The City Journal has a great piece up that is well worth the read. Here are the first few paragraphs:
The U.S. military recently uncovered alleged evidence of torture in Iraqi-run Baghdad prisons, including what appeared to be a torture chamber in an Iraqi Ministry of Interior detention facility. The Sunni reaction to these discoveries poses a considerable problem for proponents of the anti-American “torture narrative”: The Sunnis are calling on the U.S. military to correct the situation! “I wish the Americans would go to [the prisons] and find out about it,” former detainee Sadiq Abdul Razzaq Samarrai told the New York Times.
This is bizarre behavior indeed. According to Andrew Sullivan, Seymour Hersh, and other proponents of the “torture narrative,” Americans are the leading sadists in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Cuba. For the Sunnis to ask the Americans to protect them against alleged Shiite abuse would seem to them as delusional as a Jewish prisoner in Auschwitz appealing to Hitler for salvation.
But the Iraqi reaction to the recent torture allegations defies the conventional “torture” wisdom in more ways than one. It turns out that the safest prisons in Iraq are those enjoying regular American oversight. Another former detainee, Amar Sami Samarrai (cousin of Sadiq Abdul), credits his safe treatment to the fact that the Americans had gone through his detention center near Baghdad four times during his 38-day stay, according to the New York Times.
Before someone accuses me or blames me of excusing torture, I am not. Our guys have done some pretty nasty things, and I think it is the direct result of muddied policies and the positions taken by the White House. I think we need a serious re-evaluation of interrogation methods, and I think torture should be banned.
I am willing to accept that some of you disagree with me about what is and what is not torture. I think waterboarding is torture. Jeff Goldstein does not. Those are debates we should have, in which we clearly outline what is acceptbale and what is not, and we agree, to some extent, to adhere to international codes of behavior.
But at the same time, some perspective would be useful. I should probably also note that I disagree with much of the City Journal piece.
SomeCallMeTim
From the web page to which you linked:
“City Journal is the best magazine in America.”
Peggy Noonan
Enough said.
Marcus Wellby
I am not at all familiar with the City Journal, but when i see any page that has this in the header:
I kind of tune out everything below it.
Marcus Wellby
Ah, Tim, great minds and all that
Anderson
Well, come on folks, the basic point is correct: Americans have much higher standards for prisoner treatment than many other countries do.
The problem is that we have so many people in high places working to change that.
Our reputation’s still largely a good one, but this could be the last generation where that’s the case.
Peggy Noonan
City Journal is the best magazine in America. I even penned an article from the deceased point-of-view of Elvis stating as much.
It’s about time someone reminded Americans that our mistreatment of prisoners isn’t nearly as awful as how the Iraqis mistreat prisoners.
Dan
Oh yes. The Sunnis trust the U.S. more than our allies, who are routinely accused of running death squads and shooting their opponents execution-style on the roadside. Let’s break out the champagne.
Krista
Exactly…right now, the US military has taken a big hit on their moral standing because of the torture. I don’t think it’s as widespread as some think, but nor do I think it was just frat pranks by a few bad apples. Instead of either demonizing the military, or engaging in moral relativism by saying, “Well, they’re not as bad as Saddam”, let’s just deal with the damned problem already, and set out some concrete guidelines regarding the use of force. It’s going to take a lot of discussion to determine what those guidelines should be, so they should probably get started on that sooner rather than later.
Geek, Esq.
Though it is true that in the land of the blind the man with one eye is king, we should really strive to have two eyes.
And waterboarding is considered torture according to US statute, which explicitly forbids inflicting suffering on people by making them think they’re being executed.
John S.
Well, if Jeff Goldstein disagrees, then I’m with him.
His logic is unassailable!
Lines
Why don’t we ever talk about the good things we’ve gotten from torture? All the schools that its helped us build, all the clean drinking water produced. The negative element in American society wants to demonize torture without really taking the time to understand torture and the love torture has for mankind.
Matt
What?!
Only liberals do that.
Geek, Esq.
Btw, what are the odds that any conservative blogger (other than JC) is going to mention the fact that Iraq’s elected leaders have demanded that we produce a timetable for withdrawing our troops?
I mean, you’d think they’d at least pretend to care about what Iraqis want. But no, Imperator Cheney’s word is final–fuck the Iraqis.
Krista
Matt – I figured it was about damned time someone turned that particular phrase back onto those who use it most.
db
John Cole – glad to hear you believe waterboarding is torture. Waterboarding, as I understand it, restrains the ability of the individual to breathe properly and freely – much like the little kid in junior high getting his head flushed down the toilet, I imagine. How that does not constitute torture, I don’t know.
