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Some self inflicted torture is reading what reflects the attitudes of certain people in this thread. It is sickening and frightening that 'fellow Americans' could really hold these views.So what do you instead?Be real, folks!
First, it is absolutely inadmissible that America, land of the free, etc., have as an approved policy that torture be not only tolerated, but approved. The image is too ugly to accept. The damage to U.S. reputation is too much to pay. We can't be a country like that.
Second, of course anyone, anywhere, would use whatever means it took to dislodge information of the imagined magnitude presented in this thread. It doesn't have to be said and discussed. That only makes it seem even more hypocritical if things ever come to that.
Third, short of some extreme, absurd situation imagined here, torture is out of the question. Nyet. Nichts. Non. Basta. It is something only the disgusting would be involved in, or encourage!
Secret WWII camp interrogators say torture wasn't needed
Depends on what you call "torture"
And if you have the wrong person?Let me know when you subject yourself to water boarding at the hands of an enemy captor and you have no idea whether they will kill you or not.They are both torture. Quit trying to defend it because it differs in degree.Of course it’s torture. You should know this as even the U.S. officially called it torture when the Japanese did it to our servicemen in WWII. You don’t get to redefine words to suit your agenda. Torture is physical or mental abuse. Convincing someone they’re drowning is absolutely mental abuse.
What the Japanese did is not what we did.....you should try to know what you are talking about before you post....
We poured water over a cloth covering their faces, filling their sinuses....the Japanes forced hoses down the throats of POWs filling their stomachs to capcity, then jumped on the abdomens of the prisoners with both feet to force the water out explosively...
do you see what the difference in the two techniques are?
Wrong......I will listen to the 3 POWs who actually know what torture is, because they endured it for years under the socialists...
McCain’s fellow POWs support waterboarding
When I was researching my book, “Courting Disaster,” I interviewed many of them, including Col. Bud Day, who received our nation’s highest award for valor, the Medal of Honor, for his heroic escape from a North Vietnamese prison camp.
When Day was returned to the prison, his right arm was broken in three places and he had been shot in the hand and thigh during his capture. But he continued to resist interrogation and provide false information — suffering such excruciating torture that he became totally physically debilitated and unable to perform even the simplest task for himself. In short, Day is an expert on the subject of torture. Here is what he says about CIA waterboarding:
“I am a supporter of waterboarding. It is not torture. Torture is really hurting someone. Waterboarding is just scaring someone, with no long-term injurious effects. It is a scare tactic that works.”
I asked Day in an e-mail what he would say to the CIA officer who waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, if he had the chance to speak with him. Day replied immediately: “YOU DID THE RIGHT THING.”
And the other Congressional of Medal Awardee...also agrees......waterboarding is not torture.....
Like Day, Col. Leo Thorsness was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Vietnam War. He experienced excruciating torture during his captivity — his back broken, his body wrenched apart. He says what the CIA did to al-Qaeda terrorists in its custody was not torture:
“To me, waterboarding is intensive interrogation. It is not torture. Torture involves extreme, brutal pain — breaking bones, passing out from pain, beatings so severe that blood spatters the walls . . . when you pop shoulders out of joints.. . . In my mind, there’s a difference, and in most POWs’ minds there’s a difference.. . . I would not hesitate a second to use ‘enhanced interrogation,’ including waterboarding, if it would save the lives of innocent people.”
And the most famous supporter of water boarding......
Another torture victim who supports waterboarding is Adm. Jeremiah Denton — the POW who famously winked the word “T-O-R-T-U-R-E” in Morse code during a North Vietnamese propaganda interview.
It was the first message to the outside world that American prisoners were being tortured. Denton later received the Navy Cross for this courageous and costly act of defiance, for which he paid dearly when his captors figured out what he had done. I asked Denton if he thought waterboarding was torture. He told me:
“No, I think it’s persuasive.. . . The big, monstrous difference here is that the gentlemen we are waterboarding are people who swore to kill Americans. They will wreak any kind of torture just for the hell of it on anybody. When they are captured by the U.S., and we know or have reason to believe that they know of a subsequent event after 9/11, if you don’t interrogate them, more misery will take place.. . . Waterboarding is not an evil. Some of the things they did to us were torture. I passed out a dozen times from torture. We’re not exerting that kind of excruciation.”
