Waterboarding

[Defiant47]

According to my laws of land warfare? I diden't know I was making policey now. I personally have never tortured anyone. I have had to crack some heads in my day due to prisoners trying to resist and harm me, torture though? nope. I can't speak for anyone that does that sort of thing. I do know that it's not standard policey for US Servicemembers to torture anyone, if cought doing that sort of thing they can expect to feel the wrath of there command come down on them. I have never seen torture tought, advocated or reccomended in any training or schooling I have gone through in the military. That includes the SERE course I went through.

You missed the point. You cannot say "let's implement system X" and then absolve yourself in the matter by saying "well I personally never implemented system X so I'm good".

Yes, everything you say, you support a policy. If you think that the government should give more money to the poor, then even if you're not personally doing it, you support the policy of more welfare.

If you think that torture is moral if done to save lives, then you support the rewriting of warfare conventions such that both sides can torture all POWs at will: after all, torturing POWs might reveal information that could save lives.

you really think they care? seriously, we are talking about " people " who make sure they set off bombs in crowded markets and sometimes in schools to kill as many people as they can. You honestly think they give a ****?

You missed the point. They do care, since a dentist would not have the information to save their own people's lives, whereas the general who coordinated and ordered the airstrikes would. And look more carefully at the example: it does not necessarily deal with the fundamentalists who you call "animals", it deals with members of a nation who want to protect it.

If you legalize torture, how do you ensure that it only applies to the right people - i.e. the people that have the information? The fact that someone claims he is a dentist can either mean the unlikely chance that he is indeed a dentist, or he's managed to resist the torture so far.

I'm not sure what to tell you, if you think waterbording is torture than that is how you feel. I do not and I have experanced it firsthand. I consider it a forceful technique for gathering information, it's cirtianly not pretty yet in a war it's definately not much of a sin compaired to what goes on in say, combat.

To claim that waterboarding is not torture is akin to saying all psychological torture is not torture. Or is there something special about waterboarding?

The only thing waterboarding has about it is that it doesn't leave a trace (except mental), and I assure you, leaving a trace has little to do with whether something is torture or not.

 

[Bronx Warlord]

Couple things to keep in mind:
1. it seems likely that some of this information could be obtained through different means.
2. Image and PR does play a role too, waterboarding may endgender greater fear and mistrust into the world.

1 - I am sure they were tried. I am also sure that the information was time sensative. It becomes a question of how much time you have to work someone, waterbording does speed things up.

2 - You mean like when the Taliban kill 30 Afghan civilians and there is not one peep about it on this forum yet we are talking about the evils of waterboarding? Taliban kills 30, Americans waterboard. Bad Americans

 

[Defiant47]

1 - I am sure they were tried. I am also sure that the information was time sensative. It becomes a question of how much time you have to work someone, waterbording does speed things up.

When timeliness becomes an issue, torture fails. Why? The person being tortured can stall for time, and even worse give false leads.

Why do the enemy have to give the information to you when the plan is going to go off in 24 hours anyways? He can just keep stalling for time and wait until it's done. Or if he's really desperate to stop the torture, he could give some very plausible information that will take the interrogators quite a while to realize is completely false.

2 - You mean like when the Taliban kill 30 Afghan civilians and there is not one peep about it on this forum yet we are talking about the evils of waterboarding? Taliban kills 30, Americans waterboard. Bad Americans

We already know that the Taliban are evil, but we expected the Americans to be the high and holy good guys. It does concern us when there are evils committed right in our own backyard.

 

[Bronx Warlord]

You missed the point. You cannot say "let's implement system X" and then absolve yourself in the matter by saying "well I personally never implemented system X so I'm good".

Yes, everything you say, you support a policy. If you think that the government should give more money to the poor, then even if you're not personally doing it, you support the policy of more welfare.

If you think that torture is moral if done to save lives, then you support the rewriting of warfare conventions such that both sides can torture all POWs at will: after all, torturing POWs might reveal information that could save lives.

I think your missing my point. I don't consider it torture. Not compaired to what I have seen that is definately torture. I could really care less if the people trying to kill me are waterboarded. It's that simple. It comes down to a matter of opinion and in my opinion, it's not torture. I have no moral problems with it being used, unlike many with an opinion on it, I have personally felt it's effects and I think it's damn effective. I have no problems of it being used by trained professionals in persuit of information that will save lives. Your not going to convince me otherwise.

