title: Economy of Israel

text: In 2000, a 33-billion-cubic-metre (BCM), or 1,200-billion-cubic-foot, the natural-gas field was located offshore Ashkelon, with commercial production starting in 2004. however, this field is nearly depleted—earlier than expected due to increased pumping to partially compensate for the loss of imported Egyptian gas in the wake of unrest associated with the fall of the Mubarak regime in 2011. In 2009, a significant gas find named Tamar, with proven reserves of 223 BCM or (307 BCM total proven + probable) was located in deep water approximately west of Haifa, as well as a smaller 15 BCM () field situated nearer the coastline. Furthermore, results of 3D seismic surveys and test drilling conducted since 2010 have confirmed that an estimated 621 BCM () natural-gas deposit named Leviathan exists in a large underwater geological formation nearby the large gas field already discovered in 2009.


title: Economy of Israel

text: The Tamar field began commercial production on 30 March 2013 after four years of development. The supply of gas from Tamar was expected to aid the Israeli economy, which had suffered losses of more than ₪20 billion between 2011 and 2013 resulting from the disruption of gas supplies from neighboring Egypt (and which are not expected to resume due to Egypt's decision to indefinitely suspend its gas supply agreement to Israel). As a result, Israel, as well as its other neighbor Jordan, which also suffered from disruption of gas deliveries from Egypt, had to resort to importing significantly more expensive and polluting liquid heavy fuels as substitute sources of energy. The ensuing energy crisis in Israel was lifted once the Tamar field came online in 2013, while Jordan committed to a US$10 billion, 15-year gas supply deal totaling 45 BCM from the Israeli Leviathan field which is scheduled to come online in late 2019. The agreement is estimated to save Jordan US$600 million per year in energy costs. In 2018, the owners of the Tamar and Leviathan fields announced that they are negotiating an agreement with a consortium of Egyptian firms for the supply of up to 64 BCM of gas over 10 years valued at up to US$15 billion. In early 2012 the Israeli cabinet announced plans to set up a sovereign wealth fund (called "the Israeli Citizens' Fund").


title: Economy of Israel

text: Since the founding of the state through the mid-2010s decade, the state-owned utility, Israel Electric Corporation (IEC) had an effective monopoly on power generation in the country. In 2010 the company sold 52,037 GWh of electricity. Until the mid-2010s the country also faced a persistently low operating reserve, which is mostly the result of Israel being an "electricity island". Most countries have the capability of relying on power drawn from producers in adjacent countries in the event of a power shortage. Israel's grid however, is unconnected to those of neighboring countries. This is mostly due to political reasons but also to the considerably less-developed nature of the power systems of Jordan and Egypt, whose systems constantly struggle to meet domestic demand and whose per-capita electric generation is less than one fifth that of Israel's. Nevertheless, while operating reserves in Israel were low, the country possessed sufficient generation and transmission capacity to meet domestic electricity needs and unlike in the countries surrounding it, rolling blackouts have historically been quite rare, even at periods of extreme demand.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Facing the increasing demand for electricity and concerned about the low reserve situation, the government of Israel began taking steps to increase the supply of electricity and operating reserve, as well to reduce the monopoly position of the IEC and increase competition in the electricity market starting in the second half of the 2000s decade. It instructed the IEC to construct several new power stations and encouraged private investment in the generation sector. By 2015, the IEC's share of total nationwide installed electric generation capacity had fallen to about 75%, with the company then possessing an installed generation capacity of about 13.6 gigawatts (GW). Since 2010, Independent Power Producers have constructed three new gas-fired combined cycle power stations with a total generation capacity of about 2.2 GW, while various industrial concerns constructed on-premises cogeneration facilities with a total electricity output of about 1 GW, and which are licensed by the electric authority to sell surplus electricity to the national grid at competitive rates. Also under construction is a 300 MW pumped storage facility, with two more in planning, plus several solar-powered plants.


title: Economy of Israel

text: In addition to the above steps, Israel and Cyprus are considering implementing the proposed EuroAsia Interconnector project. This consists of laying a 2000MW HVDC undersea power cable between them and between Cyprus and Greece, thus connecting Israel to the greater European power grid. If carried out, this will allow a further increase in the country's operating reserve as well as sell surplus electricity abroad.


title: Economy of Israel

text: In 2016, total nationwide electricity production was 67.2 GWh, of which 55.2% was generated using natural gas and 43.8% using coal — the first time the share of electricity production using natural gas exceeded that generated using coal.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Solar power in Israel and the Israeli solar energy industry has a history that dates to the founding of the country. In the 1950s, Levi Yissar developed a solar water heater to help assuage an energy shortage in the new country. By 1967 around one in twenty households heated their water with the sun and 50,000 solar heaters had been sold. With the 1970s oil crisis, Harry Zvi Tabor, the father of Israel's solar industry, developed the prototype solar water heater that is now used in over 90% of Israeli homes.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Israel has a large industrial capacity. It has a well-developed chemical industry with many of its products aimed at the export market. Most of the chemical plants are located in Ramat Hovav, the Haifa Bay area and near the Dead Sea. Israel Chemicals is one of the largest fertilizer and chemical companies in Israel and its subsidiary, the Dead Sea Works in Sdom is the world's fourth-largest producer and supplier of potash products. The company also produces other products such as magnesium chloride, industrial salts, de-icers, bath salts, table salt, and raw materials for the cosmetic industry. Industrial production of metals, machinery and electrical equipment, construction materials, consumer goods, and textiles, as well as food processing also form a significant part of the manufacturing sector. Machinery and equipment manufactured in Israel includes computer equipment, medical equipment, agricultural equipment, and robots. Israel has a successful semiconductor device fabrication industry, with several semiconductor manufacturing facilities in the country.


title: Economy of Israel

text: One of the country's largest employers is Israel Aerospace Industries which produces mainly aviation, space, and defense products. In 2017 the company had an order backlog of 11.4 billion US dollars. There are numerous other aerospace companies. Israeli aerospace companies are primarily sub-suppliers, focusing on fields such as machining, electronic systems and components, and composite materials. Israel is a major manufacturer and exporter of unmanned aerial vehicles. Israel also has a significant pharmaceutical industry and is home to Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies, which employed 40,000 people as of 2011. It specializes in generic and proprietary pharmaceuticals and active pharmaceutical ingredients. It is the largest generic drug manufacturer in the world and one of the 15 largest pharmaceutical companies worldwide. In addition, Israel also has a shipbuilding industry through the company Israel Shipyards, which has one of the largest shipbuilding and repair facilities in the Eastern Mediterranean. For the civilian market, it builds merchant ships and other civilian watercraft as well as machinery for ports and heavy industries. It also builds naval craft for the defense market.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Israel is one of the world's three major centers for polished diamonds, alongside Belgium and India. Israel's net polished diamond exports slid 22.8 percent in 2012 as polished diamond exports fell to $5.56 billion from $7.2 billion in 2011. Net exports of rough diamonds dropped 20.1 percent to $2.8 billion and net exports of polished diamonds slipped 24.9 percent to $4.3 billion, while net rough diamond imports dropped 12.9 percent to $3.8 billion. Net exports and imports have dropped due to the ongoing Global financial crisis, particularly within the Eurozone and the United States. The United States is the largest market accounting for 36% of overall export market for polished diamonds while Hong Kong remains at second with 28 percent and Belgium at 8 percent coming in third. , cut diamonds were Israel's largest export product, comprising 23.2% of all exports.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Israel is one of the world's major exporters of military equipment, accounting for 10% of the world total in 2007. Three Israeli companies were listed on the 2010 Stockholm International Peace Research Institute index of the world's top 100 arms-producing and military service companies: Elbit Systems, Israel Aerospace Industries and RAFAEL. The Defense industry in Israel is a strategically important sector and a large employer within the country. It is also a major player in the global arms market and is the 11th largest arms exporter in the world as of 2012. Total arms transfer agreements topped 12.9 billion between 2004 and 2011. There are over 150 active defense companies based in the country with combined revenues of more than US$3.5 billion annually. Israeli defense equipment exports have reached 7 billion U.S. dollars in 2012, making it a 20 percent increase from the amount of defense-related exports in 2011. Much of the exports are sold to the United States and Europe. Other major regions that purchase Israeli defense equipment include Southeast Asia and Latin America. India is also major country for Israeli arms exports and has remained Israel's largest arms market in the world. Israel is considered to be the leading UAV exporter in the world. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Israeli defense companies were behind 41% of all drones exported in 2001–2011. Israel's defense exports in 2021 reached US$11.2 billion in sales. Exports to Arab countries that joined the Abraham Accords made up 7% of all Israeli defense exports.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Tourism is one of Israel's major sources of income in the country, attracting 4.55 million foreign tourists in 2019, yielding a 25% growth since 2016 and contributed ₪20 billion to the Israeli economy making it an all-time record at that time. The most popular paid visited site is Masada.


title: Economy of Israel

text: In 2016, Israeli goods exports totaled US$55.8 billion. It imported US$61.9 billion worth of goods in the same year. In 2017 total exports (goods and services) amounted to US$102.3 billion, while imports totaled $96.7 billion.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Israel usually posts a modest trade deficit in goods. Its main goods imports consist of raw materials, crude oil, production inputs and finished consumer goods. Most of its exports are high-value-added items such as electronic components and other high-technology equipment, tools, and machinery, cut diamonds, refined petrochemicals, and pharmaceuticals. It normally posts a substantial trade surplus in services thanks to tourism and service industries such as software development, engineering services, and biomedical and scientific research and development. Therefore, overall external trade is positive, contributing to a significant current account surplus which as of 2017 stood at 4.7% of GDP.