It is ironic that, according to one of your quotes, what makes waterboarding “not torture” is defined by who the victim is, not the act. That is seriously warped.
10s of thousands of our military are water-boarded in survival training. It's actually a mental stressor and not likely to cause permanent physical damage.
Waterboarding: A SERE-ing Experience for Tens of Thousands of US Military Personnel | Human Events
On the OP scenario ---
I would have to TRY to break the suspect in order to protect 100s of thousands or millions of lives. Sorry, but when the dirty bomb explodes and radioactively contaminates downtown Chicago for the next 1000 years, I'm gonna regret living if I didn't push for information. I don't know how anybody could live with the guilt of not trying.
There ARE possible scenarios where you need to push for ANY leads. Good, bad or indifferent.
And --- the media and the public will SKEWER the people in charge if it's known they had a conspirator in custody and DID NOT attempt to save those lives and the 1000 years of radioactive Chicago..
Oh well. Too bad, so sad.And if you have the wrong person?Let me know when you subject yourself to water boarding at the hands of an enemy captor and you have no idea whether they will kill you or not.They are both torture. Quit trying to defend it because it differs in degree.What the Japanese did is not what we did.....you should try to know what you are talking about before you post....
We poured water over a cloth covering their faces, filling their sinuses....the Japanes forced hoses down the throats of POWs filling their stomachs to capcity, then jumped on the abdomens of the prisoners with both feet to force the water out explosively...
do you see what the difference in the two techniques are?
Wrong......I will listen to the 3 POWs who actually know what torture is, because they endured it for years under the socialists...
McCain’s fellow POWs support waterboarding
When I was researching my book, “Courting Disaster,” I interviewed many of them, including Col. Bud Day, who received our nation’s highest award for valor, the Medal of Honor, for his heroic escape from a North Vietnamese prison camp.
When Day was returned to the prison, his right arm was broken in three places and he had been shot in the hand and thigh during his capture. But he continued to resist interrogation and provide false information — suffering such excruciating torture that he became totally physically debilitated and unable to perform even the simplest task for himself. In short, Day is an expert on the subject of torture. Here is what he says about CIA waterboarding:
“I am a supporter of waterboarding. It is not torture. Torture is really hurting someone. Waterboarding is just scaring someone, with no long-term injurious effects. It is a scare tactic that works.”
I asked Day in an e-mail what he would say to the CIA officer who waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, if he had the chance to speak with him. Day replied immediately: “YOU DID THE RIGHT THING.”
And the other Congressional of Medal Awardee...also agrees......waterboarding is not torture.....
Like Day, Col. Leo Thorsness was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Vietnam War. He experienced excruciating torture during his captivity — his back broken, his body wrenched apart. He says what the CIA did to al-Qaeda terrorists in its custody was not torture:
“To me, waterboarding is intensive interrogation. It is not torture. Torture involves extreme, brutal pain — breaking bones, passing out from pain, beatings so severe that blood spatters the walls . . . when you pop shoulders out of joints.. . . In my mind, there’s a difference, and in most POWs’ minds there’s a difference.. . . I would not hesitate a second to use ‘enhanced interrogation,’ including waterboarding, if it would save the lives of innocent people.”
And the most famous supporter of water boarding......
Another torture victim who supports waterboarding is Adm. Jeremiah Denton — the POW who famously winked the word “T-O-R-T-U-R-E” in Morse code during a North Vietnamese propaganda interview.
It was the first message to the outside world that American prisoners were being tortured. Denton later received the Navy Cross for this courageous and costly act of defiance, for which he paid dearly when his captors figured out what he had done. I asked Denton if he thought waterboarding was torture. He told me:
“No, I think it’s persuasive.. . . The big, monstrous difference here is that the gentlemen we are waterboarding are people who swore to kill Americans. They will wreak any kind of torture just for the hell of it on anybody. When they are captured by the U.S., and we know or have reason to believe that they know of a subsequent event after 9/11, if you don’t interrogate them, more misery will take place.. . . Waterboarding is not an evil. Some of the things they did to us were torture. I passed out a dozen times from torture. We’re not exerting that kind of excruciation.”
