TheFeniX

Nice nitpick, care to actually attack the argument?

This argument might have been true at some point, but exactly how pertinent can information be if they're holding prisoners for over 3 years at a time?

So, after all this extended "Intelligence Gathering," exactly why are any of these people being released at all? Aren't they all scum-bag terrorists looking to deprive the world of white Christians? After beating all their confessions out of them, shouldn't we be executing them or at least putting them into an actual jail?

I mean, hey, they're all guilty right: I know this because the US government tells me so and they would never lie to me, Joe 6-Pack. Forget that even with a trial system (an argument of mine you ignored), we're batting a .80 at best, leaving 20% of the people in American jail to deal with the fact that they sit in a 10 x 10 with the comfort that they don't even belong there.

So, the US Military, with no oversight, no standards of evidence, no one trained in real investigation (unless "simulated drowning" is allowed on the resume), is expected to be batting 100?

Yea. Right. Buy hey, who cares: they aren't Americans.

Yea and if the police decided this would be a good time to cut the judicial system out of the loop and just start killing or torturing suspects on a whim, then their would be Hell to pay and not just on part of the murderers. And that's a good thing.

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Kerostasis

Very well, allow me to paraphrase your argument there: We shouldn't be jailing and torturing individuals from Iraq to advance our military operations, because if worst comes to worst we can always nuke the whole damn place and kill them all! Much more economical, really.

Way to go in 2 directions at the same time! I think your second question neatly anwers your first, and your first answers your second.


Who came up with the idea Gitmo interrogations were designed to elicit confessions anyway? Thats nothing more than a red herring thrown out in "torture doesn't work" arguments, because we all agree one of the things torture is really bad at is producing reliable confessions. Again, going back to my previous point -- Guantanamo is not about punishment, it serves the dual role of intelligence gathering and detaining enemy combatants.


In statistics we talk about the difference between "Type I" and "Type II" errors. One refers to assuming something is true when it isnt, and the other is assuming something is not true when it is. Both types of errors are inevitable, but by shifting your standards of evidence you can control which kind occurs more frequently. That is, is it more important to us to make sure the innocent are not locked up by mistake, or to make sure the guilty are not let free by mistake?

In our civilian life, we have decided it is more important to ensure the innocent are not convicted, and we have designed our trial system to reflect that. But that is not the only possible answer to the question, that is just a luxury we can afford to indulge in because of our relatively safe society. In wartime you are forced to make hard decisions, and one of those is revisiting the question of which error is more important to avoid. The military isn't expected to be batting 100, but given that they are going to be making some mistakes, is it better that they should accidently lock up Joe from the corner store for a year before figuring it out and letting him go, or that they should accidently release Mahmoud Yosef who goes out and kills 5 of our soldiers with a bomb the next day?

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Beatnik

The level of myopia and apparently unresolved cognitive dissonance in this thread is staggering. Just staggering.

For reals, I fear for the country when I hear Americans like yourselves trumpet the awesomeness of torture. Or even worse, those that think waterboarding (or anything else on the complex behavioral menu that prisoners are exposed to) isn't torture. Perhaps you need to read up on the Spanish Inquisition. Or Viet Nam. Or the Khmer Rouge. Esteemed company, to be sure.

Wrong.

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ScratchMonkey

It sounds like you're a researcher who's done extensive work on this and compiled statistics showing the effectiveness of different kinds of torture. Care to share your data and analysis with us?

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Sig

ScratchMonkey

How do we know when the war is over? Or is that just another way of saying "forever"?

As far as I can see, there will always be terrorists.

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Sig

sordavie

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Waterb...mony_1110.html

The first half of the interview I thought was pretty informative. Nobody can survive being waterboarded for hours straight, as nobody can survive suffocation for hours straight.