And look more carefully at the example: it does not necessarily deal with the fundamentalists who you call "animals", it deals with members of a nation who want to protect it.

I did read it. They are intrested in protecting there familes from airstrikes that would resault from there own actions. They should have considered that before becomming insurgents and criminals. I have yet to see an insurgent platform for solving iraqs problems aside from imposing laws on the population they have no idea of following themselves, murder, rape and outright theft. They are only intrested in there own asses, not the nation of iraq or it's progress. To make that assumption is false and not based in reality.

If you legalize torture, how do you ensure that it only applies to the right people - i.e. the people that have the information? The fact that someone claims he is a dentist can either mean the unlikely chance that he is indeed a dentist, or he's managed to resist the torture so far.

Or he is going to be tortured for simply being an American servicemember. Or an iraqi that does not support the insurgeant agenda. You seem to think both sides have rules when in fact only one side is playing by them. To make this sort of comparison is again not based in reality. The example itself is crap due to one simple reason. Justification or not, they are going to work him over. Regardless. The track record speaks for itself.

To claim that waterboarding is not torture is akin to saying all psychological torture is not torture. Or is there something special about waterboarding?

Oh so now we are all about the psychological factors. News flash, combat itself as well as life in a warzone are far more damageing than waterbording. Continued exposure to combat after 90 days will, with 100% cirtianity resault in a psychological casualty. I personally do not care if I capture someone that was trying to kill me or others and he ends up waterboarded. When he goes to an iraqi run prison he is in for much, much worse at the hands of his fellow inmates let alone the guards. It's another, imho, . .. .. .. .. .. .. .. . example of why it's " bad ". There are much, much worse things going on in iraq than waterbording. Trust me.

The only thing waterboarding has about it is that it doesn't leave a trace (except mental), and I assure you, leaving a trace has little to do with whether something is torture or not.

Darn. Really. Your not going to sway me with this. People who are going about there business in a peaceful manner in iraq are being kidnapped and having there heads cut off, familys killed and children raped. Thats just the tip of the iceburg. You think I give a . .. .. .. . if we are waterbording the people doing that? to quote Show Nuff from The Last Dragon - . .. .. .. .. . Please.

 

[Bronx Warlord]

When timeliness becomes an issue, torture fails. Why? The person being tortured can stall for time, and even worse give false leads.

There is no stalling with the boarding. Thats why it's used. It's also much more humane that what one can expect if turned over to the Iraqis. I am sure if you asked some of the survivors of Insurgent torture if they would rather have what they got or the board they would go with the board. Then again most of them were tortured for reasons other than gathering information. As for false leads, anyone can give them. So you reccomend we just stop questioning people and say kill them on the spot? Mabey let thm go with a stern warning?

We already know that the Taliban are evil, but we expected the Americans to be the high and holy good guys.

You have obviously never been in an armed conflict, much less an American effort. You would be suprised at just how we treat prisoners, it's far, far better than these insurgents give or there own respective governments. I love the logic though, we know the Taliban are bad guys so we will give them a pass. They are cutting heads off, we are waterboarding so we are in the wrong?

 

[Yeekim]

I did. Can you name me one American service member thathas been captured by the insurgency/criminal elements in Iraq or the Taliban/AQ in Afghanistan that has not been tortured and killed? Save you time trying to look it up, the answer is none.

Jessica Lynch?

 

[Bronx Warlord]

Jessica Lynch?

Captured by the Fedayeen and turned over to the Iraqi Army. Given medical treatment and sodomized by Iraqi Soldier guarding her. In all fairness, I am sure he was not ordered to do that and took his own initative. Good try though, I knew someone would. It would be a good example if she were captured by say JAM or AQI, then again we would have snuff films of her on the net as example of what happens were that the case.

 

[RedRalph]

Captured by the Fedayeen and turned over to the Iraqi Army. Given medical treatment and sodomized by Iraqi Soldier guarding her. In all fairness, I am sure he was not ordered to do that and took his own initative. Good try though, I knew someone would. It would be a good example if she were captured by say JAM or AQI, then again we would have snuff films of her on the net as example of what happens were that the case.

