Napoleon's Egypt: Invading The Middle East - Reenactor.ru

THE EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION221As for his relationship with Muslims, Bonaparte clearly began to feel afterthe revolt in Cairo that his methods had been too harsh. On 11 November hewrote a letter to General Berthier strictly forbidding the beating of insurgents toextract information from them. “It has been recognized at all times that thismanner of interrogating human beings, of putting them under torture, producesnothing good. The unfortunates say whatever comes into their heads, and everythingthey think you want to know.” 37 As a result, he wrote, he was prohibitingfurther use of torture as an intelligence-gathering technique, insofar as both“reason and humanity” denounce it. He added that he did not mean to forbid theuse of the bastinado (the beating of a prisoner’s feet while he was held upsidedown), but that it should be deployed only for the purpose of punishment.