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fighter10101

A rational observer of the Guantanamo bay issue should ask the crucial question: Why is the USA there in the first place?
The backround is the Spanish-American war. In 1897 J.C Breckenridge, the US Undersecretary of war wrote a memorandum to Lieutenant General Nelson A. Miles to explain the U.S. policy towards the Hawaiian islands, Puerto Rico and Cuba in the "upcoming campaign in the Antilles ". He wrote in respect to the cuban campaing that "our policy must always be to support the weaker against the stronger, until we have obtained the extermination of them both, in order to annex the Pearl of the Antilles." and that "We must destroy everything within our cannons’ range of fire. We must impose a harsh blockade so that hunger and its constant companion, disease, undermine the peaceful population and decimate the Cuban army." After the eventual spanish defeat Breckenridge wrote that "Once the Spanish regular troops are dominated and have withdrawn, there will be a phase of indeterminate duration, of partial pacification in which we will continue to occupy the country militarily, using our bayonets to assist the independent government that it constitutes, albeit informally, while it remains a minority in the country."[1]

The Campaing ended on August 1989 and the result was that Cuba became a virtual colony of the US with a puppet president, thus preventing the liberation of cuba whitch was worrying US and Spain.[2]

In 1903 when cuba was under military occupation and threatend with "bayonets" the US forced cuba to accept the Platt Amendment. Alfred de Zayas writes that:

"The Platt Amendment had been proposed in the United States Congress by Senator Orville H. Platt (Republican, Connecticut). On 25 February 1901 the text went to the Senate and was not greeted with unanimous approval.Senator Morgan said “This is… a legislative ultimatum to Cuba”.

The text was then imposed on the Cuban Constitutional Assembly, which initially rejected it "

The goverment rejected it because "some of these stipulations are not acceptable, exactly because they impair the independence and sovereignty of Cuba." They finaly accepted the Ammendment after the US said that they would "not terminate military occupation of Cuba unless Cuba agreed to incorporate the text of the Platt Amendment into its Constitution " Even then it was only passed with 16 against 15 votes.[3]

ARTICLE VII in the Platt Amendment said that:

"To enable the United States to maintain the independence of Cuba, and to protect the people thereof, as well as for its own defense, the Cuban Government will sell or lease to the United States the lands necessary for coaling or naval stations, at certain specified points, to be agreed upon with the President of the United States."[4]

Note that the Amendment does not say that the US can use it as a torture chamber, but only for necessary for coaling or naval stations. What the US is doing today is violating their illigal treaty.

Secondly there is the torture argument:
"However, it's about time we level the playing field. They torture our guys, while we get lawyers for theirs. Doesn't sound quite equal, does it?"
This is a typical one, and the writer demostrates that he is the moral equvalent of a passionate terrorist supporter asuming ofcourse that he is a moral agent.

On the legality of what is beeing done whitch involves an illegal war, while violating the illegal treaty , I agree with Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, that is indeed illegal[5]

Alberto Gonzales wrote a memo(January 25, 2002) warning Bush that “It is difficult to predict the motives of prosecutors and independent counsels who may in the future decide to pursue unwarranted charges based on Section 2441 [the War Crimes Act]”. [6] He was referring to the war crimes act that” banned any Americans from committing war crimes—defined in part as "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. ...the law applies to "U.S. officials" and that punishments for violators "include the death penalty,”[7] Gonzales also suggested that Bush should make the War crimes act inapplicable.

The Military Commissions Act of 2006 “seeks to rewrite US obligations under international law” according to Center for Constitutional Rights, and “..creates a two-tiered system of offences within Common Article 3 of the
Geneva Conventions, namely “grave breaches” of Common Article 3, which fall within the scope of
the amended War Crimes Act.[8] In effect the act retroactively immunizes some US officials“who have engaged in illegal actions which have been authorized by the Executive.”
This gives some some insight on the thoughts of the planners.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] The memorandum shows how he regards the cuban inhabitants:" Since they only possess a vague notion of what is right and wrong, the people tend to seek pleasure not through work, but through violence. As a logical consequence of this lack of morality, there is a great disregard for life.", "The inhabitants are generally indolent and apathetic" and sentences that would have made Orwell turn in his grave : " Peace loving inhabitants will be rigorously respected" etc.
Alfred de Zayas, The Status Of Guantánamo Bay And The Status Of The Detainees,Vancouver, 19 Nov 2003 , pp.12, footnote 43.
Memorandum, Department of War ,Office of the Undersecretary ,Washington D.C. December 24, 1897
[2] op.cit., p13.
[3] op.cit., p13., footnote 49, 50 and 51.
[4] Platt Amendment, Article VII, emphasis added.
[5] Alfred de Zayas, p. 30. See also page 32 for more information on the legality of Guantanamo bay.
[6] Memorandum for the president, Alberto Gonzales, January 25 ,2002
[7] Michael Isikoff, Newsweek, Memos Reveal War Crimes Warnings, May 17, 2004
see http://www.lawofwar.org/Torture_Memos_analysis.htm for more information.
[8] Center for Constitutional Rights. Military Commissions Act of 2006. p. 6, 7, 1

