Under the Geneva Convention, for example, a POW is required only to provide name, rank, and serial number and cannot receive any benefits for cooperating.

It is easy now for critics to claim that the work was poor; they haven't produced their own analyses or confronted any of the hard questions. For example, would they say that no technique beyond shouted questions could be used to interrogate a high-level terrorist leader, such as Osama bin Laden, who knows of planned attacks on the United States?

Punishing abuse in Iraq should not return the U.S. to Sept. 10, 2001, in the way it fights al Qaeda, while Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants remain at large and continue to plan attacks.

We can guess that the unacceptable conduct of the soldiers at Abu Ghraib resulted in part from the dangerous state of affairs on the ground in a theater of war.

Declarations of war have never been a constitutional requirement for military action abroad.

This is not to condone torture, which is still prohibited by the Torture Convention and federal criminal law.

American soldiers had to guard prisoners on the inside while receiving mortar and weapons fire from the outside. Guantanamo is distant from any battlefield, making it far more secure.