Where do you stand on the issue of torture?

Once again, when the dust of war has settled and the warriors and intelligence operators are no longer needed to make the nation as a whole feel safe, the media and those opposed to warfare in any degree decide to review how things were done when we were at war and have concluded that things have occurred that we should be ashamed of. IMO, this is a complete crock of feces and was/is one last attempt to get a dig in against the previous administration by a body of the legislature, democrats in particular and one person specifically with an axe to grind against the CIA. No effort was made to verify this information with the individuals that participated or led these interrogations and the releasers of this report had over 2 years from the end of the investigation they cite as the reason for not being able to interview the perpetrators till it was released. They first denied they were briefed at all and when that was disproven they then changed their tunes to say that what occurred was far beyond what they were briefed about. Sorry, but I for one do not buy that line of crapola. Things have been done in the fog of war or during times of great distress (immediately following 911, etc.) that always seems to get "overlooked" but then as soon as things "quiet" down, there always seems to be a witch-hunt when someone's sensibilities are torqued.
A few other things I would like to comment on in general to this whole issue: 1) yes we are supposed to be morally superior when it comes to issues of torture, and we have more or less done so in the major conflicts we have been involved with since the end of WWII, however what we are facing today with these terrorists/Islamic fundamentalists is a totally different animal that anything we have faced before. 2) What has been done in the name of intelligence gathering/protecting this nation since 911 occurred is vastly different from what was done to SEN McCain and other POWs by the NV and by the members of Al Qaeda/ISIS today. No comparison in my book. 3) Anyone advocating that any of those involved in these interrogations be charged when our DOJ has determined TWICE that no charges should be brought or that they be charged by any UN/International body really needs to look at what these bodies are about and ask themselves "Will there really be any kind of fair and impartial justice brought against any American brought before them?", my answer is "No, they would not!", as these bodies have pretty much shifted from viewing our nation as the world's police force/saviors to the world's bully. The UN in my opinion can go fork itself, to me they really no longer stand for or represent what it was originally designed to do.
4) To me, any and all methods brought to bear against the terrorist/fundamentalist organizations that stand for the destruction of our way of life due to their misled view of their religious beliefs and the execution of relief workers simply because they are American/western/Christian is ok by me.

I enjoy it from time to time, but you have to have a safe word. Wait...what are we talking about here?

As someone who was married for 20 years to my ex, I find myself somewhat of a SME on the subject. She never broke me, despite all the different forms that she used. On a serious note, I find myself always going back to this speech. Should we randomly pick someone and have at it? Of course not, and I pray to God that it is a last resort. When it is sanctioned, I pray that the decision passes the ultimate scrutiny. Should we make it public policy to air out this technique and practice to a civilian public that is horrifficaly underqualified to pass judgement? Absolutely NOT! Again, "Col Jessup" brings up some excellent points. We are talking about the Constitutional rights of those who are in the business of destroying every aspect of the Constitution. I would do anything to live in a world where this question should never even be mentioned. This world will never be like that until such hatred can be erased. I hope God will forgive me for feeling this way.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FnO3igOkOk

I haven't given it much thought.

I think most people have no idea what torture is. Congress is at fault. As Congress has refused to define torture, as a reasonable person I will continue to point out that no one was tortured by the US.

I understand that defining it is a difficult proposition. So a null hypothesis can be used--define what it is not, or more directly, define what proper interrogation is.

As I would define it, proper interrogation would requires proper intent, improper intent, then constituting torture, as well as an analysis of the techniques.

Waterboarding, for example, is not torture in and of itself. If it is used, though in the pursuit of anything but actionable intelligence or it's confirmation, it could be. It is certainly torture, though, if the intent is to cause pain or discomfort for any other purpose--that's sadism.

Also, any such technique that is used in the usual Hollywood scenario: I'm going to hurt you until you talk, is torture, and that's not how interrogations are done. Done right, proper coercive techniques speed up the time it takes for an interrogator to establish a rapport with the subject in a good cop/bad cop routine.

Fully articulated, proper intent, as I see it, requires reason to think that the subject is in possession of the information, reason to think that there is a set of circumstances under which they will divulge it, and that the information be itself actionable or confirmation of other intelligence that lacks that confirmation to be actionable. If any of these elements fail, the interrogator does not have proper intent and their actions may then rise to the level of torture. Those actions also have to be scrutinized before and during, by those authorities conducting the interrogations, and escalating intensity should require higher and higher prior approval. After the fact, all levels of oversight from immediate supervisors, IG, and ultimately Congress, even if that last is the usual lost cause.

