Yesterday, in response to this post (responding to this post which really is the best response I have seen- one that goes beyond simply calling Sullivan a pussy and a liberal and an Amerikka hating traitor), the following was stated about yours truly:
I agree that Henke is beyond persuasion on this issue, but I don’t think he’s unreasonable, he just disagrees. Sullivan is not only beyond persuasion but unwilling to engage in the process of reasoning. And Cole, who is usually a sensible enough guy, seems intent on adopting the classic lefty tactic of substituting mountains of outrage for an effort at persuasion and argument.
For those interested, I wasn’t adding mountains of outrage- adding outrage should not be necessary, since it is so clear that certain quarters have learned approximately NOTHING from the fallout created by this administration’s choices regarding detainee policy/treatment. What I was adding was condescending mockery, which I hope would work where reason and logic have failed miserably. I was wrong.
At any rate, if they thought I was adding outrage, wait till they get a load of this excellent rant at the Belgravia Dispatch:
Yep, another depressingly poor decision by the White House, in a long string of them, when it comes to detainee policy. I can assure you the further sullying of our reputation in the international community because of Geneva Convention carve-outs in the Manual will greatly outweigh any supposed intelligence gains we will be able to secure because we’ll be able to ‘humiliate’ or ‘degrade’ better. But, blogospheric eminences protest, we are dealing with an Arab male honor code/system here. If we can’t humiliate Mohamed and Ahmed and gang, we won’t be able to extract any good intelligence, and next thing you know, my Colorado condo is going to be blown to smithereens because some weenie intellectual, America-hating, anti-panty-hose-on-head-during-interrogation-cowardly-defeatist wanted to be soft with the terrorists.
Really? But the pre-existing Army Field Manual, which has served us well for decades, allows for tactics such as “Fear Up Harsh”, “Pride and Ego Up,” and “Futility”–all of which would allow for a US interrogator to call an Iraqi insurgent a girlie-man, or such, for not having the balls to have really planted an IED, to use a hypo making the rounds. The point is that our pre-existing doctrine is wholly up to the task of extracting actionable intelligence.
***This is America. A reasonable person test. A do unto others as you would have others do unto you. And if in doubt, don’t do it. Or ask a lawyer. These are the kind of clean, bright lines needed near emotion fraught battle-zones where young men and women entrusted with our national security must gather intelligence amidst the exigencies of wartime. This makes pragmatic sense. This preserves our leading (if rapidly diminishing) role as avatar of international human rights, so critical, as who else will step up and do so on the international stage? Not the farcical UN Rights Commissions, that, in positively Orwellian fashion, fete Syrians or Libyans or such, and not the Indians or Italians or Romanians or Russians either. No, only we have the credibility, but we are squandering it. And for what? So we can “humiliate”? When we can already use “Pride and Ego Up” and “Fear Up Harsh” and other tried and true tactics? Instead we are in a brave new world of paradigm shifts, where the Geneva Conventions are quaint, and Rumstud manfully avers that he stands 8 hours a day, in the margins of a note documenting interrogation tactics at Gitmo.
That will leave a mark.
Paul L.
Instead of the protections of the Geneva Conventions are provided to a enemy who has not signed and does not follow them.
John S.
You hear that, Cole? Quit using our patented lefty tactics. Only a liberal would use feigned outrage as a substitute for rational discourse, and you don’t qualify.
Quit muscling in on our turf.
The Other Steve
and that’s what makes them the BAD GUYS
Marcus Wellby
Belgravia is consistently the best read out there. Probably one of the few blogs I walk away from having actually learned something (oh, yeah, boingboing.net/ too, which I go to more and more as I get sicker and sicker of politics and partisans in general ).
Not to take anything away from John — this one is still on the short lists of blogs I visit. The comments can be exhausting at times and don’t find the fire slinging as entertaining as I once did.
John S.
Therefore, we should sink to the standards of the terrorists.
