Red Cross investigation of CIA torture at Guantonamo Bay

Uncited QuoteI’m a veteran. We’re not supposed to be torturing these people. This is not Nazi Germany, Red China, or North Korea. There’s other ways of interrogating people, and you kept harping about it — “It’s OK,” or “It’s not really torture.” And it was just more than waterboarding. Some of these prisoners were killed under torture. … Anyone who could believe in torture just has got to be something wrong with them.

Artie60438 wrote:

The Evolution Of John McCain

"But we are not asked to judge the President's character flaws. We are asked to judge whether the President, who swore an oath to faithfully execute his office, deliberately subverted--for whatever purpose--the rule of law," - John McCain arguing for the impeachment of Bill Clinton for perjury in a civil suit, February 1999.

"Anyone who knows what waterboarding is could not be unsure. It is a horrible torture technique used by Pol Pot," - John McCain, October 2007.

"We've got to move on," - John McCain, April 26, 2009, reacting to incontrovertible proof that George W. Bush ordered the waterboarding of a prisoner 183 times, as well as broader treatment that the Red Cross has called "unequivocally torture."
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/04/the-evolution-of-john-mccain.html

Ohhmama wrote:

So should the US stop waterboarding their own military? It is torture after all.

Quote :

Former Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and five other ex-Bush administration officials are accused in the human rights group complaint of allegedly sanctioning torture at the Guantanamo Bay detention center.

The complaint alleges the six former officials were the legal architects of a system that allowed torture of prisoners at Guantanamo, in violation of international law.

Mirage wrote:

I fail to see how any sane person can think the waterboarding of terrorists to illicit information that saves lives can possibly be considered "cruel and unusual punishment."

OK first there is no permanent physical harm. It's not like anybody is having limbs removed or being beaten within an inch of their life to solicit a false criminal confession. But what it DOES do is allow Muslim extremists to honorably say they could endure no more and have no shame in spoiling the attack plans of their comrades.

You're thinking in Western terms, at best. But that don't wash when you're talking about people who target women & children, or worse yet when they forcibly recruit them to be suicide bombers.

I loosely equate waterboarding to a taser. Now I can see how that could be claimed to be cruel and unusual punishment, but it sure beats taking a bullet!

Quote :

Intro to American Torture- George W. Bush calls them an "alternative set of procedures" - forced standing for up to forty hours, sleep deprivation for weeks on end, dousing naked prisoners with ice water in rooms chilled to fifty degrees Fahrenheit, and strapping prisoners to inclined boards then flooding their mouths with water. American Torture examines the origins of this interrogation regime and traces how it was refined, spread, and kept legal. Along the way, American Torture uncovers the effects of state-sponsored torture and deconstructs the myths espoused by its proponents.

Mirage wrote:

I fail to see how any sane person can think the waterboarding of terrorists to illicit information that saves lives can possibly be considered "cruel and unusual punishment."

OK first there is no permanent physical harm. It's not like anybody is having limbs removed or being beaten within an inch of their life to solicit a false criminal confession. But what it DOES do is allow Muslim extremists to honorably say they could endure no more and have no shame in spoiling the attack plans of their comrades.

Mirage wrote:

Again, how can you claim this is truly a criminal act of "torture?"

Heretic wrote:

Mirage wrote:

Again, how can you claim this is truly a criminal act of "torture?"

Because we considered it as such when it was done to our soldiers during previous conflicts.

Interesting... I haven't heard any Republicans disputing calls of "torture" from McCain when recalling his treatment as a POW.

Mirage wrote:

Well since you brought it up we all know McCain has lifetime physical disabilities from his REAL torture.

Mirage wrote:

How you or anyone can compare the two is simply beyond human comprehension.

Mirage wrote:

Well I suppose we'll just have to send a nasty letter to their ambassador to make them play nice. Oh wait! They haven't got one, nor do they abide by the principles of civilized warfare. They don't even wear uniforms. In civilized warfare that's grounds for immediate execution as an assumed spy!

Again, how can you claim this is truly a criminal act of "torture?" That's what it all comes down to. And how do you propose we get them to talk?

sparks wrote:

By using the same interrogation techniques that have been proven to work in countless studies.Good cop/bad cop,build a relationship,gain the prisoner's trust,demonstrate with our actions that we are a moral society that is just.

Ohhmama wrote:

sparks wrote:

By using the same interrogation techniques that have been proven to work in countless studies.Good cop/bad cop,build a relationship,gain the prisoner's trust,demonstrate with our actions that we are a moral society that is just.

LOL, you are acting as though these guys are just a couple of thugs who robbed a bank. We are talking about murderers who will think of nothing of slicing your head off simply because you don't believe in Allah. Good cop/bad cop...ROFLMAO.

sparks wrote:

Ohhmama wrote:

sparks wrote:

By using the same interrogation techniques that have been proven to work in countless studies.Good cop/bad cop,build a relationship,gain the prisoner's trust,demonstrate with our actions that we are a moral society that is just.

