Should Our New Interrogation Rules Allow Lying To Psychopathic Homicidal Maniacs?

Space, the final frontier.
Yesterday I wrote a little blurb ridiculing the fact that someone actually complained about our interrogators blowing smoke into the face to the guy who blew up the USS Cole, killing 17 of our sailors.
I thought that was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard concerning our national security (aside from the fact that we just told everyone on the planet that we’ll be using the Army manual as a rulebook for our interrogators) – until today. It seems there is some question about whether of not, under the new rules imposed by the Obama Administration, we can lie to the people we’re questioning.
Really. I’m….flabbergasted. Why is this even a question?

Stimson is opposed to waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation techniques” that were employed under the Bush administration. But he said other methods — for instance, lying — should be at the disposal of interrogators. He said any new methods that are devised or approved should stay classified.
While “lying” might seem like an obvious interrogation method, the Army Field Manual only approves it in very specific circumstances.
Under the “we know all approach,” interrogators are allowed to “subtly” convince the prisoner that they know what he or she knows. This can be complemented by the “file and dossier” approach, in which interrogators present a “file” to a prisoner that appears to be much bigger than it really is, by being “padded with extra paper” and other decorations.

So, lying to a homicidal lunatic who is bent on your absolute destruction in the most gruesome ways he can come up with – oh, and that of your family and your little dog too, Dorothy – is only allowed under “certain circumstances”?
Taking deep breath. In. Out. Okay….
Lying to a criminal suspect has been an approved – and court sanctified – method of interview and interrogation for decades. Trust me, it works. How in the world do suspected terrorists have some sort of elevated status wherein lying to them could be some kind of violation of, of, er, of….their rights ?
More deep breathing. In. Out.
Hey, I got it. This’ll break them for sure. Let’s withold that little umbrella from their frosty afternoon drinks by the pool. Or maybe not. Better check that Army interrogation field manual first. There just might be a rule against it.
Can’t be mean to them now, can we?