“We cannot wish it away…questions of responsibility are pressed upon us,” said Robert Crawford, a UW professor who teaches courses about human rights, war and post 9/11 politics, in an introduction to the discussion about torture in the United States.

 One of the key issues raised was that of accountability. No legal action has yet been carried out against the personnel who have participated in acts of torture.

 Jess Ghannam, a clinical professor of psychiatry and global health sciences at the University of California, discussed his research, particularly with recent cases involving detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

 He is currently working with the UC Berkeley Human Rights Center on a project evaluating the post-release health effects of detention in Guantanamo. They have spoken with 63 post-Guantanamo detainees.

Ghannam said that the individuals released so far have all shown signs of physical and psychological marks, and “many have never recovered.”

 The United States has what Ghannam refers to as a “torture industrial complex,” where torture techniques are developed and processed for an instructional guide.

 Ghannam repeats: “…which occur over a lifetime,” referring to the physical and psychological affects torture has on people, referencing in particular the Iraqis tortured for the war in Iraq.

Former Guantanamo detainees have repeatedly told researchers that health professionals played a role in developing and carrying out torture techniques, such as developing psychological profiles of the individuals to enhance torture. There was one detainee who had a serious fear of spiders, and individualized torture methods were used based on this information that health professionals acquired.

 The next speaker was Randall Horton, a licensed clinical psychologist and assistant professor of psychology at Seattle University. He spoke about the role of American psychologists in the matter of torture, especially since post 9/11.

According to Horton, documents from the Bush Administration detailing the role of a psychologist and psychiatrist in “no-touch” torture techniques were released last week. Horton said that pulling together the information is a real challenge, but more light is being shed on U.S. engagement of torture.

 Some of the methods of torture mentioned were bombardment of sound and light, sexual humiliation, sleep deprivation and water boarding.

 After 9/11, with the perceived threat of terrorism, the CIA began developing interrogation procedures to put to use on the “global war on terror,” while the FBI interrogation team suggested more traditional techniques of torture.

 Reports have shown that psychologists had an active involvement in torture tactics with the military. Horton said that the problem is, according to individuals at sites like Guantanamo, nothing has changed, and these sites continue to exist in violation of international law.

 Next to speak was Dr. J. David Kinzie, a professor of psychiatry at Oregon Health & Science University and actively treating patients, many of whom have been tortured.

 These problems that develop from traumatic events, such as torture, are “persistent long-term disabilities… an up-and-down course over many years,” said Kinzie, “treatment is long, slow, persistent, cautious.”

 Crawford gave the conclusion to the discussion and laid out three principles he believes should guide our actions when facing questions of torture:

                                 1. Torture is immoral – akin to slavery or genocide

                                2. Torture is illegal – based on international law

                                3. Torture destroys credibility – for the United States as a human rights leader in this world

 Wilhelmina Hayward is a global health reporting student at UW.

Little spoke of the need for volunteers to help refugees adjust to life in America. Contrary to the belief that refugees have reached a safe haven, refugees face many challenges in America. They have to assimilate into a new culture, become fiscally independent and navigate a foreign health care system. Additionally, many arrive in the United States with trauma-related ailments that make life more difficult. 

Another speaker, Dr. David Roesel at UW, said that refugees sometimes spend many years in camps, and the skills refugees learned in the camps sometimes have little meaning in places like Seattle.

For instance, Little said her family did not understand the need to be on-time at doctor’s appointments during their first months in America. 

“If you want to be a go-getter you’ll drive yourself insane within a few hours because there is nothing to go get,” she said, speaking of life in refugee camps. “You learn to survive this way.”

For more info about the International Rescue Committee: call 206.623.2105 or e-mail Seattle@theIRC.org 

Andrew Doughman is a global health reporting student at UW and an intern at the Seattle Times.

I wonder how University of Wisconsin-Madison professorand torture expert Alfred McCoy, PhD,  would feel if we took one idea from his books that represent his entire philosophy? Books are long because they represent complex ideas. Can I open a book by McCoy at any page and be able to sum up the entire book based on what I read? Can the entire book be summed up in one sentence? If it would be an injustice to break down his book, why is it OK to do it to others?

But that’s exactly what happened at the pre-conference session, “Expanding the Definition ofWar”  at the War and Global Health conference.

Jeff Ellis from Seattle University Law School, a speaker at the session, boiled down the book, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman to one sentence: ” In order to kill during war, soldiers dehumanize the enemy.”

What surprises me is that a lawyer, someone who argues for a living, did not use more points from the book to support his argument that the death penalty is war against an individual and should be abolished.

One of the main points in On Killing is that it isn’t natural for any species, especially humans to kill their own. Animals will kill for food or in defense. However, fighting is rarely fatal among animals. When wolves fight for pack dominance, the alpha wins when the other wolf lays on its back. By showing its belly, the most vulnerable spot, one wolf accepts the other as leader. The alpha then places its paw on the submissive belly without harming the other.

