Shrinks and the SERE Technique at Guantanamo
May 29th, 2007
Yesterday I posted Steven Miles’ comments on the new Defense Department Inspector General’s report documenting the central role that psychologists played in the development of abusive interrogations at Guantanamo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Today my article on this was posted on CounterPunch and InformationClearinghouse as Shrinks and the SERE Technique at Guantanamo: Pentagon IG Report Details Central Role of Psychologists in Detainee Interrogations and Abuse. [The title was edited a bit from the one I gave it.]
It delineates how these new documents contain definitive evidence that psychologists were at the center of the development of Bush’s torture regime. All the while the American Psychological Association was chanting its mantra about psychologists making interrogations “safe, legal, ethical, and effective,” those psychologists were developing the specialized torture techniques for which the United States is now so infamous. Further, it now is extremely likely that the APA did, indeed get “subject matter experts” onto their PENS Task Force. In fact, it is now extremely likely that they did, indeed, appoint some of America’s most creative torturers to the Task Force to formulate APA ethical policy on interrogations.
It will be interesting to see how the APA spins this new evidence, as the Department of Defense wipes its hands of the most brutal torturers. Will APA do a mea culpa? Unlikely.
Stay tuned.
Entry Filed under: APA, Guantanamo, Interrogation, Psychology, Torture, War Crimes
1 Comment Add your own
1. Mike Corbeil | May 30th, 2007 at 10:04 pm
Well, Stephen, this short introduction of yours already packs a PUNCH, quite a load for only an introduction. I haven’t yet read your full length article, but will be getting to this shortly and look forward to it.
Ugh.
Crushing,
it is,
to realise,
that an association dedicated (officially anyway)
to mental health care,
namely the APA,
is diabolically criminal, and
in the way that just your short introduction indicates.
Yes,
crushing.
Why?
My God,
Why?
Doesn’t evil,
already think that we have enough,
evil,
but,
yet,
no,
it,
instead,
thinks that we need more.
No,
we have just ever more MADNESS;
ever more to justify lamentations, people crying,
because of all of this evil acting against humanity,
and against which we seem to be powerless.
No one ever said I was great at writing in poetic, …, styles, btw. Well, they were right for never having said that.
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