And yes, we should have a discussion over what methods are and are not allowed.
What is unclear to me in the public discussion thus far is whether there is any standards of reasonable doubt being applied to those who are deemed worthy of “interrogation methods” or not. Further, ought there be a sliding scale of what can be applied depending on the burden of evidence against an individual (e.g., a person caught on film killing a hostage vs a person who was fingered by somebody strapped to a waterboard)?
Even defining what is acceptable or not does not allow us to avoid the utilitarian error that can result if we don’t have some standards of reasonable doubt applied to those we want to interrogate.
Cyrus
I don’t see any contradiction at all. No one has said that we were as bad as Saddam, just that only holding ourselves to the standard of “not as bad as Saddam” is reprehensible. And as for the PR argument against torture, well, first of all that’s hardly the only one, but secondly, this doesn’t contradict it.
When former detainee Sadiq Abdul Razzaq Samarrai says “I wish the Americans would go to [the prisons] and find out about it,” he’s probably not saying that he thinks the Americans are great people doing a great job. He’s saying “I wish [someone or anyone with authority and/or force] would go to [the prisons] and find out about it.” If the Americans are the only people in a position to do so, then asking them to do it isn’t necessarily an endorsement of them.
rkrider102
Not only that, iraqs sure don’t seem to give a shit about our troops.
Stay the course, huh?
Pb
I’m waiting for an outraged polemic from Andrew Sullivan and perhaps also the ADL. They deserve one, considering the blatant and disgusting Hitler reference, and their apparent insight into his psyche–I somehow doubt they interviewed him or otherwise fact-checked that reference.
Mr Furious
Super! Do we operate the safest rape rooms too? What the fuck kind of rationale is that? We better goddamn well run the tightest ship in Iraq, and it should be a hell of a lot better, too.
Mr Furious
Don’t make that argument again if you hope to convince somebody about waterboarding as torture.
Waterboarding is no “swirlie.” The whole purpose is to make the captive feel as if they are drowning. Bringing them to the very point where they are sure they are about to die. The actually believe they are going to be killed.
This isn’t a fucking dunktank or a junior high prank. Getting your head shoved in a toilet in 7th grade is surely traumatic and terrifying, but it’s pretty clear no one intends to kill anyone. Using this as an example, however well-intentioned, just minimizes the torture and contributes to the Rush Limbaugh “prank” balance sheet.
Mike
“Marcus Wellby Says:
Ah, Tim, great minds and all that”
Or closed minds and all that….
Steve
Have we literally reached the point where actual torture methods used by the Nazis are excused by saying they’re no worse than a junior-high prank?
Gosh, I don’t understand why the Left gets so worked up all the time. Why don’t we just have a decent, honest national debate on whether we should emulate the Nazis on the torture issue.
Bruce from Missouri
It doesn’t matter whether there are worse torturers than us in Iraq. We are America. We are supposed to be better than that.
If we are defending ourselves by saying that “others are worse”, things have come to a pretty sad pass in the last 5 years.
Mary
Who was excusing waterboarding by comparing it to dunking someone’s head in a flushing toilet? Here’s the whole paragraph from db, emphasis added:
Remfin
Clear to whom?
It’s certainly not clear to the 13-year-old who is experiencing another mammal denying him his most immediate bodily need (well, I guess atmospheric pressure is the most immediate, but I doubt our animal mind thinks about that often…)
You as an adult, with a fully developed mind, and hindsight on exactly how far bullies go, may be able to temporarily bury your animal fears. But a 13-year-old has neither of those things. To a 13-year-old this would be an immediate collapse into an animal, or less than human, state of mind which is what torture does
Also, comparing a swirlie to a dunk tank is ridiculous. Consent entirely changes the mental state, because it implies control by the removal of consent. Even if you were forced into a dunk tank somehow against your will, you would still have a measure of control over your situation if you aren’t somehow restrained, and know how to swim/very shallow tank. And control is everything
Steve
I assumed, perhaps wrongly, that db’s last sentence was sarcasm.
Mike S
I don’t mind looking at things in perspective, although I’d love to see cites of either of those guys claiming that we are “the leading sadists in Iraq.” That’s a crock and pretty much makes the article suspect.
I’ll never understand why so many on the right these days define us by what or who we aren’t as bad as. The reason we are the best country in the world is because that was never in the equation. We set standards so that we can be the best, not better than the worst.
Stormy70
I know, I know. America sucks! This is what you guys sound like day after day. Terrorists trying to blow up people deserve Johnny Cochran or America is just as bad as the terrorists!