It is ironic that, according to one of your quotes, what makes waterboarding “not torture” is defined by who the victim is, not the act. That is seriously warped.
10s of thousands of our military are water-boarded in survival training. It's actually a mental stressor and not likely to cause permanent physical damage.
Waterboarding: A SERE-ing Experience for Tens of Thousands of US Military Personnel | Human Events
On the OP scenario ---
I would have to TRY to break the suspect in order to protect 100s of thousands or millions of lives. Sorry, but when the dirty bomb explodes and radioactively contaminates downtown Chicago for the next 1000 years, I'm gonna regret living if I didn't push for information. I don't know how anybody could live with the guilt of not trying.
There ARE possible scenarios where you need to push for ANY leads. Good, bad or indifferent.
And --- the media and the public will SKEWER the people in charge if it's known they had a conspirator in custody and DID NOT attempt to save those lives and the 1000 years of radioactive Chicago..
Let me know when you subject yourself to water boarding at the hands of an enemy captor and you have no idea whether they will kill you or not.They are both torture. Quit trying to defend it because it differs in degree.Of course it’s torture. You should know this as even the U.S. officially called it torture when the Japanese did it to our servicemen in WWII. You don’t get to redefine words to suit your agenda. Torture is physical or mental abuse. Convincing someone they’re drowning is absolutely mental abuse.
What the Japanese did is not what we did.....you should try to know what you are talking about before you post....
We poured water over a cloth covering their faces, filling their sinuses....the Japanes forced hoses down the throats of POWs filling their stomachs to capcity, then jumped on the abdomens of the prisoners with both feet to force the water out explosively...
do you see what the difference in the two techniques are?
Wrong......I will listen to the 3 POWs who actually know what torture is, because they endured it for years under the socialists...
McCain’s fellow POWs support waterboarding
When I was researching my book, “Courting Disaster,” I interviewed many of them, including Col. Bud Day, who received our nation’s highest award for valor, the Medal of Honor, for his heroic escape from a North Vietnamese prison camp.
When Day was returned to the prison, his right arm was broken in three places and he had been shot in the hand and thigh during his capture. But he continued to resist interrogation and provide false information — suffering such excruciating torture that he became totally physically debilitated and unable to perform even the simplest task for himself. In short, Day is an expert on the subject of torture. Here is what he says about CIA waterboarding:
“I am a supporter of waterboarding. It is not torture. Torture is really hurting someone. Waterboarding is just scaring someone, with no long-term injurious effects. It is a scare tactic that works.”
I asked Day in an e-mail what he would say to the CIA officer who waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, if he had the chance to speak with him. Day replied immediately: “YOU DID THE RIGHT THING.”
And the other Congressional of Medal Awardee...also agrees......waterboarding is not torture.....
Like Day, Col. Leo Thorsness was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Vietnam War. He experienced excruciating torture during his captivity — his back broken, his body wrenched apart. He says what the CIA did to al-Qaeda terrorists in its custody was not torture:
“To me, waterboarding is intensive interrogation. It is not torture. Torture involves extreme, brutal pain — breaking bones, passing out from pain, beatings so severe that blood spatters the walls . . . when you pop shoulders out of joints.. . . In my mind, there’s a difference, and in most POWs’ minds there’s a difference.. . . I would not hesitate a second to use ‘enhanced interrogation,’ including waterboarding, if it would save the lives of innocent people.”
And the most famous supporter of water boarding......
Another torture victim who supports waterboarding is Adm. Jeremiah Denton — the POW who famously winked the word “T-O-R-T-U-R-E” in Morse code during a North Vietnamese propaganda interview.
It was the first message to the outside world that American prisoners were being tortured. Denton later received the Navy Cross for this courageous and costly act of defiance, for which he paid dearly when his captors figured out what he had done. I asked Denton if he thought waterboarding was torture. He told me:
“No, I think it’s persuasive.. . . The big, monstrous difference here is that the gentlemen we are waterboarding are people who swore to kill Americans. They will wreak any kind of torture just for the hell of it on anybody. When they are captured by the U.S., and we know or have reason to believe that they know of a subsequent event after 9/11, if you don’t interrogate them, more misery will take place.. . . Waterboarding is not an evil. Some of the things they did to us were torture. I passed out a dozen times from torture. We’re not exerting that kind of excruciation.”
