Psyche, Science, and Society

APA and torture identified as one of most ignored stories of the year

Every year the 25 most ignored stories are identified. thi year, the APA position on torture [now being changed through member pressure] is #10 on the list:

10. APA Helps CIA Torture

Psychologists have been assisting the CIA and the U.S. military with interrogation and torture of Guantanamo detainees—which the American Psychological Association has said is fine—in spite of objections from many of its 148,000 members.

A 10-member APA task force convened on the divisive issue in July 2005 and found that assistance from psychologists was making the interrogations safe and they deferred to American standards on torture over international human-rights definitions.

The group was criticized by APA members for deliberating in secret, and later it was revealed that six of the 10 had ties to the armed services. Not only that, but as Katherine Eban reported in Vanity Fair, “Psychologists, working in secrecy, had actually designed the tactics and trained interrogators in them while on contract to the CIA.”

In particular, psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, neither of whom are APA members, honed a classified military training program known as SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape), which teaches soldiers how to tough out torture if captured by enemies. “Mitchell and Jessen reverse-engineered the tactics inflicted on SERE trainees for use on detainees in the global war on terror,” wrote Eban.

And, as Mark Benjamin noted in a Salon.com article, employing SERE training—which is designed to replicate torture tactics that don’t abide by Geneva Conventions standards—refutes past administration assertions that current CIA torture techniques are safe and legal. “Soldiers undergoing SERE training are subject to forced nudity, stress positions, lengthy isolation, sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation, exhaustion from exercise and the use of water to create a sensation of suffocation,” Benjamin wrote.

Eban’s story outlined how SERE tactics were spun as “science,” despite a void of data and many criticisms that building rapport works better than blows to the head. Specifically, it’s been misreported that CIA torture techniques got al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah to talk, when it was actually FBI rapport-building. In spite of this, the SERE techniques became standards in interrogation manuals that eventually made their way to U.S. officers guarding Abu Ghraib.

Ongoing uproar within the APA resulted in a petition to make an official policy limiting psychologist involvement in interrogations. On Sept. 17, a majority of 15,000 voting members approved a resolution stating that psychologists may not work in settings where “persons are held outside of, or in violation of, either International Law (e.g., the U.N. Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions) or the U.S. Constitution (where appropriate), unless they are working directly for the persons being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights.”

Sources: “The CIA’s Torture Teachers,” Mark Benjamin, Salon.com, June 21, 2007; “Rorschach and Awe,” Katherine Eban, Vanity Fair, July 17, 2007.

Add comment October 2nd, 2008

Jane Mayer: Could unreleased documents change public opinion?

In the TPMCafe discussion of Jane Mayer’s book, she has a new contribution in which she discusses so-far unreleased documents that might, just might, substantially change public opinion till the public demands accountability for US torture:

Explosive Documents: A Question of Evidence

By Jane Mayer

I agree that at the bottom of it all, the stumbling block to accountability is the complicity of the American public - AT THE MOMENT. But call me naïve, because I think that public opinion could shift if the next administration released certain explosive documents. The case of Abu Ghraib has hammered home the cliché about a picture being worth a hundred words. Humbling though it is for a writer, nothing written has matched the impact of those photographs. The international revulsion they stirred forced President Bush to publicly denounce them, and for the first time, call for some kind of investigation and punishment. As Eric Umansky and others have noted, it was only when President Bush acknowledged that a scandal had taken place, that the mainstream media - including network television news shows — reacted as if something was wrong.

The CIA clearly understood the potential power of incriminating pictures, which is why they destroyed them. I am told that if the CIA’s videotapes of Muslim detainees being waterboarded were seen by the public, the international political reaction would have been, as one former CIA office put it, “unmanageable.” It was bad enough watching Hitch sputtering away. So- this brings me to the question of other photographic evidence. What’s still in the federal cupboard?

Practically every detainee has described being photographed, often naked, with particular attention to their wounds. Presumably at least some of those photographs exist somewhere. In addition, there are numerous descriptions of videotapes other than those of the waterboarding, that were destroyed. The “High Value Detainees” held by the CIA describe constant closed-circuit surveillance. Presumably some was taped. Is it possible that none of these tapes were kept? There is also the interesting question of the frequent video-conferencing done by top administration officials. I am told by a presidential archivist that it is unclear at the moment whether those videotapes are required to be turned over, under the presidential records act. They include high-level conversations between the White House officials and top officials down in Guantanamo, about what to do with the detainees. They also include discussions with Cheney, speaking from his undisclosed remote locations. There were numerous discussions between Washington and Iraq and Afghanistan as well. In Watergate, the tapes were everything. In the Iran-Contra Affair, an early email system was how Oliver North got caught. It certainly would be worth knowing what is on those video-conference reels, and, where they are.

