The+role+of+the+psychologist+in+military+ops

=**Military and the Role of the Psychologist**=
 * Dawn and I were curious as to see what the role of a psychologist in the military would be. They do differ from the current everyday psychologists. They differ from their purpose right down to their code of ethics.**

1) Introduction
-What a military psychologist does -How effective their tactics are - When are these tactics used

2) Code of ethics
-what are the code of ethics a psychologist in the military follows

3) Incidents of psychologists in the military
-Abu Ghraib Guantanamo media type="youtube" key="LZ_Vxoyu8zY" width="425" height="350"media type="youtube" key="T2OnZFeKhMo" width="425" height="350"

**4) What tactics are used**.
-psychological torture -physical torture

A U.S. War for Empire
In early 1990, around 15 military psychologists met in a small conference room at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. Though the psychologists worked in different communities across the country, their job was basically the same. They helped torture people. More specifically, they helped members of the U.S. military inoculate themselves against torture by subjecting them to torture techniques. They spent their days hitting and insulting, isolating and waterboarding, all with the hope that by exposing soldiers to these terrible experiences they might prepare them — physically and psychologically — for capture. The work was a part of a larger training program for military members called Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, or SERE. Two of the men who were in that room, James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, are the psychologists who originally proposed applying the harsh tactics used in SERE training to detainees held by the United States government. Because of this they are almost universally vilified. Many think of them as people whose work has greatly tarnished the image of America. But Bryce Lefever, a former SERE psychologist who first met Mitchell and Jessen at the 1990 meeting, does not see them this w ay. Lefever went on to serve as a military psychologist at the detention center at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, and he is one of the few psychologists involved in this community who have come forward in the wake of the revelations about harsh interrogation tactics to defend the work of the mental health professionals. Lefever's message is clear: Mitchell and Jessen and the other psychologists involved in this work should be not reviled but lauded. To Lefever, they are patriots who deserve praise. "I think the media ought to give us a big ol' thank you for our efforts on behalf of America," Lefever says. "There should be some recognition of the effort — the really extreme effort — that we've gone through to help."

NPR(2009), Interview With a Military Psychologist,Can be retrieved from [|A military psychologists view on torture]

According to this military psychologist Lefever, the job of a military psychologist is to help prepare soldiers for extreme torture tactics that may be used on them if captured. I think being prepared for this type of torture seems good in theory but once it has been put into place seems abusrd. I understand why they do this type of training because their is a chance that if they were to be captured it could happen and they need to be prepared to stay silent. still I find it very unsettling that we put our soldiers through this type of training.

** When Is Psychological Torture Used **
**In The Name Of America** And from Lefever's perspective, it would actually have been unethical for them not to suggest the use of these tactics on the few individuals who might be in a position to provide information that could potentially save thousands of American lives. "America is my client; Americans are who I care about," says Lefever. "I have no fondness for the enemy, and I don't feel like I need to take care of their mental health needs." Lefever says all of the military psychologists he knew felt this way. Their client was America, and "do no harm" meant that psychologists should work in every way to save the lives of the Americans they had pledged themselves to serve. Civilian psychologists usually interpret "do no harm" in a more narrow way, as an exhortation to protect the life of the individual sitting in front of them. Lefever says he was not involved in any way in organizing or implementing the application of harsh tactics to detainees. He also says that he personally wasn't in favor of using the harsher methods because he thought that the techniques, if known, might damage America's image. Still, he feels strongly that the psychologists involved should not be unjustly criticized. "Anyone who wants to throw stones in this situation really needs to step back and figure out what they themselves would do in these situations and not just be 'ivory tower' critics," says Lefever. "Most of the time they have no idea what they're talking about."

NPR(2009), Interview With a Military Psychologist,Can be retrieved from [|A military psychologists view on torture]

According to Lefever psychological torture should be used on those individuals who hold information that could potentially save thousands of American's lives. He seems to have no problem with doing whatever takes to secure the safety of thousands of his fellow Americans.

