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Senate panel releases scathing report on CIA interrogation...

Boo Radley said:
You did exactly what I said you'd do, snitch or not.
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:lol: I'm a snitch because I pointed out that you didn't manage to read the post you were responding to closely enough, and thought it was a reply to you rather than someone else? :) Okay.

And no, I should you years ago that the people who run those programs you went through stated before congress that you did not go through what they went through. That has been clearly stated.
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Stress Positions until muscles give in? Check. Sleep deprivation for days at a time? Check. Hunger? Check. Left cold and wet for days on end? Check. I've never been waterboarded, but there are others on this board who have who you are free to check with.
 
cpwill said:
I've never been waterboarded, but there are others on this board who have who you are free to check with.
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I always have the urge to chuckle when people try to draw parallels between the "waterboarding" people do to each other so they can say they've experienced it and what actually happens in the field. They aren't the same thing at all.
 
Napoleon said:
I always have the urge to chuckle when people try to draw parallels between the "waterboarding" people do to each other so they can say they've experienced it and what actually happens in the field. They aren't the same thing at all.
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:shrug: what was your SERE experience?
 
Sabanist said:
You honestly think the report is true?
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What in it is false?

And the CIA has a decade long history of serial lies/misrepresentations about what was in the report, many of which they've later had to admit. Also, this is the same CIA that spied on the intelligence committee doing this investigation, hacked into their computers, and attempted to remove their access to the Panetta report because that report was both extremely thorough and damning. The only reason the CIA didn't remove it was because the committee printed it, and got it out of the committee's room at the CIA which was being spied on and their computers hacked into, and when discovered, this CIA then accused the Senators of a crime. Of course the CIA denied they did that, until it was proved they did. Same as many of the allegations about the torture program.
 
cpwill said:
:shrug: what was your SERE experience?
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Don't need any to recognize that experiencing something in a controlled training environment where you KNOW it will end, and you won't be at any real risk, is nothing like being subjected to it up to 200 times by an enemy who you don't have any real reason to believe is not OK killing you, or doing it another 200 times, unless and until you say what they want you to say.

This whole line of defense is odd. Basically, we claim we need to, e.g., waterboard someone to get the hardened terrorists to talk, and then in the next breath try to claim that the experience of being waterboarded is just a little bit uncomfortable, definitely NOT torture, but is bad enough to get the worst of the worst to reveal their most guarded secrets. It is bad enough that these worse of the worst will do what they most do NOT want to do to get it to stop. That's torture.
 
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JasperL said:
Don't need any to recognize that experiencing something in a controlled training environment where you KNOW it will end, and you won't be at any real risk, is nothing like being subjected to it up to 200 times by an enemy who you don't have any real reason to believe is not OK killing you, or doing it another 200 times, unless and until you say what they want you to say.
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:shrug: KSM knew it was in a controlled environment and that it would end as well. He used to taunt his captors by counting the seconds off on his fingers that he knew they had until they had to stop.

However, your admitted lack of experience and subsequent willingness to contradict those who actually know what they are talking about is noted :)
 
cpwill said:
:shrug: what was your SERE experience?
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I know the difference between what happens in the field and playing around with your buds secure in the knowledge that they'll stop when you say the safe-word and won't cause you any real harm. The primary reason some misguided people think waterboarding is effective is that its most powerful effect is purely psychological. An effect which isn't duplicated in pitiful simulations.
 
Napoleon said:
I know the difference between what happens in the field and playing around with your buds secure in the knowledge that they'll stop when you say the safe-word and won't cause you any real harm. The primary reason some misguided people think waterboarding is effective is that its most powerful effect is purely psychological. An effect which isn't duplicated in pitiful simulations.
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:doh

Gitmo isn't "the field".

SERE C isn't "playing around with your buds"

The primary reason people think waterboarding is effective is because it was effective. KSM, for example, not only became extremely helpful, he suggested to us that we waterboard all of "the brothers" we detained, as it freed them from their obligation to suffer by resisting.
 
cpwill said:
:shrug: KSM knew it was in a controlled environment and that it would end as well. He used to taunt his captors by counting the seconds off on his fingers that he knew they had until they had to stop.
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OK, so in defense of waterboarding, you're saying it doesn't work. Brilliant.