Yes, Paul, you truly are King of the Kingdom of Idiots.
tbrosz
Of course, there’s always the asterisk at the bottom of the Redstate article:
SeesThroughIt
RedStaters attempting to chastise somebody else for using outrage instead of persuasive discourse? Wow.
Paul L.
They are? I thought they were freedom fighters. After all they are fighting a imperious power.
So why should anyone we fight following the Geneva Conventions? There is no reward to follow the Geneva Conventions. They get the full protections no matter what they do.
Al Maviva
John, Amnesty and other strict interpreters of the Geneva Conventions find most of the approaches in the FM to be torture, or at least cruel and inhumane treatment, as John Yoo famously characterized it. You throw around words like “pride and ego up” or “Fear Up, Harsh” like they have meaning, some set script to be followed. There isn’t a script until a particular interrogator picks a specific strategy, applying the psychological approach using the facts at hand. Sending in a female interrogator to mock the manhood of a fundamentalist Muslim detainee, ridicule the fact that he was captured, and that he is being interrogated by a woman, would appear to fall within the category of pride and ego down. Here’s what the Field Manual says about that approach:
[emphasis added]. The example I would cite is that approach, sometimes with or without the interrogator being scantily clad, and it has been pretty widely condemned. It seems to me to fall within the FM – though the FM may itself fall outside the law here. The mild example of Fear Up, Harsh given in the FM involves the interrogator screaming nasty things and throwing stuff around the interrogation room – I’m sure they’ve come up with a couple other things to do beyond that. So how is this not torture, by our definition of it or even by the plain language, “coercion” language of the Conventions? Go read Appendix H to the unclassified annex of the FM, online here, and then come back tell us you’re fine with it, not just the text but how it is likely to be implemented. Specifically, take a look at the futility approach and how interrogators are encouraged to poke at the detainee’s nightmarish battlefield experiences in order to produce a despair that causes the detainee to talk. Is that not mental torture? I have to agree in a limited manner with some of the right bloggers, that you are taking a nifty stand against torture, then holding up the FM as an example of things you’d approve of – when most of the people you are speaking to, and certainly anti-torture advocates, would consider several of the suggested approaches in the FM to be coercive, extremely cruel, and certainly an interpretation of the Geneva Conventions and the CAT that stretches the text to, or past, their limits. I’ve really come around on this and have started to see that my liberal friends here are right. It seems we’re on a slippery slope, defining torture and adherence to the law generally downward, and I don’t much like it. The sliding isn’t hindered at all when we hold up things like a longstanding FM as some talismanic icon of compliance with the law, when it may in fact not be one, but may be quite the opposite.
JoeTx
Wasn’t reason #12 of the 27 different reasons for invading Iraq because Saddam tortured people?
So your saying the United States should take the low road of some third world country? Thats just beautiful man!
The Other Steve
It’s interesting that you can’t make up your mind.
You want us to treat them so that they can easily argue that they are freedom fighters against an imperious power. Then you accuse everybody who points out that’s what they are perceived as abroad because of our tactics as a Traiter to America for the sole purpose of dividing America. Then you whine about the fact that America is divided on this issue, the whole time justifying the abandonment of Human Rights because they do it too.
You know, why don’t you just go pick up an AK-47 and start shooting Americans in the back of the head? It’d be a much more efficient way of helping the terrorists than the game your playing now.
LITBMueller
What I have never understood is: Why is it that “terrrrrrrists” need to be tortured, anyway? Is the “Arab male honor code/system” so much tougher than, say, the street gang honor code, or the mafia’s “keep your mouth shut, or you’ll get whacked” rule? Are “terrrrists” so tough, they make even our own most hardened criminals look like a bunch of weenies?
In this country, for decades now, we have successfully interrogated and obtained admissions from, without using torture or extreme coercive measures, men that make Iraqi insurgents and other terrorists look like common street thugs, IMHO. I’m thinking of the interrogation of men accused of committing incredibly barbaric crimes, like killing their own mother, chopping her up, and storing her head in the freezer; or men who killed 10 or more young women with their bare hands, then buried them under their back porches.
