Guerra Eterna

Mayer describe la tortura a la que se sometió a Mohamed, un compendio de técnicas que han funcionado durante siglos para romper la voluntad de un detenido. Tácticas tan simples como la privación del sueño y obligar al preso a mantenerse de pie durante 18 o 24 horas provocan dolores inimaginables.

In addition to keeping a prisoner awake, the simple act of remaining upright can over time cause significant pain. McCoy, the historian, noted that “longtime standing” was a common K.G.B. interrogation technique. In his 2006 book, “A Question of Torture,” he writes that the Soviets found that making a victim stand for eighteen to twenty-four hours can produce “excruciating pain, as ankles double in size, skin becomes tense and intensely painful, blisters erupt oozing watery serum, heart rates soar, kidneys shut down, and delusions deepen.”

Mohamed cantó tanto que llegó a asumir la responsabilidad, no ya de los ataques del 11-S, sino de decenas de atentados, algunos frustrados, incluido el asesinato del periodista Daniel Pearl. En teoría, más tarde o más temprano, su caso llegará a los tribunales norteamericanos. ¿Podrá un juez aceptar una confesión obtenida bajo tortura y sin ningún tipo de asistencia letrada?

Yet Philip Zelikow, the executive director of the 9/11 Commission and later the State Department’s top counsellor, under Rice, is not convinced that eliciting information from detainees justifies “physical torment.” After leaving the government last year, he gave a speech in Houston, in which he said, “The question would not be, Did you get information that proved useful? Instead it would be, Did you get information that could have been usefully gained only from these methods?” He concluded, “My own view is that the cool, carefully considered, methodical, prolonged, and repeated subjection of captives to physical torment, and the accompanying psychological terror, is immoral.”