Art of the Spanish Inquisition, Part 1

A prisoner is brought into a room under guard. His eyes fixate on the wooden ramp. The ramp is wet, soaked with water. Droplets fall from its edges and puddle on the floor. The prisoner knows the horror is coming; it is just a moment away. The prisoner flails, dancing the dance of the terrified. The guards subdue him, force him down, with his head at the foot of the ramp and bind him tight. The guards are journeymen and do their work well. The man’s eyes are wide, wild and dart about, focusing on nothing, trying to avoid the stare of Horror that has found a home in the room.

The prisoner waits for the interrogator. The interrogator’s tools are simple and few: two pieces of cloth (one the size of a small washcloth; the other the size of a bath towel), an endless supply of water, a fluency in the man’s language and a relentless probing mind. The interrogator enters and approaches the man.

The prisoner thrashes his head about – he knows what is coming. He is desperately trying to postpone the coming horror, if only for a few moments. The guards grab his head and still its movement. The prisoner clenches his jaws with the force of life. He must stave off the violence that will be perpetrated on him if only a minute longer.

The prisoner’s tactic works for a few moments. The guards clamp his nose shut and probe the nerve bundle along his lower molars with penetrating, educated thumbs. The prisoner burns through the breath he had saved at the start of this insult. Finally the pain from the probing thumbs, combined with oxygen starvation, weakens his resolve. At that instant the interrogator stuffs the small soaked washrag into his mouth, the guards let loose of his nose and the man’s chest heaves. His nasal passages don’t allow the immediate passage of oxygen that his body demands; his chest heaves again and again in rapid succession in an attempt to inhale enough sweet air.

The interrogator places a soaked towel over the man’s face and begins to pour water over it; the towel allows the water to linger, sealing off his head like a Khmer Rouge execution garbage bag. The sensation of being under a surging black wave washes over the man. However, air is not trapped in his nose, sealing off his lungs, as it would be if he plunged into the wave. Instead, water trickles down his nasal passages, like rain flooding a gopher hole, tickling his gag reflex. Reflexively the man’s chest compresses and heaves, sucking in more water. His lungs burn and convulse, in an attempt to expel the water. Water mixed with snot and vomit explodes from his nose. Horror embraces the man; he soils himself. The smell of excrement and vomit floods the room.

The interrogator’s nose twitches at the smell of Horror’s effect as he pours more water. The prisoner fights it off the best he can. Insidiously, the interrogator has allowed a portion of the washrag to protrude from the man’s mouth – a wick if you will. The wick is soon saturated and water travels into the man’s mouth, inundating the bundled washrag. The prisoner struggles; the restraints bite and break his skin. The prisoner is desperate for air. His chest heaves, inhaling more water and vomit. His lungs cannot eject the vomit and water fast enough; the vomit chemically burns his lung; water borne bacteria nests deep in his lungs inviting pneumonia; his arrhythmic heart beat hints at cardiac arrest; and the water blocks the exchange of oxygen for carbon dioxide withering his gray matter as a result of oxygen starvation – the gray matter that may host the sought after information. [i]

The prisoner is drowning, teetering on the brink of the Great Abyss, under the gaze of his tormentors. Death tugs on the prisoner and whispers: “Its ok just lean forward.” Maybe thirty seconds has passed since the prisoner danced the dance of the terrified.
The interrogator asks a question.[ii]



[i] Telephone interview with Dr. Matt Topham M.D.; pulmonary researcher; University of Utah School of Medicine; provided medical aspects of drowning, December 12, 2007

[ii] Interview with General David R. Irvine, USA (Ret.); taught military law and interrogation techniques for the Sixth United States Army Intelligence School; reviewed waterboarding passage and verified technical aspects, November 11, 2007


Copyright Stephan Fowler 2007. All rights reserved.