Re: U.S. soldiers encouraged to spread message of their Christian faith in Afghanista
If you waterboard someone will you or will you not be prosecuted for it by either the military or the federal government?
I did answer and I did not dodge. Perhaps I need to be simpler. "
I am in the military." This means that I am held to certain rules, which would see me prosecuted for such acts. "
The CIA can do whatever it wants." This means that they are obligated to perfome certain acts beyond what the military man can do. And I know the argument you are attempting to make, which is why I moved on from it. But since you insist....just because the military can be prosecuted for it, doesn't mean the CIA can. The military can be prosecuted for adultery.....was Clinton?
This is the world we live in. Cold War spies and agents were interrogated which was above what the military can do. The roles are clear. The military is supposed to be the squeeky clean destroyer and killer with manners. The CIA is the spook world where spies, agents, and shadows are the necesary tools. In fact, when it came to interrogating some Somali thugs caught in a fight or while smuggling arms into the city, we handed them off to a European nation because they could do what we could not.
Really? That's how you view the laws we help write, agree to and become signatories to? So is it only our country that doesn't need to worry about international laws or are there others, in your opinion?
Well, I tend to read a lot of such things. And I constantly come to realizations that our international systems are outdated and inadequate for this time period. Some people simply don't know what they support as they jump to support whatever "their guy" in a business suit tells them.
It is entirely against the law to do anything to stop genocide in a "soveriegn" nation unless the UN approves it. However, it is also a matter of law that once the UN declares a genocide the international community is required to act. And of all the nations on earth, The U.S., along with the other Western Security members, is mentioned specifically as an obligatory duty. Therefore, when it came to genocide in Europe (Bosnia), the UN gave the Western powers permission to save people through force. When it came to genocide in Africa, the UN looked away.
But the internaitonal governing body called the UN is full of BS. "Clinton's war" in Kosovo was labeled illegal by the UN, despite the attempt to stop further genocide, because the UN didn't give permission.
Soveriegnty is also a con game. America is criticized for our dictator support during the Cold War, yet the UN and others looked away as we maintained a dictator in Iraq for twelve years while his people suffered UN sanctions. This was "legal." Despite flying our jets over his land, being deployed in "Kurdistan," and dictating his comings and goings, the idea of "soveriegnty" took on a special overlooked meaining as people looked away. Of course, when it came to Haiti's soveriegnty, the UN gave permission to ther U.S. to invade and re-establish that government after the people couped against their president. But "soveriegnty" as a matter of law mattered when it came time for America to be fed up with the UN containment mission of Saddam Hussien.
This leads to the question...."What is soveriegn, the nation or the individual?" According to the time period such laws were created, it was the king, czar, or kaiser that was ultimately placed above all else and protected. Their laws had everything to do with protecting the individual's right to do as he pleases to whoever he wants as long as he oppresses, tortures, or murders his own kind. Today, we live in a changed world where the people are soveriegn in most places, which lends to the credence that soveriegn attaches to borders. Yet, we also live in a world where tribes have been torn apart by unnatural borders and the European created third world borders are becoming more and more grey (Kurdistan, Somaliland, Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo, etc.) Of course, even with this changed world, some people choose to make the soveriegn the dictator as if we still live in the 18th century all in a case to avoid responsibility and the right thing.
So what we have here is are international laws "legally" shoved aside when it comes to immediate security of American (Haiti) and European (Yugoslavia) vicinities, but "legal" strict adherence to code and law when it comes to Africa and the Middle East.
And torture? it was the West who decided what torture was to be defined as after the German scourge was slapped down. However, like so many international laws, re-interpretation as the scenarios change in an ever changing world is necessary. The fact that waterboarding is considered "torture" is a joke. The idea that our men will be treated better if we only butler our prisoners of war is a joke. We do not electrocute, bludgeon, drag, behead, or whip anybody. Yet our men, since we made "the" rules, have been subjected to such things from one culture or nation to another. Even when it came to waterboarding or slapping or pro-longed standing or sleep deprivation and any other nothing of a tactic, we introduced paperwork to declare openly these tactics to define perameters. I am so sick of seeing people whiine and complain about this crap as if we have beome the new Nazi human body burning scourge of the earth.
I find it pathetic how Americans jump on this global bandwagon specifically. With Germans burning and gassing millions of Europeans...the French publicly and brutally torturing hundreds of thousands of Algerians a decade later.....they assume to lead the voice of conscience for dimwitted Americans who want a few waterboarding cases to define us as torturous monsters.
Internaitonal laws is a matter of convenience. Always has been. With advances in science, we change the way we perform medically and mechanically. With advances in religious thought, we change our beliefs and tame our religions. With society's acceptances, we change social behavior. But when it comes to an ever changing world where borders are in question, governmental roles change, and enemy tactics change....this world is supposed to be stuck with the same 17th century laws when it suits the need of the apathetic and the irresponsible. It's like arguing that despite advances in the operating room, the techniques of our great grandfathers are best.
So, you ask me my opinion, which is always a mistake if you really don't want it, but it's merely an opinion that attempts to shove off the BS that covers the reality of our world. What is your opinion? To follow the favored politician's opinion or to see this world for what it is and stop using the media and other such BS story telling platforms to define reality?