Among certain circles, including the American Psychological Association, we need more research on effective interrogation strategies. Many of us have been suspicious that these calls may cover the design of technologies that will create high-tech tools aiding abusive interrogations. In 2003, the APA sponsored, with the CIA and Rand Corp., a Science of Deception Workshop. CIA contractor torturers James Michell and Bruce Jessen were at this invitation-only conference, which discussed such topics as use of truth serums and the role of sensory overload in interrogations.
According to a press release from the Penn State University, bioethicist Jonathan Marks raises the specter of fMRI technology being used in ways that increase the likelihood of abuse. after all, if a high-tech tool suggests that someone is a “terrorist,” the potential for subjecting them to “harsh techniques” to get information from them is increased.
High-tech interrogations may promote abuse
There is evidence that brain imaging technology is being used to interrogate suspected terrorists despite concerns that it may not be reliable, and that it might inadvertently promote abuse of detainees, according to a Penn State researcher. He says the risk that such technology could license further abuse of detainees remains ever present, given President Bush’s March 8 veto of legislation that would have prohibited the CIA from conducting aggressive interrogations.
The technology - functional magnetic resonance imaging or fMRI - has been around since the 1990s. Neurosurgeons routinely use it to scan for brain tumors, and to diagnose and treat various disorders of the central nervous system.
But in recent times, fMRI has gained support from many in the intelligence community, who feel it could be a reliable tool in identifying terrorists from a group of suspects or detecting lies during an interrogation.
After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, military psychologists attached to intelligence units advised interrogators how to increase interrogation stressors and exploit detainees’ fears to make suspects talk, according to Jonathan Marks, associate professor of bioethics, humanities and law at Penn State.
“The problem is, if you apply pressure, people will say anything they think will make you stop. And that means anything they think you want to hear,” he said.
There are also reports that psychotropic drugs - so-called truth serums - have been administered. The use of brain imaging technologies appears to offer an alternative to such approaches.
The adoption of fMRI is not surprising given the limitations of other lie detection techniques such as a polygraph test, said Marks, whose analysis is published in a recent issue of the American Journal of Law and Medicine.
A polygraph relies on detecting accentuated signs of anxiety such as changes in skin conductance, heart rate, and respiration. But it is useless against sociopaths, and those trained to beat it. Counterintelligence experts also say the device is especially unreliable when questions and answers are translated with the help of an interpreter, as has been the case in Iraq.
Intelligence personnel believe fMRI could circumvent such limitations, and some commentators have argued that fMRI could render torture and interrogation obsolete. But Marks, who has critiqued the use of aggressive interrogation techniques in the war on terror, makes a case that “such claims are unfounded, and that the uncritical acceptance of fMRI as an interrogation tool could be potentially hazardous both to the health of the detainee and to the counterterrorism mission.”
Unlike a polygraph, an fMRI uses powerful magnetic fields to detect tiny changes in blood oxygen levels in the brain. Since active neurons take up more oxygen than inactive ones, these tiny changes are believed to be signatures of cognitive processes.
Some intelligence experts believe that fMRI can be used to detect deception, or to flag when a suspect recognizes (but may not wish to admit that he recognizes) the photograph or name of a suspected terrorist.
Marks, who also heads the Bioethics and Medical Humanities Program at Penn State’s University Park campus, finds the approach problematic. “There can be all sorts of reasons for recognizing a name or a photograph or for responding cognitively to a particular word,” he said. “I spent years living in London, listening to reports of IRA bombings. My brain would light up if you mentioned the word semtex (a plastic explosive).”
Interrogations that employ fMRI may also be making a considerable leap of faith. According to Marks, fMRI-based studies of lie detection have only been conducted on small groups of healthy people to examine changes in blood oxygen levels in the brain when they are lying in highly artificial laboratory settings. These results cannot be generalized, he argued, and should not be applied to terror suspects who have usually been detained in stressful circumstances and may have mental health issues that could clearly be exacerbated by their detention.
