A SOCIETY that has to resort to torture to defend itself is probably not worth defending: we demean ourselves if we resort to torture, by doing so we abandon the values that make us what we are.

Throughout our history, under torture, suspects have confessed to the most improbable conspiracies.

Perhaps the most obvious example is the witch craze which swept Europe from the 14th to the 17th centuries. In 1487 a treatise on witchcraft detailing its practise was submitted to the University of Cologne, Malleus Maleficarum (the Hammer of the witches) and it became the best seller of its day. It was a manual used by all witch hunters. Of course, under torture, plenty of vulnerable women confessed to the utterly ridiculous details set down in the book. If the pain was intense enough – and the knowledge that you were going to be put to death anyway – you may as well own up and get it over with quickly.

A disgust and proper rejection of torture however, should not make us a soft touch when dealing with wicked and dedicated enemies who are determined to kill us. I have no qualms at the prospect of putting criminals and terrorists under a bit of stress. Interrogation is not meant to be polite conversation.

Often, we put people under pressure in everyday life: sometimes it might be to see how they perform at an interview or an exam, or to “see what they are made of” before offering them a very responsible job. I used to do it myself, and the manual which guided my procedure spelt out that, such was the pressure that the candidates were to be put under, any observers were to feel very uncomfortable just witnessing the interview.

Of course, it was voluntary: the candidate could withdraw at any stage. Putting interviewees under stress in this way was a revealing exercise – not that a poor stress reaction is necessarily a fail. I even passed a candidate once who vomited under the pressure of my interrogation.

Stress is something that you can train people to deal with, so you wouldn’t just fail someone who has yet to benefit from such training. What a stress reaction can expose however, is the flaws in character that tell you that you wouldn’t want that person on your team: like the chap who smiles whilst watching the discomfort of others as they are put through their paces; or the one who loses his temper under pressure.

I have digressed, but the point that I am making, is that we use psychological techniques ordinarily in life to select people for roles that involve swift and responsible decision-making whilst under pressure, and it would be foolish were we not to apply the skills and techniques, that we have acquired in these processes, to the interrogation of our enemies. From the most basic ‘nasty cop/nice cop’ routine, to much more sophisticated strategies. Personally, I have no qualms about subjecting terrorist suspects to robust interrogation that reveals their crimes or exposes their intentions. We would be in dereliction of our duty if we were too gentle with them.

Where does one draw the line however?When does an aggressive, but proportionate interrogation strategy, cross that line and become torture? Rules, protocols, and codes of conduct will have their place, but ultimately it will come down to the integrity of the personnel, and the scrutiny and oversight to which they are subject. Clearly, something went badly wrong in these respects at the CIA.