Congress did ratify the UN Convention on Torture in 1994. But that's also no help. It does not meaningfully define torture. The UN is just as negligent in this matter as the Congress.

"Any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or
mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as
obtaining from him or a third person, information or a confession,
punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is
suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a
third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind,
when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or
with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person
acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering
arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions."
— Convention Against Torture, Article 1.1

Just as a starting point, what constitutes "severe"? More broadly, this could be applied in such a way as to prevent all interrogation.

A number of pundits, some who have said so all along, and some emboldened by the recent Senate Democrat report, have been making the assertion that the US tortured detainees. But the fact is, this assertion is completely unsupportable.

Judge Andrew Napolitano, for example, has been steadfast in this assertion. In response to the why both the Bush and Obama administrations have not pursued prosecutions, he claims that this is a political determination. He's probably not used to the accusation I'm going to level against him, but he has failed to think this all the way through.

Indeed, he is right that both administrations have made political determinations as opposed to legal ones, but he doesn't address why that should be the case. The reason is that Congress, in writing the legislation that might have applied, crafted the law, deliberately, to leave it a political determination.

The laws of the United States that "outlaw" torture, in fact, do no such thing, because, as discussed, they fail, utterly, to define what constitutes torture. Unconstitutionally vague is an understatement. Prosecution should be impossible in this circumstance and if achieved, would be unjust. The Bush and Obama administrations have made the only just determination that they can--not to try to prosecute. And that presumes, without evidence, that anyone did anything worthy of prosecution.

The US has tortured no one.

(Here is the US Code attempt at a definition: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2340)

If I'm just being honest.

Torture is bad. But ever been through basic training? SERE school? Any elite training? Then you know personally, if you wear someone down physically, to the point of exhaustion, they become more mentally open to suggestion and willing to accept your point of view. You know that. Not every civilian knows it.
So torture is bad. I do not advocate for it.
Not getting a perfect night's sleep, running hard, lifting hard, and getting yelled at, shot at, being scared...are all things we've experienced...some of us to a pretty significant degree. Let's not call everything we do to weaken an enemy combatant's ability to defend himself psychologically, "torture", because it just isn't.

I don't think the Geneva Convention should apply to terrorist. Next, we'll be paying them reparations and making sure they have HBO....

We caught bin Laden partially based off of information obtained in this manner. So your point is slightly weak.

To soon!!! but just a lil humor

I've stayed away from this for a few reasons that I will not go into.
In answer here is an article I wrote many years ago.


ABU GHRAIB PRISONER ABUSE,
A CONFLICT OF CONSCIENCE…………

Some observations by D.C.Fresch



In May, 2004 the story of massive prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq surfaced in the
mainstream press, CNN and the Internet. The opening page of this story featured a handful of photos showing Iraqi prisoners and two U.S. Army members in what the general public would consider disturbing circumstances. I make the distinction here of the public vs. those who have had the experience of conflict and as such may have become somewhat desensitized to the milder manifestations of warfare.

Since then, more photos and details have daily hit the presses. Seven service members are being charged with a number of violations. One of them has already pled out to the charges, been found guilty, and sentenced. He appears to be a large part of the Government’s case against the others.

The Arab world has been rocked by a portrayal of U.S. actions that seem to be at odds with our public, military and diplomatic stance as would be saviors of the Iraqi people.



There is a vitally important story here. It is a problem that most likely will affect our lives for the next few decades. I wish I had the opportunity to go into Iraq and find the real truth. It has not been uncovered as yet. Getting shot at and wandering in harm’s way doesn’t frighten me as much as the gross laziness displayed so far by the mainstream press reporting. Hearsay and inflammatory statements gathered second hand is not the path to the truth.

Having been in the field with the U.S. Marine Corps, as a combat tank crewman, I am of two minds when it comes to the issue of prisoner abuses in Iraq. It is, I know from experience, difficult on an emotional level as a young combatant, to not just hate them all. We are trained to hate them, to kill them, cause them pain. After all they are the enemy and we even have special names for them, to set them apart, dehumanize them, make them easier to kill. They would do it to us, we are told. They have in the past.

