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Gitmo inmate: My treatment shames American flag [W:508,759]

JasperL said:
Well then we disagree on that. Of course you don't enter into a moral black hole where no standards exist when you engage in 'war.' Where raping women, dismembering children, etc. are just tactics that can and should be embraced if they serve the purpose of winning, etc.
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The acts you mention presumably would fail the test of aiding to win the war or protect our citizens. If that was the case then they would not be justified.
 
JasperL said:
Well then we disagree on that. Of course you don't enter into a moral black hole where no standards exist when you engage in 'war.' Where raping women, dismembering children, etc. are just tactics that can and should be embraced if they serve the purpose of winning, etc.
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Are you speaking of ISIS here, one of the terrorist groups the democracies are fighting against?
 
Jack Hays said:
Our captured personnel are routinely tortured.
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Hilarious. Of course that avoids the point and you know it. What you want to say is the treatment you label 'torture' when done to our personnel is NOT torture when done BY us.

I understand it requires elaborate mental gymnastics to hold your position, but I don't understand why you feel that's necessary.
 
Grant said:
Are you speaking of ISIS here, one of the terrorist groups the democracies are fighting against?
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Jack says that there is no "evil" in war. I disagree. He says that if we need to rape women and dismember children to win, we'll do it, should do it, and evil isn't a concept that can be applied to those acts in that situation.
 
JasperL said:
Jack says that there is no "evil" in war. I disagree. He says that if we need to rape women and dismember children to win, we'll do it, should do it, and evil isn't a concept that can be applied to those acts in that situation.
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Is that a direct quote?
 
Jack Hays said:
The acts you mention presumably would fail the test of aiding to win the war or protect our citizens. If that was the case then they would not be justified.
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Like I said, we disagree 100%. It's simple to construct a scenario where they'd meet your test -certainly raping the wives and dismembering the children would serve as a deterrent to others contemplating joining in the fight against the U.S. Wiping out any village in which even ONE 'terrorist' is discovered might 'work' as another large deterrent. Maybe we have a detainee for whom torture isn't working - well, if the prospect of us cutting his child's fingers and toes one at a time would get him to talk, it would aid in the war effort and per your philosophy should be adopted.
 
Grant said:
Is that a direct quote?
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These are:

It's not just we, it's universal. The unacceptable becomes acceptable in direct proportion to the potential for defeat.
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I responded: "Sure, evil is universal. We agree on that. What we shouldn't accept is evil in service of some 'greater good' is not evil."

Jack: You are applying the word "evil" where it has no meaning. It's like asking what color is a symphony.
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There's more, just review the thread. I won't find the quote, but he said the immorality would be a country's leaders not doing 'whatever it took' (not a direct quote, but fair to the meaning) to win a war and protect its people. And subsequent discussions indicates there are no moral or ethical bounds on 'whatever it took' in his view - "evil...has no meaning" in that situation.

Here's one more:

The acts you mention ["raping women, dismembering children, etc."] presumably would fail the test of aiding to win the war or protect our citizens. If that was the case then they would not be justified.
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His objection is entirely practical. So if those acts did aid the war, they would be justified.
 
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Misterveritis said:
Have you found them helpful in any way? I ask because they do not seem to have helped. You side with the nation's enemies. That indicates a lack of reasoning skills and no conscience whatever.

There is no need for an answer.
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BS! If he sided with America's enemy he would be siding with you. You and the other right-wing nuts are the real enemy.
 
JasperL said:
These are:
It's not just we, it's universal. The unacceptable becomes acceptable in direct proportion to the potential for defeat.
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And that is quite likely true. But of course this does not apply to what the CIA or legal council suggested at the time because the US was never threatened with defeat.
I responded: "Sure, evil is universal. We agree on that. What we shouldn't accept is evil in service of some 'greater good' is not evil."
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Which misses the point. No one committed 'evil' in any 'greater good'. You are reading far too much into what was said.
There's more, just review the thread. I won't find the quote, but he said the immorality would be a country's leaders not doing 'whatever it took' (not a direct quote, but fair to the meaning) to win a war and protect its people. And subsequent discussions indicates there are no moral or ethical bounds on 'whatever it took' n his view.
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Do you feel the United States should accept defeat more easily and accept their fellow Americans be murdered rather than gathering intelligence through waterboarding, for example? Do you feel your idea of 'the high road' is more important than the lives of your fellow Americans?
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Texmex said:
BS! If he sided with America's enemy he would be siding with you. You and the other right-wing nuts are the real enemy.
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Are ISIS left wing or right wing? Does the left have any idea on how to deal with terrorist groups like ISIS?
 
JasperL said:
What would you call the Tokyo Trials (IMTFE) and the like?

