Why the U.S.A. should not use torture

Either we are a nation that is conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, or we are just another nation that justified whatever it wants to do by "reasons of state."

Either we mean what we say, or we say it and don't mean it. By
my reckoning, that is what a hypocrite does.

If torture was sure, or the only way to get information from an enemy, the arguments of the the statists make might make sense. But torture is not sure. As John McCain said, a victim of torture will say anything he thinks the torturers want to hear, true or false. And the experience of the British in WWI and WWII shows that there are equally effective ways of getting information that do not involve torture and are far more likely to get good information.

So it isn't sure, and it isn't reliable, and there are better methods. How can we justify it?

Finally, there are risks in any situation when one faces an antagonist that is a fanatic. No matter what you do, such an enemy may still do harm. So we can torture and still be subject to terrorist attacks, or we can use other methods and still be subject to terrorists attacks. We will be subject to such attacks in any case. There is no way to guarantee we will be safe from all terrorist attacks. The only question open to us is, what kind of people are we going to be as we fight our enemies. Will we be what we have always claimed to want to be, an indivisible nation under God, with liberty and justice for all? Or will we become as deceitful and treacherous as our enemies?