title: Economy of Israel

text: The United States is Israel's largest trading partner, and Israel is the United States' 26th-largest trading partner; two-way trade totaled some $24.5 billion in 2010, up from $12.7 billion in 1997. The principal U.S. exports to Israel include computers, integrated circuits, aircraft parts and other defense equipment, wheat, and automobiles. Israel's chief exports to the U.S. include cut diamonds, jewelry, integrated circuits, printing machinery, and telecommunications equipment. The two countries signed a free trade agreement (FTA) in 1985 that progressively eliminated tariffs on most goods traded between the two countries over the following ten years. An agricultural trade accord was signed in November 1996, which addressed the remaining goods not covered in the FTA. Some non-tariff barriers and tariffs on goods remain, however. Israel also has trade and cooperation agreements in place with the European Union and Canada, and is seeking to conclude such agreements with a number of other countries, including Turkey, Jordan and several countries in Eastern Europe.


title: Economy of Israel

text: In regional terms, the European Union is the top destination for Israeli exports. In the four-month period between October 2011 and January 2012, Israel exported goods totalling $5 billion to the EU – amounting to 35% of Israel's overall exports. During the same period, Israeli exports to East Asia and the Far East totaled some $3.1 billion.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Until 1995, Israel's trade with the Arab world was minimal due to the Arab League boycott, which was begun against the Jewish community of Palestine in 1945. Arab nations not only refused to have direct trade with Israel (the primary boycott), but they also refused to do business with any corporation that operated in Israel (secondary boycott), or any corporation that did business with a corporation that did business with Israel (tertiary boycott).


title: Economy of Israel

text: In 2013, commercial trade between Israel and the Palestinian territories were valued at US$20 billion annually.


title: Economy of Israel

text: In 2012, ten companies were responsible for 47.7% of Israel's exports. These companies were Intel Israel, Elbit Systems, Oil Refineries Ltd, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Iscar, Israel Chemicals, Makhteshim Agan, Paz Oil Company, Israel Aerospace Industries and the Indigo division of Hewlett-Packard. The Bank of Israel and Israel's Export Institute have warned that the country is too dependent on a small number of exporters.


title: Economy of Israel

text: The Global Competitiveness Report of 2016 to 2017 ranked Israel as having the world's second most innovative economy. It was also ranked 19th among 189 world nations on the UN's Human Development Index. As of 2018, Israel ranks 20th out of 133 countries on the economic complexity index. The IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook of 2016 ranked Israel's economy as world 21st most competitive out of the 61 economies surveyed. The Israeli economy was ranked as the world's most durable economy in the face of crises, and was also ranked first in the rate research and development center investments. The Bank of Israel was ranked first among central banks for its efficient functioning, up from the 8th place in 2009. Israel was ranked first also in its supply of skilled manpower. Israeli companies, particularly in the high-tech area, have enjoyed considerable success raising money on Wall Street and other world financial markets: Israel ranked second among foreign countries in the number of its companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges.


title: Economy of Israel

text: Having moved away from the socialist economic model since the mid-1980s and early 1990s, Israel has made dramatic moves toward the free-market capitalist paradigm. , Israel's economic freedom score is 74.0, making its economy the 26th freest in the 2020 Index of Economic Freedom. Israel's economic competitiveness is helped by strong protection of property rights, relatively low corruption levels, and high openness to global trade and investment. Income and corporate tax rates remain relatively high. , Israel ranks 35th out of 179 countries in Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index. Bribery and other forms of corruption are illegal in Israel, which is a signatory to the OECD Bribery Convention since 2008.


title: Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

text: The Eighteenth Amendment (Amendment XVIII) of the United States Constitution established the prohibition of alcohol in the United States. The amendment was proposed by Congress on December 18, 1917, and was ratified by the requisite number of states on January 16, 1919. The Eighteenth Amendment was repealed by the Twenty-first Amendment on December 5, 1933. It is the only amendment to be repealed.


text: The Eighteenth Amendment was the product of decades of efforts by the temperance movement, which held that a ban on the sale of alcohol would ameliorate poverty and other societal problems. The Eighteenth Amendment declared the production, transport and sale of intoxicating liquors illegal, although it did not outlaw the actual consumption of alcohol. Shortly after the amendment was ratified, Congress passed the Volstead Act to provide for the federal enforcement of Prohibition. The Volstead Act declared that liquor, wine and beer qualified as intoxicating liquors and were therefore prohibited. Under the terms of the Eighteenth Amendment, Prohibition began on January 17, 1920, one year after the amendment was ratified.


text: Although the Eighteenth Amendment led to a decline in alcohol consumption in the United States, nationwide enforcement of Prohibition proved difficult, particularly in cities. Alcohol smuggling (known as rum-running or bootlegging) and illicit bars (speakeasies) became popular in many areas. Public sentiment began to turn against Prohibition during the 1920s, and 1932 Democratic presidential nominee Franklin D. Roosevelt called for its repeal. The Eighteenth Amendment became the only constitutional amendment to be repealed in its entirety when the Twenty-first Amendment was ratified in 1933.


text: The Eighteenth Amendment was the result of decades of effort by the temperance movement in the United States and at the time was generally considered a progressive amendment. Founded in 1893 in Saratoga, New York, the Anti-Saloon League (ASL) started in 1906 a campaign to ban the sale of alcohol at the state level. Their speeches, advertisements, and public demonstrations claimed that prohibition of alcohol would eliminate poverty and ameliorate social problems such as immoral sexual behavior and violence. The ASL argued that prohibition would inspire new forms of sociability, create happier families, reduce workplace accidents, and improve the world overall. (Following the repeal of Prohibition, the group merged into the National Temperance League.)


text: Other groups, such as the Women's Christian Temperance Union, also launched efforts to ban the sale, manufacture, and distribution of alcoholic beverages. Churches were also highly influential in gaining new members and support, garnering 6,000 local societies in several different states. The well-known reformer Carrie Nation became a household name for her militancy, such as vandalizing saloon property. Many state legislatures had already enacted statewide prohibition prior to the ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment but did not ban the consumption of alcohol in most households. By 1916, 23 of 48 states had already passed laws against saloons, some even banning the manufacture of alcohol.


text: On August 1, 1917, the Senate passed a resolution containing the language of the amendment to be presented to the states for ratification. The vote was 65 to 20, with the Democrats voting 36 in favor and 12 in opposition and the Republicans voting 29 in favor and 8in opposition. The House of Representatives passed a revised resolution on December 17, 1917. This was the first amendment to impose a deadline date for ratification. If ratification did not occur before the deadline date, the amendment would be discarded.


text: In the House, the vote was 282 to 128, with the Democrats voting 141 in favor and 64 in opposition and the Republicans voting 137 in favor and 62 in opposition. Four independents in the House voted in favor and two voted against the amendment. It was officially proposed by the Congress to the states when the Senate passed the resolution by a vote of 47 to 8 the next day, December 18.


text: The amendment and its enabling legislation did not ban the consumption of alcohol outright but prohibited the sale, manufacture and distribution of alcohol in the United States. Those caught selling, manufacturing or distributing alcoholic beverages would be subject to arrest. The amendment superseded the many state and regional restrictions already in place.


text: Ratification was achieved on January 16, 1919 when Nebraska became the 36th of the 48 states to ratify the amendment. On January 29, acting secretary of state Frank L. Polk certified the ratification. By 1922, 46 states had ratified the amendment.


text: To define the language used in the amendment, Congress enacted enabling legislation called the National Prohibition Act, better known as the Volstead Act, on October 28, 1919. President Woodrow Wilson vetoed that bill, but the House of Representatives immediately voted to override the veto and the Senate followed suit the next day. The Volstead Act set the starting date for nationwide prohibition as January 17, 1920, the earliest date allowed by the Eighteenth Amendment.


text: This legislation that would become the National Prohibition Act was conceived and introduced by Wayne Wheeler, a leader of the Anti-Saloon League, a group that found alcohol responsible for almost all of society's problems and that also ran many campaigns against the sale of alcohol. The law was strongly supported by the powerful Minnesota Republican congressman Andrew Volstead, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, whose name came to be informally associated with the act. The act laid the groundwork for Prohibition, defining the procedures for banning the distribution of alcohol, including production and distribution.


text: Volstead had previously introduced an early version of the law to Congress. It was first brought to the floor on May 27, 1919 but met heavy resistance from Democratic senators. Instead, the so-called "wet law" was introduced, an attempt to end the wartime prohibition laws put into effect much earlier. The debate over prohibition persisted for that entire session, as the House was divided among groups who become known as the "bone-drys" and the "wets." The Volstead Act finally passed the Republican-led House of Representatives on July 22, 1919, with 287 in favor and 100 opposed.


text: However, the act was largely a failure, proving unable to prevent mass distribution of alcoholic beverages and also inadvertently causing a massive increase in organized crime. The act defined the terms and enforcement methods of Prohibition until the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment repealed it in 1933.


text: The proposed amendment was the first to contain a provision setting a deadline for its ratification. That clause of the amendment was challenged, with the case reaching the Supreme Court, which upheld the constitutionality of such a deadline in the case of "Dillon v. Gloss" (1921). The Supreme Court also upheld the ratification by the Ohio legislature in "Hawke v. Smith" (1920), despite a petition requiring that the matter proceed to ballot.