Steve
Yes, Stormy, if we are not almost, but not quite, as bad as the terrorists, then we let the terrorists win!
John S.
Moral relativism strikes again!
It’s almost like their anti-hero with an [MR] sewn onto the front of his pajama-like costume…Up, up and away!
Ancient Purple
Once again, Stormy demonstrates that she has never read the U.S. Constitution, nor does she care what it says.
Mike S
Just after I write this:
Stormy writes this:
Now I like Stormy more than many, if not most, of the of the righty commenters here. But she seems to be going around the bend at alarming speed.
John S.
Never mind the fact that she seems to think the ‘lefty’ position is that terrorists deserve to be represented by a dead guy.
Paddy O'Shea
Bush: The Worst Military Commander In The History Of Mankind?
It was the greatest military in history vs. an unarmed sandox – and two and one-half years later, there still is not a victory?
http://www.moderateindependent.com/v3i12worst.htm
chef
“my instincts are a little bit better than our credulous lefties”
Oh yes, and a better geopoltical worldview too, honed by years of saluting halftimes at the Superbowl.
Stormy70
Once again, Stormy demonstrates that she has never read the U.S. Constitution, nor does she care what it says.
Anderson
Well, when Remfin dunked kids’ heads in toilets back in junior high, it sure seemed like good fun to HIM.
Call the CIA, Remfin, they have job opportunities for you.
Stormy70
Stupid blockquote function. reverse the gray, above.
Everyone knows Cochran is dead. You still got my point, didn’t you?
Steve S
Woo hoo! We’re not as bad as Hitler!
I’m so reassured now, I can sleep peacefully at night.
John S.
I reckon. I think it’s a ridiculous point, made even more ridiculous by the way you posed it.
Nicholas
So, say I’m a prison guard carrying a gun in my hand, and you’re a prisoner. I never point the gun at you, but it’s kind of pointing in your direction. You’re worried, for whatever reason, that I’m going to point it at you and shoot you. Have I tortured you?
Is there any way to prove that you didn’t feel that way? Regardless of whether I gave you any reason to think I would shoot you, if you thought I would, would that mean I’m torturing you?
Frankly, torture is very difficult to define. To admit otherwise is folly. This is especially true if you’re going to count psychological torture.
What we really need is a serious, rational debate about this. In fact, what we need more than this is for the existing anti-torture laws to actually be enforced. They do exist, you know. It’s illegal for a US citizen to torture anyone, anywhere.
I really don’t think the kind of crazy arguments which are brought into this debate help it. In fact I think they hinder the progress of serious debate. If the hysteria can die down, perhaps we can find out just how serious the problem is and what we can do about it instead of getting into a shouting match.
For example, making such a big deal over the events at Abu Ghraib, which were already being prosecuted at the time, seriously overshadowed the much more serious accusations of torture. Making a big deal out of what seems to be one of the more minor problems was not a smart move. It belittles the anti-torture cause. Similarly, accusing senators of being “pro-torture” because they vote against a flawed anti-torture provision, when there are already laws against it, is hysteria.
Perhaps if people stop demonizing most members of the government they will have a more rational position from which to argue.
Mr Furious
Remfin, my point is that comparing torture to school yard bullying, however terrifying, is not a winning argument unless you wish to undermine charges of torture.
The dunk tank is only in there as the next minimizing step to be used by the “torture-as-frat-prank” minimizers.
Seriously, invoking images of a more or less harmelessly-preceived by adults process that countless young teens have endured and survived is not winning converts. What’s next? Pointing out that some Cub Scouts once had to sleep out in the elements, how bad could THAT be?
Sojourner
It’s good to know that we can always count on Stormy to come through and embody the stereotype of the ugly American.
Thank you so much for reminding me of what I hope to G-d I never become – callous and indifferent to the issue of justice for those who have not been proven to have done anything wrong.
Good job, girl friend.
rs
I’d like to extend an invitation to Jeff Goldstein to join our waterboarding team,the Loons.It’s just a club sport presently,but with it’s growing popularity in the military we’re hoping to catch the eye of ESPN.All of our dunker positions are filled,but we are in need of dunkees,as they seem prone to early retirement.
Paddy O'Shea
Balloon Juice: Where “conservatives” go to find their inner Jean Schmidt.
Mike S
More serious than the pictures this administration has refused to release? Every time they get their asses handed to them by the courts they come up with another reason to hold them back which again results in getting their asses handed to them.
Palease. The damned VP is lobbying for the ability to torture. The Senator who created that “flawed anti-torture provision” was actually tortured. Who do you think has more credibility on the issue?
