James Risen reports today that the American Psychological Association secretly bolstered the Bush Administration's torture program at a time when it was in serious trouble. This secret involvement is now part of an independent investigation which will bring about more revelations when it is complete.
The report is the first to examine the association’s role in the interrogation program. It contends, using newly disclosed emails, that the group’s actions to keep psychologists involved in the interrogation program coincided closely with efforts by senior Bush administration officials to salvage the program after the public disclosure in 2004 of graphic photos of prisoner abuse by American military personnel at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
Risen also reports from critics who contend that certain members of the profession got too close to their subjects, compromising their objectivity:
To emphasize their argument that the association grew too close to the interrogation program, the critics’ new report cites a 2003 email from a senior psychologist at the C.I.A. to a senior official at the psychological association. In the email, the C.I.A. psychologist appears to be confiding in the association official about the work of James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, the private contractors who developed and helped run the enhanced interrogation program at the C.I.A.’s secret prisons around the world.
In the email, written years before the involvement of the two contractors in the interrogation program was made public, the C.I.A. psychologist explains to the association official that the contractors “are doing special things to special people in special places.”
The APA allowed the Bush administration to engage in cruel and unusual punishment in Iraq, undermining the Bush administration's claim that they were there to spread freedom to the Iraqi people. In reality, both President Bush and Vice President Cheney wanted to go to Iraq for their own personal reasons. Mr. Bush wanted to go to Iraq to settle a personal score with Saddam Hussein, who he believed responsible for an assassination attempt on his father during the mid 1990's; this is a claim he made during an interview while he was running for President in the 2000 election and a claim that he repeated in his book "Decision Points." Mr. Cheney wanted to go to Iraq to further his business interests; he had served as CEO of Halliburton.
Today is the 70th anniversary of the day when Hitler took his own life, effectively ending the war in Germany. The lesson is that even the most "just" wars lead to a loss of civil liberties. World War I saw the imprisonment of many far-left activists, allegedly for aiding and abetting the Central Powers. World War II saw the interment of Japanese-American people for fear they would undermine our war effort against Japan. If even a "just" war can undermine civil liberties, then how much more does a war that was fought based on personal interest and not the national interest undermine our civil liberties? The fallout from Iraq is still continuing and may very well continue throughout our lifetime. War, even when fought to stop tyranny or a failed state, is one of the greatest evils that a government can commit. Therefore, it should only be used as a last resort when all peaceful measures have failed and only when the evil it is fighting is so great that war would be a lesser evil.