text: This was not the only controversy around the amendment. The phrase "intoxicating liquor" was widely understood to exclude beer and wine (as they are not distilled), and their inclusion in Prohibition surprised many in the general public as well as producers of wine and beer. This controversy caused many Northern states to refuse to abide by the amendment.


text: Under Prohibition, illegal importation and production of alcoholic beverages (such as rum-running and bootlegging) occurred on a large scale nationwide. In urban areas, where the majority of the population tended to oppose Prohibition, enforcement was generally much weaker than in rural areas and smaller towns. Perhaps the most dramatic consequence of Prohibition was its effect on organized crime. As the production and sale of alcohol went further underground, it began to be controlled by the Mafia and other gangs that transformed into sophisticated criminal enterprises that reaped huge profits from the illicit liquor trade.


text: Organized-crime syndicates became skilled at bribing police and politicians to overlook violations of Prohibition during the 1920s. Chicago's Al Capone emerged as the most notorious example, earning an estimated $60million annually from his bootlegging and speakeasy operations. Gambling and prostitution also reached new heights, and a growing number of Americans came to blame Prohibition and to condemn it as a dangerous infringement of individual freedom.


text: Public sentiment turned against Prohibition by the late 1920s, and the Great Depression only hastened its demise, as opponents argued that the ban on alcohol denied jobs to the unemployed and much-needed revenue to the government. The efforts of the nonpartisan Association Against the Prohibition Amendment (AAPA) added to public disillusionment. In 1932, the platform of Democratic presidential candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt included a plank for repealing the 18th Amendment, and his victory that November ensured the end of Prohibition.


text: In February 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing the Twenty-first Amendment, which repealed the 18th Amendment and modified the Volstead Act to permit the sale of beer. The resolution required state conventions, rather than the state legislatures, to approve the amendment, effectively reducing the process to a one-state, one-vote referendum rather than a popular vote. A few states continued statewide prohibition after 1933, but by 1966 they all had abandoned it.


text: Just after the Eighteenth Amendment's adoption, there was a significant reduction in alcohol consumption among the general public and particularly among low-income groups. There were fewer hospitalizations for alcoholism and likewise fewer liver-related medical problems. However, consumption soon climbed as underworld entrepreneurs began producing dangerous "rotgut" alcohol. With the rise of home-distilled alcohol, careless distilling led to as many as 10,000 deaths attributed to wood alcohol (methanol) poisoning. However, during Prohibition, the rate of use and abuse of alcohol remained significantly lower than before enactment.


text: Though Prohibition created a new category of crimes involving the production and distribution of alcohol, there was an initial reduction in crime associated with drunkenness. Those who continued to drink alcohol tended to turn to organized criminal syndicates. Law enforcement could not stop much illicit liquor; however, they used "sting" operations, such as Prohibition agent Eliot Ness famously using wiretapping to uncover secret breweries. The prisons became crowded, which led to fewer arrests for the distribution of alcohol, as well as those arrested being charged with small fines rather than prison time. The murder rate fell for two years, but then rose to record highs due to gangland killings, a trend that reversed the very year prohibition ended. The homicide rate increased from six per 100,000 population in the pre-Prohibition period to nearly ten. Overall, crime rose 24%, including increases in assault and battery, theft, and burglary.


text: Anti-prohibition groups were formed and worked to have the Eighteenth Amendment repealed, which was done by adoption of the Twenty-first Amendment on December 5, 1933.


text: Following ratification in 1919, the amendment's effects were long-lasting, leading to increases in crime in many large cities, such as Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. Along with this came many separate forms of illegal alcohol distribution, such as speakeasies, bootlegging and illegal distilling operations.


text: Bootlegging started in towns bordering Mexico and Canada as well as in areas with multiple ports and harbors. The alcohol was often supplied by foreign distributors from nations such as Cuba and the Bahamas, and some even came from Newfoundland and islands under French rule.


text: In response, the government employed the Coast Guard to search and detain ships transporting alcohol into the country, but caused several complications such as disputes over national jurisdiction areas at sea. Atlantic City, New Jersey became a frequent location for smuggling operations because of a shipping point nearly three miles offshore that officials could not investigate, further complicating enforcement. The Coast Guard was not well-equipped to chase down bootlegging vessels but began searching ships at sea instead of when they arrived at port, and upgraded its boats to facilitate more efficient and consistent arrests.


text: One complication that plagued the government's enforcement efforts involved forged prescriptions for alcoholic beverages. Many forms of alcohol were sold over the counter purportedly for medical purposes, but some manufacturers falsified evidence that their products were of medicinal value.


text: Bootlegging was the leading factor in the development of organized-crime rings in large cities, as controlling and distributing liquor was very difficult. Many profitable gangs controlled every aspect of the distribution process, such as concealed brewing and storage, operation of speakeasys, and selling alcohol in restaurants and nightclubs run by crime syndicates. With organized crime becoming a rising problem, control of specific territories was a key objective among gangs, leading to many violent confrontations such as the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre; as a result, murder rates and burglaries dramatically increased between 1920 and 1933. Bootlegging was also found to be a gateway crime for many gangs who would then expand into crimes such as prostitution, gambling rackets, narcotics, loan sharking, extortion and labor rackets, thus causing problems that persisted long after the amendment was repealed.


title: DARVO

text: DARVO (an acronym for "deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender") is a reaction that perpetrators of wrongdoing, particularly sexual offenders, may display in response to being held accountable for their behavior. Some researchers indicate that it is a common manipulation strategy of psychological abusers. An abuser denies the abuse ever took place, attacks the person that was abused (often the victim) for attempting to hold the abuser accountable for their actions, and claims that they are actually the victim in the situation, thus reversing what may be a reality of victim and offender. It often involves not just "playing the victim" but also victim blaming.


title: DARVO

text: The acronym and the analysis it is based on are the work of the psychologist Jennifer Freyd. The first stage of DARVO, denial, involves gaslighting.


title: DARVO

text: In the 2019 episode "Season Finale" of "South Park", Randy Marsh is arrested for destroying home-growers' marijuana. Randy calls President Garrison for legal advice. The President explains to him DARVO and role-plays how to use it. When Randy attempts to do so, the policemen he tries it on inform him that the tactic will not work, as Randy is not the President.


title: Rosewood

text: Rosewood refers to any of a number of richly hued timbers, often brownish with darker veining, but found in many different hues.


title: Rosewood

text: All genuine rosewoods belong to the genus "Dalbergia". The pre-eminent rosewood appreciated in the Western world is the wood of "Dalbergia nigra". It is best known as "Brazilian rosewood", but also as "Bahia rosewood". This wood has a strong, sweet smell, which persists for many years, explaining the name "rosewood".


title: Rosewood

text: Another classic rosewood comes from "Dalbergia latifolia", known as (East) Indian rosewood or "sonokeling" (Indonesia). It is native to India and is also grown in plantations elsewhere in Pakistan (Chiniot).


title: Rosewood

text: Madagascar rosewood ("Dalbergia maritima"), known as "bois de rose", is highly prized for its red color. It is overexploited in the wild, despite a 2010 moratorium on trade and illegal logging, which continues on a large scale.


title: Rosewood

text: Throughout southeast Asia, "Dalbergia oliveri" is harvested for use in woodworking. It has a very fragrant and dense grain near the core, but the outer sapwood is soft and porous. "Dalbergia cultrata", variegated burgundy to light brown in color, is a blackwood timber sold as Burmese rosewood. Products built with rosewood-based engineered woods are sold as 'Malaysian rosewood' or as "D. oliveri".


title: Rosewood

text: Some rosewood comes from "Dalbergia retusa", also known as 'Nicaraguan rosewood' or as "cocobolo". Several species are known as Guatemalan rosewood or Panama rosewood: "D. tucerencis", "D. tucarensis", and "D. cubiquitzensis". Honduran rosewood:"D. stevensonii" is used for marimba keys, guitar parts, clarinets and other musical and ornamental applications.


title: Rosewood

text: Not all species in the large genus "Dalbergia" yield rosewoods; only about a dozen species do. The woods of some other species in the genus "Dalbergia" are notable—even famous—woods in their own right: African blackwood, "cocobolo", kingwood, and Brazilian tulipwood.


title: Rosewood

text: Some species become canopy trees (up to 30 m high), and large pieces can occasionally be found in the trade.


title: Rosewood

text: The timber trade sells many timbers under the name 'rosewood' (usually with an adjective) due to some (outward) similarities. A fair number of these timbers come from other legume genera; one such species that is often mentioned is Bolivian "Machaerium scleroxylon" sold as 'Bolivian rosewood'. Another that may be found in market from Southeast Asia is "Pterocarpus indicus", sold as 'New Guinea rosewood' (and related species). "Dalbergia sissoo" is a rosewood species from India and Bangladesh, usually known as "sheesham" or North-Indian rosewood. Its timber is extremely dense and has mild rot resistance but is porous, and its exterior is soft and susceptible to wood-boring insects. It is used for making cabinets and flooring, and for carving. It is exported as quality veneers. Due to its after-work quality when sealed and dyed, it is often sold as genuine rosewood or as teak. It has no discernible qualities of a genuine rosewood. Its strength is comparable with teak, but it has lower quality and price than teak or "Dalbergia latifolia".


title: Rosewood

text: Although its wood bears no resemblance whatsoever to the true rosewoods, the Australian rose mahogany ("Dysoxylum fraserianum", family Meliaceae) and Australian blackwood, ("Acacia melanoxylon") are also sold as rosewood. "Acacia excelsa" is also commonly known as ironwood or rosewood. Australian rose mahogany, due to the strong smell of roses from freshly cut bark, is more mistakenly termed a "rosewood".