Killing members of the same species limits the genetic diversity and hurts the species as a whole. It seems like Ellis could us the example of nature to support his argument. If animals in nature know that killing their own is wrong, why can’t we, as a thinking, rational species come to the same conclusion?

Another important point in On Killing is that soldiers have to be taught to kill. If we, as a species, have to be taught to do something that is against our very nature isn’t that another argument for how wrong it is? In his book, Grossman hammers the point that only a small percentage of military members in previous wars actually fired their weapons.  He says as few as 10 percent of soldiers fired their weapons in the Civil War. Battlefields were littered with weapons that were found with multiple loads.

Close to dehumanizing the enemy, soldiers also needed to create distance. Not just physical, but emotional or technological distance. It was easier to push a button to drop a bomb or fire through a tank scope than shoot a person at point blank range. Death row executions create the same kind of emotional and technological distance. It seems that would be a good point for a person who wants to abolish the death penalty to make.

According to the book, only about 25 percent of the fighting men in WWII actually pulled the trigger. In a sense, to liberate Europe we sent men who didn’t have the facilities to defend themselves. Even in the face of the Nazi war machine, 75 percent of Americans still couldn’t pull the trigger. Maybe that is a good point to make why a person who made a mistake when they were young does not deserve to die at the hands of a fellow American.

As a student, I participated in a moot court case last week. We argued a Supreme Court case. The strategy is to win over the swing vote. Four justices are going to be with you, four are against, you need to win the one swing vote. Instead of talking to the members of the audience that agreed with him, Ellis should have taken the opportunity to convince the people who are for the death penalty like me.

I believe that there needs to be some changes, and I don’t think the death penalty system is perfect, but I support it. Ellis had a chance to change my mind or give me points to ponder and he squandered it.

What if you couldn’t sleep at night because your dreams were re-traumatizing you? So, in an effort to get some sleep you self-medicated with alcohol. Yes, in the beginning it helps, but the next day comes and you feel worse, so you have to do it again. What if, after spiraling dow ward for some time, you couldn’t get the thought of suicide or your anger became so enraging that you thought of lashing out, hurting or killing someone or something?

Today, Scott Michael, PhD, of th eVeterans Administration and Dr. Murray Raskind of the Veterans Administration – Puget Sound, described these kinds of scenarios in the combat veterans theysee for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSTD).

Sighting many statistics with charts and graphs, they went on to describe the effective treatment they and other clinicians have been using to to help men and women with PTSD. Before the late 70s,  the VA either didn’t understand or they weren’t equipped to handle traumatic stress disorders. Dr. Raskind described a situation in the late 70s where a group of angry and hostile African-American veterans demanded to be seen, heard and treated for symptoms we now know as PTSD. Raskind has held a monthly group therapy session for veterans of trauma ever since then. His group is currently around 40 in number.

He described one veteran in particular named Don, that was in “Nam,” and suffered PTSD. Having been in many terrible firefights, one in particular caused much trauma. One night during an ambush, he inadvertently shot a friend in the back. He drank himself to the point of almost commuting suicide. Today Don is well, hasn’t had a drink in over 12 years, and is on Praising, an effective medicine that Raskind has used in treating PTSD.

Michael describes PTSD as a normal reaction to an abnormal set of circumstances or situation. Many suffer from re-occurring memory intrusive, which  leads to hyperarousal. After awhile, sufferers choose avoidance as a method for coping and isolating themselves

Michael uses cognitive therapy to help his patients. He says if they are afraid of Pike Place Market, then that’s where we go, using Habituation Exposure Therapy. Sometimes an imagination thereat is used, recreating the event, but visualizing a different outcome. New therapies are integrating Buddhism into their treatments, using cross-cultural therapies. Michael says we are just trying to get the trauma down to a manageable size but that it’s never going to go away completely.

Trauma “is going to change who you are. You are not going to be who you were before,” said Raskind.

Robert Nash is a global health reporting student at UW.

Barker from UW brought to the forefront the other side of the legacy of WWII.  She said the impacts of nuclear testing in the Marshall Islands continue to afflict the people of the South Pacific. Radiation from the fallout may have a direct effect, but the second and third generations have a health issues to this day.

She said the Marshallese continue to fight with the U.S. government for recognition and compensation. She said they faced more than just fallout; some were actually experimented on to test the effects of radiation sickness on humans.

Carpenter, from the organization Hanford Challenge, said waste from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation poses more than just a risk to the local population. Being on the Columbia River, if leaked into the water, the effects could be far reaching. Carpenter  is facing these issues and bringing them to the attention of the government.

More than just saber rattling, the Hanford Challenge seeks to protect whistleblowers and to use hard data to force the government to recognize and address the hazards. Scientific research collected, analyzed and recorded is harder to ignore than a group carrying signs. For more information go to www.hanfordchallenge.org.

Peter Sessum is a global health reporting student at UW.