Third Party & Independents: Archives

Stephen:

Most people agree that torture is not acceptable, with the caveat that sometimes torture is necessary. For instance, if a madman kidnapped my daughter and buried her alive, with enough air to live for 12 hours, I’d be okay with ANY measure to get him to say where she was. It would be a timeliness issue. Similarly, if torture of one person might prevent the devastation of a brigade of young soldiers, I’d be okay with it.

But this assumes that torture would be reserved for only the most necessary of times, and that ends up opening up a wide variety of opinions on what is considered “most necessary”.

I would state that the Geneva Convention is written so broadly as to not really apply. It has provisions for paying POWs a wage rate during their captivity, and considers any type of abuse, even verbal, as unacceptable. I dont consider calling a POW names to be “torture”.

It seems to me that rewriting the GC to meet with today’s expectations makes sense. I believe the US holds much closer to the ideals of the GC than do most of our enemies—-look at Viet Nam as a historical example. Look to Iraq and how terrorists have murdered captives, even those with no military standing, in order to see how others deal with prisoners.

Lets create a standard that is measurable and also attainable. I submit that the GC is NOT attainable, and therefore becomes meaningless.

The Geneva convention does not include terrorists. So if the U.S. needs to torture 1 million terrorists to save 1 American life then it is worth it. And I’m talking real torture not this prisoner stacking and humiliation crap, I mean getting medieval with a pair of pliers and a blow torch.

People we are talking about TERRORISTS not POW’s not Americans in foreign prisons. Terrorists that have already attempted or have killed Americans
civilian or military, and then hide under the cloak of a church or school. American prisoners are being tortured already remember Somalia and Saddams home town hanging Americans from a bridge. Everyone know the U.S. is the most humane country in the world. Who has been feeding the world for the last 100 years, which country gives the most money and provides medical and teaching and building supplies? Which country has more troops in foreign countries defending them against attacks then some countries have troops?
You commmies, I mean Progressives, are so worried what other countries think of the U.S. so you try and appease them to keep them happy. What if you
raised your children that way always giving them what they want.

(I am paraphrasing this from a posting I made on another thread, since I think it is more appropriate here.)

Many who are defending the Administration today seem to think think that we signed the Geneva Conventions against our will. This is a great misunderstanding of the context and purpose of the Conventions and of the reason why America signed it.

We signed the Geneva Conventions because the values they contain are American values. We signed them in order to require less civilized nations to aspire to America’s high values. We are (or at least were until recently) the world’s moral leader with regards to human rights and military ethics.

How about we stick to the Geneva Conventions not because we are “forced” to but because we want to?

How about we show the world that we are more civilized than our enemies, instead of telling them that we have “thrown out the rule books” and that we are willing to sink as low as they are?

It sounds like a cliche, I know, but it appears that in the eyes of some of my fellow Americans the terrorists have already won, that they have turned the USA into a nation which has turned our backs on our own core values.

I refuse to go along with that defeatist and ultimately barbaric ideology, and I think that a large majority of American voters will agree with me.

America is morally better than the terrorists and tyrants we oppose. We need to speak and act accordingly and not make excuses for abuse, torture, and invasion.

We can win this without going back on the values which (most) Americans hold most dear.

-Cf

First of all, the word terrorist was never mentioned in my entry, nor in the link I referenced. For all intents and purposes, Iraq was a conventional war against an army, now now against guerillas, labeling them terrorists because they use guerilla tactics is a misnomer (in that sense, the American revolution was an illegal terrorist action). This isn’t to say that I’m favoring the Iraqi militiamen, I’m simply trying to explain that there is a difference.

Secondly, there are cases where torture may be justified against terrorists, and that is not what is being debated. What is being discussed is the US desire to scrap 50 years of goodwill with the world simply because maybe 10,000 terrorists won’t follow the rules. Following Geneva Conventions can do more good than harm, and it ensures that lower level terrorists (pay only, not ideological) will be willing to flip and provide information instead of refusing to surrender when fought against.

Granted, we are in uncharted territory in the global war on terrorism, but to adopt the tactics of torture and blackmail, we only strengthen their rhetoric and their ranks with embittered recruits.

We have an enemy that is fighting us because of hatred, which is a dangerous enemy. But we run the risk of having enemies who fight us out of fear, which is an enemy that will not stop.

“Most people agree that torture is not acceptable, with the caveat that sometimes torture is necessary. For instance, if a madman kidnapped my daughter and buried her alive, with enough air to live for 12 hours, I’d be okay with ANY measure to get him to say where she was. It would be a timeliness issue. Similarly, if torture of one person might prevent the devastation of a brigade of young soldiers, I’d be okay with it.

But this assumes that torture would be reserved for only the most necessary of times, and that ends up opening up a wide variety of opinions on what is considered “most necessary”.”

While I don’t think anyone wants to see any harm come to you daughter, my main problem with this argument is the endless questions that arise:

What if we had to touture 1 terrorist to save 1000 Americans - fine - thats easy. What about 10 terrorist to save 1 American? What about 10 suspects to maybe save 1 American? What about 1 American to save 1 American?

Once we start tearing down our own walls of humainity - who will be there to stop us?

“I mean getting medieval with a pair of pliers and a blow torch.”

Fisk - you should move to Syria where they share your beliefs.

Fahey - THANK YOU! Finally someone who understands this isnt a race to see who can out psychopath their enemy.

It is a sad an shameful day when Americans start advocating this kind of behavior.
We used to be the good guys, not a bunch of motorcycle thugs.

Justin:

You just helped elucidate the problem with trying to define a situation too closely. You yourself agreed to torturing 1 terrorist to save 1000 American lives. The point I make is that in these situations, there often is not a single answer. There often is not one sole solution that covers all options.

