WHY DID THEY DO IT?

The article discusses the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by United States soldiers in Iraq. For all the tangled nudes, the hideous hoods, the dangling wires and the dog leash, perhaps the single most shocking thing about the images from Abu Ghraib prison is the woman in so many of the pictures: smiling broadly or giving a thumbs up or just standing casually in the demented scene as if posing in a college dormitory. Psychologists and historians who study torture give what is probably the most disturbing explanation of all: they are us. For under certain circumstances, almost anyone has the capacity to commit the atrocities seen in the photos that have shocked the world. The 372nd reservists were assigned duty at Abu Ghraib in October 2003. In his investigation of the abuses, Major General Antonio Taguba found that soldiers were "actively requested" by military intelligence officers and private contractors to "set physical and mental conditions for favorable interrogation of witnesses." How much was ordered by higher-ups and how much was free-lance sadism will presumably become clearer when the accused men and women of the 372nd face the criminal-justice system. Psychologists who have studied torture and prisoner abuse say it is remarkably easy for people to lapse into sadistic behavior when they have complete power over other human beings, especially if they feel the behavior has been sanctioned by an authority figure. In a 1971 experiment relevant to Abu Ghraib, Stanford psychologist Philip Zimbardo created a fake prison ward on campus and randomly assigned student volunteers to be prisoners or guards. What was to be a two-week experiment had to be cut short after just six days because the guards "began to use the prisoners as playthings for their amusement," recalled Zimbardo.