Interrogation without torture

I'm watching a program on The History Channel called We can make you talk about interrogation techniques which get information without torture. I doubt that Military Intelligence officials knowing these techniques, would feel any need to commit actual illegalities. What sounds more plausible is that the people condoning the abuses at Abu Ghraib weren't all that bright or skilled or that the MI dealing with Graner et al didn't want to know how they were "softening up" prisoners, which is worse.