Several former CIA directors wrote a letter to President Obama, asking him to halt the criminal investigation of CIA agents who have used 'enhanced interrogation' techniques in the past. President Obama has declined to get involved with Attorney General Holder's process, stating that he thinks everyone should be accountable to the law, so the investigation will continue.
I have heard Christians come down all over the place on this issue. As Christians who are supposed to love everyone, how could we ever torture someone? How do we balance 'turning the other cheek' with water boarding? Can we treat Islamic terrorists however we want because they don't follow Christ, or because they hate America?Tough questions all, and we do right in asking them. I think part of the problem for us, as Americans and as Christians living in the 21st Century, is our squeamishness about violence and death. Somehow, in a civilized society of the modern age, death is distasteful (don't miss the irony here, in the fact that the brutal murder of abortion is legal, and even encouraged).
So what does the Bible say? Really, violence is all over the Bible, New and Old Testament, and it's not nearly as prohibited as many believers think. In the Old Testament, Mosaic Law has specific rules about floggings and beatings (Deuteronomy). Samson is granted power from God to destroy the nobility of Philistine society, along with himself (Judges 16). Proverbs speaks repeatedly about rods and fools in the context of discipline. Nehemiah 13 speaks about Nehemiah - considered a wise and just ruler - cursing, beating, and pulling out the hair of his disobedient countrymen in his anger. David spared Saul at least twice, even as Saul sought to kill him (1 Samuel 24, 26), and yet he kills the Amalekite who finally does kill Saul, even though Saul asks to be killed (2 Samuel 1). In the New Testament, Peter kills 2 Christians who give money to the church, but lie about how much of their profit they are giving (Acts 5), and everyone is terrified. Jesus Himself taught us to turn the other cheek when someone strikes us (Matthew 5, Luke 6), and yet He attacks the money-changers in the temple, flipping tables in a terrible righteous anger (John 2, Mark 11) - some Bible scholars think he might have done this twice.
Focusing specifically on David and Jesus, we see the context of what the Bible teaches. When we are wronged, we are to respond in meekness, sparing our enemies and even turning the other cheek. But when God's designs are perverted by evil men and their acts, when others are threatened who are in our care, there is a place for righteous anger. In short, there is a difference between vengeance and justice. Our CIA, acting to secure the safety of America, should have great latitude to interrogate. If the CIA, FBI or the military have good evidence that the suspect knows information that can prove vital to our national defense, then I am in favor of 'enhanced interrogations' far beyond simple water boarding. Death is not too extreme a penalty in this case, depending on the crimes in question. Justice can be served without the proceedings of a court, which is a right specifically given only to American citizens in the Constitution.
In summary, justice must be our goal, not vengeance. We must make wise choices about those who defend us, and then trust their judgment. There is accountability built into our current system, and we should not just wantonly torture anyone. But when tough choices have to be made, we have to give our defenders the ability to defend us, or we will suffer the consequences. President Obama is helping to create a terrible choice for our CIA agents: defend your country and go to prison, or play nice, obey the 'rules,' and bear the terrible responsibility of another attack on American citizens. As a Christian I don't see that torture is prohibited by the Bible, and as an American I certainly hope that we do everything we can to stop evil men from doing evil things.
Okay, you just used the Bible to defend torture. I believe it was Mark Twain who wrote, 'The Devil may cite Scripture to his purpose.'
ReplyDeleteI would like to hear more about what you think; obviously, you disagree with me. When we throw around the word 'torture' it can have all sorts of different connotations. I was careful in my post to be very specific. The Bible gives no license to wantonly torture whomever I would. The crucial difference comes when we consider our motivations in our actions. A CIA agent, or a soldier aware of an imminent threat to our country, has to make a judgment call. But when we say that violence is wrong because its violent, we criminalize every act of violence in an incorrect way.
ReplyDeleteIf someone was about to hurt my wife, for example, I am stopping that person by any means possible. The attacker's well-being is not my concern, since they have chosen to harm another person; the potential victim is my concern, and I am Biblically called to defend them, to lay down my life if necessary. There is an important distinction between an aggressor and those who defend, even though both may engage in an act of violence.
So should we just torture away? No. But should we then say "I will never take this action, no matter the consequences to those who are in my care?" No. I don't envy the tough choices that some in our government have to make to keep us safe. I don't envy the guy who has to do the waterboarding; it is not without a cost.
I would prefer never to fire a weapon in anger, myself. But to defend those entrusted into my care, I won't hesitate to pull the trigger.
Charles,
ReplyDeleteThe whole 'ticking bomb' argument is lame, in my view. It goes something like this: you have, in your custody, a terrorist, involved in a bomb-plot. You know he's a terrorist, and you know he knows where the ticking bomb is. If you don't get that information, it's going to blow up, and kill a lot of people. The only way to get the info is to torture it out of him. Do you do it? Well, duh.
But just take a look at the number of assumptions which have to be true for this scenario to work. You have to 1. Know you've got the right man. 2. Know he knows the information you seek. 3. Know that torture is the only way you're going to get that info. Charles, how often, in reality, are all those factors going to come together? Almost never. Say you torture the wrong man. Well, under torture, people will say anything, ANYTHING to make the pain stop. You'll end up with bad info, which will waste time and cost lives. This means that, in many situations, torture is not only immoral, because we are doing something we would not like done to us, causing deliberate extreme suffering to a fellow human being; AND in any case, it won't work.
