"Unthinkable": What would you do? Could you do the "Unthinkable"?

Explanation: S&F!

Yes I would do the unthinkable and not physically torture him or his family and Yes I would let the nukes detonate and kill millions of people just to make a moral point to him and him alone.

Personal Disclosure: How OL would go about that is extremely... UNTHINKABLE!

P.S. But this boards membership isn't cleared for that due to its own T&C's!

reply to post by stellify


Exactly. You cannot battle monsters and realisitically expect to win without becoming one. Certain people that have no limits will beat you everytime if you impose limits on yourself.

Again.

Truth Drugs are not a viable or reliable option.

Conclusions
The salient points that emerge from this discussion are the following. No such magic brew as the popular notion of truth serum exists. The barbiturates, by disrupting defensive patterns, may sometimes be helpful in interrogation, but even under the best conditions they will elicit an output contaminated by deception, fantasy, garbled speech, etc. A major vulnerability they produce in the subject is a tendency to believe he has revealed more than he has. It is possible, however, for both normal individuals and psychopaths to resist drug interrogation; it seems likely that any individual who can withstand ordinary intensive interrogation can hold out in narcosis. The best aid to a defense against narco-interrogation is foreknowledge of the process and its limitations. There is an acute need for controlled experimental studies of drug reaction, not only to depressants but also to stimulants and to combinations of depressants, stimulants, and ataraxics.

"Truth" Drugs in [email protected]

Reliability
According to prevailing medical thought, information obtained under the influence of intravenously-administered sodium amytal can be unreliable; subjects may mix fact and fantasy in that context. Skeptics imply that much of the claimed effect of the drug relies on the belief of the subject that he or she cannot tell a lie while under its influence. Some observers also feel that amobarbital does not increase truth-telling, but merely increases talking; hence, both truth and fabrication are more likely to be revealed in that construct.

SOURCE

The CIA was still searching for a viable "truth serum" � the Holy Grail of the cloak-and-dagger trade � when it initiated Operation Artichoke in the early 1950s and began utilizing '___' during interrogation sessions. Odorless, colorless, and tasteless, '___' was hailed as a "potential new agent for unconventional warfare," according to a classified CIA report dated Aug. 5, 1954. But even a surreptitious dose of '___', the most potent mind-bending drug known to science, could not guarantee that an interrogation subject would spill the beans.

Perhaps the concept of a "truth serum" was a bit farfetched, for it presupposed that there was a way to chemically bypass the mind�s censor and turn the psyche inside out, unleashing a profusion of secrets. After much trial and error, the CIA realized that it doesn�t quite work that way.

Eventually, CIA experts figured out the most effective way to employ '___' as an aid to interrogation. They used its terrifying effects on some prisoners as a third-degree tactic. A skillful interrogator could gain leverage over prisoners by threatening to keep them in a crazed, tripped-out state forever unless they agreed to talk. This method sometimes proved successful where others had failed. '___' has been used for interrogations on an operational basis albeit sparingly since the mid-1950s.

U.S. Army interrogators also employed EA-1729 (the code for '___') as an intelligence-extracting aid. Similar to the strategy of their CIA counterparts, Army interrogators used the drug to scare the daylights out of people who were zonked and terror-stricken on acid.

Documents pertaining to Operation Derby Hat record the results of several EA-1729 interrogations conducted by the Army in the Far East during the early 1960s. One subject vomited three times and stated that he wanted to die� after he had been slipped some '___'. His reaction was described as moderate.

After another target absorbed triple the dose normally used in such sessions, he kept collapsing and hitting his head on a table. The subject voiced an anti-communist line, an Army report noted, and begged to be spared the torture he was receiving. In this confused state he even asked to be killed in order to alleviate his suffering.

SOURCE

Do experts believe they really work?
The idea of a "truth serum" has never been widely accepted. Although there have been waves of enthusiasm for the idea of a drug that can extract information reliably, there has been even more skepticism. Ever since the 1920s, many judges, psychiatrists, and scientists have rejected the idea that there is a drug that can get memories out intact. They have claimed, instead, that it makes people feel like talking, but it also puts them in a state of extreme suggestibility: people will pick up on cues about what questioners want to hear and repeat that back. This is one of the reasons that statements made under the influence of these drugs have never, as far as I know, been accepted in an American court.

What is Truth Serum?@Scientific American

Need any more? It speaks well of people that they are naturally trying to find ways out of doing it. But the simple fact sometimes, there IS NO way out.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


Well to be honest, Anytime you "wage war" whether it be Nations against Nations or man against man and one party has to follow the "rules" . My moneys on the the one who has no boundries, no rules, no morrals. It has been this way sinse the Dawn of time.

As far as answering your "Unthinkable" question I think before anyone answers they should consider their [insert love ones here] danger.

For me, endanger my childrens lives ?

I say bring in his whole family tree, strap em up, Get Dominos on the phone and fire up the blow torch. Its gonna be a long night.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


It's a tough situation to be in. It is an interesting take on the idea of "The Greater Good". The perception of what constitutes the Greater Good (GG) might be the very problem with your scenario.