In WWII, there was a D-day training accident in which over 700 soldiers were allowed to die. No one came to help them in fear of jeopardizing the entire mission. To have saved these 700 men might have cost thousands upon thousands of lives, so it must not have been an easy decision.

It must never be easy to torture someone, but as I said, there are times when it must be legitimate. But those times must be few. As i also stated, to live up to every tenet of the Geneva Conventions is nearly impossible, unless we want to allocate funds to pay the POWS while they are in captivity. I know of NO one who advocates that, yet it is a provision of the Convention. Time for a rewrite—i think so.

Once again, I think a Ronald Reagan reference is in order. America needs to be a shining city on a hill. It’s intrinsic to who we are as a people, and why much of the world loved us. Arguments like this shouldn’t be possible.

Bob Young, I think you are partly wrong here, Bob. Our nation has always had a contingent of thugs within its ranks, we just never elected them to office before.

There sure is a lot of posturing by people who have previously shown a tolerant and indulgent attitude toward dictators who torture and kill
people as a matter of explicit policy.

The abuse (not “torture” as the libs have leaped to parrot) needs to be investigated. However, it is independent of whatever howling and yowling the stupid radical extremists are engaged in
(what World Socialist Review, the Militant, or that Global Resarch nitwit outfit in Canada have bellowed and lied about this, for example) as well as the scumbags elsewhere in the world for which this is not only normal but mild behavior (but our very worst, almost insignificant as well as so aberrent, behavior).

Speaking of abiding by the Geneva Conventions…

Rumsfeld ordered prisoner held off the books

“You just helped elucidate the problem with trying to define a situation too closely. You yourself agreed to torturing 1 terrorist to save 1000 American lives.”

I was agreeing to it in concept. If I could tourture one terrorist, that i knew was a terrorist, to get info that I knew beforehand he/she had, and that that info would definatly save 1000 lives…I think you see the problem. Why would I not tourture someone I suspected might have info? What if it was possible he had info that could save lives?

The rest of my point was once we allow tourture - we have begun the process of lowering our selves to the standards of those we call ” stupid radical extremists”.

If its a choice between having the GC and tourture, as over the top as the GC may or may not be, get the paychecks for prisoners ready.

Let us not forget that this President continues to cite torture and rape rooms conducted by Saddam Hussein as part of the justification for invading that nation and removing a man made evil by these acts. If we participate in the very same kind of behavior, what does that make us in the President’s own words?

Come on folks, get some backbone and integrity - quit being hypocrites on this issue - if it was wrong for Saddam to employ such measures for political reasons, it is just as wrong for the U.S.

Disrobing a prisoner and putting a bag over his head is not torture. Abuse maybe, but not torture. Any reasonable person would have no problem seeing the differences. The left’s mouthpieces may not fit in the category of a reasonable persons. I understand their terrorist loving minds have a hard time making out the differences, but if they can’t see the difference between giving someone a nonfatal electrical shock and using sarin and mustard gas on civilians, they need a lithium drip.

I’m pleased the Democrat Party is now attempting to portray America as “evil” and our soldiers as “tortureres”. It’s the theme that billionaire
moneybags Demmie surrogate George Soros was spewing the other day to an assembled gathering of Demmies, so now the parrots are repeating what Their George told them to think and say.

I’m pleased because it helps the American Voter to see what the Democrat Party is really like.

Disrobing a prisoner and putting a bag over his head may not be torture, but electrical shocks to the genitals? Torture.

We can see the differences, Fisk, but we still don’t condone either one.

Well, the terrorists as we know now, have captured an American in Saudi Arabia. At first they promised to do to him what was done to the prisoners at Abu Ghraib, which means I suppose that they were going to strip him naked, put woman’s underwear over his head, take some pictures and then release him back to his family with the potential for million dollars in compensation.

But now, reverting back to character, they’ve promised to kill him, probably in the most barbaric way they can imagine, and film the event for the glee of television viewers across the middle east.

What makes many of us so uncomfortable with the left is that they refuse to admit the nature of the enemy we are facing—to place outrage where it really belongs—and prefer to obsess over a handful of relatively mild abuses by a tiny minority of American guards. Fine, punish those Americans responsible. Be sure it doesn’t happen again, but it will be hard to take seriously those who can muster so much outrage at Rumsfeld and Bush and remain so passive and indifferent at the behavior of the real criminals.

A major problem here is that for many “the Geneva Conventions” seem to have morphed into something that more closely resembles American criminal justice—complete with the expectation of due process, the right to a trial, to appeals etcetera. But actually, the Geneva Conventions has pretty explicit provisions for how “insurgents” like those in Iraq can be handled. In short, the US forces would be well within their rights to capture them, give a brief military trial—verify, for example, that they were in civilian dress and/or using civilians as shields—and then send them before a firing squad the next morning.

This does not cover everyone, obviously, and many of those in Abu Ghraib were not enemy combatants (many were common criminals,murderers and rapists, and many it turns out were actually innocent of anything—these incidentally, were not the ones in the pictures).

How about the vast majority of detainees who are innocent?

Intelligence officers of the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq estimated that 70 percent to 90 percent of Iraqi detainees were arrested by mistake, the Red Cross said in a report that was disclosed Monday, and Red Cross observers witnessed U.S. officers mistreating Abu Ghraib prisoners by keeping them naked in total darkness in empty cells.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4944094

The innocent ones were released—that’s the short answer to your question.

But remember that the 70-90 percent number, if accurate, doesn’t reflect the “priority” cases in the cellblocks where those photos were taken.

What I want to know, and maybe that’s another blog, is when did the International Red Cross get into the business of discussing their findings?