However, your admitted lack of experience and subsequent willingness to contradict those who actually know what they are talking about is noted :)
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Who did I contradict? Is there someone out there, a U.S. soldier, who's been waterboarded by an enemy and who has asserted that it's NOT torture?
 
cpwill said:
:doh

Gitmo isn't "the field".

SERE C isn't "playing around with your buds"

The primary reason people think waterboarding is effective is because it was effective. KSM, for example, not only became extremely helpful, he suggested to us that we waterboard all of "the brothers" we detained, as it freed them from their obligation to suffer by resisting.
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So he mocked his interrogators, but the torture was effective? You need to pick one or the other.

And no one argues torture is ineffective in getting people to say what they think the person doing the torture wants them to say - a confession, whatever. Obviously the purpose is to get them to talk, and eventually most WILL talk. The question is whether it's a reliable way to get actionable intelligence, is better than highly effective traditional interrogation techniques, and taken as a whole increases our national security, even after considering the tremendous downside when it becomes known that we torture detainees. On this thread people are arguing that the release of the report detailing what we did will endanger U.S. personnel. Were the gains that no one can demonstrate about the effectiveness of torture worth the downside? Those are some of the relevant questions - also the moral questions are significant.
 
Pp
cpwill said:
:lol: I'm a snitch because I pointed out that you didn't manage to read the post you were responding to closely enough, and thought it was a reply to you rather than someone else? :) Okay.



Stress Positions until muscles give in? Check. Sleep deprivation for days at a time? Check. Hunger? Check. Left cold and wet for days on end? Check. I've never been waterboarded, but there are others on this board who have who you are free to check with.
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Again,before congress, the testimony was no, you don't. You get a minor taste and that's all.
 
JasperL said:
OK, so in defense of waterboarding, you're saying it doesn't work. Brilliant.
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I'm saying it does. KSM broke and told us what we wanted to know (and quite a bit more besides), and yet it wasn't what you described.

Who did I contradict? Is there someone out there, a U.S. soldier, who's been waterboarded by an enemy and who has asserted that it's NOT torture?
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...yeah. A few guys I know but who you won't care about, but one guy you can access since he's on this board.
 
Boo Radley said:
Pp
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Qq :roll:

Again,before congress, the testimony was no, you don't. You get a minor taste and that's all.
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I didn't because I didn't go to SERE C and so I wasn't waterboarded. However, I would like to meet the detainee who was kept up for 54 hours straight in extreme heat wearing extremely heavy weights and then shot at at the end of it as an interrogation technique. And I'll bet coming out of boot camp I could sit on a wall or hold a plank longer than the majority of them.
 
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JasperL said:
So he mocked his interrogators, but the torture was effective? You need to pick one or the other.
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:shrug: the two are not mutually contradicting. He counted off the seconds, he also broke and became extremely compliant.

And no one argues torture is ineffective in getting people to say what they think the person doing the torture wants them to say - a confession, whatever.
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Sure, and when what you want them to say is intelligence information, that is what they will give you.

Obviously the purpose is to get them to talk, and eventually most WILL talk. The question is whether it's a reliable way to get actionable intelligence, is better than highly effective traditional interrogation techniques, and taken as a whole increases our national security, even after considering the tremendous downside when it becomes known that we torture detainees
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:shrug: I've watched it get actionable intelligence that saved lives (probably including my own). We know that the Enhanced Interrogation Program also produced actionable intelligence that saved lives. Endless counterfactuals can be interesting, but aren't always helpful - senior VEO membership goes through resistance training the same as our guys, which rather hampers the ability of traditional interrogation techniques to produce valuable information. Which is why (for example) when they tried the nice guy approach with KSM prior to EIT, they got squat.

You are correct, however, to highlight the tradeoff.

On this thread people are arguing that the release of the report detailing what we did will endanger U.S. personnel. Were the gains that no one can demonstrate about the effectiveness of torture worth the downside? Those are some of the relevant questions - also the moral questions are significant.
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It is indeed relevant. Do you weigh risk to US personnel v the risk to Western civilians?
 
Napoleon said:
Another myth. The CIA's own internal documents state that waterboarding KSM was a fruitless endeavor.
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No. Senate Democrats claim this - and are contradicted by CIA leadership from both parties. Even their fellow Senate Democrats admit that their work is a partisan hackjob that made no attempt whatsoever to gather or interview the necessary people to make that determination.
 
cpwill said:
I'm saying it does. KSM broke and told us what we wanted to know (and quite a bit more besides), and yet it wasn't what you described.
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He talked to stop the waterboarding, correct? That's the point - to make it bad enough that even a hardened, committed enemy of the U.S., the baddest of the bad, admits to all kinds of things - he confessed to around 30 crimes as I recall - that he would otherwise NOT divulge. But you're saying it's not torture, just a bit uncomfortable? I can't connect the dots there.