It is ironic that, according to one of your quotes, what makes waterboarding “not torture” is defined by who the victim is, not the act. That is seriously warped.
10s of thousands of our military are water-boarded in survival training. It's actually a mental stressor and not likely to cause permanent physical damage.
Waterboarding: A SERE-ing Experience for Tens of Thousands of US Military Personnel | Human Events
On the OP scenario ---
I would have to TRY to break the suspect in order to protect 100s of thousands or millions of lives. Sorry, but when the dirty bomb explodes and radioactively contaminates downtown Chicago for the next 1000 years, I'm gonna regret living if I didn't push for information. I don't know how anybody could live with the guilt of not trying.
There ARE possible scenarios where you need to push for ANY leads. Good, bad or indifferent.
And --- the media and the public will SKEWER the people in charge if it's known they had a conspirator in custody and DID NOT attempt to save those lives and the 1000 years of radioactive Chicago..
What makes you think it would work to get reliable info?There was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
To repeat, this is absolutely not a policy the U.S. should be announcing as tolerable. Read the above post again.Be real, folks!
First, it is absolutely inadmissible that America, land of the free, etc., have as an approved policy that torture be not only tolerated, but approved. The image is too ugly to accept. The damage to U.S. reputation is too much to pay. We can't be a country like that.
Second, of course anyone, anywhere, would use whatever means it took to dislodge information of the imagined magnitude presented in this thread. It doesn't have to be said and discussed. That only makes it seem even more hypocritical if things ever come to that.
Third, short of some extreme, absurd situation imagined here, torture is out of the question. Nyet. Nichts. Non. Basta. It is something only the disgusting would be involved in, or encourage!
To repeat, this is absolutely not a policy the U.S. should be announcing as tolerable. Read the above post again.Be real, folks!
First, it is absolutely inadmissible that America, land of the free, etc., have as an approved policy that torture be not only tolerated, but approved. The image is too ugly to accept. The damage to U.S. reputation is too much to pay. We can't be a country like that.
Second, of course anyone, anywhere, would use whatever means it took to dislodge information of the imagined magnitude presented in this thread. It doesn't have to be said and discussed. That only makes it seem even more hypocritical if things ever come to that.
Third, short of some extreme, absurd situation imagined here, torture is out of the question. Nyet. Nichts. Non. Basta. It is something only the disgusting would be involved in, or encourage!
In the extremely rare incident imagined at the start of the thread, of course all and every effort would be used to obtain the necessary info. Anyone could expect that, especially someone in the process of committing some outrageous crime.
The minute you approve of such methods officially, you invite abuse at all levels, especially at the level of propaganda that can be used against you.
Torture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
But it's not torture, it's enhanced interrogation.Torture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
Torture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
Torture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
So much for those who insist 'rights' are from 'God' and are inalienable.Torture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
I was thinking of the Geneva Conventions which specifically would apply to people outside of the US. Foreign nationals outside the US are not covered by the constitution.
Our Constitution still rulesTorture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
And the constitutional rights of those that die in the blast are to be ignored?
I get your drift, but it's insane.
Our Constitution still rulesTorture is unconstitutional per the 8th amendmentThere was credible evidence that the person being interrogated had knowledge of an impending terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction? What if that person was an American citizen?
That’s the usual BS example. It hasn’t happened. And torture just makes people lie to make the pain stop.
It also violates international law, not that laws matter to you
And the constitutional rights of those that die in the blast are to be ignored?
I get your drift, but it's insane.
So how many potentially innocent people do you subject to torture until you realize it isnt working? What do yo tell those people, too bad, our intelligence was faulty?Let me know when you subject yourself to water boarding at the hands of an enemy captor and you have no idea whether they will kill you or not.They are both torture. Quit trying to defend it because it differs in degree.What the Japanese did is not what we did.....you should try to know what you are talking about before you post....
We poured water over a cloth covering their faces, filling their sinuses....the Japanes forced hoses down the throats of POWs filling their stomachs to capcity, then jumped on the abdomens of the prisoners with both feet to force the water out explosively...
do you see what the difference in the two techniques are?
Wrong......I will listen to the 3 POWs who actually know what torture is, because they endured it for years under the socialists...
