[News] Torture, and the Strategic Helplessness of the American Psychological Association

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Torture, and the Strategic Helplessness of the 
American Psychological Association

http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/18251

July 24, 2008 By Stephen Soldz
and Brad Olson
and Steven Reisner
and Jean Maria Arrigo
and Bryant Welch

Source: Coalition for an Ethical Psychology


Jane Mayer's new book, The Dark Side, has 
refocused attention on psychologists' 
participation in Bush administration torture and 
detainee abuse. In one chapter Mayer provides 
previously undisclosed details about 
psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen's 
role in the CIA's brutal, "enhanced 
interrogation" techniques. These techniques 
apparently drew heavily on the theory of "learned 
helplessness" developed by former American 
Psychological Association President Martin 
Seligman. (Seligman's work involved tormenting 
dogs with electrical shocks until they became 
totally unable or unwilling to extract themselves 
from the painful situation. Hence the phrase "learned helplessness.")

Mayer reports and Seligman has confirmed that, in 
2002, Seligman gave a three-hour lecture to the 
Navy SERE school in San Diego. SERE is the 
military's Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape 
program, which attempts to inoculate pilots, 
special forces, and other potential high-value 
captives against torture, should they be captured 
by a power that does not respect the Geneva 
Conventions. For reasons that are not clear, 
Seligman reportedly was not invited to the 
presentation by the Joint Personnel Recovery 
Agency (JPRA) that runs this program, but 
directly by the Central Intelligence Agency itself.

In responding to reports of his lecture to SERE 
psychologist, Dr. Seligman has confirmed the 
presence of both Mitchell and Jessen at his 
lecture. He also apparently asked his hosts if 
the lecture would be used for designing 
interrogation techniques. Seligman reports that 
they refused to answer his inquiry on the grounds 
of military security. Despite the reply, Seligman 
concluded that his presentation was intended 
solely to help SERE psychologists protect US 
troops. He also states unequivocally that he is personally opposed to torture.

The American Psychological Association (APA), the 
organization of which Seligman was president in 
1999, echoed Dr. Seligman's statement in a press 
release. The release denied allegations that Dr. 
Seligman knowingly contributed to the design of 
torture techniques. The APA, in its recent 
statements, neither denied nor addressed any of 
the other reports suggesting that the work of 
psychologists - including that of Seligman, 
Jessen, and Mitchell - was used to torture 
detainees. The only comment APA made about Jessen 
and Mitchell was that because they are not APA 
members they are not within the purview of the APA's ethics committee.

What we do now know, from a report issued by the 
Defense Department's 
<http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/abuse.pdf>Office 
of the Inspector General (OIG) and from 
<http://levin.senate.gov/newsroom/supporting/2008/Documents.SASC.061708.pdf>documents 
released during 
<http://armed-services.senate.gov/e_witnesslist.cfm?id=3413>recent 
hearings by the Senate Armed Services Committee 
(SASC), is that these SERE techniques, designed 
to ameliorate the effects of torture, were 
"reverse engineered," transformed from ensuring 
the safety of our own soldiers, to orchestrating 
the abuse of detainees in Guantánamo, Afghanistan 
and Iraq. These documents reveal, further, that 
certain SERE psychologists shifted roles from 
supervising protective SERE programs to 
overseeing SERE-inspired abusive interrogations. 
Several reporters have named Mitchell and Jessen 
(former SERE psychologists under contract) as 
responsible for this "reverse-engineering" that 
was used at secret CIA "black sites". The Senate 
Armed Senate Committee reported that other 
psychologists played a role in the 
"reverse-engineering" of SERE techniques for the 
Department of Defense at Guantánamo Bay and in 
Iraq. Senator Carl Levin, in his 
<http://levin.senate.gov/newsroom/release.cfm?id=299242>introductory 
comments to the hearings stated:
"a... senior CIA lawyer, Jonathan Fredman, who 
was chief counsel to the CIA's CounterTerrorism 
Center, went to [Guantanamo] attended a meeting 
of GTMO staff and discussed a memo proposing the 
use of aggressive interrogation techniques. That 
memo had been drafted by a psychologist and 
psychiatrist from [Guantanamo] who, a couple of 
weeks earlier, had attended the training given at 
Fort Bragg by instructors from the JPRA SERE 
school...While the memo remains classified, 
minutes from the meeting where it was discussed 
are not. Those minutes ... clearly show that the 
focus of the discussion was aggressive techniques for use against detainees."
The psychologist referred to in Levin's opening 
remarks was APA member, Maj. John Leso, whose 
recommendations at that meeting included "sleep 
deprivation, withholding food, isolation, loss of 
time...[to] foster dependence and compliance". 
Also reported in the hearings was that 
psychologist Col. Morgan Banks had 
<http://www.senate.gov/%7Earmed_services/statemnt/2008/June/Baumgartner%2006-17-08.pdf>provided 
training in abusive SERE techniques to Guantánamo 
interrogators. Col. Banks, while not an APA 
member, was appointed to the APA's 
<http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/apa_faq_coalition_comments_v12c.pdf>Psychological 
Ethics and National Security (PENS) task force on 
interrogations. APA has yet to comment upon the 
startling revelations of psychologist complicity from these committee hearings.