They were able to achieve unprecedented access to almost every prison, gulag, and muck-hut over the past 75 years precisely because of their discretion.

I find it incredible they’d be willing to sacrifice their reputation, credibility, and future access over something as seemingly trifling as the U.S. treatment of prisoners.

There’s something very wrong in that picture.

Yonivore:

Unless they do not consider the situation as trifling as some here would like to paint it.

Fisk, you are either uninformed or your are deliberately misinforming others as to the nature of the crimes committed by the American military. We are talking serious acts here, probably sodomy, rape, and murder, not just panties over the head or a leash on the neck.

The very people you try to defend, Rumsfeld and the Pentagon, and conservatives on the investigative Commission have told the public there is much worse than the acts which you describe. So, if you want any credibility at all here, relate to the facts and reality of the situation as represented by the very conservatives you appear to align yourself with, or if ignorance is the problem, get informed.

Are you aware of the lawsuits filed by detainees in Iraq who were subsequently released, if not, get informed. Are you aware of the reports by the Commission on the nature of the abuses - if not, get informed. Are you aware our own soldiers raised the ethical issue to command months before Rumsfeld and command said they were aware of the problem, (and they are on record now having come out to reveal this), if not, get informed.

If ignorance is not the problem, your credibility is seriously compromised.

> They were able to achieve unprecedented access
> to almost every prison, gulag, and muck-hut
> over the past 75 years precisely because of
> their discretion.

Can you back that up? My impression is that
(a) They have never been especially “discreet”, and
(b) They are usually denied access to prisoners held by tyrants.

Also, apparently it was revealed today that Rumsfeld kept at least one prisoner “off the books” so that the Red Cross would not know about this prisoner. Perhaps it was for security reasons, we’ll see.

-Cf

David:

Earlier you compared the abuse at Abu Ghraib to the brutality of Saddam Hussein’s regime. You said, “If we participate in the very same kind of behavior, what does that make us in the President’s own words?”

Now,I know you to be a reasonable man, and you know me to be one as well, but comparing the two circumstances is akin to comparing the removal of a splinter to major surgery. Yes, both require medical instruments, sterilization, lighting etc, but the comparison ends there.

I’m not condoning the abuses at Abu Ghraib, but I’m also against the over-the-top comparisons. Some of what happened at Abu Ghraib can be defined as torture, while some of it might not even surpass the mild hazing I received as a fraternity pledge. Lets then compare that with the men who, under Saddam, had their hands surgically removed—or should we refer to this salaciously like the media does to Abu Ghraib and say that Saddam “brutally amputated limbs in a bloody display of inhumanity”.

David, we agree generally that torture is wrong, though in some circumstances, it may be necessary. At least I think you agree with that, though I may have confused you with Christopher or another writer. If so, apologies.

But please, lets not make outlandish comparisons that have little basis in fact. Lets not take the absolute worst of what America has done, and try to say that it represents the norm, or that it represents what happened under Saddam on a regular basis. Lets call a spade a spade, but without the hyperbolic hyperventilation.

Christopher:

The prisoner kept “‘off the books’ so that the Red Cross would not know about this prisoner” was a perfectly valid circumstance, according the the article you apparently skimmed.

“Pentagon officials… concede he was classified as a type of enemy combatant that, under the Geneva Conventions, does not have to be immediately disclosed to the Red Cross.”

Christopher, apparently now even compliance with the Geneva Convention is not acceptable to you. What will it take to please you—-fine linens, a mint on the pillow, perhaps a complimentary massage for the prisoners?

The US follows the Geneva Convention in this circumstance to the letter and intent of the law, and you STILL find fault with the US because ……well, dammit man, WHY WHY WHY??

I’ve been suggesting that the GC be rewritten to accomodate modern warfare and the vagaries that come with it—non affiliated prisoners, borderless armies etc. You on the other hand have advocated following the GC completely—-yet when THAT is done, you rail against that US forces anyway. It appears that either you are simply mistaken in your outrage at this instance, or perhaps that you will rail against the US for nearly any reason. I’d love to understand which circumstance fits this situation for you.

One thing I have observed by studying Pollingreport.com is that a third of the country would make excuses for Bush regardless of what he does (and conversely for Kerry if he is elected)

If Bush confessed during a press conference to having actually cannibalized babies you would see people on this thread defend him.

I often wonder what motivates such people (democrat and republican), so I came up with several theories on “unconditional” support:

Selfishness: The candidate is going to give you something. Whether it’s tax cuts by the republicans or “entitlements” by the democrats the result is the same. Selfishness was one of the major reasons for the collapse of Rome.

Dogma: Some people become so emotionally committed to an unsubstantiated or un-provable belief that not even the death of friends and family will dissuade them from supporting destructive behavior. The Iranian human wave attacks during the Iraq-Iran war is an example.

Hatred: Hatred is always something the “other” guy suffers from. When someone starts frothing at the mouth you know the higher brain functions have ceased to function.

Sadism: Some people are just animals in human form. They like to kill and inflict pain or watch it being done by others. I would never have thought to include this in a discussion of American political culture till now. It seemed to have been more an artifact of Nazism, Communism or third world dictators. Obviously that has changed.

PS: The army is currently having serious recruiting problems. If you really want to support Mr. Bush’s re-election why not enlist? Or get a son, daughter, niece or nephew to enlist? A dot-mil email address would give you a lot more credibility.

|Unless they do not consider the situation as |trifling as some here would like to paint it.