And there's a difference anyway because in a traditional "war" those held as POWs (as opposed to accused war criminals, subject to hearings like IMTFE) were released or subject to some tribunal at the end of the war. With the indefinite War on Terror (TM) that's not an option because the war won't end or we/they have no way to determine an end except when we arbitrarily say the "war" has ended, and they'd be effectively sentenced to life in prison without charge or trial.
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Their organizations and sponsors are free to surrender at any time. Then everyone can go home.
 
joG said:
In principal, i have no objections. It would have to be not only spelled out in law, though. It would have to be fully explained and publicly transparent, why we chose this method.
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I don't know what that means. The law on this subject has been established for a long time--see, e.g., Ex Parte Quirin. The U.S.--despite Mr. Obama's efforts to make nice to various Islamist thugs--remains at war with Muslim jihadists around the world. This country doesn't need to justify drawing up rules for military tribunals and trying unlawful enemy combatants in them. Nor does it need to justify executing any convicted of war crimes.

Thirteen years after an attempt to decapitate the government of the United States, which involved the murders of almost three thousand people and cost countless billions in economic damage, the man who openly admits--boasts about--being the mastermind of the plot, far from being executed for it, as he should have been a dozen years ago, has never even been tried. It would be hard to imagine a more effective way to encourage our enemies by showing them our lack of resolve.
 
Grant said:
And that is quite likely true. But of course this does not apply to what the CIA or legal council suggested at the time because the US was never threatened with defeat.
Which misses the point. No one committed 'evil' in any 'greater good'. You are reading far too much into what was said.
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I'm really not - review the thread.

Do you feel the United States should accept defeat more easily and accept their fellow Americans be murdered rather than gathering intelligence through waterboarding, for example? Do you feel your idea of 'the high road' is more important than the lives of your fellow Americans?
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More than anything, if we believe torture is a necessary tactic to win or protect our citizens (I don't, but it's not irrational to believe it is) then let's be honest - we will torture prisoners if we believe the ends justify that. But that is the question, the high road or the low road of torture. Whether we do that because it works is a decision we need to make, which is why disclosing what a torture program looks like as implemented is important. That our torture program is less barbaric than that of the Japanese doesn't make ours not a torture program. Etc.
 
matchlight said:
I don't know what that means. The law on this subject has been established for a long time--see, e.g., Ex Parte Quirin. The U.S.--despite Mr. Obama's efforts to make nice to various Islamist thugs--remains at war with Muslim jihadists around the world. This country doesn't need to justify drawing up rules for military tribunals and trying unlawful enemy combatants in them. Nor does it need to justify executing any convicted of war crimes.

Thirteen years after an attempt to decapitate the government of the United States, which involved the murders of almost three thousand people and cost countless billions in economic damage, the man who openly admits--boasts about--being the mastermind of the plot, far from being executed for it, as he should have been a dozen years ago, has never even been tried. It would be hard to imagine a more effective way to encourage our enemies by showing them our lack of resolve.
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Speaking of a 'lack of resolve'. Dorothy Rabinowitz: The Unfinished Business of Fort Hood - WSJ
 
JasperL said:
I'm really not - review the thread.
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I understand your point but we respectfully disagree.
More than anything, if we believe torture is a necessary tactic to win or protect our citizens (I don't, but it's not irrational to believe it is) then let's be honest - we will torture prisoners if we believe the ends justify that. But that is the question, the high road or the low road of torture. Whether we do that because it works is a decision we need to make, which is why disclosing what a torture program looks like as implemented is important. That our torture program is less barbaric than that of the Japanese doesn't make ours not a torture program. Etc.
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You are using the term 'torture' rather loosely. There are 'enhanced interrogation' techniques which are not defined as torture and in fact water-boarding was not defined as torture either. We may have to be more specific as to what, with the involvement of all pertinent representatives, passes as legitimate torture. It seems that everyone in the Security Council at the time once agreed, along with White House council, that water-boarding was not torture, or they just ignored the issue..
This controversy is shamefully being used for political purposes and only does potential harm to the American people and their allies. http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/pelosi-cia-misled-congress-over-waterboarding/?_r=0
 
Grant said:
I understand your point but we respectfully disagree.
You are using the term 'torture' rather loosely. There are 'enhanced interrogation' techniques which are not defined as torture and in fact water-boarding was not defined as torture either. We may have to be more specific as to what, with the involvement of all pertinent representatives, passes as legitimate torture. It seems that everyone in the Security Council at the time once agreed, along with White House council, that water-boarding was not torture, or they just ignored the issue..
This controversy is shamefully being used for political purposes and only does potential harm to the American people and their allies. http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/pelosi-cia-misled-congress-over-waterboarding/?_r=0
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We made up the term "enhanced interrogation techniques" in an Orwellian exercise to obscure what they entail.