And we prosecuted Japanese for engaging in torture - waterboarding - of U.S. soldiers. Now that we do it to others, it's NOT torture? Nice, conveniently evolving, standard.
 
cpwill said:
Qq :roll:



I didn't because I didn't go to SERE C and so I wasn't waterboarded. However, I would like to meet the detainee who was kept up for 54 hours straight in extreme heat wearing extremely heavy weights and then shot at at the end of it as an interrogation technique. And I'll bet coming out of boot camp I could sit on a wall or hold a plank longer than the majority of them.
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I'm telling you the testimony said none is it was like the real thing. Just a taste. Nothing more.
 
JasperL said:
He talked to stop the waterboarding, correct? That's the point - to make it bad enough that even a hardened, committed enemy of the U.S., the baddest of the bad, admits to all kinds of things - he confessed to around 30 crimes as I recall - that he would otherwise NOT divulge. But you're saying it's not torture, just a bit uncomfortable? I can't connect the dots there.
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I'm saying that KSM wasn't operating under the assumption that we were going to kill him. And yes, after waterboarding (which is agreeably a pretty crappy experience), KSM became compliant - relieved even; telling us that we should waterboard "all the brothers" so as to relieve them of their religious duty to resist (you are, apparently, only required to resist up until a certain point, and then you are free do to whatever you need to).

And we prosecuted Japanese for engaging in torture - waterboarding - of U.S. soldiers. Now that we do it to others, it's NOT torture? Nice, conveniently evolving, standard.
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A) We executed a grand total of 7 Japanese from those trials - all of them for crimes involving large-scale murder. And the Japanese were performing different acts - notably, forced ingestion of water
B) Waterboarding is indeed illegal - for uniformed members of a nation state engaged in Armed Conflict, who fall under Geneva protections. It is additionally illegal for noncombatants. Those who choose to fight in civilian clothing, however, have no such rights under the international system - we could execute every member of Gitmo out of hand tomorrow and be breaking no law other than (perhaps) our own.
 
Boo Radley said:
I'm telling you the testimony said none is it was like the real thing. Just a taste. Nothing more.
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:yawn: keep clinging, boo. the exact same techniques were used as trained to.
 
cpwill said:
:shrug: the two are not mutually contradicting. He counted off the seconds, he also broke and became extremely compliant.
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So we "broke" him with non-torture?

Sure, and when what you want them to say is intelligence information, that is what they will give you.

:shrug: I've watched it get actionable intelligence that saved lives (probably including my own). We know that the Enhanced Interrogation Program also produced actionable intelligence that saved lives. Endless counterfactuals can be interesting, but aren't always helpful - senior VEO membership goes through resistance training the same as our guys, which rather hampers the ability of traditional interrogation techniques to produce valuable information. Which is why (for example) when they tried the nice guy approach with KSM prior to EIT, they got squat.
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It's hard to square claims made with no way to verify them with testimony by people who interrogate for a living and claim that torture does not produce reliable information, or at least it's no more useful and reliable than information we get 100 other ways. Obviously no one can claim that torture will never work - that is obviously false - but that's not the question. Traditional interrogation also works, and it doesn't have the downside of being morally repugnant.

If we want to have a national discussion about whether we should engage in torture because it works, I am good with that. If that's what we are as a country, that's what we are I suppose - no shining beacon on a hill, just another country that will do anything that works - human rights are optional, or if you prefer, there are no rules in war, and we're in a war that will never end, so might as well get used to it. Etc.

But what is BS is making the chicken crap claim that we aren't torturing people, so we don't have to make that incredibly difficult moral and ethical choice.

It is indeed relevant. Do you weigh risk to US personnel v the risk to Western civilians?
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I agree that it's relevant - if we torture, and it's discovered (which is inevitable) then we have to take that into account about whether torture is, on the whole, a net positive to national security.

I don't understand the personnel versus civilians question. They're both important, but the people bearing most of the actual risk of the fallout of our various programs are IMO our personnel overseas. We should take that into account when we approve programs that put them at risk when discovered.
 
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