title: Rosewood

text: All rosewoods are strong and heavy, taking an excellent polish, being suitable for guitars (the fretboards on electric and acoustic guitars often being made of rosewood), marimbas, recorders, turnery (billiard cues, fountain pens, black pieces in chess sets, etc.), handles, furniture, and luxury flooring, etc.


title: Rosewood

text: Rosewood oil, used in perfume, is extracted from the wood of "Aniba rosaeodora", which is not related to the rosewoods used for lumber. Rosewood is also used for bracelets and necklaces.


title: Rosewood

text: The dust created from sanding rosewood is known to be a sensitizing irritant and can trigger asthma and other respiratory ailments. Continual or heightened exposure can increase sensitivity.


title: Rosewood

text: In general, world stocks are poor through overexploitation. Rosewood is now protected worldwide. At a summit of the international wildlife trade in South Africa, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) moved to protect the world's most trafficked wild product by placing all 300 species of the rosewood tree under trade restrictions. At CITES meetings in 2013, 2016, and 2019, additional rosewood species were listed for protection, triggering market booms in China.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Amaro () is an Italian herbal liqueur that is commonly consumed as an after-dinner digestif. It usually has a bitter-sweet flavour, sometimes syrupy, and has an alcohol content between 16% and 40%.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Similar liqueurs have traditionally been produced throughout Europe. There are local varieties in Germany (where they are called "Kräuterlikör"), in Hungary, the Netherlands, and France. But the term "amaro" is applied only to Italian products of this kind.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Amaro is typically produced by macerating herbs, roots, flowers, bark, and/or citrus peels in alcohol, either neutral spirits or wine, mixing the filtrate with sugar syrup, and allowing the mixture to age in casks or bottles.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Dozens of varieties are commercially produced, the most commonly available of which are Averna, Ramazzotti, Lucano, and Montenegro.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Many commercial bottlers trace their recipe or production to the 19th century. Recipes often originated in monasteries or pharmacies.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Amaro is typically drunk neat, sometimes with a citrus wedge. It may also be drunk on ice or with tonic water.


title: Amaro (liqueur)

text: Amaro is flavored with several (sometimes several dozen) herbs and roots. Some producers list their ingredients in detail on the bottle label. Herbs used for flavoring may include any of the following: gentian, angelica, cardoon, cinchona ("china"), lemon balm ("melissa"), lemon verbena ("cedrina"), juniper, anise, fennel, zedoary, ginger, mint, thyme, sage, bay laurel, citrus peels, licorice, cinnamon, menthol, cardamom, saffron, rue ("ruta"), wormwood ("assenzio"), and elderflowers ("sambuco").


title: Momotarō

text: There is a popular notion that Momotarō is a local hero of Okayama Prefecture, but this claim was invented in the modern era. This notion is not accepted as consensus in scholarly circles.


title: Momotarō

text: Momotarō was born from a giant peach, which was found floating down a river by an old, childless woman who was washing clothes there. The woman and her husband discovered the child when they tried to open the peach to eat it. The child explained that he had been bestowed by the Gods to be their son. The couple named him Momotarō, from "momo" (peach) and "Tarō" (a name meaning 'eldest son in the family'). When he was just five years old, he was able to cut a big tree with just an old knife.


title: Momotarō

text: When he matured into adolescence, Momotarō left his parents to fight a band of Oni (demons or ogres) who marauded over their land, by seeking them out in the distant island where they dwelled (a place called Onigashima or "Demon Island"). En route, Momotarō met and befriended a talking dog, monkey, and pheasant, who agreed to help him in his quest in exchange for a portion of his rations (kibi dango or "millet dumplings"). At the island, Momotarō and his animal friends penetrated the demons' fort and beat the band of demons into surrendering. Momotarō and his new friends returned home with the demons' plundered treasure and the demon chief as a captive Ozaki ('end of the cape').


title: Momotarō

text: Momotarō was born from a giant peach, which was found floating down a river by an old, childless woman who was washing clothes there. The woman and her husband discovered the child when they tried to open the peach to eat it. The child explained that he had been bestowed by the Gods to be their son. The couple named him Momotarō, from "momo" (peach) and "tarō" (eldest son in the family). When he was just five years old, he was able to cut a big tree with just an old knife


title: Momotarō

text: When he matured into adolescence, Momotarō left his parents to fight a band of "Oni" (demons or ogres) who marauded over their land, by seeking them out in the distant island where they dwelled (a place called Onigashima or "Demon Island"). En route, Momotarō met and befriended a talking dog, monkey and pheasant, who agreed to help him in his quest in exchange for a portion of his rations ("kibi dango" or "millet dumplings"). At the island, Momotarō and his animal friends penetrated the demons' fort and beat the band of demons into surrendering. Momotarō and his new friends returned home with the demons' plundered treasure and the demon chief as a captive.


title: Momotarō

text: This Standard Type of "Momotarō" was defined and popularized due to them being printed in school textbooks during the Meiji Period.


title: Momotarō

text: This is the result of development of the literary "Momotarō", which had been handwritten and printed since the early Edo period into Meiji. One significant change is that in most examples of Edo Period literature, Momotarō was not born from a peach, but born naturally to the elderly couple who ate the peach and regained their youth. Such subtypes are classed as , whereas the now conventional subtypes are termed .


title: Momotarō

text: Although the oral version of the story may have emerged during the Muromachi period (1392–1573), it may not have been set down in writing until the Edo period (1603–1867). The oldest works of Momotaro known to have existed had been dated to the Genroku era (1688–1704) or perhaps earlier.


title: Momotarō

text: These older texts from around the Genroku era (e.g. "Momotarō mukashigatari") are lost, but surviving examples of later dates, such as the reprint "Saihan Momotarō mukashigatari" (c. 1777) purportedly preserve the older tradition, and form the first (most primitive) group of texts according to . The late date of the reprint has sometimes caused it to be classed as "kibyōshi" ("yellow cover") or later type of "kusazōshi" literature, but it should properly be classed as "akahon" ("red book") or early type.


title: Momotarō

text: A second group of texts, which Koike considered to be younger, includes the miniature "akahon", , printed in Kyōhō 8 (1723). This miniature book is now considered to be the oldest surviving copy of any written Momotarō story.


title: Momotarō

text: Whether belonging to the first or second groups, texts from the Edo Period generally follow the same general plot as the modern standard versions but exhibit certain differences in detail.


title: Momotarō

text: Momotarō is not supplied with "kibi dango" ("millet dumplings"); rather he is supplied with and other treats in the oldest Genroku era texts and the first group. In the first group, the old man goes out to cut grass, rather than to cut . The same three companion beasts (pheasant, monkey, then dog) appear in both groups, but in different order. Though the order of the animals is not significant to the story, the most common order that appear is the dog, the monkey, and then the pheasant. In every variation, all three animal companions agree to help Momotarō in exchange for a portion of his food.


title: Momotarō

text: As noted above, in most of the Edo Period books, peach boy is not born from the peach but from the woman who consumes the peach and grows years younger in age. Both the first and second groups consist entirely of "rejuvenation" types. The "birth from the peach" type examples (such as the version in Takizawa Bakin's 1811 essay "Swallowstone Miscellany") are found among tales that have deviated further, which Koike assigns to a third group of texts. While "birth from the peach" version has not been confirmed in earlier written texts from the Edo Period, one tantalizing sculpture dating to 1614 depicted a man standing in the middle of a split peach. This purported Momotarō carving at Kehi Shrine in Tsuruga, Fukui was lost during the air raids of 1945.


title: Momotarō

text: It was noted that the protagonist Momotarō was being drawn progressively younger by artists over the years. In one subjective estimation, Momotarō appeared about age 30-ish until c. 1735, 25-ish up to c. 1800, and 20-ish until the end of Edo Period in 1867.


title: Momotarō

text: Not every text specifies age, but in the version in (1798–1861)'s Momotarō's was 15 years and 6 months when he set out on his expedition. And in "Momotarō takara no kurairi" (c. 1830-40), Momotarō was aged sixteen. The Momotarō in Iwaya Sazanami's version of 1894 was of similar age (15 years old) when he resolved to go to devil island.


title: Momotarō

text: Researcher also noticed the trend of Momotarō being depicted younger and younger, and he dubbed the phenomenon .


title: Momotarō

text: After Japan abandoned the feudal system and entered the Meiji era, became a seminal figure in how the Momotaro story was shaped and became familiarized to the Japanese masses. For he was not only the author of the Momotaro tales in his commercially successful folktale collections, but also a major contributor to the textbook versions.


title: Momotarō

text: The "Momotarō" tale was first incorporated into nationalized textbooks for elementary schools by the Meiji government in 1887. It was subsequently omitted from the 1st edition of the National Language Reader or but reappeared from the 2nd edition onward to the 5th edition. It has been generally accepted that the 2nd edition reader of 1910 was "de facto" written by storybook author Iwaya Sazanami, who had joined the Ministry of Education as nonpermanent staff in 1906.


title: Momotarō

text: Iwaya had already published a version of "Momotaro" (1894) for his "Nihon mukashibanashi" (Japanese Folktales), where Momotaro is cast as a military soldier or commander (shōgun) of Great Japan (Dainihon), dispatched on a punitive campaign to quell the ogres who live in the northeast. Older texts took the punishing of "oni" for granted and dispensed with explaining what crimes the oni committed to deserve condemnation. But in Iwaya's version, the ogres were explicitly stated as being evil beings, who devoured the "poor people" and taken "plunder" from the Emperor's land of Japan (Ozaki's translation), thus morally justifying Momotaro's expedition. It has been suggested these ogres represented the Qing dynasty of China since the publication occurred in the year of outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War.