How is it that terrorists, who plant roadside bombs, and then run from the potential blast zone, are more in need of harsh interrogation techniques than our own homegrown maniacal killers?
Punchy
I’m confused about what one actually gets from torture. Something tells me that if my head is in a vice and the vice-turner needs a time and date, that’ll I’ll be quickly providing any time on any day. If my arm is being swiss-cheesed with a Black and Decker cordless drill, I’m guessing I’ll give my driller a bunch of names, made up or otherwise.
How can any of this “intelligence” be considered accurate and/or honest? Isn’t offering them a bagel and a hooker a better incentive for talking than ripping off their fingernails?
John S.
Honestly, who gives a rat’s ass what other people do with the Geneva Conventions? Let me make a very clear statement to you, Paul, and any of the other clowns clamoring to lower the standard for human rights:
WE ARE THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. WE ARE SUPPOSED TO LEAD BY EXAMPLE, NOT FOLLOW. WE SHOULD NEVER LOWER OURSELVES TO THE STANDARDS OF OUR ENEMIES.
Having said that, the reward of following the Geneva Conventions is having the moral high ground and living by a standard that is better than those we are seeking to destroy. Honestly, how do people like you even call yourself American?
Mr Furious
Punchy-
When the measure is confessions obtained or intel gathered as a quantity rather than quality, no.
Davebo
Obviously you are stuck in a pre 9/11 mindset. If you can’t get with the program you should just shut up and crawl under the bed with Paul.
Mr Furious
Not where it needs to. It’s fine and dandy for it to have an impact on reasonable folks who agree, but I doubt it will change a single opinion among the torture-apologists. It just gets Belgravia on the “weak on terror” shitlist.
Perry Como
We are. We are leading the world in national debt. We are leading the world in % of people imprisoned.
We’re #1!
We’re #1!
We are going the way of the former USSR. Not enough people have realized it yet.
Punchy
Well, we already have their first two letters. We’re 2/3rds there…
JoeTx
As opposed to the post-WWII mindset. Then Americans were constantly bombarded with the “duck and cover, where are you gonna be when the russian nukes hit” commercials.
Zifnab
See, this has always been a bit of a joke, and a logical fallacy the Republicans like to play. Before they follow the rules, the playing field must be made “fair”.
We can’t sign the Kyoto Treaty because third world countries aren’t held to first world standards. We can’t practice fair trade with Central and South America because they don’t practice it amongst themselves. We can’t fight without being dirty during election cycles because our opposition doesn’t fight fair first. Our media centers can’t stop using heavy right-wing media bias until the rest of the media gets off its left-wing slant.
The burden of “fair” is always put on the other guy. Two wrongs might not make a right, but we’ll be damned if we start acting honorably or respectfully before they do.
So torture is ok, so long as the terrorists do it first. Likewise, we should feel free to blow up their buildings, kill their innocent civilians, and blissfully ignore pre-existing rules of engagement because… they do too.
The Other Steve
Even though this is hyperbole.
It’s sadly correct.
RSA
This actually used to be a plausible slogan for America. In some contexts, related to protections against detention without trial, torture, government surveillance, . . .(you get the idea), the slogan is more along the lines, “We’re not as bad as third world dictatorships, so shut yer hole!”
Paul L.
The Other Steve
I was pointing out that some of the anti-war people (ANSWER/Code Pink/Michael Moore/Etc) yelling that the USA is abandoning the Geneva Conventions are the same people calling your “BAD GUYS” freedom fighters.
However, the enemy can do anything horrible (beheadings/etc) and people like you give them a pass or blame the US instead.
Crank
John – I’ll check out the full Belgravia post, and of course I’m always open to learning more facts from the critics on this issue, but in any event I’m not looking to start a pissing contest with you. But I’m just damn tired of getting these types of responses every time I raise this issue. A typical dialogue:
A: Do you support torture?
B: I don’t support torture. I’m against torture.
A: Then you must be opposed to humiliating interrogation tactics.