Do you really want to argue that if one of our soldiers was waterboarded 183 times in five sessions, thrown against a wooden wall, kept awake for a week or more, or interrogated non-stop for two weeks, kept in solitary for months or years, had food inserted into his rectum, subjected to bitter cold, etc. that as a country we'd accept that such treatment was no more or less than a legitimate interrogation of him? We all know we'd conclude he was tortured, and we'd be right, but we want to call it "EIT" and pretend that changes what happened.

I think it's chicken crap - the coward's way to avoid facing the consequences of our decisions.

And what does potential harm to the U.S. is us adopting torture as an interrogation tool, and then having a national discussion about it where about half cheer it on.
 
Misterveritis said:
This was pretty funny.
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I must say that despite your typical Darth Vader-like crankiness---possibly, wine induced---you've got a pretty good sense of humor.
Nice to see you can absorb jabs and not take the posting process too seriously.
See you around.
 
whysoserious said:
Really? This is torture:






What kind of psychopath reads that and detracts... "only pornography"????
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Forcing someone to be cold all the time can be considered slow murder. The body having to go into overdrive to keep itself warm burns more calories than even exercising.
 
JasperL said:
Hilarious. Of course that avoids the point and you know it. What you want to say is the treatment you label 'torture' when done to our personnel is NOT torture when done BY us.

I understand it requires elaborate mental gymnastics to hold your position, but I don't understand why you feel that's necessary.
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Nothing done by the US thus far constitutes torture.
 
JasperL said:
Like I said, we disagree 100%. It's simple to construct a scenario where they'd meet your test -certainly raping the wives and dismembering the children would serve as a deterrent to others contemplating joining in the fight against the U.S. Wiping out any village in which even ONE 'terrorist' is discovered might 'work' as another large deterrent. Maybe we have a detainee for whom torture isn't working - well, if the prospect of us cutting his child's fingers and toes one at a time would get him to talk, it would aid in the war effort and per your philosophy should be adopted.
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That would be a commander's decision whether a legitimate war aim was furthered.
 
JasperL said:
We made up the term "enhanced interrogation techniques" in an Orwellian exercise to obscure what they entail.
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You may be right but there must be a word that comes somewhere between just asking questions and actual torture. Enhanced interrogation techniques will have to cover the situation until a less clumsy explanation comes along.

Do you really want to argue that if one of our soldiers was waterboarded 183 times in five sessions, thrown against a wooden wall, kept awake for a week or more, or interrogated non-stop for two weeks, kept in solitary for months or years, had food inserted into his rectum, subjected to bitter cold, etc. that as a country we'd accept that such treatment was no more or less than a legitimate interrogation of him? We all know we'd conclude he was tortured, and we'd be right, but we want to call it "EIT" and pretend that changes what happened.
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Do you have a credible source for this information?

I think it's chicken crap - the coward's way to avoid facing the consequences of our decisions.
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They could be killed, as is being done now, but that way they give up less information. While EIT may be harsh, the victim will still be alive after he tells what the interrogators want to know.

And what does potential harm to the U.S. is us adopting torture as an interrogation tool, and then having a national discussion about it where about half cheer it on.
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Actually about 65% of Americans support EIT and I remain suspicious of those who don't.
 
Hamster Buddha said:
There is an important distinction there, and I'll give you an example. One of my best friends from high school was actually born at Ramstein in Germany. Now the question comes up, is he German (as he was born in the country) or is he American (as he is born on a US Base)? Turns out, he could actually apply for citizenship to both. I don't remember how he described the process, but at certain point, (or maybe he still does) have the option to apply for German citizenship should he choose. So in terms of the discussion, the legalities of US laws do cover these US Bases, at least for the most part.
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Any person born of US parents anywhere in the world is a US citizen. Many countries also acknowledge citizenship for that person if he was born in their country. Nothing unusual about that.
 
JasperL said:
We approved waterboarding, which we prosecuted people for as war crimes, torture. How do you make the leap that when done TO us, it is torture, but when done BY us it's not-torture "by a very long shot"?

And if many of our 'techniques' were done to your son in a police station in Atlanta, you would RIGHTLY conclude he was tortured by his own government. It's impossible that any of us could see someone we love subjected to these 'techniques' and conclude anything else, but we go through elaborate self denial to avoid facing the truth of what we did to people not-like-us.

If we want to accept that, fine. I'll disagree, vehemently, but if we do, at least let's be honest about it.
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In what way is waterboarding toture? Don't be silly. It depends on the aplication. As prescribed, it is an insult to people that have been tortured to say that that is torture.
 
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