title: Momotarō

text: From the 3rd edition National Language Reader (1918–1932) onwards (until the end of World War II), "Momotaro" has occupied the spot of the last tale in Book 1 of these nationalized elementary textbook series. Teachers in essays submitted in 1917 stated that the perception of the Momotaro tale was shifting, so that they were seen as containing lessons of assertiveness and helping in the material advancement of one's country. There was criticism from the liberalism side, for example, the novelist Yamamoto Yūzō (1925) protesting that the "oni" were being punished for no apparent reason, and is "tantamount to telling [children] to think of foreigners as "oni"".


title: Momotarō

text: In the early Shōwa era, after Emperor Hirohito assumed the throne, Momotarō continued to be used to instill patriotism (or the teachings of the Rescript on Education) pupils with the 4th edition National Language Reader (1933–1938) which begins with the picture of the cherry blossom. The "Momotarō" of the 4th edition was modified so that the "oni" now stated "We will no longer torment the people nor take things. Please spare our lives", and forfeits their treasures out of their own volition, thus addressing the foregoing issues (i.e., Momotarō accused of attacking "oni" for no legitimate reason).


title: Momotarō

text: The use of Momotarō in wartime propaganda against the U.S. and its Allies was discussed extensively by John W. Dower in his book "War Without Mercy" (1986). Dower is credited with coining the term "Momotarō paradigm" in this respect. Momotarō disappeared from Japanese textbooks at the end of World War II.


title: Momotarō

text: In some variants, a red and white box are seen floating down the river, and when the red box is chosen to be recovered, Momotarō is found inside. These may be a red box and a black box, or the box may contain a peach inside. These types are often seen in the northern parts of Japan (Tōhoku and Hokuriku regions).


title: Momotarō

text: Or Momotarō may exhibit the characteristic of the lazy protagonist in the "Sleeping Boy" stories. These subtypes have been collected mainly in the Shikoku and Chūgoku regions.


title: Momotarō

text: There are variances about the Momotarō's process of growth; one is that he grew up to meet the expectation of the old couple to be a fine boy. Another is that he grew up to be a strong but lazy person who just sleeps all day and does not do anything. It is possible that the Momotarō being a fine boy version is more famous to give lessons to children. Nowadays, Momotarō is one of the most famous characters in Japan, as an ideal model for young kids for his kind-heartedness, bravery, power, and care for his parents.


title: Momotarō

text: Grown up, Momotarō goes on his journey to defeat the demons when he hears about the demons of the Onigashima (demon island). In some versions of the story, Momotarō volunteered to go help the people by repelling the demons, but in some stories he was forced by the townspeople or others to go on a journey. However, all the stories describe Momotarō defeating the Oni and live happily ever after with the old couple.


title: Momotarō

text: Momotarō now enjoys popular association with Okayama City or its prefecture, but this association was only created in the modern era. The publication of a book by Nanba Kinnosuke entitled "Momotarō no Shijitsu" (1930) for example helped the notion of Momotarō's origins in Okayama to gain wider familiarity. Still, even as late as the antebellum period before World War II (1941–1945), Okayama was considered only the third contender behind two other regions known as Momotarō's homeland.


title: Momotarō

text: The demon island () of the story is sometimes associated with Megijima Island, an island in the Seto Inland Sea near Takamatsu, due to the vast manmade caves found there.


title: Momotarō

text: Inuyama, Aichi has with a legend associated with it. In the 1920s and 1930s, lyricist Ujō Noguchi wrote three "folk songs" for the locality alluding to the Momotaro legend.


title: Momotarō

text: The story has been translated into English many times. "The Adventures of Little Peachling" appeared in A.B. Mitford's "Tales of Old Japan" in 1871. William Elliot Griffis published a version in 1880, which remained obscure even to researchers, even though English translations in subsequent decades apparently borrowed from Griffis's phraseology and use of idiom, sometimes even copying outright.


title: Momotarō

text: Rev. David Thompson's translation as "Little Peachling" appeared as the first volume of Hasegawa Takejirō's "Japanese Fairy Tale" series in 1885. A second edition appeared in 1886, with a different set of illustrations, drawn by Kobayashi Eitaku


title: Momotarō

text: Yei Theodora Ozaki included a loosely translated version in her "Japanese Fairy Tales" (1903); Ozaki's retellings were based on a version by "Sadanami sanjin" ("sic.", i.e., ). Ozaki was credited with spreading Japanese folktales to the English-speaking nations by researchers such as .


title: Momotarō

text: There was another English translation that used the same source as Ozaki and published around the same time, namely, "The Story of Peach-Boy" in "Iwaya's Fairy Tales of Old Japan" (1903, repub. 1914) translated by Hannah Riddell. The translation of the collection was a collaborative effort with other translators, such as Fanny B. Greene, Tsuda Umeko and others. This latter effort was acknowledged by Iwaya himself.


title: Momotarō

text: The tale was translated as "Peach-Prince and the Demons" and included in the compilation "Fairy stories my children love best of all", although the compiler did not indicate its Japanese origin.


title: Momotarō

text: The popular children's song about Momotarō titled "Momotarō-san no Uta" ("Momotarō's Song") was first published in 1911; the text's author is unattributed, while the melody was written by Teiichi Okano. The first two stanzas, with romanization and translation, are given below.


title: Momotarō

text: Portrayal of Momotarō as a soldier in the Japanese Imperial Army fighting hostile nations was already happening by the (First) Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895). The Momotaro tale was altered by Iwaya Sazanami in 1894 so that the "oni" lived to the northeast of Japan, a thinly veiled reference to Qing China given the then current geopolitics. Iwaya was not purely a major figure in children's literature, but a government official working as the head of the editorial bureau of the Ministry of Education, since 1878. Iwaya would later pen a whole book of essay on the use of Momotaro as an instructional tool, "Momotarō-shugi no kyōiku" ("the Education Theory Based on Principles in Momotaro", 1915).


title: Momotarō

text: Comic images picturing Momotarō defending Japan against "Oni" representing Russian "Northern Devils" were given out during the 1904–1905 Russo-Japanese War.


