Torture and Confession
Awhile back, I wrote a post for The Moderate Voice about the torture debate in this country. A few days after putting the piece up, I noticed a comment by a man who went by the pseudonym “mondliath.” He had written the response after much of the discussion had died down, so I doubt that many people had a chance to read it. A Western expatriate, mondliath testified to having been subjected to torture when living in Saudi Arabia back in 2000. The detached, yet highly detailed, manner in which he relates these events suggests that it is no fabrication.* His story and the subsequent analysis, which I will post below, are both fascinating and disturbing:
…I have rather too much personal experience having had to endure both basic “coercive interrogation†and other more brutal methods of torture. In December 2000 a series of car bombings that killed and injured a number of westerners began to occur in Saudi Arabia. I and 7 other western expatriate workers were arrested and forced to confess to the said crimes in order to allow the Saudi’s to deny that they had a home grown terrorist problem. I was put through periods of sleep deprivation (forced to stand by being chained upright to the cell door) the longest periods of which were 11, 14 and 20 days, stress positioning during interrogation, beatings across the back, legs, hands, soles of the feet and scrotum, suspended off the ground in the chicken position (tied around a metal bar) and beaten in the aforementioned places, suspended off the ground in a position called the swing (hung upside down on a cable) and beaten in the aforementioned places. I first confessed (or told my interrogators what they wanted to hear) after 6 days, which brought a temporary respite, and then through subsequent periods of torture added refinements to the story they wanted me to tell. I was eventually released after 964 days in captivity, all of which were spent in solitary confinement.
One would be right to ask why I confessed if I was innocent? Simply to gain the brief respite that I received for my initial confession. There was only so much I could endure, even when by confessing I was essentially giving my captors the authority to execute me for capital crimes, so death had become preferable to the agony. Yet, even I, a middle aged man with no training or preparation, managed to hold out for 6 days before telling my captors what they wanted to hear. Admittedly, the Saudi’s were out to extract a confession that they knew not to be the truth, so whatever I told them as long as it was within their required framework was what they were after. The truth had nothing to do with it. My fellow detainees all suffered varying degrees of torture, and all began to provide false confessions within 4 to 9 days of having been arrested.
Even in situations where the arresting authority is chasing after the truth, the subject of the torture is likely at some point to start telling them what they want to hear (or what the subject thinks the interrogators want to hear). Referring to the case of the Tipton Three, British Muslims of Pakistani ethnic origin, Asif Iqbal, Ruhal Ahmed and Shafiq Rasul were arrested in Afghanistan and ended up in Guantanamo. False confessions produced via a rewards system allied with the other techniques of coercive interrogation, had these 3 men branded as hard core Al Qaeda members.
Eventually it was claimed that they were present in a video of a meeting in August 2000 between Usama bin Laden and Mohamed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 hijackers. However the men in the video looked nothing like them. Furthermore, in August 2000, when the video was shot, Rasul had been working in a branch of the electronics store Curry’s, and was enrolled at the University of Central England. Yet after the months of isolation and serial interrogation in stress positions Rasul gave up and confessed that it was him in the video. The other two made similar confessions.
In September 2003, MI5 arrived at the camp with the documentary evidence which showed they could not have been in Afghanistan at the relevant time, confirming their alibis and providing further proof that none of the three had any association with radical Islamists. Finally, they were released in March 2004. Still the three men had provided false confessions as psychologically they had reached a breaking point caused by the very nature of the interrogation techniques. Their interrogators were in no doubt after the truth, and the detainees were innocent of the charges, yet between the parties involved all that was gained were false confessions, bad intelligence and 3 men held for 26 months.
An older story, but one just as horrific, concerns the cases of the Guilford 4, the MacGuire 7 and the Birmingham 6 in Britain during the mid-1970’s when an IRA bombing campaign was in operation The details of these cases fill volumes, but it is essentially a situation in which coercive techniques and beatings were illegally used by police officers producing a series of false confessions that led to convictions (in at least one of the cases the added complication of now discredited forensic evidence that had the authorities unwilling to consider the true nature of the confessions). As a result the individuals concerned were given sentences ranging from 12 years to life imprisonment for being involved in the IRA bombing campaign on mainland Britain during 1974-1975. Eventually, the convictions were overturned, but not until some of the individuals had served out their sentences, whilst others had served up to sixteen years (one detainee Giuseppe Conlon died in prison). The real perpetrators remained at large, though it seems that some were arrested for other terrorist incidents, but never investigated for those relating to the above cases.
