Interrogation techniques

The other night I attended an electrifying debate by Intelligence Squared U.S. about U.S. interrogation techniques in the war on terror....

Many of the interrogation techniques employed by the CIA and now barred by the Army field manual do not amount to what most Americans would call torture. While it's easy to understand why waterboarding is controversial, I cannot say the same about depriving detainees of sleep, being disrespectful to them in a good cop/bad cop context, and subjecting them to loud music (unless it is Hanson's "MMMBop"). These are all practices currently barred by the Army Field Manual, but which the CIA is permitted to employ against high-value terrorist detainees....

The speaker who struck me as most loopy was John Hutson, a former Judge Advocate General of the Navy, who refused to draw any nuance about the different interrogation techniques used by the CIA. He called everything torture, and even proclaimed "This is not an existential war" and that "Killing us isn't their goal."