Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Playing Chess as a Form of Torture: World War II interrogators on how they extracted information from prisoners

Interesting article about World War II interrogators demonstrating that, not only is torture inhumane, but it isn't even necessary:

Back then, they and their commanders wrestled with the morality of bugging prisoners' cells with listening devices. They felt bad about censoring letters. They took prisoners out for steak dinners to soften them up. They played games with them.

"We got more information out of a German general with a game of chess or Ping-Pong than they do today, with their torture," said Henry Kolm, 90, an MIT physicist who had been assigned to play chess in Germany with Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess.

Read more here.

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