McCain’s fellow POWs support waterboarding
When I was researching my book, “Courting Disaster,” I interviewed many of them, including Col. Bud Day, who received our nation’s highest award for valor, the Medal of Honor, for his heroic escape from a North Vietnamese prison camp.
When Day was returned to the prison, his right arm was broken in three places and he had been shot in the hand and thigh during his capture. But he continued to resist interrogation and provide false information — suffering such excruciating torture that he became totally physically debilitated and unable to perform even the simplest task for himself. In short, Day is an expert on the subject of torture. Here is what he says about CIA waterboarding:
“I am a supporter of waterboarding. It is not torture. Torture is really hurting someone. Waterboarding is just scaring someone, with no long-term injurious effects. It is a scare tactic that works.”
I asked Day in an e-mail what he would say to the CIA officer who waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, if he had the chance to speak with him. Day replied immediately: “YOU DID THE RIGHT THING.”
And the other Congressional of Medal Awardee...also agrees......waterboarding is not torture.....
Like Day, Col. Leo Thorsness was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Vietnam War. He experienced excruciating torture during his captivity — his back broken, his body wrenched apart. He says what the CIA did to al-Qaeda terrorists in its custody was not torture:
“To me, waterboarding is intensive interrogation. It is not torture. Torture involves extreme, brutal pain — breaking bones, passing out from pain, beatings so severe that blood spatters the walls . . . when you pop shoulders out of joints.. . . In my mind, there’s a difference, and in most POWs’ minds there’s a difference.. . . I would not hesitate a second to use ‘enhanced interrogation,’ including waterboarding, if it would save the lives of innocent people.”
And the most famous supporter of water boarding......
Another torture victim who supports waterboarding is Adm. Jeremiah Denton — the POW who famously winked the word “T-O-R-T-U-R-E” in Morse code during a North Vietnamese propaganda interview.
It was the first message to the outside world that American prisoners were being tortured. Denton later received the Navy Cross for this courageous and costly act of defiance, for which he paid dearly when his captors figured out what he had done. I asked Denton if he thought waterboarding was torture. He told me:
“No, I think it’s persuasive.. . . The big, monstrous difference here is that the gentlemen we are waterboarding are people who swore to kill Americans. They will wreak any kind of torture just for the hell of it on anybody. When they are captured by the U.S., and we know or have reason to believe that they know of a subsequent event after 9/11, if you don’t interrogate them, more misery will take place.. . . Waterboarding is not an evil. Some of the things they did to us were torture. I passed out a dozen times from torture. We’re not exerting that kind of excruciation.”
It is ironic that, according to one of your quotes, what makes waterboarding “not torture” is defined by who the victim is, not the act. That is seriously warped.
10s of thousands of our military are water-boarded in survival training. It's actually a mental stressor and not likely to cause permanent physical damage.
Waterboarding: A SERE-ing Experience for Tens of Thousands of US Military Personnel | Human Events
On the OP scenario ---
I would have to TRY to break the suspect in order to protect 100s of thousands or millions of lives. Sorry, but when the dirty bomb explodes and radioactively contaminates downtown Chicago for the next 1000 years, I'm gonna regret living if I didn't push for information. I don't know how anybody could live with the guilt of not trying.
There ARE possible scenarios where you need to push for ANY leads. Good, bad or indifferent.
And --- the media and the public will SKEWER the people in charge if it's known they had a conspirator in custody and DID NOT attempt to save those lives and the 1000 years of radioactive Chicago..
What this all comes down to is INTENT and the backlash from the RESULTS.
If the intent of the Torture was to simply inflict incredible pain to someone you have hatred for, then yes, it is simply barbaric.
But, in the scenario of saving life at any and all cost, although still barbarism, it is a case of need and not wanton blood lust. To an absolutist there is not difference, but reality is far different.
The difference is the failure of legal interrogation tactics on a person known to have information that, if given, can save thousands, if not millions of life's.
The faux outrage by some on this thread reminds me of the story of the town drunk who showed up at his usual bar dressed in a fine suit and with a new haircut. He orders Martinis instead of beer and proceeds to get drunk. The bartender asks him "what's up with the suit and Martini's" and the drunk responds that he's running for Congress because it's not what's inside me that matters, it's what you look like on the outside.
