Army Document at Odds With Ethics
The following statements are excerpted from the Army's OTSG/MEDCOM Policy Memo 06-029, dated October 20, 2006. The memo sets out Department of Defense standards for actions by psychologists and psychiatrists during interrogation of detainees. APA and the AMA have stated their opposition to such activity by psychiatrists and other physicians (see Ethics Experts Challenge Army's Interrogation Participation Memo), but the memo indicates “... that the Department of Defense still wants doctors to be involved in interrogations and continues to resist the positions taken by medicine's professional associations,” according to a recent Perspective in the New England Journal of Medicine. The full memorandum is posted at the journal's Web site (see URL below).
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[T]he events of September 11, 2001 and the ongoing Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) have required the unprecedented and sustained involvement of Behavioral Science Consultants (BSCs) in support of both detention operations and intelligence interrogations and detainee debriefing operations.
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BSCs are psychologists and psychiatrists, not assigned to clinical practice functions, but to provide consultative services to support authorized law enforcement or intelligence activities....
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The mission of a BSC is to provide psychological expertise and consultation, or to assist the command in conducting safe, legal, ethical, and effective detention operations, intelligence interrogations, and detainee debriefing operations.
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BSCs must regularly monitor their behavior and remain within professional ethical boundaries as established by their professional associations, by their licensing State, and by the military.
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BSCs are authorized to make psychological assessments of the character, personality, social interactions, and other behavioral characteristics of detainees....
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BSCs may observe interrogations.
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Psychologists and psychiatrists are bound by both legal and ethical constraints when supporting detention operations, intelligence interrogations, and detainee debriefings.
Also, the document quotes guidelines in the AMA's 2006 report“ Physician Participation in Interrogation” and then adds commentary from the Army memo. Here are excerpts from that portion of the document.
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Second AMA guideline: Physicians must neither conduct nor directly participate in an interrogation, because a role as physician-interrogator undermines the physician's role as healer and thereby erodes trust in the individual physician-interrogate and in the medical profession.
Memo Commentary: Although physicians who provide medical care to detainees should not be involved in decisions whether or not to interrogate because such decisions are unrelated to medicine or the health interests of an individual, physicians who are not providing medical care to detainees may provide such information if warranted by compelling security interests.
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Third AMA guideline: Physicians must not monitor interrogations with the intention of intervening in the process, because this constitutes direct participation in interrogation.
Memo Commentary: The presence of a physician at an interrogation, particularly an appropriately trained psychiatrist, may benefit the interrogates because of the belief held by many psychiatrists that kind and compassionate treatment of detainees can establish rapport that may result in eliciting more useful information.
The Department of the Army's “Behavioral Science Consultation Policy” is posted on the Web site of the New England Journal of Medicine at<http://content.nejm.org/cgi/data/359/11/1090/DC1/1>.▪
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Published online: 3 October 2008
Published in print: October 3, 2008
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