Well, Jaren, compared to the host of abysmal prisons to which theyve been given access; from Nazi Germany Stalags, to Russian Gulags, other Middle East “Abu Ghraibs,” and African “Prisons,” etc…yeah, I would consider the allegations arising from a U.S. Controlled Abu Ghraib and Guatanamo Bay P.O.W. camps to be trifling. Naked pyramids, panties on the head, and even sodomy don’t compare to some of the atrocities to which they’ve been witness and remained silent.

I want to know, why now? Why America?

And, like I said, this may be a different thread because, frankly, I agree — the abuses recorded in images are wrong and due punishment; but, still, nothing we’ve been made aware of rises to the level we know existed (after the fact) in some of the prison visited by the IRC in years past.

Sorry to post this in a blog. But, where are the instructions for knowing how to quote and provide links in responses?

I see others doing this and believe it would be helpful in responding to specific questions and arguments.

I know ezcode but, apparently, this is not the syntax used here.

Again, my apologies for interrupting this blog for technical assistance, there’s just not much in the way of assistance on the home page (unless I missed the link).

Thanks.

Wow - it really makes me sad to see how far people will go to justify this. How many posts here start to the effect that ‘I dont condone what happened’ and then spend the next 3 paragraphs talking about how tourture is okay if ‘they know something’ or if ‘they’re enemy combatants’. Please. Lets just call a spade a spade here: either you support tourture or you dont. Why would you be willing to tourture an ‘enemy combatant’ but not a kidnapper? why not a drug dealer? The life you save could be your sons!!!! I dont see any good reason to not stop once we start. Do you have one?

At least Fisk has the nuts to say what he believes.

yonivore, email me at drremer@gvtc.com and I will provide instructions on formatting that you requested.

-David

Justin, I agree with you. But to look at it from, say, joebagodonuts’ point of view, he thinks that the stink over the abuses is worse than the abuses. He may be right about that insofar as the abuses themselves are mostly not as barbaric individually. The problem is the perception they cause and the Administration’s ass-backward reaction to the abuses — neither he nor the Administration has found a way to change the conversation to one in which America doesn’t look like it is making excuses for torture.

Of course, such a change of conversation would be very easy: President Bush could simply appear on TV and say:
“America will never abuse or torture anybody, no matter who they are or what they have done. We will not use loopholes and creative legal maneuvers to wiggle our way out of the Geneva Conventions, nor will we forsake our core values as Americans. I emphatically renounce the various internal White House and Justice Department memos suggesting that such loopholes may exist. America renounces torture in all its forms, now and forever.”

Many of us have agreed that tactical-level emergency instances of torture can in rare cases be condoned. I agree with this in theory (the buried-daughter example is a good one).

But we should not as a nation risk even the appearance that such things can be condoned by America as a whole, especially not as official policy. Our leadership should officially condemn and foreswear even the aforementioned “emergency” kind of abuse/torture.

The troops on the ground who are wise enough to break this rule responsibly might just do so in such an emergency. If they get caught and their actions were found to be justified, our government will stand by them without having to change America’s official policy. If they get caught and their actions prove to be unjustified, the government should throw the book at them.

Those soldiers and agents who are not qualified to make such judgements (i.e., 99% of our troops) should continue to operate under the assumption that such behavior is totally condemned by our President and our military commanders.

This may sound hypocritical, but to me it is just America being responsibly flexible. It is far better to have rules that in unique and extraordinary situations might get broken than to have the Administration continue to issue vague statements and wink-wink arguments about how the US is above the law, or that the rules are obsolete or not applicable.

Here’s an analogous example ripped from today’s headlines: It’s obviously against the law for American fighter pilots to shoot down passenger jets. But on 9/11 such an order was given by the Vice President, who realized that such an order was the only solution. I agree with that order, and there’s no way on earth America will ever condemn Cheney for that order. But in no way should it become American policy to tell fighter pilots that shooting down passenger jets is no longer illegal.

-Cf

re: it’s abuse, not torture.

You have to remember that there were a number of prisoners killed, not just embarrassed. There were many serious injuries - bodily beatings, maulings by dogs, etc. I’d say that you have to pass through torture, from abuse, to get to murder. So, we do agree that there was abuse. No doubt. Now we just need to agree that there was some torture and some murder as well.

Also, it’s important at this point to look above those 7 bad seeds. With all of these memos, reports from Afganistan and Gitmo, and transfer of investigative authority to a 4-star general, it seems clear that more people will eventually be held responsible.

It is both unimaginative and corrupt to assume that when the other side doesn’t play by the rules that we must give up all pretense (or reality) of civilization. We can never win such a race to the bottom. We either become just like the monsters in their fanaticism, or we fail and end up in the worse position of moral ambiguity and sublimated shame, which weakens our resolve and the support of our allies.

Americans understood well that all the support and goodwill we sacrificed to go to war in Iraq was intended to serve the greater good, that we did the unpopular thing and went it alone because we believe this was the right thing to do. Unfortunately, by allowing a culture of systematic cruelty toward our enemies and towards the citizens, the Pentagon and the president have called into question the very motivation of the war. Americans are asking themselves, did we burn bridges with allies, see hundreds of billions of dollars and hundreds of lives spent in Iraq so we could have this broadcast to the world?

This isn’t the media screwing up another war for the Pentagon, this is the Pentagon screwing up another war, and complaining that a media that is supposed to look over the shoulder of it’s government is doing it’s job while they are failing to do theirs. Now they can spend all their time and effort trying to spin this, trying to justify it, or they can do their utmost to dispassionately excise the cancer of atrocity that Abu Ghraib is a symptom of.

Those who comfort our nation by saying we haven’t sunk as low as Saddam are only making things worse, because if we continue to justify torture and abuse elsewhere, we will become inured to the horror of what we do as a nation.