The Gestapo knew a lot about torture, and they did not hesitate to torture suspected terrorists. So, what did the various resistance movements do? They took well-known counter-measures, and underground resistance to the nazis flourished. All you have to do, if you want to operate against an enemy who is willing to use torture, is to deny them the ticking-bomb scenario. Make sure your operatives only know their own little piece of the jigsaw. It works; resitance to the nazis only increased the whole war, in spite of a policy of torture, which was only limited by their capacity to think up new ways to inflict severe pain. At the same time, the nazis policy of torture increased the moral resistance of people against them, and gave people of conscience more incentive to resist.
Now, please note, I am not comparing America to Nazi-Germany, on a moral level. Far from it. I am merely talking about the efficacy of torture, using occupied Europe as a case study. I am saying, torture is not only wrong, morally, it also doesn't work. It doesn't work because the ticking-bomb scenario exists only in our imaginations, and because there are very well-known counter measures available against torture. So, what do you do, on a policy level? Do you keep torture available for the ticking bomb scenarios? NO! That simply leads to outrages and PR disasters like Abu-Ghraib (sp?). If you encourage a culture which is permissive towards torture, you will inevitably create a climate where abuses take place AND you won't do your cause any good.
Finally, I also made a point about using Scripture to justify moral positions. We are fallible, as human beings, and our interpretations of Scripture reflect this fact. Under slavery, the slave-owners used scripture, and notions of God's providence to justify their practice of buying and selling human beings. This shows that Scripture is not an ultimate guide, which we can be confident in. Slave-owners were just as confident that they were right (as shown by their willingness to fight and die for their cause) as Creationists and others are today. We read Scripture with our fallible human brains, so it can not be treated as an ultimate, infallible authority.
--Andy
In your review of the ‘ticking bomb’ scenario, you talk about a number of assumptions having to be true, and ultimately that the argument is “lame.” But there is a difference between gathered intelligence and assumptions being made by the CIA, first and foremost. The use of waterboarding and the like, here referred to as torture, was not used on the vast majority of terrorist suspects that passed through our hands. Our research and investigations determined that certain suspects had critical information on future attacks. At that point waterboarding was used to get additional information. Those who did the ‘torturing’ state that attacks were avoided in this manner, for which I am grateful, as an American citizen. Remember when the CIA was widely criticized after 9-11 for not preventing the attack? Now they have prevented attacks, and those who are against their methods want to cry that nothing would have happened, anyway (some, such as Nancy Pelosi, were of course in favor of waterboarding, before they were against it). So which way do we want it? We need to wisely choose the right people to defend us, and let them do their jobs.
ReplyDeleteIf we look at the training of our own Special Forces, they are waterboarded, humiliated, and treated in the same way as these terrorist suspects. So if the behavior itself is evil, we have a problem far beyond the CIA. But the point of the training is to show these soldiers that everyone breaks, without exception. The goal of the training is to teach discernment – when do I hold out to the bitter end, and what is worth dying for? Now, in regards to terrorists being questioned, is every piece of information gleaned in this way true? Absolutely not. That’s why we have multiple intelligence gathering methods. My argument here is not that we only torture, but that waterboarding should remain one of our options.
Bringing the Gestapo into the argument does mean we are comparing Nazi Germany to the US on the moral level. If torture is wrong in every case, regardless of its purpose, then the US is guilty of the same evil as the Gestapo; bringing them into the discussion does have moral implications. And could our enemies take steps to reduce waterboarding as an effective intelligence gathering option for us? Sure, if it’s not effective I would expect the CIA to stop using the method, just like any other ineffective measure.
Lastly, let’s touch on the issue of using Scripture to justify moral positions. This is working backwards; Christians must be reading Scripture to discover their responsibilities, and carry those out. We should read to discover what our positions should be, not read in order to justify positions we hold beforehand. The fact that many people have used the Bible to justify their actions does not invalidate the message of the Bible, it simply exposes the evil and selfishness within the human heart which is the real problem. Men will always seek to justify their actions, as they have throughout history, by one method or another. The fact that my human brain is fallible – and I fully agree with this point you made – does not mean the Bible is not infallible, it just adds strength to the argument that we desperately need an absolute standard outside ourselves by which to live. As a Christian, I see the Bible as the ultimate authority on the nature of reality, as it really is. And I would love to see a Bible-based viewpoint that torture is inherently evil! Questions and challenges are always welcome, because the more we seek the truth in all things, the more we will find it.
"And I would love to see a Bible-based viewpoint that torture is inherently evil..."
ReplyDeleteSadly, I don't think you'll find it. Perhaps you should read a bit of Noam Chomsky, who often calls attention to the concept of 'universality' in morals. That is, if it's wrong for our enemies to torture, or blow people up, then it's wrong for us to do it too.
Look up: categorical imperative (Kant)
Golden Rule (a version exists in just about every human culture)