“MRI machines are very useful diagnostic tools but using them to claim that certain things are going on inside people’s minds is a major jump,” said Marks, who is also a research fellow and acting director of Penn State’s Rock Ethics Institute. Such a jump is a particularly dangerous one in the interrogation context, he argues.
The short duration of the test is another worry. According to the Penn State researcher, many neuroscientists argue that it could take many hours, even weeks, of testing with the suspect before getting accurate baseline readings.
Marks also argues that fMRI scans are open to broad interpretation, but they can produce seductively persuasive graphic images that provide a false sense of security and help create a narrative that may lead to aggressive interrogation tactics.
“One of the real concerns I have is that you can see how people can begin to say ‘the fMRI picked him out as a terrorist so let us give him a going over in the interrogation room,’ ” Marks explained. “Contrary to the view that fMRI will render torture obsolete, it might become a license for further abuse of detainees because its readings will convince people that they have a terrorist on their hands.”
The Penn State bioethicist says his view, which draws on the previously unpublished statements of an experienced U.S. interrogator, raises fundamental concerns about the use of fMRI either to detect deception or to flag recognition of a stimulus. If a terror suspect does recognize a certain stimulus, that person could be singled out for more aggressive interrogation.
March 19th, 2008
Psychologist Jean Maria and retired Counterintelligence operative David DeBatto have written a critique of the American Psychological Association 2007 resolution against torture and it’s February 2008 revision. Arrigo and Debatto discuss the concrete settings and circumstances that psychologists operate under when participating in interrogations. These settings and circumstances, Arrigo and DeBatto argue, preclude effective ethical oversight by the APA or any other outside organization.
For other comments on the February revision , see those by Brad Olson and myself; those by Valtin; and those by Steven Miles that I posted this morning.
An Intelligence Perspective on
the February 22, 2008, APA Modification of the August 19, 2007, APA Resolution on
Reaffirmation of the American Psychological Association Position Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and Its Application to Individuals Defined in the United States Code as “Enemy Combatants”
Jean Maria Arrigo, PhD
Project on Ethics and Art in Testimony
David DeBatto
U.S. Army Counterintelligence Operative (ret.)
March 19, 2008
The original June 2005 American Psychological Association (APA) policy on psychological ethics in national security (APA PENS Report) and the August 2007 Resolution have been strengthened by a February 22, 2008, vote of the APA Council of Representatives. The February 2008 Modification affirms international human rights law and proscribes psychologists’ participation in a list of known abusive interrogation techniques. From an intelligence perspective, however, the Modification is largely a symbolic moral gain, without direct effect on operations, as we explain below.
The February 2008 Modification states:
BE IT RESOLVED that this unequivocal condemnation [of torture] includes all techniques considered torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; the Geneva Conventions; the Principles of Medical Ethics Relevant to the Role of Health Personnel, Particularly Physicians, in the Protection of Prisoners and Detainees against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; the Basic Principles for the Treatment of Prisoners: or the World Medical Association Declaration of Tokyo. An absolute prohibition against the following techniques therefore arises from, is understood in the context of, and is interpreted according to these texts: mock executions; water-boarding or any other form of simulated drowning or suffocation; sexual humiliation; rape; cultural or religious humiliation; exploitation of fears, phobias or psychopathology; induced hypothermia; the use of psychotropic drugs or mind-altering substances; hooding; forced nakedness; stress positions; the use of dogs to threaten or intimidate; physical assault including slapping or shaking; exposure to extreme heat or cold; threats of harm or death; isolation; sensory deprivation and over-stimulation; sleep deprivation; or the threatened use of any of the above techniques to an individual or to members of an individual’s family. Psychologists are absolutely prohibited from knowingly planning, designing, participating in or assisting in the use of all condemned techniques at any time and may not enlist others to employ these techniques in order to circumvent this resolution’s prohibition. Like the earlier APA policy statements, the February 2008 Modification presumes the validity of psychologists’ roles in interrogations in national security settings, including settings where the conditions of detention violate human rights law. Similarly, the Modification points to no implementation, monitoring, or enforcement.-Violations of APA Ethics Code in civilian settings, in contrast, may be reported by victims or witnesses; and remedies are supported by the clinics, hospitals, schools, universities, and other institutions that embed civilian psychological practices.