B: Well, nobody likes to be humiliated, but there is a difference between humiliation and torture. There are some limited circumstances where we should be willing to allow the former but never the latter.
A: So, you support torture.
B: Well, we can’t really go anywhere with this discussion if you and I keep meaning different things when we say “torture.” If you want to prohibit things beyond torture, you should say so rather than trying to redefine the term from its traditional meaning and use.
A: You must be a torture apologist.
Steve
Yeah, the pro-beheading Left bothers me too. They’re much worse than, say, Debbie Schlussel and David Horowitz, who celebrated Marla Ruzicka’s death in Iraq, or Rush Limbaugh, who said “part of me likes it” when Christian peace activists were kidnapped in Iraq. If the enemy is kidnapping or murdering lefties, the spokesmen of the Right are absolutely fine with it, and that’s cool, right?
JoeTx
Hypothical question…
If the United States is invaded by China and they overrun our military and we end up in “Wolverine” type hit and run engagements and Canadians and Hispanics come to our aid and help us fight, would they be called terrorists?
Punchy
Who spells “America” with 2 k’s? who does this? Either go with 3k’s, ala Ice Cube, and imply racism, or just spell it correctly. Is there a meaning behind two-k’ed “Amerikka” that I don’t know about?
canuckistani
So what? Is that your standard for right and wrong? People you don’t like are pointing out your wrongdoing, so you can ignore them and commit evil acts? When Moveon.org asks you not to commit atrocities, is the request negated by the source?
No one gives the terrorists a pass, but if you start an unnecessary war, you’re going to get some of the blame for the terrible things that happen during it.
RSA
Crank, here’s what it looks like on the other side of the aisle.
A: I’m against torture, the kind of thing that went on at Abu Ghraib.
B: That was no different than what happens at the Skull and Bones initiation and we’re going to ruin people’s lives over it and we’re going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time.
The Other Steve
If you’re going to take what people say in defense of American Values, and twist and turn those into an attack on the patriotism of Americans…
you know, like I said. Why don’t you just go get an AK-47 and start shooting Americans in the head. It’s obviously what you want to do, and it’d be a far more effective way than the minimal aid to terrorists your giving now with your attempts to divide the country.
It’s just incredible, how you actively work to divide the country, and then defend bad apples on the American side doing bad things. Just incredible, and fucking pathetic.
Look, if you don’t love America. FUCKING LEAVE ALREADY! WE DON’T WANT YOU! GET OUT! GO SOMEWHERE ELSE!
The Other Steve
I think Commies do this. They love Klinton and hate Amerika!
Or maybe it was Nazis? That’s a good question.
The Other Steve
The war on straw has begun.
The only question you need to ask yourself is… Would you be fine if these techniques were used on American soldiers?
As long as you’re not going to complain and call those who use them on Americans evil, they’re reasonable tactics.
Darrell
I hadn’t heard that, but since you made the accusation, I googled to find what Horowitz had written about her after she was killed, and I found nothing resembling a “celebration” as you put it. Horowitz wrote:
Serious, respectful words for someone on the opposite end of his political spectrum. I didn’t see anything resembling a ‘celebration’ of her murder as you put it.
Do you have anything to substantiate what you alleged about celebrating Marla Ruzicka’s death?
tBone
Yep, that’s the Left in a nutshell: objectively pro-beheading.
PaulL: King of Spoop.
Faux News
I think the movie “Team America: World Police” sad it best in the song “AMERICA, FUCK YEAH!”
John Cole
It is not my side of the debate that is playing word games. I have pretty clearly stated I believe what is, and what is not, torture. I have pretty clearly stated waterboarding is torture- there are plenty on your side of the debate who think it is just psychological headgames.
I have stated pretty clearly certain forms of humiliation are ok, to an extent, but that chaining someone to the ground naked, immersing them in cold water, keeping them in rooms that are below a certain temperature while they are rolling around in their own fecal matter and playing loud music are beyond humiliation. That is torture.