** Code Of Ethics **
**Ethical Standard: The Most Good For The Most People** From Lefever's perspective, the notion that psychologists behaved in an unethical manner is absurd; a product, he believes, of a fundamental misunderstanding of the psychologists' true ethical obligations. Because psychologists are supposed to be do-gooders, Lefever says, "the idea that they would be involved in producing some pain just seems at first blush to be something that would be wrong, because we 'do no harm.' " But in fact, says Lefever, "the ethical consideration is always to do the most good for the most people." Under this logic, after the horrors of Sept. 11 it was only natural for the psychologists involved in the SERE training to come forward and propose the application of those techniques to people detained by the U.S. government. The American people, after all, were under threat. "America's house was broken into on 9/11 and someone had to raise their hand to stop it," says Lefever. "And early on there was a sense of desperation in intelligence-gathering." In the face of that desperation, says Lefever, psychologists felt a need to act. Though today there is int ense controversy around the idea that harsh interrogation tactics produce accurate information, at the time, says Lefever, it was "absolutely clear" to the psychologists in the SERE programs that the harsh interrogation tactics worked. "You know, the tough nut to crack, if you keep him awake for a week, you torture him, you tie his arms behind him, you have him on the ground — anyone can be brought beyond their ability to resist," says Lefever.

NPR(2009), Interview With a Military Psychologist,Can be retrieved from [|A military psychologists view on torture] His ethical standards make sense, do what is in the best interest for the most people, but at what point is it too much. Most Americans would probably agree that some of these tactics would cross their morals and ethical views. I for one could never harm another human being no matter what their information may be. There is a chance that these tactics could produce false information and then we would have torutured another human for false information. The ethical standards on torture are very foggy and I would say that most Americans would rather not know how the information was retrieved.

Tactics That Are Sometimes Used During Interrogations
This is a description of waterboarding, the torture technique U.S. interrogators have used against suspected “terrorists” in the years after 9/11, at the turn of the 21st Century. Now read this description: //“A man is thrown down on his back and three or four men sit or stand on his arms and legs and hold him down; and either a gun barrel or a rifle barrel or a carbine barrel or a stick as big as a belaying pin,—that is, with an inch circumference,—is simply t////hrust into his jaws and his jaws are thrust back, and, if possible, a wooden log or stone is put under his head or neck, so he can be held more firmly. In the case of very old men I have seen their teeth fall out,—I mean when it was done a little roughly. He is simply held down and then water is poured onto his face down his throat and nose from a jar; and that is kept up until the man gives some sign or becomes unconscious. And, when he becomes unconscious, he is simply rolled aside and he is allowed to come to. In almost every case the men have been a little roughly handled. They were rolled aside rudely, so that water was expelled. A man suffers tremendously, there is no doubt about it. His sufferings must be that of a man who is drowning, but cannot drown. ...”// This is a quote from U.S. Lieutenant Grover Flint over 100 years ago—at the turn of the 20th Century. He is describing the “water cure”—a torture technique used by U.S. soldiers in the Philippine-American War that started in 1898.
 * P**anic and suffering is induced by tilting a victim’s head back and pouring water into their mouth and nose. The person is unable to breath or cough out water, the lungs collapse, and the sinuses and trachea are filled with water. In this way, the subject is “drowned from the inside.” The chest and lungs are kept higher than the head so that coughing draws water up and into the lungs while avoiding total suffocation.

Onesto, L.,(2008) Torture Techniques at Guantanamo. Can be retrieved at [|techniques at guantanamo]

After reading this section I just have one question, What if your son or daughter was suspected of having information pertaining the safety of Americans, would you want these tactics used on them? These tactics seem very extreme and cruel. I feel that any person in their right mind would say anything that the militants wanted. I for one wouldn't be able to handle waterboarding.