I am not unrealistic. Sometimes extreme measures must be taken to safeguard democracy and people’s lives. But if we make a bad habit of using torture as our means of investigations, we may end up both neglecting our detective work, and our duty to spare the innocent from false charges, defamatory accusations, and official intimidation. A harsh interrogation can be understood in hindsight by an innocent person. A torture session can only be experienced in terms of the evil done to one’s person.

We must maintain our integrity, or else expect everything we believe in to be made false.

Joe wrote:
> The prisoner kept “‘off the books’ so that the
> Red Cross would not know about this prisoner”
> was a perfectly valid circumstance, according
> the article you apparently skimmed.
>
> “Pentagon officials… concede he was classified
> as a type of enemy combatant that, under the
> Geneva Conventions, does not have to be
> immediately disclosed to the Red Cross.”

First of all, you have no idea what article I read to get my information.

And second of all, this quote is so absurd as to be surreal - you’re using the Pentagon’s words as proof of the Pentagon’s innocence. It proves exactly nothing except that the Pentagon is willing to say anything at this point.

The stories I read, including this AP story - which I more than “skimmed” and which does not contain your surreal quote at all - generally disagree with your quote, which is of course from the Administration itself. The Pentagon’s statement essentially meaningless in light of last week’s memos and in light of the Administration’s repeated arguments that the Geneva Conventions don’t apply here, there, and everywhere since the Administration appears to believe that anything is permissible and legal.

The suspected terrorist has been held since October without being given an identification number and without the International Committee of the Red Cross being notified, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said. Both conditions violate the Geneva Accords on treatment of prisoners of war.

Obviously this statement is the AP reporter’s conclusion, but the point is that this issue is not as cut and dry as you portray it… nor am I as totally irresponsible as you portray me to be.

-Cf

Christopher:

I fear we may be falling into a parody of the Saturday Night Live parody of Crossfire. Soon I may have to begin my posts to you with “Christopher, you ignorant slut….” Just kidding.

You are correct that I don’t know the article you read from. What was clear though was your impression that the US has once again erred in its judgement. To totally accept the Pentagon version as the factual truth ( which I did for the purpose of my post) is no better than assuming the Administration to be lying. It would be best for both of us to not make these blanket assumptions, but to rather investigate the real truth (which, in my opinion, rarely comes from the media and even more rarely from the AP).

Also, I dont consider you irresponsible at all. I do see a willingness to take a point of view against America and our administration, just as I have a willingness to support America and our administration. I guess its the pot calling the kettle black.

> against America and our administration

Just the latter. Only the latter.

-Cf

joebagodonuts, many of us consider taking a stance against this administration to be supporting America.

Let’s not be throwing out the “anti-American” epithet when it does not apply.

LOL—-i threw that in there just for yuks and giggles….coulndt wait to see the responses. Though there are those out there who would willingly see America fall to her knees in their desire to see Bush fall to his.

Lets not imagine that those folks are NOT out there. Chris and Ceejay—I’m not counting you in that group, but I am suggesting that you both show a willingness to see America in a bad light that I dont think is deserved. Thats not to say that America is perfect, but it IS to say that in my perspective, we have been and still are the best country out there, and our ideals and goals are of the highest caliber.

joebagodonuts, you agree torture was committed by both Saddam and Americans in Iraq. Please define for me what makes our torture less abhorrent or wrong than the torture which took place at the direction of Saddam? Talk about moral relativism, this takes the cake. Torture regardless of who commits it is just as wrong and abhorrent.

These American incidents, whose numbers are growing, do not reflect on the moral character of the American people, UNLESS, the American people attempt to justify it when WE do it.

The fact that the Bush Administration attempts to justify it, sounds just as bad to the rest of the world as it would be for us to listen to Saddam Hussein try to justify his torturous acts.

This President is reflecting very badly on the moral character of the American people when he speaks for us saying we are exempt from legal recourse when we torture, we are justified in using torture against suspected terrorists (whom by the way we will define as such in secret). The President is degrading the moral character of Americans in the eyes of the people of the rest of the world - and I for one will be much relieved when his reelection bid fails.

joe said:

The prisoner kept “‘off the books’ so that the Red Cross would not know about this prisoner” was a perfectly valid circumstance, according the the article you apparently skimmed.

“Pentagon officials… concede he was classified as a type of enemy combatant that, under the Geneva Conventions, does not have to be immediately disclosed to the Red Cross.”

Now, I’ll admit that my knowledge of the red cross is limited, but from their own website I can find a quote about their procedures which seems to refute the idea that it was ok to hold this prisoner off the books and hide him away from the Red Cross:

Before the ICRC visits prisoners, it has to reach an agreement with the detaining authorities on several conditions that must be agreed sine qua non. Access to all prisoners and detainees means that the ICRC should be allowed to see any and all persons. No prisoner should be withheld or hidden from its delegates. If the ICRC obtains information about a person that has not been seen, it can immediately ask to see that person. In any given place where detainees and prisoners are held, the ICRC may choose to see all of them, or only those it may select, without any restriction from the authorities.
www.icrc.org

Well, Jaren, compared to the host of abysmal prisons to which theyve been given access; from Nazi Germany Stalags, to Russian Gulags, other Middle East “Abu Ghraibs,” and African “Prisons,” etc…yeah, I would consider the allegations arising from a U.S. Controlled Abu Ghraib and Guatanamo Bay P.O.W. camps to be trifling. Naked pyramids, panties on the head, and even sodomy don’t compare to some of the atrocities to which they’ve been witness and remained silent.

Your information about the red cross is as inaccurate as your reproduction of my name as Jaren.