The German Army of WWII, specifically Lt.Col. Joachim Peiper, on 17 December 1944 captured and summarily executed over 100 members of the U.S. Army’s Battery B of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion. At the crossroads south of the Belgian town of Malmedy his command assembled and machine-gunned his captives. Thirty survived the “Malmedy Massecre ”and Peiper and 73 of his command were tried for war crimes. Forty-three of those were convicted and sentenced to death. The sentence was never carried out, owing to the skills of their American attorney.
The Japanese routinely beheaded captured British commandos. After the fall of Manila they executed 16,000 U.S. and Filipino prisoners, those who dropped out of the 60 mile Bataan death march, those whose crime was not being able to make the forced march to detention. The survivors were subjected to being used as slave labor, worked to death. The Japanese slaughters that took place within China and the Indo-china area are well documented by history.
Any one who has not heard of the horrors of the Hanoi Hilton in North Viet Nam need only look through Jeremiah Denton’s book “When Hell was in session” to get a graphic look into the Viet torture of our pilots during that decade. Admiral Denton’s depiction of his seven and a half years of captivity gave us the first look into the depraved practices of the North Vietnamese. It is a chronical of pain and heroics.
Today’s headlines are now giving us the recent Iraqi murders and mutilations of the four ex- Special Forces operators. Once ambushed, they were taken from their vehicle, dismembered, hanged and burned. Although ex-military they were working as civilian aid workers. Also telling is the widespread Internet decapitation of 26 year old civilian Nicholas Berg. His killing has been touted as revenge for the treatment of Iraqi POWs.
We have not ourselves been immune from violations. Vietnam awakened us to our own savagery with the “My Lai incident” of March 16th 1968. We witnessed the wholesale slaughter of the inhabitants of the village of My Lai by troops under the command of Lt. Calley and Capt. Ernest Medina. The resulting court-martials and convictions displayed to the world, the shame of the U.S. Army’s Company C., 11th brigade of the Americal Division and the country.

It is not difficult to understand the individual troopers leap from the adrenal testosterone pumping fear of a recent firefight to the off hand and somewhat understandable abuse of a helpless enemy. But once that enemy is moved down the road and up the chain of command to detention and interrogation it is another story. There is no longer a clear and present danger. There is an infra structure of authority and supervision . Checks and balances put in place to avoid atrocity. And there are always THE RULES. They have been in place for decades. We have agreed to abide by them, and for very good reasons.

* * * * * *

It is illegal, so says the Geneva Conventions of War, to abuse and or not hold safe and secure those combatants that are out of the fight. It actually says much more.

Specifically: THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS ON THE LAWS OF WAR, 1949

Article 3: In the case of armed conflict…..each party shall be bound to apply as a minimum the following provisions:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed ‘hors de combat’ by sickness, wounds, DETENTION or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, color, religion, or faith, sex, birth, or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above mentioned persons:

(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) Taking of hostages;
( c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

(2) The wounded and the sick shall be collected and cared for….


And also some reasons why we have chosen this course, from:

The U.S. ARMY Field Manual: The Law of Land Warfare, 1956...

2. Purposes of the Law of War

The conduct of armed hostilities on land is regulated by the law of land warfare which is both written and unwritten. IT IS INSPIRED BY THE DESIRE TO DIMINISH THE EVILS OF WAR BY:

a. Protecting…..from unnecessary suffering;
b. Safeguarding certain fundamental human rights of persons who fall into the hands of the enemy, particularly prisoners of war, the wounded and sick, and civilians; and
c. Facilitating the restoration of peace…

3. Basic Principles

a. Prohibitory Effect. The law of war places limits on the exercise of a belligerent’s power in the interests mentioned in paragraph 2 and requires that…refrain from employing any kind or degree of violence… not necessary for military purposes…and conduct hostilities with regard for the principles of humanity and CHIVALRY.


And then, grunt simple from:

MACV Pocket Card “The Enemy In Your Hands” circa: mid 60s:

As a member of the U.S. Military Forces, you will comply with the Geneva Prisoner of War Convention of 1949 to which your country adheres. Under these conventions:

You can and will:

Disarm your prisoner…
Immediately search him thoroughly….
Require him to be silent….
Segregate him from other prisoners…
Guard him carefully…
Take him to the place designated by your commander

You cannot and must not:

Mistreat your prisoner
Humiliate or degrade him
Take any of his personal effects that do not have significant military value
Refuse him medical treatment if required and available

ALWAYS TREAT YOUR PRISONER HUMANELY


3.) Mistreatment of any captive is a criminal offense. Every soldier is personally responsible for the enemy in his hands.

