Thread: torture

Surasak you're equivocation is over what torture really is.
According to you and the bleeding heart liberals just making a prisoner uncomfortable is considered torture. This is pure bullshit.
I described in a previous post in this thread what I consider torture to be.
And no I don't advocate the use of torture.
But I do not consider water-boarding and other techniques interrogators use that create temporal psychological and physical stress to be torture.

You and your human rights boneheads can't even agree on what a terrorist is.
Watch the upcoming national geographic program on Saddam Hussein. Made then you will begin to get a clue.
If you want to see evidence of terrorists in the USA research the unlawful acts of the IRS. Read this book then you can refrain from you hysterical liberal platitudes.
Made your breath will improve too once you quit kissing Michael Moores ass.

Who the hell is Micheal Moore and why do you keep bringing him up?

Water boarding isn't torture, huh?

David Corn

It's amusing the hypocrisy of the United States government:

Twenty-one years earlier, in 1947, the United States charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for carrying out another form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian. The subject was strapped on a stretcher that was tilted so that his feet were in the air and head near the floor, and small amounts of water were poured over his face, leaving him gasping for air until he agreed to talk.

We charged people with water boarding as a form of torture (under the guise of war crimes), now, it's OK (especially since we passed a law exempting any punishment for things like this).

Before long the 'islamofacists' are going to be the good guys if we keep this up.

Have you figured out what a terrorist is yet?

What does that have to do with torture?

Originally Posted by surasak

What does that have to do with torture?

Oh my...... you really have lost your grip on reality.
Did you just wake up Mr. Rip Van Winkle?

I want to know just what the hell the definition of a terrorist has to do with whether or not the United States conducts torture on SUSPECTS as a matter of unofficial or official policy?

It's beginning to smell a lot like straw around here....

To understand why this is all a mess now do some assigned reading:

Ex parte Quirin, 317 US, 1942

FindLaw for Legal Professionals - Case Law, Federal and State Resources, Forms, and Code

Let's see how many people here are competent enough to discuss this ruling.

Has anyone heard of 'Chinese water torture'?

Originally Posted by friscofrankie

Water-boarding is torture. Stapping someone down and pouring watre ofer their face with no ability to avoid or protect themselves is fucking torture. If the American governement is now openly advocating this they are no better, in fact worse, that the 'terrorists" they are warring against.

I am a US citizen, I am truly sickened by the course of events that have played out in [b]my[b/b] country. The current administration is turning my country into nothing more that a neo-facist terrorist state. It has got to stop. What does one citizen do? Has the population of the US gone mad? Is the "reign of terror" so bad that the people are afraid to speak out?

History has proven that you cannot conquer the world with fear and oppression. If the situation continues to deteriorate at this reat, it is going to force the rest of the world to rise up against us. And they maybe even right to do so.

I think about these things quite often. I sometimes get the idea I should be going home to fight the course our "leaders' have taken in any way I can. I am a nobody, my one voice weak, but I am not dust in the wind to be blown about by the avaricious whims of the those that would bring our country down in the name of profit and power. one more voice to rail against the atrocious behavior exhibited by those in control in the US is such a small thing, but souldn't I make the effort?

The most dangerous situation of all will be when other countries take the lead of the U.S. and start rounding up their dissidents, activists, or political opponents under the guise of "well, the U.S. does it so we may as well." If we ignore the rule of law and due process then are we doing more harm than the ones we are supposedly fighting? For better or for worse America is the moral compass for the world and woe be unto those who stand idle while the cesspit of American neoimperialism overflows. It'll be a much more dangerous world for Americans in general if we continue down the road we started on 9-11.

Originally Posted by Mr Earl

I described in a previous post in this thread what I consider torture to be.
And no I don't advocate the use of torture.
But...

very GWB-esque

Originally Posted by raycarey

Originally Posted by Mr Earl

I described in a previous post in this thread what I consider torture to be.
And no I don't advocate the use of torture.
But...

very GWB-esque

I wont deny that.
I will add that my "but" takes in consideration the mentality of the people who hijacked the airliners on 9/11/01. Also the mentality of the executioners of Daniel Pearl, Nick Berg, Paul Johnson and the many unfortunates who happen to fall prey to jihadist massacres.

Comparisons of the current anti-terrorist US policies with Polpot and Japan during WW2 are grasping for a very thin thread of reality.

Not at all.

Even the worst child molester here gets a fair trial. Tim McVeigh got a fair trial, and, on a per capita basis killed more people than any of the 9-11 hijackers or so-called jihadists. We rounded up the worst Nazis and gave them a fair public trial. That's the difference between a civilized society and the kind of society you support. It's called justice, not revenge.