title: Momotarō

text: Momotarō was an immensely popular figure in Japan during World War II, appearing in many wartime films and cartoons. Momotarō represented the Japanese government, and the enemy states, namely the Allies, later including the United States was symbolized by the oni, the demonic figure. One wartime film, in which Momotarō and his animals mount on a military operation for the Japanese Armed Forces (against the British) is "".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: "Enhanced interrogation techniques" or "enhanced interrogation" is a euphemism for the program of systematic torture of detainees by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and various components of the U.S. Armed Forces at remote sites around the world, including Bagram, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and Bucharest authorized by officials of the George W. Bush administration. Methods used included beating, binding in contorted stress positions, hooding, subjection to deafening noise, sleep disruption, sleep deprivation to the point of hallucination, deprivation of food, drink, and medical care for wounds, as well as waterboarding, walling, sexual humiliation, subjection to extreme heat or extreme cold, and confinement in small coffin-like boxes. A Guantanamo inmate's drawings of some of these tortures, to which he himself was subjected, were published in "The New York Times". Some of these techniques fall under the category known as "white torture". Several detainees endured medically unnecessary "rectal rehydration", "rectal fluid resuscitation", and "rectal feeding". In addition to brutalizing detainees, there were threats to their families such as threats to harm children, and threats to sexually abuse or to cut the throat of detainees' mothers.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The number of detainees subjected to these methods has never been authoritatively established, nor how many died as a result of the interrogation regime, though this number could be as high as 100. The CIA admits to waterboarding three people implicated in the September 11 attacks: Abu Zubaydah, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and Mohammed al-Qahtani. A Senate Intelligence Committee found photos of a waterboard surrounded by buckets of water at the Salt Pit prison, where the CIA had claimed that waterboarding was never used. Former guards and inmates at Guantánamo have said that deaths which the US military called suicides at the time, were in fact homicides under torture. No murder charges have been brought for these or for acknowledged torture-related homicides at Abu Ghraib and at Bagram.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Debates arose over whether "enhanced interrogation" violated U.S. anti-torture statutes or international laws such as the UN Convention against Torture. In 2005, the CIA destroyed videotapes depicting prisoners being interrogated under torture; an internal justification was that what they showed was so horrific they would be "devastating to the CIA", and that "the heat from destroying is nothing compared to what it would be if the tapes ever got into public domain." The United Nations special rapporteur on torture, Juan Mendez, stated that waterboarding is torture—"immoral and illegal", and in 2008, fifty-six Democratic Party members of the US Congress asked for an independent investigation.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: American and European officials including former CIA Director Leon Panetta, former CIA officers, a Guantanamo prosecutor, and a military tribunal judge, have called "enhanced interrogation" a euphemism for torture. In 2009, both President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder said that certain techniques amount to torture, and repudiated their use. They declined to prosecute CIA, US Department of Defense, or Bush administration officials who authorized the program, while leaving open the possibility of convening an investigatory "Truth Commission" for what President Obama called a "further accounting".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In July 2014, the European Court of Human Rights formally ruled that "enhanced interrogation" was tantamount to torture, and ordered Poland to pay restitution to men tortured at a CIA black site there. In December 2014, the U.S. Senate published around 10% of the Senate Intelligence Committee report on CIA torture, a report about the CIA's use of torture during the George W. Bush administration.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Almost immediately after the 9/11 attacks, Bush administration officials conferring by video link from bunkers decided to treat the attacks as acts of war, rather than merely crimes. The question arose: were captured prisoners to be treated as prisoners of war? Officials including Justice Department lawyer John Yoo recommended classifying them as "detainees" outside the protection of the Geneva Conventions or any other domestic or military law, and incarcerating them in special prisons instead of the barracks-like "prisoner-of-war camp you saw in "Hogan's Heroes" or "Stalag 17"." On September 17, 2001, President Bush signed a still-classified directive giving the CIA the power to secretly imprison and interrogate detainees.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In late 2001, the first detainees including men like Murat Kurnaz and Lakhdar Boumediene, later established to be innocent and arrested on flawed intelligence or sold to the CIA for bounties, were brought to hastily improvised CIA/military bases such as Kandahar, Afghanistan. They were subjected to beatings, electric shocks, exposure to extreme cold, suspension from the ceiling by their arms, and drowning in buckets of water. An unknown number died as a result. In late 2001 and early 2002, interrogation under torture at secret sites was still ad hoc, not yet organized as a bureaucratic program, nor sanctioned under Justice Department legal cover.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: As early as November 2001, the CIA general counsel began considering the legality of torture, writing that "the Israeli example" (using physical force against hundreds of detainees) could serve as "a possible basis for arguing ... torture was necessary to prevent imminent, significant, physical harm to persons, where there is no other available means to prevent the harm."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In April 2002, the CIA had captured its first important prisoner, Abu Zubaydah, who was transferred to a CIA black site and at the suggestion of psychologist James Mitchell the CIA embarked on interrogation methods which included sleep deprivation using bright lights and loud musicstill prior to any legal authorization from the US Justice Department. Later that April, Mitchell proposed a list of additional tactics, including locking people in cramped boxes, shackling them in painful positions, keeping them awake for a week at a time, covering them with insects, and waterboarding, a practice which the United States had previously characterized in war crimes prosecutions as torture.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Jose Rodriguez, head of the CIA's clandestine service, asked his superiors for authorization for what Rodriguez called an "alternative set of interrogation procedures". The CIA sought immunity from prosecution, sometimes known as a "get out of jail free card".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In May 2002, senior Bush administration officials including CIA Director George Tenet, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and Attorney General John Ashcroft met to discuss which techniques the CIA could legally use against Abu Zubaydah. Condoleezza Rice recalled "being told that U.S. military personnel were subjected in training to certain physical and psychological interrogation techniques". During the discussions, John Ashcroft is reported to have said, "Why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Jay Bybee, head of the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel, collaborated with John Yoo to draft and sign what are now known as the Torture Memos. These classified memoranda legalized a number of torture techniques for use on detainees by very narrowly defining torture and expansively defining executive authority. After the Justice Department completed the Torture Memos, Condoleezza Rice told the CIA that the techniques were approved in July 2002. Dick Cheney said "I signed off on it; so did others." In 2010 Cheney said, "I was and remain a strong proponent of our enhanced interrogation program." In 2009 Rice said "[w]e never tortured anyone"; she maintained the abuse was "not torture", but was "legal", and "right".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In addition, in 2002 and 2003, the CIA says they briefed several Democratic congressional leaders on the proposed "enhanced interrogation technique" program. These congressional leaders included Nancy Pelosi, the future Speaker of the House, and House Intelligence Committee Ranking Democrat Jane Harman. The response to the briefings was "quiet acquiescence, if not downright support", according to officials present. Ms. Harman was the only congressional leader to object to the tactics being proposed. Former senator Bob Graham (D-Fla.), chairman of the Senate intelligence committee after the 9/11 attacks, said he was not briefed on waterboarding and that in three instances agency officials said he'd attended briefings on days that his personal journal shows he was elsewhere.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: At least one Bush administration official opposed torturing prisoners, Condoleezza Rice's most senior adviser Philip Zelikow. Upon learning details of the program, Zelikow wrote a memo to Rice contesting the Justice Department's Torture Memos, believing them wrong both legally and as a matter of policy. Zelikow's memo warned that the interrogation techniques breached US law, and could lead to prosecutions for war crimes. The Bush Administration attempted to collect all the copies of Zelikow's memo and destroy them. Jane Mayer, author of "The Dark Side", quotes Zelikow as predicting that "America's descent into torture will in time be viewed like the Japanese internments", in that "(f)ear and anxiety were exploited by zealots and fools."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The authorized "enhanced interrogation" (the originator of this term is unknown, but it appears to be a calque of the German "", meaning "intensified interrogation", used in 1937 by Gestapo chief Heinrich Müller) was based on work done by James Elmer Mitchell and Bruce Jessen in the Air Force's Survival Evasion Resistance Escape (SERE) program. The CIA contracted with the two psychologists to develop alternative, harsh interrogation techniques. However, neither of the two psychologists had any experience in conducting interrogations. Air Force Reserve Colonel Steve Kleinman stated that the CIA "chose two clinical psychologists who had no intelligence background whatsoever, who had never conducted an interrogation ... to do something that had never been proven in the real world." Associates of Mitchell and Jessen were skeptical of their methods and believed they did not possess any data about the impact of SERE training on the human psyche. The CIA came to learn that Mitchell and Jessen's expertise in waterboarding was probably "misrepresented" and thus, there was no reason to believe it was medically safe or effective. Despite these shortcomings of experience and know-how, the two psychologists boasted of being paid $1000 a day () plus expenses, tax-free by the CIA for their work.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The SERE program, which Mitchell and Jessen would reverse engineer, was used to train pilots and other soldiers on how to resist "brainwashing" techniques assumed to have been employed by the Chinese to extract false confessions from captured Americans during the Korean War. The program subjected trainees to "waterboarding ... sleep deprivation, isolation, exposure to extreme temperatures, enclosure in tiny spaces, bombardment with agonizing sounds at extremely damaging decibel levels, and religious and sexual humiliation", including forced enemas and other anal assault. Under CIA supervision, Miller and Jessen adapted SERE into an offensive program designed to train CIA agents on how to use the harsh interrogation techniques to gather information from terrorist detainees. In fact, all of the tactics listed above would later be reported in the International Committee of the Red Cross Report on Fourteen High Value Detainees in CIA Custody as having been used on Abu Zubaydah.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The psychologists relied heavily on experiments done by American psychologist Martin Seligman in the 1970s on learned helplessness. In these experiments caged dogs were exposed to severe electric shocks in a random way in order to completely break their will to resist. Mitchell and Jessen applied this idea to the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah. Many of the interrogation techniques used in the SERE program, including waterboarding, cold cell, long-time standing, and sleep deprivation were previously considered illegal under U.S. and international law and treaties at the time of Abu Zubaydah's capture. In fact, the United States had prosecuted Japanese military officials after World War II and American soldiers after the Vietnam War for waterboarding and as recently as 1983. Since 1930, the United States had defined sleep deprivation as an illegal form of torture. Many other techniques developed by the CIA constitute inhuman and degrading treatment and torture under the United Nations Convention against Torture and Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Internal FBI memos and press reports have pointed to SERE training as the basis for some of the harshest techniques authorised for use on detainees by the Pentagon in 2002 and 2003.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: A March 22, 2005, sworn statement by the former chief of the Interrogation Control Element at Guantánamo said instructors from SERE also taught their methods to interrogators of the prisoners in Cuba.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: According to the SERE affiliate and two other sources familiar with the program, after September 11 several psychologists versed in SERE techniques began advising interrogators at Guantánamo Bay and elsewhere. Some of these psychologists essentially "tried to reverse-engineer" the SERE program, as the affiliate put it. "They took good knowledge and used it in a bad way", another of the sources said. Interrogators and BSCT members at Guantánamo adopted coercive techniques similar to those employed in the SERE program.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: a February 2002 memorandum signed by President George W. Bush, stating that the Third Geneva Convention guaranteeing humane treatment to prisoners of war did not apply to al-Qaeda or Taliban detainees, and a December 2002 memo signed by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, approving the use of "aggressive techniques" against detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, as key factors that lead to the extensive abuses.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: However, the Bush administration's February 2002 memorandum had, in fact, stated that only al-Qaeda detainees were not covered by the Geneva Conventions. That same order held that Taliban detainees would be entitled to treatment under Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Common Article 3 remained the policy under the Obama administration, and not the balance of the Third Geneva Convention.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: harsh interrogation techniques used by the CIA and the U.S. military were directly adapted from the training techniques used to prepare special forces personnel to resist interrogation by enemies that torture and abuse prisoners. The techniques included forced nudity, painful stress positions, sleep deprivation, and until 2003, waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In December 2007, CIA director Michael Hayden stated that "of about 100 prisoners held to date in the CIA program, the enhanced techniques were used on about 30, and waterboarding used on just three.".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The report, "Experiments in Torture: Human Subject Research and Evidence of Experimentation in the 'Enhanced' Interrogation Program", published by the advocacy group Physicians for Human Rights, described personnel in the CIA's Office of Medical Services (OMS) performing research on the prisoners as the above techniques were used both serially and in combination. This report was based on previously classified documents made available by the Obama administration in 2010.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: According to ABC news in 2007, the CIA removed waterboarding from its list of acceptable interrogation techniques in 2006. ABC stated further that the last use of waterboarding was in 2003.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In 2003, the Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's "Working Group" on interrogations requested that the DIA come up with prisoner interrogation techniques for the group's consideration. According to the 2008 U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee report on the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody, the DIA began drawing up the list of techniques with the help of its civilian employee, a former Guantanamo Interrogation Control Element (ICE) Chief David Becker. Becker claimed that the Working Group members were particularly interested in aggressive methods and that he "was encouraged to talk about techniques that inflict pain."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Becker claimed that he recommended the use of drugs due to rumors that another intelligence agency, name of which was redacted in the Senate report, had successfully used them in the past. According to the analysis of the Office of Defense Inspector General, the DIA's cited justification for the use of drugs was to "[relax] detainee to cooperative state" and that mind-altering substances were not used.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Some more lurid revelations of DIA's harsh interrogations came from FBI officers, who conducted their own screenings of detainees in Guantanamo along with other agencies. According to one account, the interrogators of what was then DIA's Defense HUMINT Service (currently the Defense Clandestine Service), forced subjects to watch gay porn, draped them with the Israeli Flag and interrogated them in rooms lit by strobe lights for 16–18 hours, all the while telling prisoners that they were from the FBI.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The real FBI operative was concerned that DIA's harsh methods and impersonation of FBI agents would complicate the Bureau's ability to do its job properly, saying "The next time a real Agent tries to talk to that guy, you can imagine the result." A subsequent military inquiry countered FBI's allegations by saying that the prisoner treatment was degrading but not inhuman, without addressing the allegation of DIA staff regularly impersonating FBI officers - usually a felony offense. A year before this investigation was concluded, it was revealed that interrogations by special units of the U.S. military services were much harsher and more physical than any of the above DIA practices, to the point that 2 DIA officials reportedly complained, after which they were threatened by non-DIA interrogators.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Similar activities are thought to have transpired at the hands of DIA operatives in Bagram, where as recently as 2010 the organization ran the so-called "Black jail". According to a report published by The Atlantic, the jail was manned by DIA's DCHC staff, who were accused of beating and sexually humiliating high-value targets held at the site. The detention center outlived the black sites ran by the Central Intelligence Agency, with the DIA continuing to use "restricted" interrogation methods in the facility under a secret authorization. It is unclear what happened to the secret facility after the 2013 transfer of the base to Afghan authorities following several postponements.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In November 2006, former U.S. Army Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, in charge of Abu Ghraib prison until early 2004, reported seeing a letter apparently signed by United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld that allowed contractors employed by the U.S. to use techniques such as sleep deprivation during interrogation. Karpinski stated that the "methods consisted of making prisoners stand for long periods, sleep deprivation ... playing music at full volume, having to sit uncomfortably" and that "Rumsfeld authorized these specific techniques." She said that she considered this treatment to be contrary to the Geneva Conventions, which state "Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind." According to Karpinski, the handwritten signature was above his printed name and in the same handwriting in the margin was written, "Make sure this is accomplished."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On May 1, 2005, "The New York Times" reported on an ongoing high-level military investigation into accusations of detainee abuse at Guantánamo, conducted by Lieutenant General Randall M. Schmidt of the Air Force, and dealing with: "accounts by agents for the Federal Bureau of Investigation who complained after witnessing detainees subjected to several forms of harsh treatment. The FBI agents wrote in memorandums that were never meant to be disclosed publicly that they had seen female interrogators forcibly squeeze male prisoners' genitals, and that they had witnessed other detainees stripped and shackled low to the floor for many hours."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On July 12, 2005, members of a military panel told the committee that they proposed disciplining prison commander Major General Geoffrey Miller over the interrogation of Mohammed al Qahtani, who was forced to wear a bra, dance with another man, and threatened with dogs. The recommendation was overruled by General Bantz J. Craddock, commander of U.S. Southern Command, who referred the matter to the army's inspector general.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In an interview with AP on February 14, 2008, Paul Rester, chief military interrogator at Guantanamo Bay and director of the Joint Intelligence Group, said most of the information gathered from detainees came from non-coercive questioning and "rapport building", not harsh interrogation methods.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The American Psychological Association (APA), the primary professional organ of psychologists in the United States, collaborated with the Bush administration in secret to write legal and ethical justifications for the torture.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In 2006, senior law enforcement agents with the Criminal Investigation Task Force told MSNBC.com that they began to complain in 2002 inside the U.S. Department of Defense that the interrogation tactics used in Guantanamo Bay by a separate team of military intelligence investigators were unproductive, not likely to produce reliable information, and probably illegal. Unable to get satisfaction from the army commanders running the detainee camp, they took their concerns to David Brant, director of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS), who alerted Navy General Counsel Alberto J. Mora.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: General Counsel Mora and Navy Judge Advocate General Michael Lohr believed the detainee treatment to be unlawful, and campaigned among other top lawyers and officials in the Defense Department to investigate, and to provide clear standards prohibiting coercive interrogation tactics. In response, on January 15, 2003, Rumsfeld suspended the approved interrogation tactics at Guantánamo Bay until a new set of guidelines could be produced by a working group headed by General Counsel of the Air Force Mary Walker.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The working group based its new guidelines on a legal memo from the United States Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel written by John Yoo and signed by Jay S. Bybee in August 2002, which would later become widely known as the "Torture Memo". General Counsel Mora led a faction of the Working Group in arguing against these standards, and argued the issues with Yoo in person. The working group's final report was signed and delivered to Guantánamo without the knowledge of Mora and the others who had opposed its content. Mora has maintained that detainee treatment has been consistent with the law since the January 15, 2003, suspension of previously approved interrogation tactics.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: It was not known publicly until 2008 that Yoo wrote another legal opinion, dated March 14, 2003, which he issued to the General Counsel of DOD, five days before the invasion of Iraq started. In it, he concluded that federal laws related to torture and other abuse did not apply to interrogators overseaswhich at that time the administration applied to Guantanamo as well as locations such as Iraq.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: President Bush stated "The United States of America does not torture. And that's important for people around the world to understand." The administration adopted the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 to address the multitude of incidents of detainee abuse. However, in his signing statement, Bush made clear that he reserved the right to waive this bill if he thought that was needed.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Porter Goss, the Director of Central Intelligence, in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 17, 2005, described waterboarding as falling into the area of "professional interrogation techniques", differentiating them from torture.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: "The Washington Post" reported in January 2009 that Susan J. Crawford, convening authority of military commissions, stated about the interrogation of Mohammed al-Qahtani, one of the alleged "20th hijackers" of the September 11 attacks:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. ... You think of torture, you think of some horrendous physical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge [i.e., to call it torture].


