Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Weekend Contributor
This past week’s news reports of the Senate report on the CIA Torture program were both distressing and enlightening. I was dismayed to not only read what the full extent of the CIA’s Torture program was, but also when I read pundits and former CIA officials claim that rectal rehydration was merely a medical procedure! I was further discouraged when commenters on this blog made claims that waterboarding and other torture tactics were either necessary or what the devils deserved.
Very few pundits or commenters seem to care if the so-called Enhanced Interrogation techniques were legal or ethical when the CIA resorted to them shortly after 9/11. This “debate” over the actions taken in our name by the CIA has gone from a report based on the CIA’s own words to denials that the techniques were torture, to claims that great intelligence value was gained using the torture and claims that it was a biased report written by Democrats.
When we were attacked on September 11, 2001, most of the world was supporting the United States in its hours of grief and anger. What happened after the attacks quickly turned the tide of world opinion against us and created new enemies. When the CIA delved into its historical “playbook” to devise black sites and brutal interrogation techniques, the result, in my opinion, was a loss of our ethical and legal bearings that are still out of whack today.
When our greatest generation fought enemies stronger and just as brutal as what we face today, our forces were held to a higher standard than the enemy we were fighting. The idea that America does not torture or mistreat its prisoners or enemies is not a new one. It dates back at least to when General George Washington decided that British regulars and paid mercenaries fighting for the British were not to be mistreated in our detention facilities.
He made that decision knowing what too many of our soldiers had experienced under the hands of the British forces. We were supposed to be better than our enemies.
When the CIA delved into the black sites and torture techniques, another US agency, the FBI balked and questioned the tactics being practiced by the CIA. The FBI was gaining valuable information from al Qaeda operative, Abu Zubaydah, after his capture in March of 2002, but that all changed when he was put into isolation for 47 days.
“The Senate report describes the F.B.I. questioning — both in the hospital and later at the black site — as successful. Intelligence reports indicate he provided valuable information, but denied knowing anything about plots against America. But agency officials believed he was holding out. In response, Mr. Mitchell offered a menu of interrogation options.
While C.I.A. and Justice Department lawyers debated the legality of the tactics, the report reveals, Mr. Zubaydah was left alone in a cell in Thailand for 47 days. The Senate report asserts that isolation, not resistance, was the reason he stopped talking in June. Mr. Soufan said he was livid when he read that. “What kind of ticking-bomb scenario is this if you can leave him in isolation for 47 days?” he said.
For three weeks in August 2002, Mr. Zubaydah was questioned using the harshest measures available, including waterboarding. But the Senate report says he never revealed information about a plot against the United States. The C.I.A. concluded he had no such information.” New York Times
The CIA has used harsh interrogation and torture during past wars and conflicts and eventually the agency was brought under control. Waterboarding is torture, no matter what name it is given. Isolation, rectal rehydration, sleep deprivation, to name a few, are torture. We have prosecuted past enemies for waterboarding and even some of our soldiers who crossed the legal and moral line.
Why is it now only a crime if our enemies do it to us? Will we regain the soul of America again and finally get past partisan grievances to retake the moral standing of our nation?
We talk often on this blog about the rule of law. Whether it is a President who is grabbing more power for the Executive Branch or citizens of color who seemingly are undervalued by our Justice system. An argument can be made that ever since money starting taking control of our government, we have lost our rule of law because the wealthy and powerful seem to be immune to prosecution. Does the CIA stand above the rule of law?
Will the CIA be brought under control? Will government officials who authorized the torture and those that carried it out and those that refused to prosecute it be brought to justice? I submit that if we do not get control over the CIA our collective souls will continue to suffer in our eyes and in the eyes of the world. As Ali H. Soufan, the former FBI interrogator mentioned earlier says, our actions have consequences.
“‘We played into the enemy’s hand,” said Ali H. Soufan, a former F.B.I. agent who clashed with the C.I.A. over its interrogation tactics. “Now we have American hostages in orange jumpsuits because we put people in orange jumpsuits.”’ New York Times It is an overused phrase, but it fits here:
“The whole world is watching.”
Only we can resurrect the soul of America. We are better than torture. At least we used to be.
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One of the BIG lies is torture does not work. Think logically. On some real tough people, it may not work. On weak people, it almost certainly does work. One of the bigger problems w/ torture is it can produce false leads, which takes up lost time. You never get that time back. Feinstein and her ilk has had the meme “torture does not work” because she knows most people are fine w/ it. All CIA people, Dem and Rep, say we got valuable info from these techniques. Feinstein is lying about this. And of course, she interviewed NO CIA people in her investigation. NONE!