Regardless, what is going on is that this administration and its defenders are fuzzying what is and what is not acceptable behavior, and are attempting to rewrite the standards for who is who is not protected from not only torture, but from the types of things I just described- except they just call them ‘humiliation,’ and what the hell- they were unlawful combatants, anyway. Don’t you know we used to summarily execute them in WWII?
What they want to do flies in the face of international standards of decency, standards of decency among most normal people who have not been scared into fits of frenzy, and, I might add, it appears beyond the standards for behavior that most in JAG and many in the military leadership would prefer. And that isn’t even addressing the legal aspects of the treaties we are currently supposedly adhering to.
It is yet another attempt to create wiggle room, or to borrow a phrase that those on my side of the aisle might remember- a situation where there is “no controlling legal authority”- so that we can do what we want with who we want, becuase, you know, after all, they want to kill us and they were just unlawful combatants, anyway.
Steve
Horowitz published Schlussel’s hateful slander of Ruzicka in his online magazine. That’s what I was referring to.
I note you offer no defense for what Schlussel actually said, nor what Rush Limbaugh said. I assume that’s because there is no defense. I guess you could argue that Rush Limbaugh doesn’t speak for the conservative movement – good luck with that one.
Pooh
My thing is, even backing out the moral and legal dimensions (which I think come down strongly on the ‘anti’ side as well), how do we justify a policy of torture on pragmatic grounds? Balancing the correct information we get against A) the incorrect stuff people say just to make it stop and B) the loss of ‘moral’ or ‘diplomatic’ capital, or whatever else you want to call it, I find it hard to make a credible case. Even the President acknowledges the Abu Ghraib objectively hurt our cause (yes, yes that durn librul media is the actual culprit, we clearly need our own Baghdad Bob.)
I take it as a given that if the unlikely “24”ish ticking-bomb scenario were to occur, it would get done, and forgiveness either would or would not be forthcoming – but I think we’re well beyond that…
It’s almost enough to turn P.J. O’Rourke on his side and say “Islamo-terrorists claim Western Democratic values are a sham and Bush & Co. get elected and prove it.”
Darrell
So although Horowitz himself did no such ‘celebrating’, you feel justified in smearing him as having done so, simply because he permitted an unflattering article on her written by someone else to appear in his magazine. How honest of you
Not at all. More dishonesty on your part. The first google search I did appeared to discredit your accusations. That you are unable to provide anything more to substantiate them, makes your accusation a baseless smear. I saw no reason to research your other ‘accusations’ further.
But I’ll take your bait on Schlussel. Google produced Schlussel’s article on Ruzick. Schlussel is obviously pissed with Ruzicka’s involvement with code pink which has undermined our military in several ways. In that context, here is the closest thing I could find to a “celebratory” comment from Schlussel:
Not the nicest choice of words, but not celebratory either. I assume your characterization of Rush Limbaugh is a similar dishonest smear on your part
Crank
John – See, you and I may not be that terribly far apart on the specifics of which things we would and would not think to be outside the lines of the acceptable. Plenty of what went on at Abu Ghraib was unacceptable, even things that didn’t rise to the level of the traditional definitions of torture. And I do think we should ultimately have clear and understandable rules, and I will be disappointed if we get a revised manual that doesn’t set them. But I think it’s deeply dangerous – including ultimately dangerous to civil liberties and insulting to everyone who wears a uniform and complies with the laws of war – to say that we have to treat unlawful combatants, who commit continuous war crimes as a matter of policy, precisely the same as legitimate soldiers who are accountable to an identifiable chain of command and who ordinarily comply with the rules under which they seek protection.
Darrell
Well I tend to agree with you except that neither one of us has experience in extracting info from bad guys.. Do you think you’re the only one who knows that a terrorist suspect being tortured may tell the interrogators whatever he thinks will make them stop? Some with more experience than either of us feel valuable info can be gained through certain forms of torture. But from what I’ve seen and read, the gains are probably outweighed by the loss of credibility and moral standing.. but again, I’m not the one whose life is on the line over there.
