Oh, forgot to put in that last post of mine.

Don the reasoning outlined in your post of 18 Apr 08 - 01:51 p.m., has got more holes in it than a collander.

Ticking bomb scenario, with the mind-set of the current terrorists:

You are onboard an aircraft mid-Atlantic, mid-Pacific. You are informed that there is a bomb onboard and the identity of the person who has it is known. You have one hour to extract the location of the bomb and instructions how to disarm it.

Under those circumstances anyone onboard that aircraft who says that they would have qualms about any means of interrogation used, or think twice about what they had to do to get that information is a liar. I would venture to guess under such circumstances, whether successful or not, you and the "terrorist" are all in the same boat, you do nothing and you are going to die for certain, attempt to forcefully interrogate the "terrorist" and you stand a chance of surviving, it is the only option realistically open to you and you do want to live.

Now Don the holes in your hypothetical scenario, which you laid out as follows:

Part 1:
"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."

Well those Al-Qaeda members who have been interrogated so far must have passed on some information of worth judging by the number of senior operational figures rolled-up to date and the number of operations that have been exposed. By the bye Don as to the mind-set of the terrorists Kahlid Sheik Mohammed has got no more desire to enter paradise than Osama bin Laden or any of the other leaders of the jihadist terrorist groups, they're the fat-cats who get their lieutenants to con others into carrying-out the attacks, they would never dream of carrying them out themselves.

Part 2:
"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."

In your scenario neither the interrogator or the terrorist is in danger, unless of course you both happen to be in Washington, D. C., but you did not state that.

You also ommit to provide detail as to how the terrorist came to be in your hands, but you imply that it is known that he, "was in on the plot", therefore you were not running blind, you were "on to him", you must have had more information - this bit is important.

Part 3:
"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."

Thumb-screws, waterboarding, electric shocks, naw just, "sit him down with his bags off slap his toger and in a floury bap with a pork chop bring in a Cocker Spaniel and shout "lunchtime Fido". Your description has hallmarks of Hollywood. What is wrong with it is this:

- In all probability your terrorist has not been trained to withstand interrogation.

- You as interrogator however know full well that he will try to resist, he will try to delay, he will try to mislead.

- From the minute that he has been caught, he is robbed of any means of knowing the time, he has no idea of how long he has to hold out, you as interrogator make sure of that.

- You must have had some knowledge, some information, from some source, that led to his capture. It had to be something that he was completely unaware of otherwise he would not have been caught.

- So you question him about some aspect of his capture, something that know the answer to, but he does not. He will resist, he will try to delay, he will try to mislead, but you know the answer that you are looking for, so you continue until finally you get the correct answer. You as interrogator have broken your man you now know his threshold.

- Only then do you ask him about the bomb.

Part 4:
"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."

Knows he's dead meat? Not in the slightest Don, he wasn't intending to die in the attack, it wasn't part of the plan was it? At least not as described in your scenario. Not wishing to point out the obvious flaw in your arguement Don if he is not only willing to die, but as eager to die as you suggest he would have been standing guard by the bomb, not swanning around getting caught many miles distant. And that is where the Cocker Spaniel, the floury Bap and the Pork Chop come into play- Any devout muslim who engages in bestiality involving the eating of pork ain't buying a first-class ticket to anywhere, least of all Allah's favour, and is not bound for Paradise.