Mike S
You may want to take that up with the administration. They employ people like John Yoo to find ways around those laws.
Nicholas
I don’t know. I’m no fan of the administration and I suspect there are some serious problems going on. They need to prosecute anyone who was not following the rules, and last time I checked the rules said no torture. If they don’t it won’t discourage it from happening in future.
I know who McCain is, thank you. Have you read McCain’s anti-torture provision? For a start, it leaves it up to the Army to decide what torture is. Which isn’t really all that bad, but is that the best way to do things? Additionally, since the army already says what is and is not allowed, they already have the ability to enforce that through military justice don’t they? So why not just do that?
I don’t really know the full story about what the government is trying to achieve. Perhaps what is going on is that there is not agreement about what constitutes torture and therefore they’re trying to avoid outlawing things they think should be illegal along with the rest.
Surely, the best approach is to take that which everyone agrees is wrong, make sure it’s outlawed, then debate the rest?
But my point is, if there already laws against it (and I’m pretty sure there are; I can cite several), and it’s happening, the problem is NOT with the laws; it’s with the enforcement; right?
So… are the existing laws being enforced? If not, why not? If so, then maybe there needs to be a change in the way people are trained, if they are doing these things. To me those are the real questions. We can worry about whether the laws are adequate once they’re actually being enforced…
Nicholas
Wow, that’s just clueless bashing. You obviously have no idea how laws work. They have to be INTEREPRETED in order to be applied to each case. Therefore, if you want to do something but are not sure whether it’s legal or not, you get a lawyer to look at the law(s) and tell you how they are to be interpreted in that specific case.
Now, it depends on which lawyer you pick exactly how they’re interpreted, but regardless you need to pick someone to do so. So, you’re saying that by the very act of reading the law(s) and saying what they do and do not make illegal, he’s somehow doing something immoral?
If it’s legal to do something, but immoral, then certainly we want to change the laws. But that means they’re bad laws. If that’s the case, replacement laws have to be carefully thought out, so as not to be as flawed as the original. Did McCain’s proposal receive any debate before it was tabled? I don’t remember hearing about it. I don’t think that’s a good way to make laws better.
You can’t “find ways around a law”. You CAN find situations in which a law does not apply. Again, that makes it a bad law, if the majority of people feel those things are not right.
Regardless, most of the accusations of wrong-doing I have seen are not legal, at least not under the military codes. If members of the military are breaking the military codes, they should face military justice, correct? That’s regardless of what the Geneva Conventions say…
db
Steve and Furious,
My last sentence that Steve references was NOT sarcasm.
I did not say waterboarding was a prank. That was not the comparison I was making. OKAY?!?!
The comparison I was making was with respect to restraining the ability of somebody to breathe. Whether it’s your head forced in a toilet or your head being covered with a wet towel as you are placed in a tub of water, you are being restrained from breathing and the fear of death is real whether the perpetrators (whether it is a school bully or a military interrogator) have no real intention of killing you.
I did not call it a prank. I consider the action reprehensible.
Please, before accusing others of making equal comparisons, read what people are saying carefully.
Let me demonstrate. Steve writes:
Conclusion: The Nazis used waterboarding. Pentagon has a memo on waterboarding. Therefore, the US military is waterboarding. The US military is comprised of United States citizens. Therefore, the US military is comprised of Nazis, and since the US military is comprised of US citizens, all US citizens are Nazis.
Just because I used “toilet” and “waterboarding” in the same paragraph does not mean I claim that waterboarding is a prank for Christ’s sake.
RTO Trainer
Lots of talk on torture.
Anyone here have a handle on what the actual legal standards concerning torture are? How it’s defined in US law and international treaties?
How much good does it do to keep using this word if no one knows what it actually means?
John S.
Classic! You get a gold star.
Steve
Ok, well, if your intent was to establish that waterboarding is torture by comparing it to a common junior-high prank, I don’t care if you feel it’s logically sound, you did a poor job of making your case.
Nicholas
RTO Trainer: Here is the regular US law which makes torture illegal along with definitions:
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_113C.html
“torture” means an act committed by a person acting under the color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control;
The US military definition is actually a lot broader and extends to anything which makes someone “uncomfortable”; not very useful in my opinion, since it’s far too broad. I can’t find the link right now, sorry.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition defines torture as “Infliction of severe physical pain as a means of punishment or coercion”.
db
Steve writes:
Well, Mr. Logic, why don’t I just run every one of my thoughts by your desk for approval or censure?
My use of the phrases “much like” and “I imagine” convey a certain level of uncertainty in the waterboarding vs toilet comparison. And NO – my intent was not to make this comparison if you read the whole note instead of picking up on just one fragment of a sentence.