Many institutional factors combine to defeat APA principles on interrogation in national security settings under the Bush Administration. We note four.
1. In intelligence operations, information is passed to participants strictly on a “need to know” basis. Inasmuch as the February 2008 Modification prohibits psychologists from “knowingly planning, designing, participating in or assisting in the use of all condemned techniques,” it is a simple matter to withhold morally relevant information from psychologists and to provide cover stories. Indeed, intelligence professionals consider psychologists easy to manipulate because psychologists’ principles and habits render them predictable, because they become attached to their projects, and because they tend to be ambitious in their national security careers. In a recent Associated Press interview, Col. Larry James, twice commander of the Behavioral Science Consultation Teams (BSCTs) at Guantanamo Bay, stated: “I learned a long, long time ago, if I’m going to be successful in the intel community, I’m meticulously-in a very, very dedicated way- going to stay in my lane…. So if I don’t have a specific need to know about something, I don’t want to know about it. I don’t ask about it” (Selsky, 2008).
2. The vast majority of psychologists in contact with detainees are junior officers who owe service in exchange for educational scholarships (Bennett, 2007). For example, the U.S. Army offers full tuition and a living allowance to prospective psychologists in exchange for one year of service for each year of graduate school, with extra service required for internships (U.S. Army, 2008) A psychologist who reneges on service must repay educational expenses.
3. Regardless of rank, a psychologist is a staff officer, not a commander, and he or she must obey the field commander of whatever rank. For example, suppose Colonel Smith diagnoses Private Jones, under combat operations in Baghdad, with a severe case of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Smith writes a medical order for Jones to be sent immediately to the U.S. for treatment of his PTSD. The combat commander, Captain Adams, countermands Smith’s medical order, stating: “Private Jones is necessary for continued combat operations in and around the Baghdad area of operations,” as well as, “this brigade is chronically undermanned in Private Jones’s MOS (Military Occupational Specialty).” The combatant commander’s orders will always take precedence over a medical order, especially in a combat theater of operations such as Afghanistan or Iraq.
4. The role of interrogation consultant is only one of many roles in which psychologists can facilitate abusive interrogations. For example, a U.S. Army Sergeant with over 20 years of service witnesses what he considers to be the blatant torture and abuse of Iraqi detainees by his fellow Army intelligence personnel. The sergeant reports the abuse up the chain of command. The company commander, not wanting to disgrace his command by reports of torture, orders the sergeant to be interviewed by the unit “Combat Stress Counselor,” an army clinical psychologists. The company commander instructs the psychologist to insure that her report on the sergeant shows him to be “mentally unstable” and “delusional, and his allegations of abuse and torture “without basis in fact”-otherwise, the psychologist’s career is in jeopardy. The counselor therefore diagnoses the sergeant as delusional and has him sent involuntarily to an army mental ward in Germany for an undetermined length of time (DeBatto, 2004). A recent study of district surgeons in apartheid South Africa outlined the institutional mechanisms of complicity in abusive interrogations (Gready, 2007). These mechanisms include selection of cooperative health professionals, security clearance, and oath of secrecy; the “culture of obedience”; “professional isolation,” “fear of the consequences of dissent” (p. 418); the presence of third parties, such as interpreters and security personnel, during treatment (p. 420); “blurring of the division between custodial and clinical staff”; scheduling of patient visits according to the convenience of detention authorities; and so on. A system ostensibly designed to safeguard the detainees thus becomes a system to protect and legitimize the authorities (p. 428).
APA policy ignores the institutional context of psychologists in detention centers. Rather, it addresses psychologists in national security settings as morally autonomous agents serving as independent consultants. This view conforms to the military “virtue ethic” of officership, that is, the belief that individual character is the basis of conduct. The virtue ethic is inspirational for officer training and as an individual guide to conduct. But military ethicists have warned that, “The focus on character may prevent leaders from taking a critical look at the institutions they lead and thereby ensure that morally corrupting rules, structures, and systems remain” (Robinson, 2007, p. 31). In any case, the APA model of the morally autonomous psychologist, “absolutely prohibited from knowingly planning, designing, participating in or assisting in the use of all condemned techniques,” defies the classic empirical social psychological studies on conformity and obedience (Asch, Milgram, Zimbardo), as well as the recent findings on self-control in demanding situations (Baumeister, 2008).