Not how she tells it chief, then again no doubt her word is "irrelevant":

The authorized biography, I Am A Soldier Too: The Jessica Lynch Story, by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Rick Bragg states that Lynch had been raped during her captivity, based on medical records and her pattern of injuries.[30]

However, Lynch has since stated that she does not recall any sexual assault and was "adamantly opposed to including the rape claim in the book", but that Bragg wore her down and told her that "people need to know that this was what can happen to women soldiers."[31]

Having looked some mroe around on the net I can find her initial rape claims which she says she was pressured into making, and subsequently admitted she had no idea if they were true and medical reports saying she wasnt.

 

[I'm Cleo!]

You have obviously never been in an armed conflict, much less an American effort. You would be suprised at just how we treat prisoners, it's far, far better than these insurgents give or there own respective governments. I love the logic though, we know the Taliban are bad guys so we will give them a pass. They are cutting heads off, we are waterboarding so we are in the wrong?

No one's "giving the Taliban a pass," Bronx Warlord. Everybody knows they're the bad guys, and obviously they should be punished for their actions.

But America are the good guys. So it's notable when the good guys depart from their moral code (the bad guys, of course, don't have such a moral code from which to depart). It's "man bites dog." Moreover, America is a democracy, which presents two additional issues: (i) the American people are in some way responsible for the actions of their agents; and (ii) discussion and education, translated into voting, can change the policy. We can do something about American torture policy. What can we do about Taliban torture policy? Well, just about everyone supports waging war against them -- I hardly think you can call that "giving them a pass."

No one thinks the Taliban aren't wrong, Bronx Warlord. You have to be able to understand this. It's that, accordingly to a lot of people's conceptions of morality, just because the Taliban are absolutely horrible, it doesn't mean that Americans can't be criticized for their own immoral actions. Now, you can argue that waterboarding people isn't immoral, but you can't seriously think that anybody's "giving the Taliban a pass" while coming down on Americans.

Cleo

 

[Bronx Warlord]

Not how she tells it chief, then again no doubt her word is "irrelevant":

It's Sergeant if we are going to get technical, not Chief. I am not an E-7+ in the USN nor am I a WO.

She also has trouble recalling the inital firefight, the time she spent in captivity and her rescue to varying degrees of detail. Pretty common in tramatic experances like she went through. Funny thing about medical records, they recall everything.

BUT... let's say she was not. Does that still dispute my point that she was not captured by the insurgency? No, it does not

 

[RedRalph]

Yeah well you know Cleo apparently some flip remark in a speech by an idiot given 7 years ago can become part of someone's view on a conflict, regardless of how illogical it is

 

[RedRalph]

It's Sergeant if we are going to get technical, not Chief. I am not an E-7+ in the USN nor am I a WO.

She also has trouble recalling the inital firefight, the time she spent in captivity and her rescue to varying degrees of detail. Pretty common in tramatic experances like she went through. Funny thing about medical records, they recall everything.

BUT... let's say she was not. Does that still dispute my point that she was not captured by the insurgency? No, it does not

no it dosent and I didnt say she was, I knew it was the army who captured her. Yeah medical records are more reliable than victim recollection in a case like this, and Iraqi doctors have always disputed that she was raped. they are at least as reliable as the Pentagon's account.

 

[Shekwan]

double post

 

[Shekwan]

You have obviously never been in an armed conflict, much less an American effort. You would be suprised at just how we treat prisoners, it's far, far better than these insurgents give or there own respective governments. I love the logic though, we know the Taliban are bad guys so we will give them a pass. They are cutting heads off, we are waterboarding so we are in the wrong?

I had no idea that the american government and military would stoop so low as to justify their actions by comparing themselves to the Taliban!

If the American people think that waterboarding is immoral then it shouldn't be done. It has nothing to do with how ''evil'' the enemy is.

Your argument is like a child in a playground shouting ''he started it'' to get out of trouble

 

[BSmith1068]

Of course not, he doesn't know anything and he's not killing Iraqis. I'm not interested in a question of when torture is justifiable, only that it can be justified. The debate I've been having is about the inherent immorality of torture and I've said torture in not inherently immoral. It depends on the circumstances, and you've just posted a question that proves it - either those Iraqi insurgents are justified or they are not justified. Trying to add gray into the question doesn't change the fact that justification either exists or does not.