According to Mayer in The Dark Side, and other 
reporters over the past three years, in the weeks 
following Seligman's lecture, Mitchell made 
liberal use of the "learned helplessness" 
paradigm in the harsh tactics he designed to 
interrogate prisoners held by the CIA. One 
prisoner was repeatedly locked in a fetal 
position; in a cage too tiny for him to do 
anything, other than to lie still in a fetal 
position. The cage was evidently designed not 
only to restrict movement, but also to make 
breathing difficult. In periods where the 
detainee was outside of the cage, the torture 
mechanism always remained in plain view so the 
detainee was constantly aware of his pending return to the device.

Another detainee was suspended on his toes with 
his wrists manacled above his head. This 
detainee, however, had a prosthesis that agents 
removed so that he either balanced on one foot 
for hours on end or hung suspended from his wrists.

Most detainees were subjected to long periods of 
isolation, often in total darkness, and often 
while naked. Human contact in these periods was 
minimized. In one case, the only human contact 
for a detainee occurred from a single daily visit 
when a masked man would show up to state, "You 
know what I want," and then disappear.

Based on these media reports and government 
documents, it seems likely that Dr. Seligman's 
work on "learned helplessness" was used to aid 
the development of these torture techniques 
following his presentation at the SERE school.

APA's response to the Seligman matter is 
perplexing. If Dr. Seligman's report is accurate, 
and he was kept from knowing how the CIA would be 
using his material because he did not have 
security clearance, Seligman was evidently duped. 
At a minimum, one would hope the APA would be 
concerned enough about this deception to sound a 
cautionary alarm against psychologists' naive 
engagement with government programs potentially 
involved in interrogation abuses.

Instead, the APA has put extraordinary effort 
into maintaining and expanding opportunities for 
psychologists to serve US intelligence and 
security institutions. As the APA's 
<http://www.apa.org/ppo/issues/nstcreport.html>Science 
Policy Insider News (SPIN) proudly announced in 
January 2005, "Since 9/11 psychologists have 
searched for opportunities to contribute to the 
nation's counter terrorism and homeland security agenda."

These efforts included cosponsoring a 
<http://www.apa.org/ppo/spin/703.html>conference 
with the CIA to investigate the efficacy of 
enhanced interrogation techniques, including the 
use of drugs and sensory bombardment. Among the 
reported organizers of that conference was APA 
member Kirk Hubbard, Chief of the Research & 
Analysis Branch, Operational Assessment Division 
of the CIA. Hubbard recruited the "operational 
expertise" for that conference. Among the 
attendees to this "by-invitation-only" conference 
were Mitchell and Jessen. (Hubbard also helped 
organize the event at which Seligman spoke and to 
which Mitchell and Jessen were invited.)

In addition, the APA co-sponsored a conference 
with the FBI during which it was suggested that 
therapists report to law-enforcement officials 
information obtained during therapy sessions 
regarding "national security risk." And just this 
past June, APA's efforts included 
<http://www.apa.org/ppo/spin/608.html>lobbying 
for the retention of "invaluable behavioral 
science programs within DoD's Counterintelligence 
Field Activity (CIFA) as it reorganizes and loses 
personnel strength." For those who are not 
familiar with this issue, the CIFA program was 
closed down because of numerous scandals, 
including: misuse of national security letters to 
<http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-01-16-tkc-CIFA_x.htm>gain 
access to private citizen's financial information 
without warrants, the resignation of a 
Congressman accused of accepting bribes in 
exchange for CIFA contracts, and, according to 
the 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/02/washington/02intel.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=cifa&st=cse&oref=slogin&oref=slogin>New 
York Times, the collection of a wide-reaching 
domestic "database that included information 
about antiwar protests planned at churches, 
schools and Quaker meeting halls." The CIFA 
psychology directorate, although a top secret 
operation, was known for its 
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/18/AR2005121801006_pf.html>risk 
assessments of Guantánamo detainees, including 
feeding questions to interrogators.