What is the GG in this scenario? I think most would say "saving thousands of American lives" by preventing the bombs from going off in the locations they have been planted. What about the terrrorist? Collateral damage. His family? The same. What about the motivations for these actions (removing US forces from ME)? Couldn't those be seen as a Greater Good? If the bombs go off, then it's likely the American public will demand a withdrawal of US troops from the region to avoid a future event like this happening again. If that were to happen and say thousands of ME lives were saved in the process as a result, then couldn't this be perceived as the GG?

It is about how we define The Greater Good. Is there actually such a thing when looking at the situation objectively?

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


The development of drugs fo such a reason has been underway for quite a while and retrieving information from people is now very simple. There are pschotropic drugs in use that make torture and the like seem prehistoric.

reply to post by inbound


Read just above please.

I saw that movie and thought it was great. There isn't a thing you could have done to that man to make him tell until you had his kids in front of him. Samuel Jackson was great in that movie. I talked about this a lot after I saw the movie and my conclusion is this. If it came down to saving millions of people and my family I would wipe my rear end with the constitution. I love this country and our freedoms but sometimes the rules just don't apply. In the movie there was no question of the villains guilt. He wasn't some innocent guy, he was the bad guy. I'll bet they could have gotten more information out of Timothy McVeigh if they really wanted to. TPTB had no interest in getting more info. They had their Lee Harvey Oswald and rushed him to the chair.

reply to post by Dark Ghost


Or go mad and it be used as a pretext to conquer. Which I think is the most likely scenario.

Originally posted by andy1033
Na i would not do it fact, fbi like our mi5 are just murderers looking for innocent people to kill, while everyone else laughs.
150,000 murders in usa in ten years,

by death penalty or direct action of the fbi?

and i know for a fact that electronic mind control exist in uk since 1992 when i was at school.

can you explain the electronic mind control technology any further and how you know for a fact that it exists?

That shows police like fbi are solicitating murder, as they could use these techs to find out if people on death row are innocent.

so then the deaths you're talking about are death penalties being carried out?

Fbi or mi5 have no interest in truths or saving lifes.

how do you claim the Mi5 to be the same as the FBI in that way when the point you were making about the FBI related to the death penalty and the U.K doesn't have the death penalty - so Mi5 couldn't be soliciting murder?

Just trying to understand.

-B.M

The whole scenario is flawed. The bombs are to go off tomorrow but seriously how can the terrorist's demands be proven to have been met in such a short period of time? One would think tricking the terrorist into thinking that you will meet his demands and start some immediate withdrawal of troops, have an American puppet ruler step down and board an aircraft. Then the terrorist must keep his side of the bargain and disclose the locations, after which proven he told you the truth and the bombs are disarmed you can kill the guy and stop the charade, for all after him with the same idea to see.

Make sure you invite the media too!

reply to post by Illustronic


You're argument is flawed. We are talking about human beings after all.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


What assurances do either side have in the scenario?

reply to post by Illustronic


Is there ever any assurances in life? Especially in situations such as this one would be. The simple underlining question is would you pull out all the stops to defend who you could. Who's lives are more important, the good of a few? Or the lives of the many?

I wouldn't, its not my choice to make.

My scenario would kill or harm no one, as we pretend to heed to the demands. I only kill the terrorist after the lives of many (supposedly) are saved for the message it sends to other would be terrorists with such ideas, ludicrous ideas at that, impossible to prove met in such a timeframe. That's where the no solution paradox lies. Demands are met so call off the hounds, oh, sorry, we lied.

reply to post by Illustronic


And would likely fail. In the movie they got the location of the other bombs by just threatening his kids. Sam L.'s character is the one that figured out there was a 4th bomb and wanted to take it further because he knew he was holding one in "reserve" so to speak.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


Yes, I would torture him and/or harm his children to save millions of people, including my own family. Sacrifices have to be made. Call me cruel, callous and inhuman, but I wouldn't miss a nights sleep. When the SHTF, no matter what people say now about morals and ethics, when society breaks down, all people will be in survival mode looking out for their own family and/or close friends.

i see alot of bush era schlock coming in these reply's. torture is ok? killing innocents is ok?
just like the waterboarding, most americans were all for it. but, if we recieve confirmation someone is torturing our people we throw a fit, call whatever country monsters, murderers, etc. moraly, torture is wrong, but i'm NOT saying i wouldn't do it.
if something happened to my son, someone kidnapped him, you can bet i'll put the fingernails out of the first reponsible party i can find. but that doesn't make my actions right, nor would i attempt to justify them above anything more than they effed with the wrong little boy. but then, there is a difference, psychologicaly, between someone who kidnaps a child, and someone who is willing to blow up buildings, planes, busses or even just plant a bomb in a public place.

that being said, torturing or killing his family would do no good.
someone who is willing to kill millions of people is so far gone in their beliefs, they'll likely see the torure and murder of loved ones as necessary and inevitable, and have probably already come to terms with the fact. this WILL happen, they WILL kill my wife. so, she is already dead and means nothing to me. you have to remember, people who do things like this, whether it be 9/11 or oklahoma city. these types of people, on some level, are insane, plain and simple. they don't care about you, your family, themselves, their family.. nothing and no one.
but, that's just my opinion..