Moreover under your sceanario

a prisoner that you believe has information that, if he tells you, will save lives. The information is not necessarily time sensitive, but the time frame is not open ended.

If you hang them, you ain't going to get the info. I think my the men and women of my father's generation who served in WWII
intuitively understood that little problem (even if you don't understand that hanging would be at cross purposes with your information gathering) and I don't think that is the method they would have used.

As for WWII being somehow different, you are incorrect. And it doesn't appear to me that the interrogators of that era agree with you

When about two dozen veterans got together yesterday for the first time since the 1940s, many of the proud men lamented the chasm between the way they conducted interrogations during the war and the harsh measures used today in questioning terrorism suspects.

Blunt criticism of modern enemy interrogations was a common refrain at the ceremonies held beside the Potomac River near Alexandria. Across the river, President Bush defended his administration's methods of detaining and questioning terrorism suspects during an Oval Office appearance.

Several of the veterans, all men in their 80s and 90s, denounced the controversial techniques. And when the time came for them to accept honors from the Army's Freedom Team Salute, one veteran refused, citing his opposition to the war in Iraq and procedures that have been used at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

"We got more information out of a German general with a game of chess or Ping-Pong than they do today, with their torture," said Henry Kolm, 90, an MIT physicist who had been assigned to play chess in Germany with Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess.

"We did it with a certain amount of respect and justice," said John Gunther Dean, 81, who became a career Foreign Service officer and ambassador to Denmark.

The interrogators had standards that remain a source of pride and honor.

"During the many interrogations, I never laid hands on anyone," said George Frenkel, 87, of Kensington. "We extracted information in a battle of the wits. I'm proud to say I never compromised my humanity."

Now I have answered the question several times, this last time in great detail. I would not torture, I would not violate the law. The people you seek to defend, did.

What's more, their superiors who authorized the torture did as well and knew they were violating the law. Torture is notorious for producing false confessions and I think that is exactly what they wanted- any corroboration -true or false- that it was necessary to invade Iraq. Cheney and company didn't care, they just wanted to justify  it.