Supporting Literature

    For background reading on the history of the APA’s relationship to the military and to
    government facilities in which foreign nationals are being held, the following links to
    articles and books are recommended:

    Oath Betrayed:  Torture, Medical Complicity, and the War on Terror
    by Steven H. Miles, New York: Random House, 2006   221pp.

    The author is an expert in medical ethics and a practicing physician who has worked
    with refugees in Cambodia and Indonesia.  For this book he studied thousands of documents –
    congressional testimony, media accounts, declassified reports, etc.  –  
    and his bibliography and notes are an excellent resource.  Miles’ indignation at the
    medical complicity in Abu Ghraib and other CIA interrogation centers is backed up
    with vivid examples and an overwhelming array of evidence, including the names,
    dates, locations of specific cases of abuse in the past five years.  He compares
    the responses of different professional societies and identifies how the report of
    the American Psychological Association’s presidential task force on “Psychological
    Ethics and National Security” diverges from codes of medical ethics. - Martha Davis
    click here to order from amazon.com


    A Question of Torture:  CIA Interrogation, from the Cold War to the War on Terror
    by Alfred W. McCoy, New York:  Henry Holt, 2006   290pp.

    Written by an historian, this book treats the scandals of Abu Ghraib as the result
    of decades of research that the CIA either exploited or directly sponsored in
    an effort to develop new interrogation techniques.  McCoy focuses on how
    research on sensory deprivation, personality assessment, and relationship to
    authority were used by the CIA for an evidenced-based psychological approach
    to interrogation that would minimize physical signs of torture.  The analysis
    of CIA interrogation manuals and their development is particularly instructive.
    The final chapter debates the effectiveness of psychological and physical
    torture for eliciting information and how we can best address the need for
    information on terrorists.   This book also lists copious sources and gripping
    descriptions of actual cases.  However, for psychologists it is more controversial
    than Miles’ work because it locates the source of the torture techniques squarely
    in psychological research and the historic relationship between American
    psychologists and the U.S. military.  McCoy accuses very prominent American
    psychologists of being implicated in the development of CIA interrogation
    techniques now under attack by experts in international law.  Some psychologists
    have accused McCoy of distorting the record (e.g. Thomas Blass, “Milgram and
    the CIA: Tortured Allegations, APA Monitor letters to the editor, Jan. 2007).  
    Notably, McCoy’s descriptions of “Behavioral Science Consultation Teams”
    and how psychologists continue to assist interrogators in military prisons such
    as Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo are supported by Miles’ account. - Martha Davis



    A 2007 article in Washington Monthly describing the history of the APA's current ethical
    problems. click here for the link     
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