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Abstract

This essay discusses enhanced interrogation techniques. For reference, enhanced interrogation techniques are interrogation techniques that involve “physically coercive interventions” (Duke & Puyvelde, 2017). The U.S. government supported these techniques after the attacks on September 11, 2001. This essay argues that enhanced interrogation techniques should not be used in interrogations because they are unethical, ineffective, and negatively impact the mental health of the interrogators using these techniques. Additionally, the essay references articles on the varied viewpoints as well as explains information on these interrogation techniques. Also, the essay argues that enhanced interrogation techniques encourage people to be cruel and inhumane. Moreover, there is evidence that interrogations involving torture actually bring out lies and false-memories--instead of the truth--from detainees. For example, in the “Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program,” the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence talks about how the CIA unsuccessfully got credible intelligence information from detainees through enhanced interrogation techniques. Furthermore, these interrogation techniques cause major psychological problems for the interrogators using these techniques, such as “burn out” and PTSD (Dee, 2017). However, the essay mentions that some people support enhanced interrogation techniques because they think the detainees receiving the torture deserve it and that it is effective. The essay refutes these claims by saying that torture is against human rights and that science shows that torture is ineffective in interrogations. To conclude, the essay claims that there are ethical interrogation techniques that can bring out more reliable information than enhanced interrogation techniques.

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