As for the ‘librul media’, they ran headlines with Abu Ghraib photos for what, 2 or 3 months straight? Sure the photos were sensational, but given what else was occurring in Iraq, did the newsworthiness justify literally months of headline news?
John Cole
Crank-
I am not giving this administration or this President one more inch of leeway or authority. They have no credit with me to do the right thing on virtually any matter.
Perry Como
How should we treat taxi drivers that are labelled unlawful combatants? The treatment to date seems to be murder.
Perry Como
Would you prefer they run photos of the decapitated bodies or the bodies with holes from power drills? Or would that ruin the new and peaceful Iraq narrative?
Perry Como
btw, is there an Article 1 issue with the Executive branch changing the Army Manual?
Could Congress step up and tell the Executive “no” to the pro-torture changes? (not that they would)
Pooh
I think that cuts both ways in that those who are in danger seem likely to overemphasize the gains and undervalue to cons. Hence the need for a rather clearer vision from those with a little objectivity and distance.
Tulkinghorn
Are you saying that the media should have ignored them? As long as the pictures were authentic, they were legitimate news.
Those pictures were all over the international media for months – the diplomatic damage was done even if they were never printed in the US. And surely you are not going to blame the US media for what European and Arab media disseminates?
But the U.S. media should not print them out of patriotism?
The point you are making appears to be that US media should not print pictures that diminish administration prestige in the eyes of Americans. I guess Americans can’t handlke the truth, whether about what its government does, or what the world thinks about us, because… because… why was that again?
Jess
Why? From a pragmatic point of view, it makes sense to either torture them to get useful intel, or treat them decently so as not to foster even more resistance and hatred for the West. What the hell is the point of abusing or humiliating prisoners? What is this going to do to help our long-term goals in the Middle-East? It’s just stupid. It would be so much smarter to make a big deal of treating prisoners well and broadcasting it to everyone, while we carefully and secretly target those who really do have useful information to offer, and use professional interrogators and interrogation tactics that actually have a good chance of working–and there seems to be plenty of evidence that torture is not a good tactic. This abuse and “frat pranks” by amateurs is even less defensible that outright torture. It’s just amazingly foolish on so many levels.
Darrell
Yes, that’s what I was saying Tulkinghorn.. the US media should have ignored the Abu Ghraib photos out of patriotism. That was exactly my point [/dumbass]
Tulkinghorn
As detached citizens we do not so much have a better capacity to analyze the health of the venture in Iraq, but a different moral relationship with it.
A good soldier focusses on his mission, and works to maintain good morale as part of that mission. He does not have the luxury of considering the moral and strategic aspects of why he is the theater. This means supporting the civilian leadership as a matter of course.
A good civilian supports the soldier, but not by agreeing with his evaluation of the effectiveness of the mission, but by looking out for the good of the military and the country, and subjecting the civilian leadership to as strict review and ceaselessly demanding the highest standards from that civilian leadership.
This is a necessary and correct conflict, where both soldier and civilian critic are looking out for each other and the country as a whole. It should be possible for the two sides to respect a divergence of opinion. Unfortunately there are politicians who perversely try to drive a wedge between the military and the civilians. That is a very dangerous development in a Democracy.
Steve
Nope, Darrell, nothing celebratory about calling someone’s death “poetic justice.” Nothing celebratory about saying “part of me likes” seeing Christian peace activists kidnapped in Iraq. Just more examples of what you like to label “dishonest smears” on my part. Nothing celebratory there in the least.
Tulkinghorn
Darrell,
your point was that it was wrong for the press to publish them, or to linger on them, or something like that.
Considering that the audience of those papers are american voters, predominantly, what is your point?
If there was harm to our cause in the disseminating of those images, it was in the foreign press. I think we can safely put away the straw man argument that tries to blame the American press for the harm that disseminating the Abu Ghraib pictures may have had.