You and others have been arguing that we are justified in torturing someone whom we suspect of having knowledge of an impending attack that will kill our fellow citizens. When this exact same logic is placed on the other side, all of a sudden it is not justified. How is this possible?

In the example presented, the Iraqis that capture the American serviceman believe that he has information and knowledge that can prevent an impending attack on their fellow citizens. It doesn’t matter if the individual actually has the information, but that they believe that he does. How is this different than your argument that we are justified in torturing if we believe that someone has info on an impending attack?

I dont have to prove anything, I'm not the one who is claiming torture is inherently immoral - the burden of proof is on those making the accusation. And I'm still waiting for that proof. And I dont have to prove water boarding prevented an attack, it dont matter to me if it did or didn't - it could - and this is a debate about the morality and justification of using it. Besides, the program was secret, how in the hell are we supposed to know what exactly water boarding did achieve?

Sure you do. You have made several statements of fact to support your argument that frankly are not justified. How do we know that water boarding has indeed prevented any attacks or saved any lives? If it has not, then how is it justified? You just assert that it has saved lives, therefore it is OK to do it, but can't back up that assertion.

The burden of proof in any argument is not the responsibility of one side over another. Both sides have to justify their arguments with facts and be able to prove those facts. Otherwise we are just wasting our time.

 

[Bronx Warlord]

I had no idea that the american government and military would stoop so low as to justify their actions by comparing themselves to the Taliban!

If the American people think that waterboarding is immoral then it shouldn't be done. It has nothing to do with how ''evil'' the enemy is.

Your argument is like a child in a playground shouting ''he started it'' to get out of trouble

I'd say the American people don't considering they had an 85% approval raiting and congrassional vote to send armed men into Iraq.

You would expect us to treat hardended murders like we would a shoplifter? Thats great advice. Your bringing mortality into war, were men are killing one another? Please.

 

[BSmith1068]

I did. Can you name me one American service member thathas been captured by the insurgency/criminal elements in Iraq or the Taliban/AQ in Afghanistan that has not been tortured and killed? Save you time trying to look it up, the answer is none. He's going to be tortured and killed, pure and simple. Justifiable? I'd personally rather just see him shot than worked over for the sake of working him over but it's not my choice.

I did. They are going to do it anyway. It's pretty simple. Don't matter if he is a dentist, cook, Speical Forces or a Korean Laundry person. Track record on that is pretty clear. You do recal we are dealing with animals... wait, animals are a few steps above most of these people. Silly me, I'd like to apoligize to animals everywere for that comparison.

No. You. Didn’t. Answering the question is very simple. There is only one of 2 answers that will answer it:

1.) Yes. The Iraqis are justified in torturing this service member in this situation.
2.) No. The Iraqis are not justified in torturing this service member in this situation.

Which is it? You keep sidestepping the question and getting into if it is a foregone conclusion that they will be tortured. That is not what I am asking. Are they justified in torturing this individual in this situation?

 

[RedRalph]

I'd say the American people don't considering they had an 85% approval raiting and congrassional vote to send armed men into Iraq.

You would expect us to treat hardended murders like we would a shoplifter? Thats great advice. Your bringing mortality into war, were men are killing one another? Please.

do you think considerations of morality have a place in war?

 

[BSmith1068]

I did read it. They are intrested in protecting there familes from airstrikes that would resault from there own actions. They should have considered that before becomming insurgents and criminals.

And the U.S. is interested in protecting their families from terrorist attacks that would result from their own actions. They should have considered their actions before becoming imperialists and occupiers*.

Your same logic can be used against us, but somehow we are justified in our actions, but our enemies are not.

* Please note that this is not my view, but presented for argument sake.

 

[Shekwan]

I'd say the American people don't considering they had an 85% approval raiting and congrassional vote to send armed men into Iraq.

You would expect us to treat hardended murders like we would a shoplifter? Thats great advice. Your bringing mortality into war, were men are killing one another? Please.

Its easy to get an 85% approval for a decsion based on complete and utter lies.

Did I say that I was against waterboarding? I'm fully aware that when you capture an insurgent he isn't going to go "You got me!" and spill the beans.

I'm just saying that your reasoning was childish at best. Don't you see the irony in the idea of nobly bringing ''regime change'' or ''building democracy'' on the one hand and then on the other justifying acts of brutality by saying the other guy is worse.