The Daily Background

There is a myth, proagated by the Administration and almost exclusively unchallenged by the media, that so-called ‘torture lite’ techniques which the Administration has approved for use on ‘unlawful enemy combatants’ don’t run the risk of causing permenent injury or death to the victim. I’m working on a longer piece about human rights violations in the “War on Terror,” but below is a sneak preview of two relevant sections that, I hope, would dispell such myths. The section below references a memo signed by SecDef Donald Rumsfeld, approving various torture methods. Anyways, I hope to have the full piece I’m working on published in Truthout by the end of the month, or if not I’ll publish it here.

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…Among the other techniques the memo sought approval for was something called ‘waterboarding.’ Though the memo did its best to describe the practice in the most vague, inoffensive terms possible (“Use of a wet towel and dripping water to induce the misperception of suffocation”), the technique is extremely dangerous and controversial. Former CIA officers and anonymous governmental sources procedure as a horrific ordeal, in which a victim’s legs and arms are strapped to a tilted bench so that their head is below the rest of their body. They are then restrained by interrogators who place a piece fabric or light plastic over their nose and pour water over their heads. The process severely limits or cuts off the victim’s supply of oxygen. As such, it can cause permanent injury to the lungs as well as brain damage. According to Human Rights Watch, the technique can even be lethal. According to one report, hardened CIA operatives can only endure an average of 14 seconds of the technique during counter-interrogation training.

Obviously the this technique is banned under US domestic law as well as all sorts of international human rights statues which the United States is a party to- the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), UN Convention Against Torture (CAT), the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), and the Geneva Convention to name but a few. More than that: the US State Department considers the procedure a war crime. Shortly after World War II, it was determined that a Japanese officer had participated in waterboarding an American citizen. He was subsequently sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. President Bush has personally approved this technique as an acceptable interrogation practice in his “War on Terror.” And it’s been used against “unlawful enemy combatants.”

[…]
Another type of interrogation technique affectionately dubbed by Administration officials as “Torture Lite” used in the so-called “War on Terror” is called “Cold Cell.” Cold Cell is actually the nickname for a technique which would be more appropriately referred to as “Induced Hypothermia.” The technique, which is done in several different manners, is to essentially reduce a UEC’s body temperature to the point where they are in extreme physical pain and feel the effects of hypothermia. That is, if they can feel anything at all. The theory is that they will then be more willing to share secret information helpful to the United States as part of the “War on Terror.” That is, if they are able to say anything at all at afterwards.

One manner in which this technique is done is sending a naked detainee out in the rain on a cold day. Call that the low-budget way. Other applications of Cold Cell involve an actual cell that is actually cold (below 50 degrees, usually). The UEC is then periodically splashed with cold water over a period of hours. The most sophisticated and brutally efficient manner in which the induced hypothermia technique is conducted is by the Navy SEALS, according to one former US Army interrogator. The UEC is placed in a tub which is then filled with ice and cold water until the detainee’s body head is dramatically and dangerously reduced. As with normal hypothermia, the victim’s bodies become numb and they are unable to control movement as they shake violently and eventually become stiff. President Bush, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales have all personally approved this technique, which is banned under international law and would never be legally admissible in the United States.

Filed under: Human Rights, Z-TDB Blog