In further disregard of psychological realism, APA policymakers have not inquired into the opinions of senior interrogators concerning the value of psychologists in interrogations. The several senior U.S. Army interrogators whom we have consulted state that they do not want the assistance of psychologists in interrogations. Col. Steve Kleinman, a 30-year veteran interrogator often cited on other matters by APA, stated this clearly during his 2007 APA Convention presentation (Kleinman, 2007). Nor do psychologists serve to raise the moral level of interrogations overall. According to these interrogators, psychologists’ efforts are misplaced in “softening up” detainees for novice interrogators and for extralegal, untrained amateurs. Instead, psychologists should direct their efforts toward selection of interrogation trainees and preparation of novice interrogators for superior, nonabusive, methods of interrogation. These methods require social perception, tolerance, cultural sensitivity, cognitive complexity, flexible thinking, situational awareness, and self-control (McCauley, 2007; Arrigo & Bennett, 2007). The proper mentor for a novice interrogator is not a psychologist but a senior interrogator. A senior interrogator needing consultation will ordinarily prefer another senior interrogator, as a psychotherapist will prefer consultation with another psychotherapist. Moreover, psychologists, who greatly outrank interrogators, easily interfere with the dynamics of the interrogator-source relationship (Bennett, 2007).
Patriotic psychologists could contribute ethically to the effectiveness of interrogation by taking the “expert-performance approach” articulated by cognitive psychologists. The same training requirements detailed by senior interrogators (McCauley, 2007; Arrigo & Bennett, 2007) are found in many other domains of measurable expertise, such as chess and musicianship (Ericsson & Ward, 2007): “10 years of intense preparation-even for the most ‘talented’,” “training situations with immediate valid feedback,” “deliberate practice…in maintaining expertise.” and so on (pp. 346 & 349). Recent cognitive research (Baumeister, Vohs, & Tice) also shows how various forms of self-control and initiative that are essential to effective interrogation-decision making, choice, creative problem solving, management of emotions, etc.- are quickly depleted through use. Indeed, “there are levels of depletion beyond which people may be unable to control themselves effectively, regardless of what is at stake” (p. 353). A senior interrogator gave this example: “In the high-adrenaline raid of a terrorist safe house, the direct interrogation approach of Special Forces may be to kick the captive in the head and then ask his name” (Arrigo & Bennett, 2007, p. 418). Scientific psychologists could research and promote the expert-performance approach to interrogation deemed effective by senior interrogators (McCauley, 2007). They could assist interrogators in establishing the necessary training programs and in securing resources (Arrigo & Bennett, 2007). Where is the APA opposition to the use of 18-year-old interrogators with 16 weeks of training and no professional mentorship?
Instead, the February 2008 Modification continues to accommodate interrogation practices championed by the Bush Administration; it leaves psychologists in place for the unethical and counterproductive purpose of destabilizing detainees through aversive techniques. But the Modification covers these psychologists with yet grander-still unoperationalized- ethical principles. In this way, APA contributes to the degradation and ineffectiveness of the armed services and intelligence agencies. Intelligence professionals are least of all deceived by high principles that have not been operationalized.
A truly significant Modification to the June 2005 APA PENS Report and August 2007 APA Resolution would add these requirements:
Psychologists, their trainees, and supervisees may serve only in detention sites where international human rights law is observed.
The American Psychological Association requests the Department of Defense to amend the U.S. Army Field Manual for Interrogation to: (a) prohibit military psychologists or their trainees or supervisees from participating in any phase of interrogations, including the review of a detainee’s medical files for use in an interrogation; (b) impose severe penalties for commanding officers who violate this regulation by way of coercion and/or threats against a psychologist or their trainees or supervisees; (c) train psychologists to submit written complaints through their chain of command to the Office of the Army Inspector General against any commanding officers who attempt to involve them in interrogations or to influence their mental health assessments of patients; (d) inform psychologists of the implications of their research or clinical work in regard to interrogations; (e) prohibit destruction, or concealment from legitimate investigation, any evidence of psychologists’ involvement in interrogations.
