In today's Washington Post, Michael Scheuer trots out the usual argument about the "ticking timebomb scenario":
In surprisingly good English, the captive quietly answers: 'Yes, all thanks to God, I do know when the mujaheddin will, with God's permission, detonate a nuclear weapon in the United States, and I also know how many and in which cities." Startled, the CIA interrogators quickly demand more detail. Smiling his trademark shy smile, the captive says nothing. Reporting the interrogation's results to the White House, the CIA director can only shrug when the president asks: "What can we do to make Osama bin Laden talk?"
Let's pretend that this 0.0001% scenario -- which has never occured -- happens and that the US captures a top Al Qaeda member who has fresh info on a pending attack.
1.We wouldn't know that there was a pending attack. Scheuer's scenario is a joke: OBL would not say a word until it was over. A child could poke holes in this. Without being handed gifts of crucial intel by captives, we would be guessing. We might be wrong, and would likely (99% of the time) be torturing someone who doesn't know of a pending attack.
- Even if we know, the enemy would simply lie. If tortured, they would lead you on a wild goose chase to the wrong location, the wrong city, and the bomb would go off anyway somewhere you hadn't evacuated. Indeed, if OBL tells us that within one hour, NYC will be destroyed, we would have to worry that this is misinformation meant for us not to evacuate DC. The incentive for the terrorist to lie and achieve success in their plot is immense. They are willing to die.
So, even though the terrorist would simply lie to us, the pro-torture camp is willing to destroy the ideals of our nation because of this one immature, paranoid fantasy.
But wait, there's more!
* Opportunity costs: How many valuable man-hours was wasted following up lies, and what is the opportunity cost of missed real leads?
* How do you know it's really a terrorist? Innocent people could be tortured. Scheuer cleverly uses someone who is obviously a terrorist. But in real life, we might not know. The injustice of torturing someone who doesn't know anything or is the wrong person is grave.
* Our soldiers will be tortured. Get ready for American soldiers being waterboarded, and the video probably being uploaded to the internet. Worse still, we won't be able to complain and the world will feel little sympathy.
* We lose the moral highground and 'soft power' which buys us cooperation and respect around the world. Being respected means fewer people are motivated to attack us, and people are more likely to inform on people who might.
* (And this last one might not convince hardcore torture fans, but allow me to get on my soapbox.) We forget what we are fighting for and who we are as a nation. We once prosecuted Axis powers for their cruelty and abuses. How sad that some want us to adopt their methods. I thought the reason we fought Nazis and Communists was because they were evil, and not just because they were rivals. People fought and died for our freedoms and for our civilization and ideals.
Now how much would you pay for the "benefits" of letting yourself be duped by terrorists??
I also note that Wikipedia has an entry on this fallacy (perhaps some intrepid WaPo editor could have Googled it?)
Some human rights organisations, professional and academic experts, and military and intelligence leaders, have absolutely rejected the idea that torture is ever legal or acceptable, even in a so-called ticking bomb situation.[1] [4] They have expressed grave concern about the way the dramatic force and artificially simple moral answers the ticking bomb thought-experiment seems to offer, have manipulated and distorted the legal and moral perceptions, reasoning and judgment of both the general population and military and law enforcement officials. .....They believe that simplistic responses to the scenario may lead well-intentioned societies down a slippery slope to legalised and systematic torture. They point out that no evidence of any real-life situation meeting all the criteria to constitute a pure ticking bomb scenario has ever been presented to the public, and that such a situation is highly unlikely.
The distorting and misleading nature of the scenario is in part due to the fact that it is most often presented in a manner that keeps many of its assumptions hidden. Once exposed, it becomes clear that the scenario is either wildly unrealistic or that any exception to the prohibition of torture would be much more widespread than the proponent of the scenario originally suggested. The scenario thereby manipulates moral and ethical judgment by obscuring the true moral cost of tolerating any act of torture....
For instance, it is asked whether torture would be limited to suspects, or whether one could torture the family and friends of a suspect to make him compliant. According to John Yoo (the former Department of Justice official who wrote memos justifying President Bush's policies on torture) this would be legally permissible, including crushing the testicles of the person's child to obtain information.[6] If we imagine that officials might attempt to justify torture of people whose phone numbers happened to be in a suspect's mobile phone or agenda-book, in their desperation to find useful information, the range of possible victims of "ticking bomb" torture becomes much wider.
Another point is the notorious unreliability of the information gathered, e.g. Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi.
Pretty grim stuff -- torturing children of terror suspects. But according to the "ticking timebomb" spinmeisters' logic, it is probably only a matter of time before the US is torturing children -- hey, if it saves New York City? If it's Osama Bin Laden's child and would get him to "talk", why not? How about it, Scheuer? Are you going to own the full implications of your argument? (And aren't 'rape rooms' and killing of families the reason we invaded Iraq and executed Saddam???)
Clearly, the only real "ticking timebomb" is this failed argument, which leads us down a dangerous and disturbing path.
The only question remaining is simply why is our media culture so intellectually inept that they can't poke holes in this very flawed argument, and perpetuate a fallacy that has been debunked so thoroughly?
(crossposted at TPM)