Just for starters, information about the red cross being blocked from seeing the atrocities of the nazi death camps: http://www.nizkor.org/features/qar/qar51.html Please note, in particular, the part about how even those who would deny the atrocities committed during the war cite a red cross REPORT, which shows that the red cross have long been in the business of discussing their findings. That would kind of be the point of inspections, otherwise they’re just fancy private tours.

And the red cross has hardly singled out america for censure. Here is their official statement on Seoul and Pyongyang’s inability to adhere to the geneva convention as pertains to the protection of the civilian population and the reuniting of families. http://www.icrc.org/Web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/5PSD49!OpenDocument Such censure is an important part of their work, as it places international pressure on these countries to conform to humanitarian standards.

I want to know, why now? Why America?

And, like I said, this may be a different thread because, frankly, I agree — the abuses recorded in images are wrong and due punishment; but, still, nothing we’ve been made aware of rises to the level we know existed (after the fact) in some of the prison visited by the IRC in years past.

Rape, nonlethal electroshock, murder, setting dogs on the prisoners… these are not of the same level simply because nobody is cutting off limbs yet that we are aware of? There seems to be a desire to downplay the charges that have actually been made.

Indeed, the very idea that the humiliating acts are not even as bad as a normal fraternity hazing is fundamentally flawed when one considers their culture and religious beliefs. Let me be blunt: when the majority of people in that country are of a fundamentalist religion which views clothing which displays a woman’s ankles as promiscuous and unacceptable, do you really think that they’re looking at being held naked with panties over their head remotely the same way a college guy at a fraternity hazing would be. Also, hazing can only be done to willing parties… these men are not willing, they are prisoners and have no choice… there is a large difference between the two states of existence, and I am really getting disgusted by those who try to draw a comparison between these acts. Especially in light of the alleged acts of electroshock, rape, and murder that are also being committed alongside of the acts of humiliation, which many here seem to want to ignore entirely or brush off as necessary treatment of terrorists to get information.

When rape, torture, or even abuse designed to create an atmosphere of fear and humiliation for those held in our prisons become tools of information gathering acceptable to our government and our country, we have become the terrorists. We have started making excuses for committing acts *designed* to create an atmosphere of terror. Is this really so hard to understand?

The DOD announced the investigation of abuse in
January about a week after it was discovered. Read the timeline that Rumsfeld presented to Congress. Its only the pictures that were not
released. Your fuss over the photos just shows that liberals are a perverts and a voyeurs. The dems and the media didn’t care about the story until there were dirty pictures.

There’s no reason for me to bother refuting the statements of ultra-left-wing whackos like the Kerry campaign (and many on this blog) in detail. Any more than I bother to refute the statements of UFO nutcases and Holocaust deniers in detail. Because some positions, and some lunatics, are outside the pale of normal discourse. This is what happens when you hate someone so very much, for no real reason other than that he isn’t one of your liberals, and you’re forced to hate everything around him with the same mindless vituperative rage. When it suits them, Bush is a moron. When it suits them, Bush is the leader of a failed operation. When it suits them, Bush is the megalomaniacal genius in charge of the latest conspiracy theory. They hate him, When something goes wrong, he’s to blame. When something goes right, it’s his ‘handlers’ because he’s too stupid to do anything himself.

Compare the two cultures. While America is investigating the abuse of Iraqi prisoners … while America is preparing to punish those responsible … while America is apologizing to the families of the prisoners and their countrymen for the actions of a few soldiers, and preparing to pay these families large sums of money .. while America is trying to do the right
thing, Arab Muslims are slaughtering an innocent American civilian who’s only crime was he was looking for a job trying to improve the Iraqi
communications infrastructure.

This vicious murder of an American civilian should serve to reignite the American resolve to destroy, not to appease, but to destroy the Islamic Jihadists. Now you should know that playing nice won’t work. While we try to bring to justice the people responsible for the abuse of Iraqi prisoners, the Islamic fanatics cut the head off of an innocent American civilian in order to “redeem” their manhood. They’re not men, they’re bugs … and they need to be squashed.

The retaliation for this vicious act must be firm, it must be swift, and itmust have a violent finality. These inhuman Muslims must learn that these actions against Americans will not go unanswered … and the answer will have a terrible finality.

Oh … and just where are the Euro-weenies on all of this? Has anyone heard from the French? The Spanish? The Germans? I guess they’re too busy adding up their losses since their buddy Saddam was tossed out on his Baathist butt.

We torture our own people in jails all accross this “land of the free” why should anyone think we would treat prisoners at Gitmo or in Iraq any different. Right is right and wrong is wrong. There can be no shades of grey in the discusion. We pride ourselves on being the best of the best. It’s time we get our heads out our collective butts and act like it.

Fisk, do you have any idea how many terorists there are are out there? Are there 100,000, a million? These Islamic Jihadist’s are part of a religion that is the largest on this planet. Are we going to kill them all? Would that satisfy you?

Fisk:

The retaliation for this vicious act must be firm, it must be swift, and itmust have a violent finality. These inhuman Muslims must learn that these actions against Americans will not go unanswered … and the answer will have a terrible finality.

And then more of the jihadists will retaliate for the violent act you’re calling for, and then you’ll call for a bigger retaliation, and the cycle continues again and again… with no end until one side or the other perishes.

Are you really trying to ignite an eternal blood-feud between the west and muslim nations? Do you really believe these are a people who can have their will crushed by us? Are you seriously proposing a holy war of our own against these nations that you label filled with “vicious muslims” and “bugs”? Because that is what your rhetoric sounds like.

Arab Muslims are slaughtering an innocent American civilian who’s only crime was he was looking for a job trying to improve the Iraqi communications infrastructure.

