion on this both in courts and public opinion.
It has taken me many paragraphs simply to get to a religious or moral evaluation of these abuses of human rights. As citizens of the U.S., we have certain shared values of how we as a nation act and how we wish to be regarded around the world. Our history has many examples of our shared desire to be “moral” and “good.” We have typically declared our support of the victims of oppression or invasion, and have long called to task regimes past and present for their abuses of human rights. Our schools and faith communities teach those broad truths and values, and this includes our military training. So it appears to me that we have certain moral standards we believe in, and for which many have fought and died to preserve. Those implicit values are violated by the activities of the CIA and others. So by historical U.S. standards, the behaviors in the report are immoral.
For those of us adhering to traditional Christian moral theologies, the report is even more horrifying, for we root the humane treatment of others in the revealed will of God, variously defined. I am astonished that persons reared within Christian contexts would have been comfortable participating or justifying such abuses. (I expect there was a lot of psychological compartmentalization or distress among the perpetrators, and I worry about them.) The constant Biblical reminder that only God knows the future calls into question all calculations about preventing further enemy actions; we just cannot know that for sure, much less cause great harm to forestall undefined potential harm. Even the somewhat coarse histories of the Hebrew testament fence violence and imply that it must be morally justifiable for the safety of the nation. There are several notable occasions where abuse of others by those in power have led to their removal, execution, or destruction by God. No one is apart from God’s judgment.
The revelation of God’s love in Christ Jesus places the abuse of persons in even starker light. I have seen dozens of references to how wrong it is for followers of a person tortured to death by authorities to support the torture by authorities of anyone, in this context and in the context of police violence. Jesus himself reminds the powers-that-be many times that they are not above God’s laws and justice. The New Testament has many reminders that it is our duty to protect and support the weak and powerless, the hungry and cold, the least of our neighbors. And, explicitly, the Bible speaks of protecting and helping the prisoner. So there is a well-defined and long-held moral imperative in Christian thought against human rights abuses and torture, particularly since World War I and II and persisting even through the moral ambiguity of Viet Nam. If anything, Christians would seek to be on the side of the victim instead of the torturer.
So pragmatically, philosophically, theologically, morally, and religiously, the human rights abuses of persons who are not still active combatants is wrong. As in immoral. Calling something an “enhanced interrogation technique” does not whitewash torture. I believe it is our duty as citizens and our calling as followers of Christ to repudiate the actions detailed in the study and seek justice and righteousness and forgiveness instead.
In Christ,
David
Texts For Sunday Worship:
There is no rational reasoning in time of war.
ReplyDeleteAs a soldier, you are there to kill and/or to be killed.
When at war, there is only the Law of War, which is only used to prosecute someone after the fact.
If you are a soldier at war and refuse to to act as a war fighter, yo u will most likely to be killed by your own.
Been there, seen that.
The answer is to not allow war to start, not to wail about the atrocities during or after the fact of war.
Ray