Secret military commissions are nothing more than a kangaroo court, and, for you to support a procedure that is nearly univerally condemned as torture says a lot about your moral values.

Originally Posted by surasak

It's called justice, not revenge.

Well, SK and friends would be supporters of Sharia laws if they were Islamists,

Ironically.

I love the apologists excusing water boarding.

"I don't consider it torture, it's just someone getting a shower."

"It's just a mild form of torture."

"But one also must consider that torture is potentially morally justifiable when a defendant has claimed a plan has been set in motion to kill thousands of innocent people."

Surely if anyone is justified of being tortured it would be a child molester, but, even that is an outrageous consideration in the application of justice. Justice isn't about seeking revenge but making sure the accused is caught, tried, and sentenced accordingly.

The slippery slope is a terrible argument to base morality upon.

Always good for a laugh though.

Waterboarding isn't really torture anyway ... it's just a mental ordeal. Do we know if in any of the cases the subject of the waterboarding had his will broken ? If so, then the means justified the end. If not ... let'em sue.

Seems to me somebody is confusing the issue emotionally. It's not about revenge at all. It's just about getting information. If the US tortured people to death then it would be about revenge. The US form of torture does seem to respect life in that sense. I guess it does suck to break a terrorists will against his will. You might be right though ... maybe if we asked the terrorists to, "pretty please ... with suger on top ... tell us where the IEDs are" that they'd give up the info more readily.

If a terrorist is tortured (waterboarded) for information that results in 30 Iraqi lives being saved from a car bomb ... then the torture was morally justified.

Or we could waterboard him and get nothing and then we have just lowered ourselves to the level of the lowest kind of human scum. We take a bit shit on the face of civilization because someone 'might' confess. Sounds like the Spanish Inquisition to me.

If water boarding isn't torture then why did the U.S. try and convict people of doing such during WWII as a war crime?

If you torture then you are assuming guilt. That is not the hallmark of the basis of our justice system.

The bottom line is that when “water treatment” was practiced against our side, it was called a war crime. That was the ruling against the Japanese after the Second World War by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East and by the military courts that tried what were called in the Far East, the “B” and ”C” level war criminals.

The Garret Tree: Waterboarding is a war crime

If the Singapore and other cases throughout history are any guide, it is more likely that some innocent person or marginal suspect would do what torture most often does, make up a story to please the torturer and end the torment. All those civilians in the Singapore confessed to sabotage, sabotage, that in reality, they knew absolutely nothing about.

Originally Posted by surasak

If water boarding isn't torture then why did the U.S. try and convict people of doing such during WWII as a war crime?

Does seem kind of silly in comparison to the actual documented atrocities that we never sought compensation for. The Japanese did alot worse than waterboard Allied prisoners and in most cases nothing was ever really done about it. Probably the moral thing to do in that case right ... set the example ... turn the other cheek ?

What did the US ever really do about the violations of the Geneva Convention committed in Vietnam ? And speaking of McCain he seems to flip flop back and forth over whether he approves or disapproves of torture or not from what I've read. Were those who tortured him ever held accountable ?

Originally Posted by Storekeeper

And speaking of McCain he seems to flip flop back and forth over whether he approves or disapproves of torture or not from what I've read.

absolute nonsense. or can you post a link?

Originally Posted by raycarey

absolute nonsense. or can you post a link?

Don't have to post a link. it's my opinion. It came up before several months ago. If my memory serves me correctly there might be something about it in the Guantanamo thread.

By the way ray ... John McCain said that Iraq is no Vietnam ... is he right about that ? Or do you just pick and choose people's quoes to suit your fancy ?

The failure to hold people accountable in the past has zero relevance to whether or not we should torture now.

The fact that we did hold some people accountable means that we considered the technique serious enough to merit charges. If an act is serious enough to warrant charges then it means it's something we don't want people to do and if they do then they should face punishment. It's irrelevant to other situations and irrelevant to whether or not we should now engage in the same exact behavior.

You can't expect to hold people accountable when they torture our citizens or our soldiers yet at the same time state it's OK to torture others because we might get some useful information. If we capture a 'suspected' al-Quida member and torture him or her and fail to get anything useful out of it then what? Do we accept that we have sunk to their level?

If we give any indication, any green light that we accept situations where we can torture people then other nations will follow in our footsteps. What's to stop them from torturing if they capture one of ours? They might anyways, but, if we do it then chances are they will be even more willing to do it. Their justification will be "well, the U.S. does it."

Would it be OK for al-Quida to capture a GI and torture him or her under the guise that obtaining information might save 20 or 30 al-Quida members? The hypothetical works both ways.

You cannot codify or otherwise allow such behavior because if one person is allowed to do something legally then someone is going to come along and think it's OK to break the rules just slightly.

We are supposed to be above that.