These miscarriages of justice were not only effectively crimes against the wrongly convicted, but also a disservice to the very government and judiciary that imposed the sentences. Both British security service officers and leading members of the IRA have stated in recent years that the convictions and the use of coercive interrogation techniques and brutality to gain the confessions assisted the IRA in gaining recruits and increased the support for the organisation both in Ulster and the Republic. The same effect is now being seen in the upsurge of anti-American sentiment and support of Al Qaeda in various Muslim nations derived from the torture that has occurred at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo (regardless of the fact that under the Taliban rule in Afghanistan and Saddam’s rule in Iraq even worse levels of torture were a regular means of subduing the population).
From my own research in the nearly 4 years since my release, I have come across extremely few situations where torture or coercive interrogation was shown to be an effective means of intelligence gathering even in the long term, and have found no cases where it is been effective at all in the short time frames posited in the ticking bomb hypothesis. However, within popular mythology, as espoused in much of entertainment media (e.g. 24, Nikita etc.), it bears instant results, fuelling our own need for a quick fix to the problems of terrorism that invoke in us real fears. In fact, the only result that torture seems provide is a propaganda victory for the other side, hardly something one wants hand to one’s enemy.
This is only part of what he wrote; mondliath’s full commentary is here — just scroll down the page.
*(Please note that, while this story is compelling, I have no way of confirming it.)
20 Responses to “Torture and Confession”
I will not debunk this mans story. I can only debunk Jeb for a sad attempt at guilt by association.
He was tortured in Saudi Arabia. Not the United States.
The 8 November car-bomb attack in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, was a strong reminder that Al-Qaeda — or terrorist groups using Al-Qaeda techniques — remain a potent threat, despite a recent crackdown on militants in the country. This time, the target was a housing complex for mostly non-Saudi Arabs, leaving many to ponder the ultimate goal of such attacks. What purpose does killing innocent Muslims serve?
A group of British and American Shiite Muslims of Iraqi descent said they had been beaten on Sunday by the Saudi religious police because of their nationalities and the fact they were holding Shiite-style prayers.
Bush administration officials are expressing increasing anger at what they say has been Saudi Arabia’s counterproductive role in the Iraq war.
The papers are full of this from all over the world. Let us not forget that this is Muslims killing Muslims with attempts at non muslims from time to time.
Theres two sides to every story. The only one we hear is the antiwar screaming so loud that air raid sirens cant be heard over their din. Instead the world..led by the antiwar…say oh stop, lets put our head in the sand and it will go away. Just as long as the torture, murder, extortions, kidnappings and mass murders take place somewhere else all is good with the world.
This is just another example of using a torture story from a country that has used torture since the beginning of time to somehow convince readers that THIS is what the USA is doing.
Somebody – Do you deny categorically that the USA has ever used torture?
Somebody is totally missing the point. This contradicts the meme that torture is an effective technique for extracting information. As those who have tortured have said, and is repeated above, they end up saying whatever they think the interrogators want to hear to make the torture stop.
Lastly, of course we don’t torture–we only engage in extraordinary rendition! God I love how we are playing the PR game.
Comments like Somebody Said’s above would break your heart. He’s obviously intelligent, certainly articulate, and his concern for how our country is viewed genuine and heartfelt I’m sure, but still he trots out far right talking points to discredit anyone who questions our detainee policies, in particular our policy of employing techniques that not so long ago, and when used by our enemies, our leaders were happy to describe as torture.
To admit our government has gone too far in its determination to protect the country is not to put our heads in the sand, quite the opposite in fact. It is Somebody Said who has covered his ears, shut his eyes and is threatening to hold his breath until everyone stops saying those nasty things.
As has been documented by those within GITMO, prisoners have been frozen close to death. They have been kept awake, with minimal respite, for 20 days and more. Water boarding has occurred.
If you think this is an OK way for the United States Of America to treat its prisoners then for God sake say so, and stop throwing ridiculous insults at any who would disagree with the direction the Bush Administration has decided to take the country.
No I do not categorically deny anything. The man that was to testify against Hillary Clinton suddenly committed suicide.
I did not say anything about her having him killed, nor do I make such accusations……..However if I write something and imply something but dont say it….it is suggestive reasoning.
This is what Jeb is doing. The debate rages in the USA about torture. Yet he then reprints a torture victims story from another country. Implication? The USA tortures like Saudi Arabia does.
Secondly I do very much understand the point of torture. It does in fact work. It works quite well in fact. Yet when you beat someone this type of torture does not work. The people end up telling you whatever you want to hear. Instead you break them subtly, using sleep deprevation, cold cells, mind games.
If you want to know how the USA effectively interrogates its prisioners then I invite you to read a very telling article published in the Atlantic in the May 2006 issue “How to bring down a Terrorist” by Mark Bowden.
