Justification for Torture
Torture is a scenario that dates back to the old government ages. Is government torture ever justified? This answer is can be answered by this quote,”Torturing the terrorist is unconstitutional? Probably. But millions of lives surely outweigh constitutionality “(Levin 1). Who would not save the lives of fellow citizens If the only option to solve the issue was torturing an individual for his crimes? Many people would see the situation as a sacrifice for the better of the people. The lives of Americans should be the most important priority of a nation.
Torture is justified as long it is for the safety of the people and not for the mere cause of violence. Torture is the considered to be a harmful mentally and physically to anyone. It is a very well known method in the time of war. There have been many cases where it used on children and women. The course of torture can range from physical abuse to sexual abuse. Those are without a doubt an international crime. Using torture on innocent human being is completely out of the question. The use of torture in terms of water boarding on terrorist can be another matter.
Torture without a doubt is a cruel treatment for an individual but it must be a nation policy (Falbaum 15). Saving innocent lives should be a governments priority in a “ticking time bomb ” scenario. The scenario states, lets say an officer, got control of a terrorist planning an attack on hundreds of people. It is highly likely this terrorist will be interrogated by other officials to obtain information about the attack. Torture should be an option if the individual refuses to give the data to save hundreds of lives.
Falbaum also mentions that 9/11 attack could been prevented if the United States had torture as part of their system. If the US policy was more strict at those times the terrorist would have feared their policy or would have captured their leader and gained details about the whereabouts of the attack. A poll shows that majority of registered citizens prefer harsh techniques that can keep America safe (Bauer 27). The society should support inhumane behaviors like torture if it is seen as last hope for innocent lives.
Successful interrogations can keep America safe for the future. The world revolves around information and if your country is lacking information, terrorists can take advantage of the situation. Using torture on terrorists to gain information will benefit in prevention of future attacks on the country. Marc A. Thiessen goes into detail how many terrorists that have been interrogated provided them with reliable information that ended up saving thousands of American lives. “Thiessen believes that terrorist suspects will talk if pressured in the right way” (Thiessen 36).
Some people may argue that torture does not provide the right detail because the victim will say anything to stop the deadly act. A statement said by the terrorist Abu Zubayah explains that captive terrorist tends to resist as long as they can, if they fail to do this they are given permission by their religious belief to tell what they have known. “The job of the interrogator is to safely help the terrorist do his duty to Allah, so he then feels liberated to speak freely “(Thiessen 40). It leads to show if the US practice and enhance their torture techniques it will lead to a safer nation.
What techniques can be considered torture? Water-boarding is the act where the victim is drained water on his head to stimulate the pain of drowning. Water-boarding to Joseph Farah is not considered torture. He states that the technique is relatively safe with the right management. Not only that he argues that United State also practice this technique on their own soldiers as training (Farah 82). According to him while water-boarding is very abhorrent it is not as bad as cutting of a hand or anything gore.
The truth is Water-boarding is very effective and most of the time the result are given in less than a minute. The success stories range from learning about al-Qaida’s top plans. It is said that the terrorist agents resisted normal interrogations for hours and hours but gave into water-boarding sooner than the word can be said. This scenario can happen anywhere in the nation. Lets say an al-Qaida member was captured by the CIA and found whereabouts of bombs being placed around a city. They hire the top of the line negotiators to spoil the information.
The real question still remains. Will they be able to make the terrorist member talk before it’s too late? Then again we could resort to the use of water-boarding and save their lives before it is too late. It is not like we have torn their limbs off to order to get the information. “But a few seconds of dripping water on a prisoner’s face? That’s not torture to me “(Feah 85). Some believe that torture disregard true American standards. Patrick J. Buchanan gives a great insight about this issue. He states that torture is viable as long as it fit to save the American people.
It is just like how murder is seen unethical yet you see soldiers and cops given the permission to kill as long as it fits the right scenario (Buchanan 55). Would a war hero that killed twenty men in order to rescue 2,000 citizens receive a death sentence? Just because he murdered 20 men, no. He would be honored as a hero he so deserved to be. There are doctors that inflicts pain to many soldiers in the war field by cutting of parts of their body. This saves their life by preventing death by decay. These are one of the exceptions that torture should be given into.
Take for example someone’s son or daughter was captivated by a terrorist group. One of their remember was found, he would not spoil or hint any information by simple conversations. What will a parent would want from the government to do? It does not matter if they oppose torture or not, a parent would choose water-boarding compared to the death of their child. Torture is not to be taken lightly but should be considered an option if the situation arise. Torture should the last option if it ever to be used. It a very sensitive topic for many people.
There are groups that strongly rejects torture in any situation and there are people that support torture if it leads to saving lives. Ultimately saving lives should be the priority of any government. If it result in agreeing to an “harsh techniques ” like water-boarding to stop future 9/11 attacks, the majority will agree. It is very hard to come to a conclusion about this specific topic because both sides can provide very good viewpoints. It will be one of those controversial topic that will go on for decades.