Oh, I forgot, the press is liberal, so liberals are to blame for what the press does… [/dumbass]
Darrell
You might first deal with what I actually wrote:
So based on that statement I wrote, you claimed I wanted the press to stifle the Abu Ghraib photos out of patriotism.
Tulkinghorn
I did not claim anything. I was asking you to clarify your point.
Are you questioning the focussing on the pictures?
Are you questioning the failure to talk about all the good news coming out of Iraq?
As far as I can tell, the point is that you do not like that the news told a story about the war that made American voters ashamed of their government, and failed to tell stories that made them proud of there government. And that in doing so the American media acted unpatriotically, or at least intentionally against American interests. Then again, this assumes that telling the truth, and focussing on the most newsworthy aspects of the news, are not the most important principles of a free press.
Then again I am a dumbass. So what is the point, Darrell?
Darrell
Although there have been a lot of concerns raised over the dangers of grey area ‘word games’ defining torture, I haven’t seen much acknowledgment that some (many?) on the other side would love to see any and all aggressive interrogation techniques disallowed.. no form of humiliation permitted whatsoever on suspects, and so on.
Steve
Who are these people? Any elected political figures among them?
By the way, maybe there wouldn’t have been a need to repeatedly publicize the Abu Ghraib photos if so many on “your side” hadn’t persistently tried to dismiss the whole thing as a bunch of fraternity pranks. Sadly, the presentation of graphic evidence was the only thing that could get them to stop lying.
Darrell
Well, at the same time he did qualify his statement explaining that ‘part of him’ wants them to open their eyes to the reality that our enemies really are brutal child killing monsters, rather than victims of American imperialism and oppression
It’s not like Rush said “Screw ‘Em” after Americans were brutally murdered in Iraq or anything, right?
Darrell
I thought the media was made aware of Abu Ghraib only as a result of our military informing them on their investigation.
Bruce Moomaw
John: “I am not giving this administration or this President one more inch of leeway or authority. They have no credit with me to do the right thing on virtually any matter.”
Shame on you, John. Didn’t you read Crank’s final note on the previous thread on this subject, in which he announced that the President should never be held accountable (including legally) for anything he does after he wins reelection? How dare you doubt a man who has (or at least says he has) a law degree?
Bruce Moomaw
And, for the record, Crank, we still haven’t gotten any response from you as to what you think should be done about an administration that officially defines waterboarding as mere “humilation” rather than torture.
Bruce Moomaw
I think the intellectual/journalistic Right has finally reached the point analogous to the point the Left reached when it had to draw a line between Stalinist and non-Stalinist leftists. John is clearly on one side of this fence; Crank is clearly on the other. (But there are a few surprises — see, for instance, Grover Norquist’s furious denunciation of the “lawlessness” of the Bush Administration, in Elizabeth Drew’s new article in the New York Review of Books. Andrew Sullivan has the link.)
DougJ
Speaking of Belgravia Dispatch, I’m going to a restaurant tomorrow on the say-so of the guy who writes it, whatever his name is. It’s Jack’s Luxury Oyster Bar in the East Village. The Belgravia Dispatch guy compared it to Le Bernadin.
Tulkinghorn
As a public service I think it appropriate to put the entire Kos statement on record here, since Darrell can’t be bothered.
DougJ
Damn, someone is bringing a vegetarian, so I can’t go there after all. Quel dommage.
Perry Como
French lovers.
Al Maviva
So, John Cole, you think humiliating treatment is sometimes okay. Where exactly is the morality in that?
Article 3(1) of the Third Convention states:
You’ve got some nerve calling the Administration lawless for failing to follow the Geneva Conventions, bucko.
Bruce Moomaw
Al, are you telling us with a straight face that “humiliating” treatment is as bad as torture — and that ANY kind of interrogation of POWs is thus not permitted by the Geneva Conventions? And are you by any chance cranking up to use this moronic argument to “prove” that Bush’s allowance of flat-out physical torture is really no worse than the regular interrogation of POWs?
Al Maviva
Read the law, Moomaw. I put it in blockquotes so that you might, just possibly, perhaps, maybe, actually read it before you fired off a response.