There you will find unusally unique versions of subtle torture because as you guys define torture it is anything that deprives the terrorists of a Donald Trump lifestyle while in captivity.
Abu Ghraib was an abomination. A bunch of thugs run a muck. Poorly trained National Guardsmen given subtle yet unreavaling suggestion by higher ups who then covered their own arses.
No I have no doubt that we have had transgressions but the cia refuses to even partake of interrogations unless they are conducted using stringent time established methods that work and work quite well.
Its funny how in the Moderate Voice if you question the antiwar you are a Hate mongering, mindless Neocon who wants to murder men, women and children either thru heinous torturing methods or depriving young children of medical care until their head rots off.
Read the article. The mans article implies all types of evil, painful, life threatening things that the USA has never done to its prisioners. OR….OR if it has it was isolated incidents and the people have gone to prision for it. Repeat….people go to prision for this type of activity……………STILL…..Repeat people go to prision and have their lives ruined for these types of misdeeds.
My point was he was using this article to imply the USA does these things.
If your antiwar you scoop it up and condemn me for even questioning this article with quotes such as:
It is Somebody Said who has covered his ears, shut his eyes and is threatening to hold his breath until everyone stops saying those nasty things.
If you think this is an OK way for the United States Of America to treat its prisoners then for God sake say so, and stop throwing ridiculous insults
Did I say it was okay to Torture? NO. I said this was a sad attempt by Jeb to use this article to imply that the USA does this same type of thing.
Somebody – I certainly hope when a Democrat wins the White House we have another version of the Church Commission where ALL our dirty laundry is laid out for the world to see what America has sponsored in our names.
Somebody – I certainly hope when a Democrat wins the White House we have another version of the Church Commission where ALL our dirty laundry is laid out for the world to see what America has sponsored in our names.
Why? We are fighting a WAR. These people are paid to defend you.
The Church Committee was a fine reason for Jimmy Carter to GUT the CIA and force us to play catch up even today. I suppose it was necessary given the severity of the Watergate breakins and President Nixons resignation however we pay our spys to spy.
Covert operations are not meant to be pretty, politically correct nor socially acceptable. They are intended to preserve protect and defend the United States of America. I am sorry many of you feel so threatened that you would once again want to gut the very forces that protect us from evil purely because you have an obsessive hatred for all Things Bush/Cheney.
Jimmy Carter was a knee jerk reaction to Watergate. The Church Committee was a knee jerk reaction to the fact that a few ex cia operatives were involved in Watergate. The result was a gutted and worthless CIA that failed to spot 911……..Gave us worthless intell on Iraq, told Bill Clinton to bomb an aspirin factory, and I could go on and on. It was not their fault. It was a countries fault that cannot accept responsibility but rather must forever look for someone to blame.
NOW….if you mean you want someone to investigate Bush/Cheney………….so be it.
Then when Hillary Leaves office we will appoint someone to investigate her. Where does it stop??
YOU are advocating a continual polarization of this country. I am opposed to that. Sometimes the truth is not worth knowing. The cost is just too great to bear.
Sometimes there is just too much information.
Somebody is completely off topic
Thia is about false confessions obtained under torture, not about being pro-war or anti-war or any of the diversionay arguments usually used to avoid the gist of the matter.
The British experience teaches important lessons.
Aside from the obvious harm done to the tortured, getting false confessions from the wrong detainees can acutally obsruct the process of getting accurate intelligence and catchimg the correct wrongdoers.
In addtition, it fuels the enemy’s capability to recruit.
It didn’t work in regard to the IRA and it doesn’t work with other terrorists.
With that historical knowldge available, why the US felt it had to invent the wheel all over again, I”ll never understand.
As we stand now, the military code forbidding torture does not extend to the CIA,and the very definition of torture in some circumstances includes a bar set so hight that it’s virtually impossible to reach it: techniques that INTENTIONALLY cause organ failure or death. Will a psychiatrist determine if organ failure was caused accidently or willfully?
It is also ture that false accusations of torture are quite possible. What makes them possible, however, ifs that the US chose to lower its standards enough to make false accusations realistic, if not actually real.
The importance of a clean record and a good reputation can not be overstated. I wonder if we will ever regain what has been lost in that regard.
Somebody-
You are continually missing the point.
These techniques do not defend or protect.
They hinder defending and protecting.
Secondly I do very much understand the point of
And so, finally, we get our answer- Sleep deprivation, cold cells, mind games (I notice water boarding doesn’t get a mention, why so shy?) the same techniques successive administrations condemned as torture when practiced by the Soviet Union, are all OK with Somebody just so long as their subtle (I’m finding it hard to understand how you would freeze someone close to death in a subtle way, or what exactly a subtle stress position looks like).