This point about heads being forced underwater into a toilet or a tub was the most trivial thing I had to say in regard to John Cole’s original post. You and Furious blew this way of proportion and had nothing to say about what the real intent of my post was.
It is quite clear to me that my original note had two points:
1) I am glad to see JC’s stand on waterboarding
2) Rather than simply discussing what does and does not constitute torture, I would also like to see some discussion on burden of proof before any such methods are applied
Does that simplify it enough for you?
Steve
No, you need to make it simpler.
Nicholas
db, yes obviously in our justice systems we have certain practices which are allowed for suspects (interrogation methods, short detention, etc.) and others which are only allowed for those convicted (prison, execution, hard labour (is that used any more?) – but not cruel nor unusual punishment).
It does make a certain amount of sense to apply that to military detanees now that the Geneva Conventions no longer apply nor really make sense. How can you put an enemy fighter you have captured into a POW camp until the end of the war, when it’s not really obvious any more when the war has ended? In a sense it really is a war but in another sense there are definitely police-like attributes to what is going on.
So, coming up with a hybrid POW/criminal system makes sense I think. And just like with regular criminal cases, I agree that you want to be careful how you treat people against which these is little evidence.
It would require a system of military justice for detainees, which I’m not sure exists at the moment, at least not quite like a regular justice system. It would necessarily, I think, be a faster system with less obstacles. But it would hopefully ensure consistency of treatment and oversight.
richard
This tragic debate is continuing, much to the detriment of this country’s moral preeminence in the world. I guess that since China will own us soon enough, we may as well adopt their standards of criminal investigation.
Ladies and gentlemen, a scenario:
The protagonists, Chuck, a CIA-affiliated interrogator, and Abu Jihad, recently picked up in Scranton, PA and currently residing in a hotel room outside of Vladivostock, accomodations and transportation rendered by the American taxpayer.
Chuck is concerned about rumors of an armed nuclear device obtained from elements in Pakistan’s secret services (U.S. allies) and transported on a Liberian-registered tranker through the still-unsecured freight terminal in Wilmington, DE. It is supposed that the device is armed and currently about to detonate in a major US city. This scenario is conveniently known as the ‘ticking-bomb’ case and is trotted out about once a day by torture fetishists in the media and government (along with Cheney’s fantastic notion of the worldwide Islamic caliphate stretching ‘from Spain to Indonesia’, after somehow overthrowing a sequence of stable and heavily armed governments using nutballs like Zaqari et al., after originally being able to take power in Iraq despite the opposition of the heavily armed and organized Kurdish and Shi’ite militias)
Chuck: tell me where the bomb is…
Abu: no way you infidel scum, I will die and be with Allah before I tell you anything.
Chuck: you’ll wish you were dead by the time I finish with you..
At this point Chuck goes over to Abu, who is strapped into a gurney and puts the foot of the gurney up on a low table, so Abu’s head is about a foot below his feet. He places a cloth over Abu’s mouth and pours water onto it from a pitcher. ABu is unable to move and quickly starts to become distressed. He is unlikely to drown because no water is getting into his lungs, despite his intense feeling of strangulation. He is not really thinking about fluid dynamics right now, though, so he thinks he is being drowned.
Abu: hmmmf hmmmmf grrrrrggglleee
Chuck: what? (removes cloth)
Abu: in the name of Allah stop, I’ll tell you everything
Chuck: go ahead then
Abu: the bomb is at the Getty station just off the onramp to I95 in Philadelphia. Mumtaz al-shabazz works there and he is part of a jihadist group. He is going to detonate it when the G7 meets in the city next week.
Seems like torture is a good idea, right? Chuck gets on the phone, tells his superiors, they pick up the gas-station attendant in Philly and start to sweat him within a couple of hours.
While he is being interrogated, of course, the bomb goes off in Virginia Beach, VA. Abu may or may not have known anything about the bomb, but during the torture he remembered that his wife’s cousin had a brother who had a gas station in Philly near the interstate. A couple of days before he was picked up he read in the paper about the G7 meeting. When he realized that Chuck was about to kill him (so he thought) he put together the quickest story he could in order to stay alive and stop the pain. Because Chuck and his superiors believed in the superior ability of the torturer’s art, they passed his story on and precisely the wrong action was taken at the wrong time in the wrong place.