Precedence…
http://cdn.historycommons.org/images/events/a690_waterboarding_in_vietnam_2050081722-19279.jpg
This picture of US soldiers supervising the waterboarding of North Vietnamese prisoners was published in a US newspaper in 1968, resulting in an investigation and convictions. [Source: Bettmann / Corbis]
Issac –
If you look at the videos which are supposedly of the planes crashing into the WTC, you see the “plane” melt into the building as though the building was
made of butter. No wings fall off. Nothing falls off, and a count of the frames shows that the “plane” flew thru the steel/glass building in the same number of video frames if it simply flew thru the air unobstructed. The only thugs that day were not piloting commercial airliners.
Annie,
Did you catch Dick’s quote, “It was only three people”?
Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury,
The Charlie Manson defense rests.
Max , Paul and Inga are the two sides of the same coin . I’m disgusted by both the current and the previous administrations. We can only hope that in 2016 we have a half way decent character running the country’s affairs .
Many people in this country were once “fine” with slavery…thought it was acceptable to own other human beings as property. Fortunately, things have.
Why am I not surprised that the Media/Propaganda machine is platforming these torturers so as to exonerate themselves? You know, catapulting the propaganda…
JT, I apologize for the dance comment. But, you are a bit Victorian. I need to constantly remind myself of that.
Thanks to our current president , the war criminals are on TV expressing how wonderful it was to torture people , instead of being behind the bars . So , if this president has protected the criminals , can a decent future president undo the damage that his predecessors have caused to the “soul” ?
For the record, my inclination is to accept the scenarios DBQ outlines at 5:25 & 5:34 PM today. However, that does not lessen the conflict in my mind. Sometimes just being privy to ugly things cannot be made nice. They just are.
More so Paul C.
What is it called when you strap/pin someone down and rectally penetrate them against their will?
Max-1 – What do you call it when you strap/pin someone down and insert a needle in their arm against their will?
I’m having comments eaten which makes me wonder… How often will this happen before Spinelli gets the same treatment I have?
> Nick Spinelli,
> You have had a comment deleted as a violation of our civility rule.
Here’s the thing, Professor. There is no civil way to defend torture. It is, by definition, not civil, and defense of it is sickening.
And being civil to people who defend it is exactly why we all get to hear from Dick Cheney on Eat the Press instead of from his Lawyer at the Hague.
Paul C.
Rectal dehydration supposes that there is a condition in which the rectum has become dehydrated…
… Clue us in on how this works.
What medical community uses this procedure to revive and rehabilitate patients.
Shouldn’t the medical community determine that there is such a condition to begin with so as to call it rectal dehydration so as to administer a rehydration?
Max-1 – the medical condition you are looking for is called starvation.
Issac,
Gathering information and scrutinizing our enemies or potential enemies is understandable. Torture has been shown to not garner enough actionable information to make its use worthwhile.
To RAPE a person… defenseless.
Whereas some would prefer to call RAPE a “ESE” Enhanced Sexual Experience… Others have defined it as a crime.
In this case, we see people arguing that RAPE was necessary…
That is very well said Issac. We need both William Lloyd Garrison and General Grand.
“Should any American soldier be so base and infamous as to injure any [prisoner]. . . I do most earnestly enjoin you to bring him to such severe and exemplary punishment as the enormity of the crime may require. Should it extend to death itself, it will not be disproportional to its guilt at such a time and in such a cause… for by such conduct they bring shame, disgrace and ruin to themselves and their country.”
– George Washington, charge to the Northern Expeditionary Force, Sept. 14, 1775
It’s time too be done with this agency… Defund it or risk more stains on America.
At least one of the thugs that flew a plane into the World Trade Towers had been taking flying lessons in Florida. He explained to the trainer that he simply wanted to know how to steer the plane and was not interested in take offs and landings. The trainer thought this was strange but as nothing had happened yet and the US was not on the war footing it is on today, he dismissed it.
Now, if someone were to seek the same flying lessons, they would be picked up and, at the very least, scrutinized closely. So, the question is, if one of these thugs had been scrutinized, tortured, whatever, and it resulted in the thwarting of 9/11, would torture be OK?
It is a board room decision, much as the speed limits. When Carter lowered the speed limits in response to the oil crisis, a side effect was the saving of hundreds of lives. When Reagan raised the speed limit, he signed the death warrants of thousands during his term. When Reagan allowed SUV’s to be exempt from the new regulations for cars, by having them classed as trucks, he further doomed the American Automobile industry. Japan, and Europe continues raising standards, technology, and fuel efficiency while the US used more chrome.
The building codes are typically tightened in response to a catastrophe where lives are lost and property destroyed, e.g.. fire, seismic, etc. These are all board room decisions that are responsible for some lives saved and some lost, those lost are due to our need for speed, lower building costs, etc.
This is the nature of the beast, and we are the beast. That we torture to save lives is inevitable. That we discuss it is the only light at the end of the tunnel. Like the board room decisions that doom some and save others, hopefully we will continue to strive forward while we do what has to be done.
If people cannot handle the truth then what good are they anyways.
They are worthless untermenschen!