The issues of psychologist involvement in 
"national security" efforts are complex. Although 
there may be appropriate and ethically acceptable 
ways for psychologists to participate in such 
activities, even a cursory historical awareness 
indicates that such involvement is often 
ethically problematic. Whether for good or for 
ill, the CIA has a long record of tapping 
academic scientists as witting and unwitting 
consultants and researchers, and of providing 
protection through cover stories and secrecy. For 
example, the 1977 Senate investigation of the CIA 
Behavioral Modification Project (called MKULTRA) 
disclosed that the CIA had contracted with 
researchers at over 80 universities, hospitals, 
and other research-based institutions through a 
front funding agency. In the Senate hearing, the 
Director of Central Intelligence stated: "I 
believe we all owe a moral obligation to these 
researchers and institutions to protect them from 
any unjustified embarrassment or damage to their 
reputations which revelations of their identities 
might bring."[i] But these are not just ploys of 
the past. Recently, Dr. Belinda Canton, a 
long-time CIA intelligence manager and a member 
of the 2005 President's Commission on the 
Intelligence Capabilities of the United States 
Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, 
recommended opportunistic use of scientists as an 
approach to management of uncertainty: "Identify 
academics and scientists who may have insights" 
and note where "opportunities exist to exploit scientific cadre."[ii]

This history, along with the current, 
well-documented authorizations for detainee 
abuse, should have provided sufficient warning to 
APA leaders and to individual psychologists about 
the moral risks in aiding the national security 
apparatus, especially under the present U.S. 
administration. But the APA has not taken the 
lead in helping psychologists confront these 
dangerous ethical situations. To the contrary, 
the APA has been insensitive to the use of 
psychological techniques in torture and to the 
role of psychologists in aiding that torture. 
This insensitivity itself has shocked many psychologists here and abroad.

In 2006, Time magazine released the interrogation 
log of Guantanamo detainee 063, Mohammed 
al-Qahtani. This log demonstrated that al-Qahtani 
had been systematically tortured for six weeks in 
late 2002 and 2003. The log also alleged that 
psychologist and APA member Maj. John Leso was 
present at least several times during these 
episodes. The APA said nothing about this alleged 
participation of an APA member in documented 
torture. It is at least 23 months since ethics 
complaints were filed against Dr. Leso and still the APA has remained silent.

In May 2007, the Defense Department declassified 
the Office of Inspector General report, 
documenting the role of SERE psychologists in 
training military and CIA personnel in techniques 
of abuse that "violated the Geneva Conventions." 
The APA responded with silence. When we inquired 
about the APA's reaction, we were told that the 
organization needed time to "carefully study" the 
report. It has been 14 months, and to date no APA 
leader has commented upon the Report.

The APA leadership has failed psychologists and 
failed the profession of psychology. It has also 
failed the country. When ethical guidance was 
required, the APA put its ethical authority in 
the hands of those involved in the questionable 
practices that needed investigation. When the 
evidence became overwhelming that psychologists 
helped design, implement, and standardize a U.S. 
torture regime, the APA remained silent. When it 
was reported that the use of psychological 
paradigms such as ‘learned helplessness' have 
guided psychologists' manipulation of detainee 
conditions, the APA continues to ignore or 
discount these reports. They instead assert that 
psychologists presence' at CIA black sites and 
detention camps "assures safety." When it became 
clear that the APA should offer a strong voice 
and a clear policy prohibiting psychologists' 
participation in operations that systematically 
violate the Geneva conventions and international 
law, the APA leadership raised concern that a 
"restraint of trade" lawsuit might be brought 
against them. These arguments, of course, do not 
pass the red face test in any discerning forum of world opinion.

These are not our values. The APA leadership has 
shamed us and our profession with its strategic 
helplessness. It is time for the APA to clarify 
that psychologists may not ethically support in 
any way abusive or coercive interrogation tactics 
in any settings. It is also time to identify and 
hold publicly responsible the individual 
psychologists who have created the institution 
that the APA has now become. It is time to hold 
these psychologists accountable for developing 
the widespread and systematic moral failures in 
the organization's current infrastructure. 
Indeed, if we do not do this, then we, too, are complicit with torture.



References

[i] U.S. Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence 
and Subcommittee on Health and Scientific 
Research of the Committee on Human Resources. 
(1977) Project MKULTRA: the CIA's program of 
research in behavioral modification. U.S. 
Government Printing Office, Washington, DC. Pp. 7, 12-13, 123 & 148-149.
[ii] [Canton, Belinda. (2008). The active 
management of uncertainty. International Journal 
of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, 21 (3): 487-518.]




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