I am unclear who you are referring to here. If it is Paul Marshal Johnson, the captive discussed elsewhere in this thread, you seem to be misinformed. He was an aeronautics engineer. He works on apache helicopters, according to his own words on the tape delivered after his kidnapping. Oh, but wait, you’re not… you’re apparently referring to Nick Berg. Or rather, Neal Boortz, the person you’ve stolen significant portions of your reply from verbatim, was. http://boortz.com/nuze/200405/05122004.html So I will simply suggest you apply your obvious googling skills to the search term “nick berg” and note the information about the anomalies connected with his death that have yet to be explained before blame can be conclusively assigned for his murder.

Jarin is a criminal degenerate with no morals.

David;

For a usually reasonable person, you sometimes go off the deep end, accusing me of moral relativism. What a fun one. I have said, and you know this, that torture is wrong. I have also said that much of what is being called torture (sleep deprivation and the like) is not really torture.

The biggest difference is that torture was absolutely routine with Saddam, as was amputation and murder. Would you suggest that this is the case with America??? If so, then you need to open your eyes. If not, then you see the difference I referred to.

To my knowledge, this administration has never ever condoned torture, nor justified it, as you say they have. What this admin HAS done is begin to prosecute those involved, and investigate how far the involvement goes. Now I understand its in YOUR best interest to have it go high up, since that not only is your desire and belief, but also would help accomplish your goal of getting someone else in the Presidency.

But at least use facts in your arguments, David, rather than simply mumbling out tired phrases that have no basis to them.

Jarin: I care little what you know or dont know about the Red Cross. What i referred to was the Geneva Convention, not the Red Cross doctrines.

Another case in point for it is the FIRST Gulf War, when America was notorious for humane treatment of prisoners the world over, and Iraqis were not unaware of that even under Saddam’s regime. Faced with a choice between poor treatment by their own government or better treatment by Americans, many of the Iraqi soldiers made the obvious choice.

Additionally, the very first military school I went to (after Basic) was an Interrogator school I failed the course because I’m terrible at telling lies, which is an integral part of the mind-game of interrogation because you have to adapt your own interrogator personna after the nature of your captive (e.g., if the prisoner is devout Catholic, you have to masquerade as a PRIEST—how the hell am I going to pull that off? I’m not an actor!); anyway, it was either the first or second day of Interrogator training and the guy sitting next to me said something to the effect of “why not just do what they did in Vietnam—wire them up to hand-crank generators and keep cranking until they talk?” The rest of the day’s instruction was a detailed analysis on why torture is not just against the International Law of Armed Conflict, but also *DOESN’T WORK*. They brought in an instructor who was a Vietnam veteran who gave detailed examples of how FALSE information was extracted under torture, because a torturee will say anything they think will make the torture stop—which makes the mind very inventive in making up stories and filling them in with vivid (but false) detail.

This is why I laugh when some ersatz “intelligence” people claim to have gotten “good information” from the Abu Ghraib prisoners and in Afghanistan. Sure, it SOUNDS good, and in the time it takes to check the story out he’s transferred away to Gitmo and the damage of the false story is done, probably costing more lives out in the field than any were saved.

This is why all the tactical errors reported in Iraq (car bombs catching us by surprise, hitting a wedding party thought to be a muj staging area, etc.) make me think instinctively, in my gut “that’s bad info pulled out of the Abu Ghraib interrogations coming back to bite our troops in the ass.”

It’s very, very sad. Sometimes at the end of the day I wonder, with great worry, whether Kerry will be able to undo the damage that Bush has done—or worse yet, if he’s even willing (voting for it before he votes against it!)

Talk of a Nader or at least Libertarian vote will at least let me sleep at night.

joe:

You miss my point, which does not hinge on international law. You used the Pentagon’s quote about the geneva convention as an argument supporting the basic premise that it was alright to hold this prisoner off the books. My argument addresses the premise, not the specific supporting argument you used for it, because my argument makes your supporting argument irrelevant.

Regardless of what the geneva convention by itself says, it is basic red cross procedure to secure these agreements before conduction prison inspections. That the red cross is inspecting these facilities implies that these conditions were agreed to, sine qua non. (Which means they are absolute prerequisites, without exception.) For the US to make arrangements for them to inspect the facilities, with this as one of the chief prerequisites for such inspection, and then hold a prisoner off the books is a severe breach of faith with the Red Cross and should rightly be called into question at the very least.

Jarin:

Ummmm….okaaaay. So now holdingto the tenets of the Geneva Convention are not enough for you. Very interesting.

I used the quote to show that the US is keeping to the GC guidelines on that issue. Most people have been complaining that the US is NOT meeting the Geneva Convention rules—-yet in this case it appears they are. (Not being a GC expert, I’m having to take their word on it, but I doubt any of us in here are GC experts—if you care to refute the Pentagon claim, please do so with evidence).

But of course, even when the US appears to meet the Geneva Convention, now you simply go a step further in your requirement. And if the US meets THAT requirement, where will you go? Another step further.

Thanks, Ciggy. After reading the many comments here, I was amazed that no one had mentioned it earlier. Testimony under duress of torture is unreliable and dangerous.

Those who advocate torture feel angry, impotent, and compelled to lash out for its own sake. The psychology of abusers is well documented. Apologists for abusers have the added component of cowardice. It is truly repellant, and if it weren’t for folks like this we could just move on and accept that the prison abuse scandal was plainly damaging to our foreign (war) policy and that torture has no utility whatsoever.

“That the red cross is inspecting these facilities implies that these conditions were agreed to, sine qua non. (Which means they are absolute prerequisites, without exception.) For the US to make arrangements for them to inspect the facilities, with this as one of the chief prerequisites for such inspection, and then hold a prisoner off the books is a severe breach of faith with the Red Cross and should rightly be called into question at the very least.”

