More from Chris Eberle

Chris Eberle writes:

Just a quick note about Rob Vischer’s recent post.   I take it that Rob’s view  is that “the creation of the perception of imminent death” by way of “extreme physical suffering” is a sufficient condition of torture – waterboarding is torture because it does just that.  That doesn’t seem to be to be right.  After all, creating the perception (and reality) of imminent death by way of extreme physical suffering is what soldiers do to enemy combatants all the time, but killing, wounding and maiming enemy combatants isn’t torture.  Moreover, many American soldiers undergo waterboarding, during which the aim is to create the perception (without the reality) of imminent death by way of extreme physical suffering. But waterboarding is not torture in those cases, or, if it is, then it’s permissible torture.  Perhaps that’s why, as I was wandering through the hall here in Annapolis, it was hard to find someone who thinks waterboarding is torture.

Of course, that hardly settles the issue – we can’t rely on the expertise of military folks to determine whether we should engage in waterboarding if for no other reason than that they are divided on that matter.  For what it’s worth, I think that we ought not engage in that practice – that’s where my gut is – but it’s very difficult to specify what it is about that practice that’s so heinous.  Neither Rob’s post nor the editorial from the Armed Forces Journal helps remove that perplexity.

Readers might be interested, by the way, in this post of mine ("What Is 'Torture'?"), over at the Vox Nova blog, and also in the many interesting comments.