ABSTRACT
There are few testimonies of perpetrators. Most are self-exculpatory texts in the context of judicial procedures, making it difficult to gauge the extent to which they reflect the actual thoughts of the interrogator. Different studies have shown that these texts mostly offer rationalisations of actions, or false requests for forgiveness (Payne, 2009). The purpose of this chapter is not to reflect on how an ordinary person becomes a torturer, or the psychological mechanisms that allow him or her to practice torture, but to examine how torturers conceptualise psychological torture. This will complement our analysis of interrogation techniques in later chapters.