LOL, you are acting as though these guys are just a couple of thugs who robbed a bank. We are talking about murderers who will think of nothing of slicing your head off simply because you don't believe in Allah. Good cop/bad cop...ROFLMAO.

Since terrorists do have such a negative impact on the world by targeting innocent people with random violence, I believe that the best way to defeat them is to use interrogation techniques that have been proven to work. The goal is to eliminate terrorism, not lower our country to the terrorist's level of violence and depravity.

LoisLane wrote:

How naive are you? This PC crap may work in the limp wristed places you visit, but in the Middle East you are talking extremists that get their hands cut off for shoplifting. Have you EVER been outside the United States? You need a lesson in reality. Oh, and PUH-LEEZE don't cut and paste a passage from the Enquirer that you read in line at the supermarket. Take a trip to Europe or Asia, and maybe your opinion on foreign policy will change your already left wing, politically correct attitude.

Artie60438 wrote:

Lois,Can you provide any examples of where a plot was foiled or lives were saved as a result of torture during interrogations? Oh,and btw,"Cheney said so." doesn't count.

LoisLane wrote:

Artie60438 wrote:

Lois,Can you provide any examples of where a plot was foiled or lives were saved as a result of torture during interrogations? Oh,and btw,"Cheney said so." doesn't count.

Sorry, I was not put on this planet to educate you or any of your other left wing buddies. I have more to do with my time that to explain every issue on this board. Next, you'll be asking me to give you crayons and milk so that you can nap in the afternoon. Have you ever considered employment, or volunteering at a nursing home?

WhitingLib wrote:

LoisLane wrote:

Artie60438 wrote:

Lois,Can you provide any examples of where a plot was foiled or lives were saved as a result of torture during interrogations? Oh,and btw,"Cheney said so." doesn't count.

Sorry, I was not put on this planet to educate you or any of your other left wing buddies. I have more to do with my time that to explain every issue on this board. Next, you'll be asking me to give you crayons and milk so that you can nap in the afternoon. Have you ever considered employment, or volunteering at a nursing home?

I'll translate this one for you Artie....
No, she cannot provide any examples.

Ohhmama wrote:

LOL, you are acting as though these guys are just a couple of thugs who robbed a bank. We are talking about murderers who will think of nothing of slicing your head off simply because you don't believe in Allah. Good cop/bad cop...ROFLMAO.

Quote :

It would be reassuring to think that somebody close to Obama had handed him a copy of a little-known book called Camp 020: MI5 and the Nazi Spies. This was published by the British Public Record Office in 2000 and describes the workings of Latchmere House, an extraordinary British prison on Ham Common in the London suburb of Richmond, which housed as many as 400 of Hitler's operatives during World War II. Its commanding officer was a man named Col. Robin Stephens, and though he wore a monocle and presented every aspect of a frigid military martinet (and was known and feared by the nickname "Tin-Eye"), he was a dedicated advocate of the nonviolent approach to his long-term guests. To phrase it crisply—as he did—his view was and remained: "Violence is taboo, for not only does it produce answers to please, but it lowers the standard of information."

To give you some of the flavor of this prohibition, I ask you to consider the case of the German agent codenamed "TATE," who was parachuted into England in September 1940, at a time when almost all of continental Europe was under Hitler's control and when neither the United States nor the Soviet Union had entered the war against Germany.* Taken to Camp 020, TATE stubbornly maintained that he was a Danish refugee. An external interrogator unused to the rules of Ham Common was exasperated by this initial stubbornness and "followed TATE to his cell at the close of that first interrogation and, in flagrant violation of the Commandant's rigid rule that no physical violence should ever be used at Ham, struck the agent on the head. The incident led, on immediate representations by the Commandant, to the instant recall of [the offending officer] from the camp." One blow to the head at a time when undefended British cities were being blitzed every night, and the brute was out of there for good.

Nor is this all. TATE was then put to the inconvenience of intensive questioning, which included the distinct suggestion that he had been betrayed by a close Nazi friend. He ended up making a full confession, leading his captors to the place where he had concealed his transmitter, and then using it to send false intelligence back to Germany. The British wartime records conclude that "skilful direction of his activities and reports provided not only opportunity for deception of the enemy, but gained advance information leading to the detection of other agents and their neutralization."

Quote :

As Col. Stephens wrote, following the words quoted above about how "violence is taboo" and that it "lowers the standard of information":

"There is no room for a percentage assessment of reliability. If information is correct, it is accepted and recorded; if it is doubtful, it should be rejected in toto."

In other words, it is precisely because the situation was so urgent, so desperate, and so grave that no amateurish or stupid methods could be permitted to taint the source. Col. Stephens, who was entirely devoted to breaking his prisoners and destroying the Nazis, eventually persuaded many important detainees to work for him and began to receive interested inquiries "from the FBI and the North West Mounted Police, from the Director of Security in India to the Resistance Movements of de Gaulle, the Belgians and the Dutch." It would be nice to think that even now, American intelligence might take a leaf from his ruthless and yet humane book.

Ohhmama wrote:

Won the debate?? Because of an article posting??? LOL