The Ticking Time-Bomb Scenario

[QuidProQuo]

I'm interested to read people's opinions on the issue of torture, and whether it is morally justifiable in the dreaded 'ticking time-bomb' scenario - wherein the use of non-lethal or lethal torture of a terrorist suspect may prevent attacks of either a small or cataclysmic scale, as in biochemical weapons and the like.

Personally, I am a consequentialist in this regard, and so I believe it is both morally justifiable and important to allow states the facility to conduct interrogations and torture - to an extent - if the circumstances call for it. I would think it's far more desirable to incur the death of one or a hand-full of terror suspects than to see the deaths of innocent civilians - potentially thousands in number. But then again, what does this say about our commitment to the ideal of the assumption of innocence? In protecting the innocent, would we not then be circumventing one of the basic principles which allows this in the first place?

Yes, torture would lead potentially to the corrosion of democratic principles, and of course, torture warrants like those proposed by Alan Dershowitz are likely to be breached at any moment - also considering that interrogators who do exploit these guidelines would never likely, in a country like America, be convicted by jury in a civil suit - but what are the practical risks of remaining too deferential to terrorism when the citizenry, not only the ethical fibre of a country, is at stake? What are people's opinions on the praxis of a torture warrant and the likelihood of keeping this regulated?

http://www.alandershowitz.com/publications/docs/torturewarrants.html