This is why no-one who thinks rationally about torture thinks it is worth doing. Never mind the moral issue- The CIA stated yesterday that torture doesn’t work and they don’t do it; the army believes the same thing AND that they need to protect their people from being tortured by not presenting the enemy with the excuse; Colin Powell supports McCain on the torture issue; the justice system domestically has realized by painful experience that confessions elicited through beatings etc. are worthless and misleading, and eventually expensive and demoralizing. Who is left to advocate torture? Dick Cheney and the editorial staff at the Wall Street Journal, apparently, and I don’t think that Cheney really approves of torture- instead he so narrowly passionate about executive privelege that he has put himself in a box with this issue.
Thank God that the administration is backpedalling furiously on this issue, on Padilla, and on the other liberties it has taken with our liberties. The freeperocracy and other marginal elements will soon be on their own with this, and hurrah for that. I hope that they take Kit Bond, Tom Coburn, Jon Cornyn, Session, Inhofe et al down with them.
Mr Furious
db,
I know you were congratulating John on his stance and that you are opposed to waterboarding and regard it as torture. I am not the one who accused you of excusing anything. My point (and Steve’s above) is that using grade school pranks to make your case is a bad strategy.
If kids in grade school burned each other with cigarettes, it would be a bad example to use to describe similar actions by troops too. The fact that similar behavior goes on in other venues that people can relate to as “normal” is undermining your own point. I think you must realize that now, or at I least I hope so.
I don’t want to blow anything out of proportion or be interpreted as having serious issue with your point, I don’t, I just think it can be made in a better way.
Mr Furious
Okay everybody, hypothetical here…
Here’s a different example. Say (ala “Deerhunter”) you force a bunch of detainees to play Russian Roulette. The captors know the round in the chamber is a blank, but they’ve done everying possible to convince the prisoners they are actually playing with their lives. They are mortified for their lives and psycologically being traumatized. Much like waterboarding they believe they are about to die. But nobody dies THIS time playing the game. NEXT time might be different, and they know there will be a next time after shift change.
Is that torture?
p.lukasiak
Before someone accuses me or blames me of excusing torture, I am not.
[which of course is followed by the usual “excusing torture” rhetoric]
C’mon Cole….why not just advocate pouring White Phosphorus on detainees, and say its not torture because its being used to illuminate the interrogation room.
Steve S
I’m just so glad we aren’t as bad as Hitler!
db
Nicholas,
Exactly! Shades of gray.
With respect to Steve’s and Furious’ outrage at me of saying waterboarding (WB)=toilet-dunking (TD) for fear that the likes of Rush might run with it, well, I am extremely flattered that they would think that my mind would be the only one in the world capable of such high-powered logic.
Steve – that was sarcasm; of course, I did NOT say this.
Look – if you want to quiet people who make “Rush-like” comments, that’s a bad strategy to convince people that WB is bad as well.
Let’s see where Dick Cheney is coming from. He wants terrorism to end. He believes acquiring information through any means necessary can accomplish that end. This may, in fact, include WB.
I am not sure if John Cole’s ONLY opposition to WB is because it is similar to TD in that it does prevent somebody from breathing. I am sure it is not. And it is not for me either.
WBs and TDs differ in that the purposes of them are different (same means, however – which was the point of my trivial comparison, btw). TDs serve to intimidate and garner a perceived level of respect. WBs, in the current context, would serve a purpose to acquire “valuable” information rather than just lunch money.
We all want terrorism and conflict to end. However, is extreme torture likely to elicit accurate information to that end? I personally do not think so. In fact, quite the opposite, perhaps. I could easily think of a terrorist suspect relishing in the torture because they firmly believe in their cause. Further, I could also think of them relishing in providing innacurate information to serve their own group’s end – such as providing info that might lead some brass to drop a smart bomb on a school in the Middle East.
Pb
p.lukasiak,
Now *that’s* creative! Keep up the good work, because one day Alberto Gonzales might have a job opening just for you!
Steve
Look, I’m not saying you’re a bad person, or that Rush might be reading the comments at Balloon Juice. What I’m saying is that when I read your original post, I took it to be from a torture apologist comparing water-boarding to a junior-high prank, saying sarcastically, “clearly anything 12-year olds do to each other MUST be torture.”
I accept that you are not on that side of the argument at all. I accept that it could be completely my fault for putting that construction on your words. All I’m saying is that, to the eyes of at least one reader, your argument was so bad that it caused me to assume you were actually on the other side of the debate. Maybe it’s you, maybe it’s me. I’m not outraged or appalled or anything of the sort.
John Gillnitz
It is totally fucked up that we are even considering making torture legal. If Cheney thinks its such a great idea lets put his wrinkled ass on the rack and see what he tells us.
Steve
“I’m in my last throes”?
Jon H
“According to Andrew Sullivan, Seymour Hersh, and other proponents of the “torture narrative,” Americans are the leading sadists in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Cuba.”