The American Psychological Association requests all other national security agencies and government contractors who employ or fund psychologists, their trainees, or supervisees to enact effective, corresponding regulations.
The obstacle to such requirements has been hidden financial interests. The APA’s effective refusal to assist and legitimize abusive interrogations under the Bush Administration would jeopardize the APA’s vigorous lobbying efforts for Department of Defense funding (see APA Science Policy Insider News, 2002-2007). These financial interests were represented by the participation of unacknowledged, high-level APA lobbyists in the original APA PENS Report (Arrigo, 2007). To turn the tide against psychologists’ participation in coercive interrogations we assert that APA lobbying efforts should be conducted transparently, with input from military ethicists as well as the general APA membership.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Ray Bennett, U.S. Army Interrogator (ret’d), and to Stephen Soldz for critical reviews and additional information.
References
American Psychological Association Science Policy Insider News. (2002-2007). Online newsletter. Available at: http://www.apa.org/ppo/spin/1102.html.
Arrigo, Jean Maria. (2007, August). A counterintelligence perspective on PENS task force process. Symposium on ethics and interrogations: Confronting the challenge. Presented to the Convention of the American Psychological Association, San Francisco, CA.
Arrigo, Jean Maria, & Bennett, Ray. (2007). Organizational supports for abusive interrogations in “The War on Terror.” In Torture Is for Amateurs, special issue of Peace and Conflict, 13 (4): 411-421.
Baumeister, Roy F. (2008). Free will in scientific psychology. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3 (1): 14-19.
Baumeister, Roy F., Vohs, Kathleen D., & Tice, Dianne M. (2007). The strength model of self-control. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 16 (6): 351-358.
Bennett, Ray. (2007, January 21). Involvement of medical professionals in military and intelligence interrogations-Operational issues. Telephone interview conducted by J.M. Arrigo. Intelligence Ethics Collection, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.
DeBatto, David. (2004, December 8). Whitewashing torture? Salon.com. On-line periodical: http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2004/12/08/coverup/index.html.
Ericsson, K. Anders, & Ward, Paul. (2007). Capturing the naturally occurring superior performance of experts in the laboratory: Toward a science of expert and exceptional performance. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 16 (6): 346-350.
Gready, Paul. (2007). Medical complicity in human rights abuses: A case study of district surgeons in apartheid South Africa. Journal of Human Rights, 6: 415-432.
Kleinman, Steve. (2007, August). What are Psychologists doing in U.S. Military Detention Centers? Symposium on ethics and interrogations: Confronting the challenge. Presented to the Convention of the American Psychological Association, San Francisco, CA.
McCauley, Clark. (2007). Toward a social psychology of professional military interrogations. In Torture Is for Amateurs, special issue of Peace and Conflict, 13 (4): 399-410.Robinson, Paul. (2007). Ethics training and development in the military. Parameters: US Army War College Quarterly, 37 (1): 4-22.
Selsky, Andrew O. (2008, February 6). AP confirms secret camp inside Gitmo. [Associated press writer]. Guardian.co.uk. Available at http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-7288144,00.html. [Accessed March 16, 2008].
U.S. Army. (2008). Health Professionals Scholarship Program. Available at: http://www.goarmy.com/amedd/docs/hpsp.pdf. [Accessed March 12, 2008].
March 19th, 2008
Abu Ghraib MP Lyndie England was interviewed by the German magazine Stern [in English on their web site]. The interview provides further evidence of the ongoing nature of the abuses at Abu Ghraib and of the collusion of higher-ups in those abuses. It also provides suggestions that waterboarding may have gone on there.
Remember, England and the others were only charged for taking or participating in the photographs. No one was ever charged for committing the abuses at Abu Ghraib. This is undoubtedly because such a prosecution would have opened up the responsibility, right up the Chain of Command for these abuses, from military intelligence and the CIA to the Secretary of Defense and the President.