I wrote about this on another thread. There would be two results should the United States Government approved this in this specific scenario:
First. The torture (and I will not shy away from the use of the word) gets the desired results and the bomb is found and disarmed.
The news would be filled with stories of just how many life's were saved. Stories of those that would have perished, the single Mother, the Teacher about to retire, the retired, the sick, the poor, the Democrats, the Republicans, Young Married couple with their child. There would be 24/7 coverage of the economic damage the blast would have created and the recession/depression it would have caused, and the administration and those that applied the torture would be applauded as hero's, not only here, but in the entire civilized world as the world wakes up to the now real possibility that this could soon happen to them as well.
Those that opposed the use of torture to accomplish the resulting savings of life would be ridiculed. They would not dare show their face or voice their opinions in fear of looking the fool.
Second: The torture fails and the bomb goes off killing many thousands of people, maybe millions. The economy goes into a tailspin. War is declared on each and every nation known to harbor these terrorist groups, not only by the United States, but by every nation that could fall victim by the same act by those groups. The world becomes a very chaotic place in the matter of days.
What was done to the individual that had the information, but refused to supply it, becomes unimportant as the world try's to come to grip with what happened and tries to restore some semblance of order.
Again, those that oppose the use of torture would not dare to open their mouths as thousands of their fellow countrymen are being put to rest, and thousands more, maybe millions more are being treated and are dying from the fallout that later occurred. The people would be far more interested in where their next meal was going to come from, what was happening with the economy and watching their Sons and Daughters go off to War to seek justice for what just happened.
The dude that was tortured, and the approval of such would lay at roughly 15,000 on the list of concerns that the American people would have at that point and for decades in the future.
If all that is important to you is the appearance of being decent, while those around you die, then those that would oppose the use of torture as a last resort, are no different than the drunk in the bar that I referenced earlier and just as shallow in thought.
So how many potentially innocent people do you subject to torture until you realize it isnt working? What do yo tell those people, too bad, our intelligence was faulty?Let me know when you subject yourself to water boarding at the hands of an enemy captor and you have no idea whether they will kill you or not.They are both torture. Quit trying to defend it because it differs in degree.
Wrong......I will listen to the 3 POWs who actually know what torture is, because they endured it for years under the socialists...
McCain’s fellow POWs support waterboarding
When I was researching my book, “Courting Disaster,” I interviewed many of them, including Col. Bud Day, who received our nation’s highest award for valor, the Medal of Honor, for his heroic escape from a North Vietnamese prison camp.
When Day was returned to the prison, his right arm was broken in three places and he had been shot in the hand and thigh during his capture. But he continued to resist interrogation and provide false information — suffering such excruciating torture that he became totally physically debilitated and unable to perform even the simplest task for himself. In short, Day is an expert on the subject of torture. Here is what he says about CIA waterboarding:
“I am a supporter of waterboarding. It is not torture. Torture is really hurting someone. Waterboarding is just scaring someone, with no long-term injurious effects. It is a scare tactic that works.”
I asked Day in an e-mail what he would say to the CIA officer who waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed, if he had the chance to speak with him. Day replied immediately: “YOU DID THE RIGHT THING.”
And the other Congressional of Medal Awardee...also agrees......waterboarding is not torture.....
Like Day, Col. Leo Thorsness was awarded the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism during the Vietnam War. He experienced excruciating torture during his captivity — his back broken, his body wrenched apart. He says what the CIA did to al-Qaeda terrorists in its custody was not torture:
“To me, waterboarding is intensive interrogation. It is not torture. Torture involves extreme, brutal pain — breaking bones, passing out from pain, beatings so severe that blood spatters the walls . . . when you pop shoulders out of joints.. . . In my mind, there’s a difference, and in most POWs’ minds there’s a difference.. . . I would not hesitate a second to use ‘enhanced interrogation,’ including waterboarding, if it would save the lives of innocent people.”
And the most famous supporter of water boarding......
Another torture victim who supports waterboarding is Adm. Jeremiah Denton — the POW who famously winked the word “T-O-R-T-U-R-E” in Morse code during a North Vietnamese propaganda interview.