This is 100% bullshit.
I can’t see Sullivan or Hersh thinking it would be just fine, if we were only the 2nd or third leading sadists, rather than #1.
And so, the piece evaporates in a puff of straw.
Jon H
“It is totally fucked up that we are even considering making torture legal”
The scary thing is that the “we’re not as bad as Hitler/Saddam/Castro” people seem to feel so restrained, like they want to get just as close as they possibly can to that level, while maintaining a few micron’s distance to save face.
RTO Trainer
We are not considering making torture legal. Torture is already illegal. The only legislation in Congress on the issue has the effect of still making it illegal. (Though I don’t suppose it will make it more illegal?)
You can’t pour white phosphorus. Its a waxy solid. It also ignites on contact with oxygen which would make the pourer pretty uncomfortable in short order.
The problem not only with torture but with debating torture is that the definition of torture is much like the definition of pornography, thus when John Cole and Jeff Goldstein see waterboarding they disagree, and under the current conditions, no one can say for certain which, if either, is correct. I can see a point to this with pronography where community standards reign, but do we want community standards to apply to torture? And when abroad, as in Iraq, whose community gets to decide?
The point is, that if Congress wants to do something constructive on this issue, rather than condemning some thing amorphous that is already condemned, they should knuckle down and craft a defintion of torture so we would know what was aboveboard and what was not.
If this is done than the lawyers at Justice have far less room for offering expansive definitions, troops don’t have to second-guess their methods, nor have them second-guessed and debate like this might actually progress, because we won’t all be approaching it with completely different ideas of where the lines are drawn.
Nicholas provided the USC definition. The UN Convention Against Torture says this:
A long paragraph that provides no guidance and plenty of nuances that can be used as cover. Some agreement.
I don’t know, here and now, how to word such a definition. All I can say at this moment is that whever definition is offered should offer enough guidance to make a determination whether specific practices that are in contention (such as waterboarding, sleep deprivation or “stress positions”) is or is not torture. When I grow enough brain to present such a definition, I’ll let you know.
Evil Progressive
Bush, Cheney, and Goss do not condone torture. They merely condone “a variety of unique and innovative ways” to ” obtain information”.
I wonder how you, chickenhawks, if you ever got your cowardly asses over to Iraq instead of being armchair warriors, would react to the “unique and innovative techniques” described below if you were taken prisoner? My best bet is that you would be screaming “torture”, “inhuman and degrading treatment”, and “Geneva Convention”!
Hypocrites!
washingtonpost.com 11/23/05
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> Director for Torture
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> CIA DIRECTOR Porter J. Goss insists that his agency is innocent of torturing the prisoners it is holding in secret detention centers around the world. “This agency does not torture,” he said in an interview this week with USA Today. “We use lawful capabilities to collect vital information, and we do it in a variety of unique and innovative ways, all of which are legal and none of which are torture.” Mr. Goss didn’t describe any of those “innovative” interrogation techniques, nor has his agency allowed its secret prisons to be visited by the International Red Cross or any other monitor. But some of the people who work for him provided a description of six “enhanced interrogation techniques” to ABC News, because they believe “the public needs to know the direction their agency has chosen,” the network reported. Thanks to that disclosure, it’s possible to compare Mr. Goss’s words with reality.
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> The first three techniques reported by ABC involve shaking or striking detainees in an effort to cause pain and fear. The fourth consists of forcing a prisoner to stand, handcuffed and with shackled feet, for up to 40 hours. Then comes the “cold cell”: Detainees are held naked in a cell cooled to 50 degrees, and periodically doused with cold water. Last is “waterboarding,” a technique that’s already been widely reported. According to the information supplied to ABC: “The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner’s face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.” ABC quoted its sources as saying that CIA officers who subjected themselves to waterboarding “lasted an average of 14 seconds before caving in.”
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> Are these techniques “not torture,” as Mr. Goss claims? In fact, several of them have been practiced by repressive regimes around the world, and they once were routinely condemned by the State Department in its annual human rights reports. By insisting that they are not torture, Mr. Goss sets a new standard — both for the treatment of detainees by other governments and for the handling of captive Americans. If an American pilot is captured in the Middle East, then beaten, held naked in a cold cell and subjected to simulated drowning, will Mr. Goss say that he has not been tortured?