A breech of the Conventions, is a breech of the Conventions. You can’t stand there like John does above, and call the Administration lawless for breeching the Conventions, and then say an acceptable course of action is… wait for it… a breech of the Conventions.
So what’s your deal, Moomaw? Like John, you’re in favor of mental cruelty, but the physical kind turns you off? What is the legal or moral basis for that belief? Both kinds appear to be banned by the Conventions and U.S. law. So why is a cigarette burn somehow worse than ridiculing and humiliating a man? Seems to me they’re both outlawed and defined as torture under the Conventions.
farmgirl
Perry —
They already did, with the McCain amendment, and the Executive wiped their own asses with it.
Bruce Moomaw
“So why is a cigarette burn somehow worse than ridiculing and humiliating a man?”
Words fail me… except to say that the guy with the VERY severe reading comprehension problem (along with certain other severe problems) is clearly Al. Do try actually reading Greg Djerejian’s description at the beginning of this thread of the sorts of things the Army Field Manual DOES already allow interrogators to do, without anyone inside this country or outside it saying that they violate the Geneva Conventions. Then meditate for an hour or so on why even panties on the face just MIGHT be a bit less serious than cigarette burns or waterboarding.
demimondian
No, Al is pointing out what the law is. I think — but don’t have a copy of the text — that the “humiliating or degrading” treatment mentioned in section 3 is limited to “public display” further down, but, failing that, I can’t see any hole is his argument.
Al Maviva
Look, the Field Manual can say on its face that nothing in it violates the GCs, but then prescribe stuff that is in fact in violation of it. Just because I say I’m not kicking my dog, doesn’t mean I’m telling the truth. If the dog is howling, I’m probably lying.
My personal opinion is that there are only two sources on international law – customary and traditional behaviors and interpreations; and treaties. Customary international law construes the terms in the GCs, and has normally defined the terms “humiliating” and “coercive” downward, into a term of art that most people would probably find shocking. The FMs, and the manner in which they are applied, fit (for the most part, I think) within the customary interpretation of the GCs, but certainly not within the letter of the law. Amnesty and others of their ilk know this, and have decided to double down, and not being happy with being able to beat up the U.S. over real abuses – unsanctioned abuse like Abu Ghraib, sanctioned abuse as some interrogators from Afghanistan have been tried for – they have gone for “cruel” treatment as torture. It’s just upping the ante and saying the text of the GCs controls the question, customary interpretation be damned.
I’m willing to buy off on that. It makes me feel good about being an american, that we’re willing to impose standards on ourselves much higher than what NATO and customary international law imposes. But if you do what Amnesty has done, if you commit to that legal course, as John does, you can’t pick and choose. If you want to stay within the four corners of the Geneva Conventions, then you by-God have to do so, you can’t cherry pick. Otherwise, you’re back to where Rumsfeld and Yoo are. If you commit to this literalist approach, you also have to understand the costs to it. Very few detainees will give up information, and instead of taking high risk to capture them, troops will just call air strikes on their positions and be done with it. Then you will have to figure out some way of shipping them to some neutral country where they won’t be killed, tortured, or put on trial; and you have to accept diminished effectiveness (and more loss of U.S. life on the battlefield and in the United States. I’m cool with that, even though I work in downtown D.C. and would likely be one of the people killed in a WMD attack, as my office is situated more or less between likely targets.
Bruce Moomaw
This still misses the damn point — which is that the US has used “humiliating” treatments of the type described by Djerejian routinely for decades in interrogation, with neither anyone in the US or anyone abroad making much if any of a stink about it. If that had been maintained, nobody would be making a stink about it NOW.
The trouble started — entirely — when THIS administration started redefining flat-out torture as non-torture, and specifically as “humiliation”. Are we seriously supposed to believe that its new move to explicitly allow “humiliation” (as defined entirely by itself) is unconnected with this?
Paul L.
And Markos “Kos” Moulitsas proves me right.
Higher Ground