News and Views

I have to side with John McCain and the majority of the Senate in supporting the anti-torture bill. As a civilized country, I don’t think we have any business torturing anyone.

However, I can think of situations where I might waver. What if we have incontestable evidence that there is a plan to detonate a nuclear weapon in Phoenix, and we have someone in custody who could tell us enough to stop the attack if we could only get the information out of him. Is it OK to torture this one person, in order to save tens or hundreds of thousands of lives?

Shade the situation a little grayer. We have evidence that there is a plan to detonate somewhere a conventional bomb (but we’re not sure), and we have somebody who might well know something about it, but maybe not. Maybe he is innocent. Can we torture him?

Then make it even grayer. We are in a “war with terrorists.” There are undoubtedly plans being developed to kill Americans. Some of the people in custody might know something about some plan somewhere. Can we torture them all on the chance that we will gain some useful information from one of them? This will undoubtedly result in many innocent people being tortured.

But is this really so much different from what we despised Sadam Hussein for, retaining and torturing large numbers of people, many of them innocent of any crime, because we might find a real enemy in this way?

These are some of the questions that make the whole situation complex.

I remember visiting the Tower of London, and hearing the guides discussing some of the tortures and punishments that were routinely carried out there. We think back on how barbaric they were, just a few hundred years ago, and how far we have risen above their level. There are still forces in the world and in our country trying to pull us back down into that barbaric pit. The United States as the only world superpower has to set an example, putting human rights and compassion above vengeance and perfect security.

Benjamin Franklin’s quote has been repeated so much lately that it is almost trite, but I think it still stands up. To paraphrase, “Those who would sacrifice freedom for security, will gain neither”.