Jarin: Very interesting debate style as well. You first say there is an IMPLICATION of agreed upon conditions. Then you jump to the idea that the conditions are “absolute prerequisites”. Then you hold the US accountable for breaking the “absolute prerequisites”.

One problem…..you’ve taken your suppositions, painted them as fact, while never once using any facts, other than your IMPLIED facts. Its easy to win an argument that way, if you just introduce your “facts” into the discussion. Lets try it a different way—lets use REAL facts rather than your made up ones.

to reignite the American resolve to destroy… the Islamic Jihadists. …They’re not men, they’re bugs … and they need to be squashed… These inhuman Muslims must learn… and the answer will have a terrible finality.

It is common for serial killers, mass murderers, and genocidal maniacs to attempt to dehumanize the enemy to justify their actions.

joe:

Nice try. But I made no jump when calling them absolute prerequisites and I made up no facts. The article I linked to on the ICRC page called them that, I merely translated the term they used, “sine qua non”, into english.

The logical chain I paint is reasonable. Reduced to pure logic: If A requires B, and A is a given, then B must be true. A’s existence implies B, inherently.

I’m sorry if this chain of reasoning confounds you, but I think it is a far better one for us to discuss then trying to argue points of international law through the exchange of sound-bites from our respective sides on the subject which no on here has offered evidence of being an expert on.

As for my argument taking things a step further, and the very letter of the geneva conventions not being enough for me? You are right, as I would argue against prisoners being held in secret regardless of what the specific text of the geneva conventions was. So, I thought, would most of the people in this country. Isn’t one of the things we always cite as terrible about totalitarian regimes the fact that people can just be made to disappear in the dead of night by the government and in many cases are never heard from again? I do not like the idea of indefinite detention in secret, without benefit of a trial or contact with the outside world, for anyone. I do not believe it can be justified in any way, and I would always argue against it being performed by this country regardless of the letter of international law. You’re quite right about that.

Jarin:

“As for my argument taking things a step further, and the very letter of the geneva conventions not being enough for me”

Enough said…nothing this administration ever does will be good enough for the likes of you. You will find a reason to dislike it. If they don’t follow the GC, you dislike them for it. IF the DO follow it, you heap on further requirements. Reminds me of the furor over the pictures showing Uday and Qusay Hussein dead. I imagine you railed over the breach of GC convention by showing the pictures, yet had the pictures not been shown, you’d have been there claiming some conspiracy. You simply cant have it both ways.

It’s too bad that Fisk is gone. Now we’ve lost the true voice of Bush Country, the true Republican base. Now all we’re left with are these anomalous rational Republicans like Eric, Martin and joe!

;)

-Cf

> I imagine you railed over the breach of GC
> convention by showing the pictures, yet had
> the pictures not been shown, you’d have been
> there claiming some conspiracy.

That’s total speculation, Joe, and you are putting words directly into your opponent’s mouth. It’s a really weak debate style. You can’t base a whole post on something your opponent has not said.

I, for one, *totally* agreed with the rationale for posting those pictures - Geneva Conventions be damned. It was certainly an exceptional case where the good (ensuring millions of Iraqis that the regime was gone) outweighed the bad.

-Cf

Joe:

Considering that I am not one of the ones arguing here that the geneva convention alone is the prime reason not to hold someone in secret without a trial, I think you have little factual evidence upon which to base the assumption that nothing this administration could do would ever be enough for me. On this particular issue, simply not holding people in secret would be enough for me. Justifying holding people in secret as not violating the letter of international law would never be. I think that this is fairly clear, and has not changed since the beginning of our discussion let alone increased in response to a change in the administration’s position. I have a similar position regarding abuse and torture. I would never support this government using it, regardless of whether the action could be argued to not violate the geneva convention due to the individual being abused or tortured belonging to some special class of combatants. This position also has not changed, let alone increased in response to a change in the administration’s position on the matter. Please debate my actual unchanged positions, not the straw-man never-satisfied-with-anything position you would like to believe I am taking based on what side of the debate I am on.

I want to elaborate a little further on the ersatz “utility” of torture to extract information. Some of the arch-hawks out there who advocate such charming acts as flailing the skin from the body of muj captives (complaining Abu Ghraib was “too mild”), use as their excuse that Saddam was able to extract perfect information from his own people by these methods and also keep the population cowed into submission thereby.

Well, I begin my rebuttal to them like this: in Saddam’s world, by the time they are dragging you and your wife and your 10 year-old daughter into the interrogation rooms, they already have all the “information” they need. This was just “fun and games” time for them. Saddam was a sadist and he tended to promote sadists within his ranks. The exercise of torture in Saddam’s Iraq wasn’t about getting information: he had a huge network of informants and spies for that (an investment of HUMINT that we would actually be wise to duplicate in that arena!) He DID use torture partially for political control, beyond the pure sadistic joys of it (although the same could not be said of Uday and Qusay—each of which were just as likely to torture and murder their most loyal followers as anyone else). But then, the hatred cowering behind the fear, of Saddam, in the Iraqi population, shows exactly what you get with that sort of “political control”. The inevitable end result of it is a peasant slapping your statue with his shoe as it’s taken down.

In the modern world, Right makes Might. It makes for mighty Psyops. It makes for mighty foreign relations. It makes for mighty morale on the home front and among the troops. In Vietnam, My Lai might have slaughtered a VC village but it killed morale in America on an even larger scale. And now, Iraq is resembling Vietnam a little TOO closely, for comfort.

With all of the above being said, once the war effort does get back on the right track (which it will just about have to, out of necessity), it will be a civic duty for the media to NOT BE AFRAID to say something’s right and good when it is. Terrorist beheaders are still the enemy.