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Crawford decided not to prosecute al-Qahtani because his treatment fell within the definition of torture, so evidence was tainted by it having been gained through coercion.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Former President Bush in his published memoirs defends the utility of "enhanced interrogation" techniques and continues to assert that they are not torture.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Former President Obama, former Attorney General Holder, and Guantanamo military prosecutor Crawford have called the techniques torture. The British government has determined the techniques would be classified as torture, and dismissed President Bush's claim to the contrary. A report by Human Rights First (HRF) and Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) stated that these techniques constitute torture. "A United Nations report denounced the US abuse of prisoners as tantamount to torture. The UN report called for cessation of the US-termed "enhanced interrogation" techniques, as the UN sees these methods as a form of torture. The UN report also admonishes against secret prisons, the use of which, is considered to amount to torture as well and should be discontinued.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In 2009, Paul Kane of "The Washington Post" said that the press was hesitant to define these techniques as torture, as it is a crime and nobody who engaged in "enhanced interrogation" has been charged or convicted. In the summer of 2009, NPR decided to ban using the word torture in what was a controversial act. Its Ombudsman Alicia Shepard's defense of the policy was that "calling waterboarding torture is tantamount to taking sides." However, Berkeley Professor of Linguistics, Geoffrey Nunberg, pointed out that virtually all media around the world, other than what he called the "spineless U.S. media", call these techniques torture.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On December 9, 2014, United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) released a 525-page document containing the key findings and an executive summary, of their report into the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program. The remainder of the 6,000-page report remains classified. The report concluded that the interrogation techniques were far more vicious and widespread than the CIA had previously reported; that "brutality, dishonesty and seemingly arbitrary violence at times brought even [CIA] employees to moments of anguish." The report said that CIA officials had deceived their superiors at the White House, members of Congress and even sometimes their peers about how the interrogation program was being run and what it had achieved.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The Senate Report examined in detail specifically whether torture provided information helpful in locating Osama Bin Laden, and concluded that it did not, and that the CIA deliberately misled political leaders and the public in saying it had.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The three former CIA directors George Tenet, Porter Goss, and Michael Hayden, who had supervised the program during their tenure, objected to the Senate Report in a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece, calling it poorly done and partisan. They insisted that some information derived from the CIA program was useful, specifically that interrogation techniques made some detainees compliant and that the "information provided by the totality of detainees in CIA custody" had led to Osama Bin Laden. According to the CIA, enhanced interrogation "conditions" were used for security and "other valid reasons, such as to create an environment conducive to transitioning captured and resistant terrorist (sic) to detainees participating in debriefings."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Republican Senator John McCain, citing Obama Administration CIA Director Leon Panetta (who did not join with the others in the Wall Street Journal Op-ed) had previously said that brutality produced no useful information in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden; leads were "obtained through standard, noncoercive means". In May 2011, Panetta had written to Senator McCain, that:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In 2014, Panetta wrote that torture did produce some useful information, but that the product was not worth the price, and if asked whether America should engage in similar practices he would say "no". Obama Administration CIA director John Brennan said that it is "unknowable" whether brutality helped or hindered in the collection of useful intelligence. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said whether information derived from CIA torture may have helped find Osama Bin Laden, President Obama believes "the use of these techniques was not worth it because of the harm that was done to our national values and the sense of what we believe in as Americans." Similarly, Republican McCain agreed with Democrat Dianne Feinstein in remarks on the Senate floor that torture "stained our national honor" and did "much harm and little practical good".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The Panetta Review was a review begun in 2009 by the CIA that examined the use of torture during interrogations of detainees. The review was described as "particularly scorching ... of extreme interrogation methods like waterboarding, which the memos described as providing little intelligence of any value."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On request by the National Security Advisor Susan Rice in 2015, the CIA compiled a summary of key intelligence, which according to their records had been collected after the application of (unspecified) interrogation techniques. The memorandum lists intelligence related to the following topics: The Karachi Plot, The Heathrow Plot, The "Second Wave", The Guraba Cell, Issa al-Hindi, Abu Talha al-Pakistani, Hambali's Capture, Jafaar al-Tayyar, Dirty Bomb Plot, Shoe bomber, and Sh(a)kai (Pakistan). The CIA concluded that the enhanced interrogation techniques had been effective in providing intelligence and has been a key reason why al-Qa'ida has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since September 11, 2001.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: In December 2007 it became known that the CIA had destroyed many videotapes recording the interrogation of prisoners. Disclosures in 2010 revealed that Jose Rodriguez Jr., head of the directorate of operations at the CIA from 2004 to 2007, ordered the tapes destroyed because he thought they would be "devastating to the CIA", and that "the heat from destroying is nothing compared to what it would be if the tapes ever got into public domain." "The New York Times" reported that according to "some insiders", an inquiry into the C.I.A.'s secret detention program which analyzed these techniques, "might end with criminal charges for abusive interrogations." In an op-ed for the "New York Times", Thomas H. Kean and Lee H. Hamilton, chair and vice chair of the 9/11 Commission, stated:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: As a legal matter, it is not up to us to examine the C.I.A.'s failure to disclose the existence of these tapes. That is for others. What we do know is that government officials decided not to inform a lawfully constituted body, created by Congress and the president, to investigate one "(of)" the greatest tragedies to confront this country. We call that obstruction.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: the possibility that the authors of these memoranda counseled the use of lethal and unlawful techniques, and therefore face criminal culpability themselves. That, after all, is the teaching of "United States v. Altstötter", the Nuremberg case brought against German Justice Department lawyers whose memoranda crafted the basis for implementation of the infamous "Night and Fog Decree.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Jordan Paust concurred by responding to Mukasey's refusal to investigate and/or prosecute anyone that relied on these legal opinions