* * * * * *

This last item was put into the hands of EVERY combatant in the RVN Theater of operations. Additionally troops received two hours of instruction on the handling of POWs according to the Geneva Conventions. I would hope that a similar training program was conducted in the Iraqi/Kuwaiti Theater as far back as 1991 and again with the present conflict. If not then the shame and guilt of omission does indeed rise very high.

Despite all of these safeguards, through out the ages, from before the civil wars’ Andersonville and on into the future, angry disgruntled and fearful warriors have and will take their share of “Get Back” out on their enemies. It is not right, but it will always happen. The lines of chivalry will understandably and occasionally be crossed in the field by the grunts that are more than likely still bleeding and hurting from recent hostile actions. This is the sharp edge of war where combatants become captives and the point of that transition may become blurred.
There is no reason and no excuse for garrison troops, Military Police included, to ever become involved in any abuse of prisoners. If they are so grossly unsupervised, directed or ordered to do so, all of the above rules and laws of war still become unnecessary. The unwritten expected basic moral obligations as men come into play.

If this prison travesty has resulted from a lack of supervision, the U.S. Army needs to address these problems. I’m proud that the procedures of the Marine Corps, on the whole, seem to still wash out the sexual sadists that have apparently gotten through the cracks of this recent episode. These self-stroking monsters deserve to go to a special Military hell at Leavenworth, forever. If only for what they will cost this country in lives, military and civilian, and our stature in the world community over the next generation or so. They have shown no moral grounding that can mark them as humans. Responsibly, provisions have also made for those whose duty it was to hold this tiger by the tail. The company commanders and all those above are just as responsible and get a ticket to the same hell, guilty by omission.

1800 photographs surfaced in the first flush of the Abu Ghraib investigation. Why are there 1800 photos? I know this is the digital age but this implies either obsession or agency.

If all of this was the result of some grand direction orchestrated by the intelligence agencies, we may never find the truth. The product of a gray area of warfare down through time, intelligence driven interrogations will never be admitted to. If this is what has happened in this case, the peons will burn on the altar of intelligence secrecy while the spooks slide back under the covers and leave them holding the bag and the responsibility. We all know the difference between right and wrong. If we are not prepared to ask the right questions, follow what is morally correct, instead of following blind ego and questionable orders, we have to be prepared to be thrown to the wolves, be prosecuted and pay the price for illegal actions. Sorry, no get out of jail free card for the perpetrators. We will all pay for these crimes.


Do Intel groups do these things we have seen in the news, and on the internet? You betcha! Have they done it in wars past? Absolutely! Will they do it again? For sure! In the big Intel picture this is small potatoes.

We ended the big one in the Pacific by testing out our two new Nukes on Nagasaki and Hiroshima vaporizing thousands of Japanese civilians. The reasoning was to avoid a protracted land battle that would have cost us possibly hundreds of thousands killed. Was it the right thing to do? You Bet! What ever works and can be gotten away with, that “makes the other poor bastard die for his country” as George Patton is to have said. That is what war is in the end, killing, winning. Otherwise it may as well be a cooking contest. It is not. Unpleasant things happen and people die from the result of critical decisions made throughout the chain of command.

There is no easy answer to this problem. It may be a necessary evil that any military power must live with. Either that, or else not get caught. The terrible press exposure will hurt us but not destroy us. We have an amazing resilience.

Hanoi was never called on the carpet for its many atrocities. Few paid for Germany’s horror shows with their lives. Our spies and interrogators are as necessary as any of our air, sea, and land forces. We cannot do without them or overly shackle them as we have in the past, but we must come up with a civilized answer to this problem. Training or responsibility for our actions, we must choose.

We cannot take away freedom to gain liberty. We cannot become the monsters that we have taken an oath to protect our country from. Our word is our bond and honor, as a people and a country. We have said that we agree to abide by the laws of war…that includes prosecution of those that are guilty. There are guilty, from those that performed the deeds, to those that allowed them. The rules could not be clearer. If we are to make decisions to break the rules, we must be prepared to face prosecution for doing so. We have a moral ethical responsibility as individuals and as a country.