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> Are the techniques “legal”? In 1994 the Senate ratified the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment; in doing so, it defined “cruel, inhuman or degrading” as anything that would violate the Fifth, Eighth, or 14th amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The Bush administration has never been clear about whether it considers the CIA’s techniques legal by that standard. If it does — as Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has suggested — then it has opened the way for the FBI to use cold cells and waterboarding on Americans. But the administration also claims a technical loophole: Since the Constitution doesn’t apply to foreigners outside the United States, the administration argues that by the Senate’s standard, the CIA can use cruel and inhuman methods on foreign detainees held abroad.
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> Few legal experts outside the administration agree that this loophole exists. To make sure, senators led by Republican John McCain of Arizona are fighting, by means of amendments to the current defense authorization and appropriations bills, to bar the use of “cruel, inhuman and degrading” methods. But Mr. Goss’s statements suggest a deeper problem. Even if the legislation passes — and Mr. Bush has threatened a veto — the CIA will be led by an administration that has redefined standard torture techniques as “unique and innovative ways” of collecting information. No one beyond Mr. Goss and a handful of senior officials accepts that spin: not the agencies’ professionals, or 90 members of the Senate, or the rest of the democratic world. Yet now that the Bush administration has so loosened and degraded the torture standard, the abuse of detainees will become far harder to prevent — not only in the CIA’s clandestine cells but around the world.
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Devil's Advocate
“The first three techniques reported by ABC involve shaking or striking detainees in an effort to cause pain and fear. The fourth consists of forcing a prisoner to stand, handcuffed and with shackled feet, for up to 40 hours. Then comes the “cold cell”: Detainees are held naked in a cell cooled to 50 degrees, and periodically doused with cold water. Last is “waterboarding,” a technique that’s already been widely reported. According to the information supplied to ABC: “The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner’s face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.” ABC quoted its sources as saying that CIA officers who subjected themselves to waterboarding “lasted an average of 14 seconds before caving in.”
How lovely that the above does not qualify as torture!
Why don’t you, rightnuttters, have the nerve to come out with what you REALLY want: a right-wing dictatorship in the U.S.? Or equally noxious, a Taliban-like theocracy run by the religious right?
Stop pretending. Your game is up. You don’t want a democracy. You want a dictatorship run by your kind. You want to be able to emulate Latin American juntas and emprison dissidents, torture them, and “disappear” them.
I am sure you are dreaming about dropping dead — or half-dead — people off airplanes into the ocean…
The Raven
Have we completely clarified this matter yet? Does nicholas (or anyone else reading here) still believe that the U.S. “does not torture” its captives?
For God’s sake I hope they’ve been made aware of what we’re doing in these secret prisons and overseas hellholes. But if you don’t manage to read a lot, and especially if your news diet is Fox-heavy, it’s understandable that maybe you’ve missed a few things.
So how did it happen? It starts with Dick Cheney. Early in his career – specifically after he stages a coup and wrests control of the intelligence and State Department functions away from Kissinger in the Ford administration, he puts together his team of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Libby, and this group (known as “Team B”) begins to restructure the government by boosting the authority of the Executive branch.
Team B is characterized by a penchant for opacity. Meetings in secret. Private agreements. Backroom dealing. Things “get decided” and then “that’s how it is.” Debate and opinion are not part of this process. Intelligence becomes a tool for manipulating opinion, not forming it.
It isn’t clear why Rumsfeld orders a group of Pentagon analysts to construct a “torture matrix,” but they do what they’re ordered to do, and construct documents that build an orderly procedure for inflicting intense pain and suffering on our captives in order to break their wills and get them to “spill” whatever they might know. A CNN story archived here explains the Cheney/Rummy process in this: http://www.globalnewsmatrix.com/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=3575
Then you Bush asking Yoo and Gonzales to prepare a legal framework for torture – and that’s where the infamous “redefinition of torture” briefing comes from. It basically says that amputating body parts, destroying the function of organs or bringing the subject close to the point of death is torture. Anything else is on the table. And they make the case that if we detain the captives on foreign soil then our own laws do not apply. So nicholas, f’rinstance, is allowed to assert that “our laws don’t let us torture people,” and in a sense he’s almost right.
Team B did its work very carefully – hooding a naked captive, standing him on a box for 24 hours with electrodes wired up to his body, that isn’t torture by definition, and even if it is, Geneva conventions don’t apply since he isn’t a combatent, and even if he is, our torture laws only apply to people held on U.S. soil. The captive is in a black hole and it gets worse. If Army regs don’t allow a certain procedure, then we bring in a CIA interrogator. If the CIA guy can’t do what he wants, we bring in a private contractor from CACI or the like, and if he can’t push the Third Degree as far as he wants, then we can “render” the prisoner to Syria or Egypt and let them do the work. All of this is documented.
Hey – at least we’re not as bad as Hitler.