Here are a few highlights of her account:
The abuse started under the previous company.If true, this constitutes further evidence that the abuse was countenanced and planned:
The company that we relieved was doing the exact same stuff. We just took over from them.
Was Graner already a part of that?
There was a three-week ride-a-long where two of our guys would work with two of their guys to get to know the ropes and during those three weeks Graner would tell me how they were doing this and that.
What do you mean by “this and that”?
Pushing them around, stripping them down, putting them in stress positions, yelling at them.
And:
The torturers and the politicians who are responsible for their actions are getting away with it. Does that make you angry?
Yeah, I think they used us because the unit that was there before us, the 72nd MP Company, was pretty much doing the same things we were. Only they weren’t documenting it. I’m pretty sure that it was the same at other prisons. Only there are no pictures.
The intelligence staff were shown the photographs and said “Great job!”:
How did you react when Graner told you how the detainees were being treated?
Of course it was wrong. I know that now. But when you show the people from the CIA, the FBI and the MI the pictures and they say, “Hey, this is a great job. Keep it up”, you think it must be right. They were all there and they didn’t say a word. They didn’t wear uniforms, and if they did they had their nametags covered.
Which photos did Graner present to them?
All of them. He showed them on his laptop. He’d say, “Hey, let me show you this, this is what we’re supposed to be doing.” And they said, “Yeah, we got great results, keep it up, you’re doing a good job.” He actually got a letter of commendation for the stuff he did.
And:
Why did the people from the intelligence units allow photos to be taken?
I don’t know. They never said, “Hey, you’re not supposed to be taking pictures.” I never heard them say that at all. They never even said, “Don’t get caught.” Everybody knew what was going on. Once they heard there were pictures, they wanted to see. Graner started making copies on floppy disks or memory sticks. And he didn’t even want money from them. So they took it and they showed it to their buddies and their buddies wanted a copy and so on and so on. And the hearsay around was that it was okay. It was approved by MI and the OGA.
Military intelligence and other intell staff gave orders for the MPs to “soften up” the prisoners, including the use of sleep deprivation, nakedness, and hypothermia:
Who told you to soften the prisoners up for interrogation?
The OGA and MI-guys…
…the Other Government Agencies, meaning CIA and FBI…
Don’t ask me their names because I don’t know. They always spoke to Graner directly.
And what was the term they used?
“Soften em up.” “We’re trying to get information out of this guy and he hasn’t been cooperating for so many days.” So they would give us instructions on sleep deprivation, on what we could feed them, and if they wanted them to be naked, we would be told to take their mattress and blankets away so they’re sleeping on the cold floor. After the end of October it gets pretty damned cold.
Some type of abuse occurred in the showers which led detainees to scream. England believes there may have been waterboarding going on in there:
Did you do any water boarding?
No, I didn’t. And I didn’t witness it. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t done. Because a lot of the time the interrogators would take the prisoners into the showers and close the doors and we would have to put like sheets or blankets up over the windows. We could hear what was going on but we couldn’t see.
You heard screams?
Yeah. Sometimes.
The missing photographs may show detainees being bitten by dogs:
There is talk about new pictures that are even harsher than the ones we know.
I know there were some harsher pictures they had at the time of the trial that the media decided not to expose.
What was on those pictures?
You see the dogs biting the prisoners. Or you see bite marks from the dogs. You can see MPs holding down a prisoner so a medic can give him a shot. If those had been made public at the time, then the whole world would have looked at those and not at mine.
England believes that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld was well aware of what was occurring at Abu Ghraib:
The former Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, called you and your colleagues the “rotten apples” of the military. Bush claimed to be ashamed of what you did.
Well, back then I thought: How can they say that when it was happening all over Iraq. The same thing is happening in Guantanamo now and other places. We knew that our officers knew about it and our sergeants. We thought if they know then somebody else knows. And I really do still think that Rumsfeld knew what was going on. I mean he had been there while I was there at that prison. And if he was there I know he knew what was going on. How could he have not known? And Bush? He’s the headman.
Read the whole interview here.
March 19th, 2008