There are written documents too that might impact public opinion. One former Bush Administration official tells me that it is impossible for people to imagine the destructive power of the interrogation and detention program without actually reading the details. Among the documents believed to contain these details, in vivid color, are the report by the International Committee of the Red Cross spelling out what the CIA’s 14 high value detainees (now in Guantanamo) described having gone through. As far as I know, this report is NOT classified. It could conceivably be made public by future administration officials, if they choose to. Additionally, there are several internal investigative reports that were done by the CIA’s inspector general, which are said to be horrifying. They probably wouldn’t have the impact of photographs, but they certainly would make a lot clearer to the American public, what is meant by the euphemism, “enhanced” interrogation methods. There is also the still-secret specific list of authorized techniques, and numerous other Justice Department documents, not yet publicly available.

So, I agree that at the moment, there is not an overwhelming call for accountability inside America. But I also think that many Americans still don’t really understand what happened in this program. If they did, I think there would be a much stronger reaction. The question is whether the public will see the evidence before it goes the way of those videotapes…

PS: I’d be interested in what’s on others’ wish lists, in terms of documentary evidence that the public should someday see.

1 comment October 2nd, 2008

PHR on APA letter to Bush

Physicians for Human Rights has released the following statement on today’s dramatic letter from APA President Kazdin to President Bush, calling for removing psychologists from the illegal detention centers:

PHR Salutes APA’s Ban on Psychologists at Illegal US Interrogations

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Media Contacts:

Nathaniel Raymond
nraymond [at] phrusa [dot] org

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Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) CEO Frank Donaghue congratulates American Psychological Association (APA) President Alan E. Kazdan, PhD, who wrote to President George W. Bush on October 2 to inform him of a significant change in APA policy that limits the roles of psychologists at illegal U.S. detention facilities, such as Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and CIA black sites overseas, where systematic torture has occurred.

Cambridge, MA. (PRWEB) October 2, 2008 - “APA’s announcement today is a historic victory for medical ethics and human rights,” said Physicians for Human Rights CEO Frank Donaghue. “PHR salutes the APA for telling President Bush that psychologists can no longer serve at illegal US facilities that violate the Constitution and international human rights standards. This dramatic policy reversal represents a massive transformation by an organization that has until now encouraged members to assist interrogations of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and CIA black sites overseas.”

The Association’s policy reversal was driven by a first-of-its-kind referendum, pushed by a reform movement among its members, with PHR’s active support. PHR has been campaigning since 2005 for the APA to end psychologists’ participation in U.S. national security interrogations. Government and press reports have confirmed that military and intelligence psychologists were central to the design, implementation, and supervision of the Bush administration’s regime of psychological and physical torture.

“The Pentagon and the CIA must now abide by the APA’s new policy and immediately cease employing psychologists as part of detainee interrogations,” stated Donaghue. “The Bush Administration’s interrogation policies have inflicted grievous damage to the core principles of medical ethics and the rule of law. The APA’s statement today is a watershed moment in the fight to stop psychologists from being used to cause harm and return them to their appropriate role as healers.”

The Department of Defense is expected this month to review the operational guidance for BSCTs (Behavioral Science Consultation Teams), which use mental health professionals in detainee interrogations—an application which violates international standards of health professional ethics. PHR has led the public and behind-the-scenes effort to shut down the BSCT program.

“While today is a proud day for the APA and its membership, the APA must now act to permanently prohibit direct participation by psychologists in interrogations and to ensure those psychologists who engaged in abuse and torture are held to account,” said Donaghue. “The APA has taken a tremendous step forward but has not yet reached the ethical standards of the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association, organizations which have banned direct participation by physicians in all interrogations. Also, the APA has not yet specified what rights abuses would render a detention facility illegal under its new policy.”

Add comment October 2nd, 2008

APA writes President Bush: Psychologists do not belong in the illegal detention centers

In a MAJOR development today, APA President Alan Kazdin wrote President Bush to inform him of the new APA policy from the referendum passed two weeks ago:

“The effect of this new policy is to prohibit psychologists from any involvement in interrogations or any other operational procedures at detention sites that are in violation of the U.S. Constitution or international law (e.g., the Geneva Conventions and the U.N. Convention Against Torture),”

The full letter is available here.

This is a truly wonderful development! We have worked for years for this day and should all be proud. And President Kazdin deserves credit for stepping up and doing the right thing.

We have many struggles ahead of us, for investigation of the roles of psychologists in detainee abuse, for accountability, for implementing the AMA/A Psychiatric A policy removing psychologists from all detainee interrogations, and for changes within the APA to prevent a recurrence when the next crisis hits.

But today is truly a day of celebration. A few highly principled people stood up and changed history. We should be proud and the APA should be proud.

Add comment October 2nd, 2008