The lack of physical signs can make psychological torture appear less damaging even though it generally causes more severe and long-lasting damage than the pain inflicted during physical torture. “Psychological torture is designed to destroy the victim’s sense of privacy, intimacy, trust of others and security, as well as one’s sense of self and how one relates to one’s surroundings.... Psychological torture often makes victims feel that they are responsible for the pain and suffering that they experience and induces feelings of intense humiliation leading to feelings of worthlessness. “Victims often feel that they had a choice, or even that they share responsibility of what was done to them, when in reality they were powerless. Victims of these techniques are often told that their lack of cooperation will lead to the torture of others, causing the victims of torture to believe that he or she shares the responsibility for the pain and suffering of others. The effects can be particularly harmful when the victim is forced to witness pain being inflicted on others as a result of not giving information to interrogators,” write the authors of //Break Them Down//. Far from being the result of random acts of a few psychopaths, mental torture is employed to generate a very specific dynamic between torturer and victim. For example, forced nudity—the most widely documented form of sexual humiliation—is expressly intended to create a power differential between the detainees and interrogators. Stripping the victim of his/her identity induces immediate shame and establishes an environment of ever-present threat of sexual and physical assault. “Forced nudity was used not as a punishment, nor as an exception, but as an accepted method of interrogation,” explain the study’s investigators. The effects of isolation are augmented when prisoners are not told about the reasons for their confinement or how long they will be held. This is particularly relevant to detainees currently held by the US, who are in legal limbo and kept totally in the dark regarding all aspects of their incarceration. Detainees held under these conditions face significant risk of the development of irreversible psychiatric symptoms. Effects include depression, hallucinations and perceptual distortions, paranoia and problems with impulse control. Long-term isolation, according to one study referred to by PHR, can lead to increased withdrawal of prisoners into themselves to the point that their environment is “so painful, so bizarre and impossible to make sense of, that they create their own reality—they live in a world of fantasy instead.” Another researcher found that solitary confinement “results in deep emotional disturbances. Aggression is mobilized in two directions, suicidal and homicidal. A third reaction is a withdrawal into the self leading to a psychotic-like state or a psychosis.” The most pervasive use of threats of death or injury occurred in Iraq, with the earliest use of mock executions beginning in April 2003. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is extremely common among survivors of torture, with some researchers even arguing that PTSD inadequately describes the exact nature of the symptoms resulting from torture. In a telling sign of the prevalence of torture in American foreign policy, some researchers are making the case for the creation of a specific “torture syndrome,” while others promote the argument that torture victims suffer from a heightened form of PTSD, dubbed “complex PTSD.” A significant portion of the PHR report deals with the history of how the US government set about to create the pseudo-legal justification for torture beginning in early 2002 with the reclassification of prisoners of war. “The repudiation of the Geneva Conventions’ applicability to Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees left a void, that as soon as the ‘war on terror’ began, so too did the use of psychological abusive interrogation methods,” summarizes the report. The chronological outline of the “descent into routine use of psychological torture” presented by PHR clearly refutes any claim that torture is not an integral part of US militarism. Laurier,J.,(2005). New Study: Use of Psychological Torture Systemic and Unabated. Can be retrieved at []
 * Consequences of psychological torture**

After reading the consequences of mental torture tactics I am shocked that the incidence at Abu Ghraib even happend. I feel like in any situation where torture is concerned the detainee would lie in order to make the torture stop.

. Operational psychology has been defined as: the use of psychological principles and skills to improve a commander's decision making as it pertains to conducting combat or related operations. Operational roles may include counterinsurgency stragety, human profiling, interrogation and detention support, special mission unit personnal and direct support of counter intelligence operations. Whether military psychologists serve in the traditional clinic and hospital rules, combact clinic roles, or operational billets, they are prone to wrestle with conflict resulting from their dual identities as psychologist and military officers.

Challenges to ethical practice in military environments Dual Identities, military psychologists struggle with being an licensed psychologists and a commissioned military officer.Military mission, uniformed psychologists hold a legally binding obligation to place the military mission first and foremost. Diffuculty identifying the client,

References Laurier,J.,(2005). New Study: Use of Psychological Torture Systemic and Unabated. Can be retrieved at [] NPR(2009), Interview With a Military Psychologist,Can be retrieved from [|A military psychologists view on torture] Onesto, L.,(2008) Torture Techniques at Guantanamo. Can be retrieved at [|techniques at guantanamo]