Sex at Dawn

I realize the use of sodium pentothal as a "truth serum" has been largely discounted except in spy fiction. (Its ability to weaken the resolve of a secret-keeper is dubious, and agents can be conditioned to resist it.) But does anything in international law preclude its use? If not, and injection of drugs for interrogation purposes is considered acceptable, might not ecstasy and other psychedelics already be part of the interrogation toolkit? I'm not endorsing these practices, just wondering out loud that they aren't already being (ab)used.

I realize you're talking about establishing trust and intimacy, but I'd be concerned that interrogators accustomed to electrodes and waterboarding would use a chemically induced tunnel into the psyche for purposes of ransacking, without concern about putting things away -- whether they find anything incriminating or not.

So how dangerous would be the abuse of MDMA as an interrogation tool? What could be the worst permanent/long-term effects of its misapplication? Psychic break, PTSD, etc. ?

I've admired your posts in the past, but your suggestion that the world's militaries be allowed to use psychedelics as an interrogation tool is patently offensive. As you already point out, the Israeli military regularly uses torture against Palestinian prisoners. The technique known as "Palestinian hanging," in which a prisoner has their arms placed behind their back and are then hung from the wrists to dislocate their shoulders, was later used by military interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison. The Canadian businessman Manadel al-Jamadi was killed under interrogation when US forces used this tactic after breaking his ribs. It may seem that using drugs instead would be a good alternative, except that it would only add new forms of psychological terror to an existing policy of physical terror.

You may not realize that the United States has already experimented with psychedelics with very damaging results. As the Church Committee Hearings of the 1970s revealed, the CIA and the military tested large amounts of LSD on unsuspecting GIs and other government employees. To cite one example, the CIA admitted giving LSD to Frank Olson, who later jumped from the 13th floor of his hotel, and later paid the Olson family $750,000 in compensation. When these experiments were exposed the public was justifiably outraged.

As a psychologist, you must know of the damage to the APA's reputation for the role that military psychologists played in harsh interrogation techniques at Abu Ghraib and CIA "black sites". Are you sure that you want to be publicly endorsing using hallucinogenic drugs against detainees in contravention of the APA's standard of ethics? I understand your interest to promote MDMA research, and I'm sure your advocacy is well intentioned. But your irresponsible suggestion that this research should be utilized in the torture chamber is, at best, ignorant of modern realities and, at worst, an example of professional misconduct. Either way, my respect for you has been seriously eroded.

Good questions, Jim, concerning possible long-term effects. I don't know the answers.

As to the concerns raised by Anonymous in Liquid Torture, I'm sorry your respect for me has been seriously eroded, but I'd suggest you might want to reread the post – especially the bit where I explicitly write that I'm not qualified to comment on the legality or ethics of using MDMA or other chemicals in such a context.

Furthermore, the use of MDMA would seem (unlike the LSD experiments you mentioned) unlikely to cause "psychological terror" in prisoners, precisely because of the anti-anxiety effects I mentioned.

In any case, I thought I was clear that it wasn't my intention to "endorse" anything. Like Jim, I suspect this is already happening and I think it's an interesting question as to whether it's better, worse, or equally bad as blasting loud music 24/7, sleep deprivation, or extended solitary confinement (see recent New Yorker article on U.S. prison system).

[To avoid further confusion, I've just added a paragraph to the post stating explicitly that I don't mean to advocate such techniques.]

As I understand it, a blog is a place for casual discussion of half-baked ideas. My apologies if you still found this one undercooked.

CPR

24 and the Republican Party, have been very
effective at promoting the idea that the purpose
of torture is to "get information".

But, if you look at history, torture has been used
extensively, but rarely to "get information".
Throughout history, dictators (i.e. Kings, Queens,
Emperors, Duce, etc) have used torture chiefly:

- to punish those who committed crimes against those
in power, or acted against those in power

- to frighten those who would consider committing crimes,
or acting against those in power

- to produce false confession and conspiracies on demand

- to provide fun and excitement for the thugs who
work for those in power

- public entertainment that feature extremely painful
public executions (drawn and quartered, skinned alive,
flogged to death)

Nowadays, in the U.S.A., torture as public entertainment
is the most common use (24, and numerous movies that
feature lots and lots of torture).

Torture to "get information" is just an excuse to torture
for other reasons. Finding a perfect "truth serum", or
painless interrogation method would unfortunately have
no effect since the torture-lovers would just argue
that *only* torture is effective.

More Reasons to Torture was certainly to the point. After reading Terry's comments, it seems clear that Bush/Cheney simply made the most of their opportunity to abuse power and inflict pain. The support they still command in certain circles speaks to the sorry state of the nation.