As Mark Bowden pointed out in his contribution to ‘The Question Of Torture’ discussion held at the New York Library in 2005, if you’re scared enough you might find comfort in the idea that there are guys on our side tough enough to brutalize our perceived enemies, but as the Israelis discovered, its a false comfort because when you legalize abuse it escalates out of all control and pretty soon its the sadists running the show. The result is more enemies, not less; more death, not less, and worst of all, a once great country crawling around in the dirt with all the other disgraced nations of the world.
Was it Beckett who said ‘Nobody knows what the Ostrich sees in the sand’? Maybe Somebody can give us a hint.
Torture doesn’t work, unless the goal is to give sadistic satisfaction to the torturers.
“The Church Committee was a fine reason for Jimmy Carter to GUT the CIA and force us to play catch up even today. I suppose it was necessary given the severity of the Watergate breakins and President Nixons resignation however we pay our spys to spy.”
That’s because a CIA sponsored guerilla war caused the deaths of innocent clergy in South America. Somebody needs to go back and re-read. Trust me it helps broaden your viewpoint.
…and yet again, this is not about pro-war/anti war- but a personal account of someone caught in the middle who was forced to endure extreme measures for the sake of expedient, and miscarried justice.
…and yet again, this is not about pro-war/anti war- but a personal account of someone caught in the middle who was forced to endure extreme measures for the sake of expedient, and miscarried justice.
Your right Hangin I should reread my history cause it keeps being rewritten by GOOGLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, I have said this before but..
We are supposed to be the good guys. And in a war of ideas, volintarily sacrificing the morale high ground to wallow in the mud with our opponents is hardly a winning strategy.
As has been pointed out, it does not work
Osama wants us to torture. If you pay any attention to AQ’s goals, turning the US into something no different then any other third world country is high on the list. Point to AQ on this one issue anyway.
When we stoopt o the methods of the KGB and Khmer Rouge we loose the moral high ground and in effect justify the brutallity of the USSR. We won the Cold War ultimately because the corrupt and brutal Soviets couldn’t stand up to the Wests freedoms. If you accept the KGB torture, is using tanks against protesters in Hungary and Prague also justified? Should we send out the Army to beat and intimidate Cindy Sheahan,the Amish and Quakers?
Why does no one seem to realize the ethically slippery slope even “enchanced interrogation” techniques rest upon? Honestly, do you expect us to be at war with radical Islam for years, decades, centuries? Why just sleep deprive when we can knock them around a bit? Just a few love taps on the scrotum. Let’s kidnap their families as well, and threaten their children in front of them. Let’s trot out some thumb screws, racks, starvation, etc. Let’s sodomize them a few times to show them we mean business. Finally, if we’re put in the unfortunate position of having to execute these people simply because we can’t have them spreading lies about how the United States tortures…well. You have to break a few eggs to win a global war on terror. I definitely sleep safer at night knowing such brave patriots are willing to sacrifice everything, including their ethics, to defend us from these animals.
Somebody, even if you condone torture and think it is vital to the war effort, above all, it’s stupid that the United States has been caught red handed, multiple times, and now its only going to get worse. Should we restrict media coverage of torture? How about we let the military “secure” our ports and airports in the United States? Let’s install video cameras everywhere and trust Hillary Clinton, once she’s possibly elected, to monitor your email, phone calls, voicemail, credit card purchases, campaign donation records…
Honestly, if you can justify anything for the GWOT, what’s left of the United States? Where is “stop, this is too much, I cannot allow this in America?” for the right? I’m really curious to know.
One suggestion, please realise that someone can be against torture and still think it works. People can have differing ideas of what constitutes torture while still being a honest, decent person.
Somebody, even if you condone torture and think it is vital to the war effort
Did I say it was okay to Torture? NO. I said this was a sad attempt by Jeb to use this article to imply that the USA does this same type of thing.
Somebody-
You are continually missing the point.
My point was he was using this article to imply the USA does these things.
Let me emphatically state that I am opposed to torture. That the means of torture depicted by this mans personal narrative does not work. He is correct in assuming that intelligence sometimes tries to make the facts support a preconceived conclusion.
Oh wait that might be misread and yet again sound as if Im supporting torture. So I’ll make it real simple.
I do not believe in or condone torture.
No that might be too many words.
NO TORTURE.
TORTURE BAD.
So the US doesn’t torture, eh? Let’s see what US Senator Lindsey Graham had to say about this after viewing Abu Ghraib photos and videos. Take it away, Senator!
“The American public needs to understand we’re talking about rape and murder here.”
Thanks Lindsey, your beautiful. That’s all, folks!