I just heard an interview on the radio with a woman had been in the Army for twenty years and who spent her last several years of government service in the State Department. A few years ago, she resigned in disgust when she could no longer tolerated the disparity between what the State Department knew leading up to the Iraq war and what the public was being told. When the interviewer pointed out that the United States has not undergone a terrorist attack since 9/11, she responded, "Despite the much touted 'protective measures,' many of which involving erosion of civil rights, this country is so porous that terrorists could attack us any time they want. But they don't need to. They are sitting back and watching with satisfaction as this country destroys itself." [She has a book just out, and I tried to get her name and the title of the book, but the radio station's web site is temporarily off-line. As soon as it's back, I'll post it.]

Apart from the moral issue, there is the question of whether or not torture is an effective way of extracting accurate information. Especially with the mid-set of the current terrorists, it obviously is not. Let's take the standard scenario that many advocates of torture present:    A nuclear bomb has been planted in a major city and is set to go off in a very few hours. We have captured a terrorist who was in on the plot and knows where the bomb is located. Of course, he refuses to say what city it's in and where it is within that city.

So we apply the thumb-screws. Literally. Waterboarding, electric shock to the genitals, whatever strikes the torturers sadistic fancy. AHA! Success! He blurts out that the bomb is in New York City, and he gives the exact location.   We make a quick phone call and a team of specialists rushes to the location.

Just as they discover that there is nothing there, Washington, D. C. goes up in a horrendous fireball.

The terrorist knows that he's dead meat anyway. And when he is not just willing to die for his cause, but eager to do so because he believes it assures him a place in Paradise, he sits back and laughs. No matter what they do to him now, he has just bought himself a first-class ticket to Allah's favor and a state of Eternal Bliss.

Those who are willing to commit mass murder to achieve their ends are beyond the pale. Less than human. There are very effective ways of dealing with terrorism that the leaders of our country are simply unwilling to try because it means drastic changes in our foreign policy. But for the sake of this discussion, that's another matter.

Those who torture, those who authorize torture, those who defend it, and those who just prefer to look the other way are also less than human. I have nothing but the greatest disgust and contempt for terrorists and torturers alike.

Don Firth