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CingularDuality

I guess I simply don't care. The way I see it, these guys were close to being shot on the battlefield and instead they were captured and brought to Guantanamo. Regardless of how long it takes for us to release them, most would regard life to be desired over death. And it's not like we're waterboarding all the prisoners, either. Waterboarding was used on a few high profile and stubborn prisoners to get them to talk. Once they're talking other techniques become more effective.

Considering that waterboarding is a technique that involves the feeling of suffocation as only a part of it, people can certainly survive waterboarding for hours. The technique wouldn't be very effective if it was simply holding someone's head under water.

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TeflonDon

Where did you learn this?

I have been looking for the last 20 mins for a defense department report from about 2 years ago stating that a vast majority (I believe 80% or more) were not even captured by US forces. It may sound convenient, but I can't find the report at the moment. I promise it exists.

Reports by NGO's are probably easily dismissed by most people on the pro-torture side of the issue. But there have been numerous reports about the US offering bounties to local Afghan warlords and villagers for captured "terrorists". About paid mercenaries picking up random people. In sum, reports about people being picked up nowhere near any battlefield.

Suppose this is only true in one or two cases out of the 400 odd inmates there, and that those people are innocent. Does that not matter? One can argue that torturing an actual, or even suspected, terrorist is fine as long as it saves lives. Is that still the case if there are 100% purely innocent inmates, as the evidence suggests?

Let's suppose that there is another attack on US soil. The evidence points towards some wacko Americans who have signed on to the fundamentalist muslim ideaologies. The government starts rounding up the suspects, people friends with the suspects, the suspects' families, etc. They start paying off gangs and local scum to round up people who they "know" are terrorist affiliates. Should we torture all of them until we get answers that please us? Is it ok to torture innocent Americans, as long as the aim is to protect more americans?

I dunno, it doesn't sound right to me.

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sordavie

Waterboarding is a technique that involves controlled suffocation--not merely the feeling of suffocation. According to the interview, the process described in popular media is not how waterboarding is done. The process does not merely involve pouring water over someone's covered face. It involves pouring a steady flow of water into someone's nose and mouth in such a way that they cannot prevent it from filling their lungs. Nobody can survive suffocating for hours straight. Nobody can go without oxygen for that long.

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CingularDuality

Sigh...

We're arguing semantics. Let's look at the three definitions for the intransitive verb 'suffocate':

1. To die from lack of air or oxygen; be asphyxiated.
2. To feel discomfort from lack of fresh air.
3. To become or feel suppressed; be stifled.

Hmmm, obviously the first definition doesn't fit, as nobody has died from this. The other two definitions certainly fit, and I'm fine with it, although it makes your semantic argument moot.

Yeah, they pour water down your nose until you cough and gag and feel like you're going to die. If you doubt the description of waterboarding, try it yourself. Lie down with your head tilted back and have a friend pour water down your nose. I guarantee that a glass of water can make you feel like you're going to die. Strap someone down so they're helpless and it gets cooperation.

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TacticalGamer TX LAN/BBQ Veteran:

gunjunkie

That we know of...

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CingularDuality

Well, hell, now we're going back to the "I don't care" part of my position. Obviously the technique wouldn't be effective at all if it killed people. There are simpler and cheaper ways of killing people if that's your goal.

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TheFeniX

Your completely distorted view of my argument aside: how is that a counter-point? The idea behind a strawman is that you misinterpret the argument, then attack it. Not just misinterpret.

In Bizarro world maybe. I'll ask again: if these people are guilty of illegally attacking the US, why aren't they being tried and imprisoned/executed after we've beaten the info out of them?

Then why aren't they being tried? If they are so guilty and dangerous, why are they being let go after years of imprisonment?

The only problem is: there is no standard of evidence in places like Gitmo because there is no oversite.

Not really, but that's a separate argument.