It was the first message to the outside world that American prisoners were being tortured. Denton later received the Navy Cross for this courageous and costly act of defiance, for which he paid dearly when his captors figured out what he had done. I asked Denton if he thought waterboarding was torture. He told me:
“No, I think it’s persuasive.. . . The big, monstrous difference here is that the gentlemen we are waterboarding are people who swore to kill Americans. They will wreak any kind of torture just for the hell of it on anybody. When they are captured by the U.S., and we know or have reason to believe that they know of a subsequent event after 9/11, if you don’t interrogate them, more misery will take place.. . . Waterboarding is not an evil. Some of the things they did to us were torture. I passed out a dozen times from torture. We’re not exerting that kind of excruciation.”
It is ironic that, according to one of your quotes, what makes waterboarding “not torture” is defined by who the victim is, not the act. That is seriously warped.
10s of thousands of our military are water-boarded in survival training. It's actually a mental stressor and not likely to cause permanent physical damage.
Waterboarding: A SERE-ing Experience for Tens of Thousands of US Military Personnel | Human Events
On the OP scenario ---
I would have to TRY to break the suspect in order to protect 100s of thousands or millions of lives. Sorry, but when the dirty bomb explodes and radioactively contaminates downtown Chicago for the next 1000 years, I'm gonna regret living if I didn't push for information. I don't know how anybody could live with the guilt of not trying.
There ARE possible scenarios where you need to push for ANY leads. Good, bad or indifferent.
And --- the media and the public will SKEWER the people in charge if it's known they had a conspirator in custody and DID NOT attempt to save those lives and the 1000 years of radioactive Chicago..
What this all comes down to is INTENT and the backlash from the RESULTS.
If the intent of the Torture was to simply inflict incredible pain to someone you have hatred for, then yes, it is simply barbaric.
But, in the scenario of saving life at any and all cost, although still barbarism, it is a case of need and not wanton blood lust. To an absolutist there is not difference, but reality is far different.
The difference is the failure of legal interrogation tactics on a person known to have information that, if given, can save thousands, if not millions of life's.
The faux outrage by some on this thread reminds me of the story of the town drunk who showed up at his usual bar dressed in a fine suit and with a new haircut. He orders Martinis instead of beer and proceeds to get drunk. The bartender asks him "what's up with the suit and Martini's" and the drunk responds that he's running for Congress because it's not what's inside me that matters, it's what you look like on the outside.
I wrote about this on another thread. There would be two results should the United States Government approved this in this specific scenario:
First. The torture (and I will not shy away from the use of the word) gets the desired results and the bomb is found and disarmed.
The news would be filled with stories of just how many life's were saved. Stories of those that would have perished, the single Mother, the Teacher about to retire, the retired, the sick, the poor, the Democrats, the Republicans, Young Married couple with their child. There would be 24/7 coverage of the economic damage the blast would have created and the recession/depression it would have caused, and the administration and those that applied the torture would be applauded as hero's, not only here, but in the entire civilized world as the world wakes up to the now real possibility that this could soon happen to them as well.
Those that opposed the use of torture to accomplish the resulting savings of life would be ridiculed. They would not dare show their face or voice their opinions in fear of looking the fool.
Second: The torture fails and the bomb goes off killing many thousands of people, maybe millions. The economy goes into a tailspin. War is declared on each and every nation known to harbor these terrorist groups, not only by the United States, but by every nation that could fall victim by the same act by those groups. The world becomes a very chaotic place in the matter of days.
What was done to the individual that had the information, but refused to supply it, becomes unimportant as the world try's to come to grip with what happened and tries to restore some semblance of order.
Again, those that oppose the use of torture would not dare to open their mouths as thousands of their fellow countrymen are being put to rest, and thousands more, maybe millions more are being treated and are dying from the fallout that later occurred. The people would be far more interested in where their next meal was going to come from, what was happening with the economy and watching their Sons and Daughters go off to War to seek justice for what just happened.
The dude that was tortured, and the approval of such would lay at roughly 15,000 on the list of concerns that the American people would have at that point and for decades in the future.
If all that is important to you is the appearance of being decent, while those around you die, then those that would oppose the use of torture as a last resort, are no different than the drunk in the bar that I referenced earlier and just as shallow in thought.