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: it is legally and morally impossible for any member of the executive branch to be acting lawfully or within the scope of his or her authority while following OLC opinions that are manifestly inconsistent with or violative of the law. General Mukasey, just following orders is no defense!


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On March 15, 2009, Mark Danner provided a report in the "New York Review of Books" (with an abridged version in "The New York Times") describing and commenting on the contents of a report by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), "Report on the Treatment of Fourteen "High Value Detainees" in CIA Custody" (43 pp., February 2007). "Report ..." is a record of interviews with black site detainees, conducted between October 6 and 11 and December 4 and 14, 2006, after their transfer to Guantánamo. (According to Danner, the report was marked "confidential" and was not previously made public before being made available to him.)


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Danner provides excerpts of interviews with detainees, including Abu Zubaydah, Walid bin Attash, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. According to Danner, the report contains sections on "methods of ill-treatment" including suffocation by water, prolonged stress standing, beatings by use of a collar, beating and kicking, confinement in a box, prolonged nudity, sleep deprivation and use of loud music, exposure to cold temperature/cold water, prolonged use of handcuffs and shackles, threats, forced shaving, and deprivation/restricted provision of solid food. Danner quotes the ICRC report as saying that, "in many cases, the ill-treatment to which they were subjected while held in the CIA program, either singly or in combination, constituted torture. In addition, many other elements of the ill-treatment, either singly or in combination, constituted cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: A heavily redacted version of the November 8, 2006 meeting was released by the CIA on June 10, 2016. The report tells that the ICRC finds the detainees stories "largely credible, having put much stock in the fact that the story each detainee told about his transfer, treatment and conditions of confinement was basically consistent, even though they had been incommunicado with each other throughout their detention by us [the CIA]."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: A bipartisan Senate Armed Services Committee report, released in part in December 2008 and in full in April 2009, concluded that the legal authorization of "enhanced interrogation techniques" led directly to the abuse and killings of prisoners in US military facilities at Abu Ghraib, Bagram, and elsewhere. Brutal abuse believed to originate in Chinese communist torture techniques to extract false confessions from American POWs migrated from Guantanamo Bay to Afghanistan, then to Iraq and Abu Ghraib. The report concludes that some authorized techniques including "use of stress positions and sleep deprivation combined with other mistreatment" caused or were direct contributing factors in the cases of several prisoners who were tortured to death. The report also notes that authorizing abuse created the conditions for other, unauthorized abuse, by creating a legal and moral climate encouraging inhumane treatment. The legal memos condoning "enhanced interrogation" had "redefined torture", "distorted the meaning and intent of anti-torture laws, [and] rationalized the abuse of detainees", conveying the message that "physical pressures and degradation were appropriate treatment." What followed was an "erosion of standards dictating that detainees be treated humanely." The report accused Defense Secretary Rumsfeld and his deputies of being, according to "The Washington Post", directly responsible as the "authors and chief promoters of harsh interrogation policies that disgraced the nation and undermined U.S. security."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: "Atlantic Monthly" writer Andrew Sullivan has pointed out similarities between the Gestapo interrogation method called " and what the US called "enhanced interrogation". He asserts the first use of a term comparable to "enhanced interrogation" was a 1937 memo by Gestapo Chief Heinrich Müller coining the phrase "Verschärfte Vernehmung", German for "sharpened questioning", "intensified" or "enhanced interrogation" to describe subjection to extreme cold, sleep deprivation, suspension in stress positions, and deliberate exhaustion among other techniques. Sullivan reports that in 1948 Norway prosecuted German officials for what trial documents termed "Verschärfte Vernehmung" including subjection to cold water, and repeated beatings. Sullivan concludes:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The very phrase used by the president to describe torture-that-isn't-somehow-torture"enhanced interrogation techniques"is a term originally coined by the Nazis. The techniques are indistinguishable. The methods were clearly understood in 1948 as war-crimes. The punishment for them was death.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. in assessing the effect of the Bush torture program on the reputation of the United States in the world, stated that the damage to U.S. reputation had been incalculable. "No position taken has done more damage to the American reputation in the worldever."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On June 8, 2008, fifty-six House Democrats asked for an independent investigation, raising the possibility that authorising these techniques may constitute a crime by Bush administration officials. The congressmen involved in calling for such an investigation included John Conyers, Jan Schakowsky, and Jerrold Nadler.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: information indicates that the Bush administration may have systematically implemented, from the top down, detainee interrogation policies that constitute torture or otherwise violate the law. ... Because these apparent 'enhanced interrogation techniques' were used under cover of Justice Department legal opinions, the need for an outside special prosecutor is obvious.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: According to "The Washington Post" the request was denied because Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey felt that "officials acted in 'good faith' when they sought legal opinions, and that the lawyers who provided them used their best judgment." The article also reported that "[h]e warned that criminalizing the process could cause policymakers to second-guess themselves and 'harm our national security well into the future.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: After Cheney acknowledged his involvement in authorising these tactics Senator Carl Levin, chair of the Armed Services Committee, a "New York Times" editorial, Glenn Greenwald and Scott Horton stressed the importance of a criminal investigation: "A prosecutor should be appointed to consider criminal charges against top officials at the Pentagon and others involved in planning the abuse."


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Shortly before the end of Bush's second term, news media in other countries were opining that under the United Nations Convention Against Torture, the U.S. is obligated to hold those responsible to account under criminal law.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On January 20, 2009, the United Nations special rapporteur on Torture, Professor Manfred Nowak, remarked on German television thatfollowing the inauguration of President Barack ObamaGeorge W. Bush no longer had head of state immunity, and that under international law, the U.S. is mandated to start criminal proceedings against all those involved in these violations of the UN Convention Against Torture. Law professor Dietmar Herz explained Nowak's comments by saying that under U.S. and international law former President Bush is criminally responsible for adopting torture as an interrogation tool.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: On February 4, 2009, the High Court of England and Wales ruled that evidence of possible torture in the case of Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian-born British resident who was held in Guantanamo Bay until 2009, could not be disclosed to the public:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: as a result of a statement by David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, that if the evidence was disclosed the US would stop sharing intelligence with Britain. That would directly threaten the UK's national security, Miliband had told the court.


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The judges said they found it "difficult to conceive" the rationale for the US's objections to releasing the information, which contained "no disclosure of sensitive intelligence matters". Adding, "we did not consider that a democracy governed by the rule of law would expect a court in another democracy to suppress a summary of the evidence contained in reports by its own officials".


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: Responding to the ruling, David Davis, the Conservative MP and former Shadow Home Secretary, commented:


title: Enhanced interrogation techniques

text: The ruling implies that torture has taken place in the <nowiki>[Binyam]</nowiki> Mohamed case, that British agencies may have been complicit, and further, that the United States government has threatened our high court that if it releases this information the US government will withdraw its intelligence cooperation with the United Kingdom.