Bush administration: 'We tortured Qahtani'

I guarantee our soldiers get far worse treatment than stress positions, loud music, sleep deprivation, and even water boarding(which has only been used 3x). Our soldiers get treated worse in SERE school, than these prisoners.

reply to post by sos37

---

I don't think it's literal...

It's just the worst person of the day. It's more of a joke than anything, but all jokes have some hint of reality in them.

[edit on 1/15/2009 by Irish M1ck]

Torture usually just gives the torturer bad information.

CIA's Harsh Interrogation Techniques Described


FBI Agents Contradict White House Insistence that Torture Yielded Valuable Information from Abu Zubaida


Experts: National Security Not Ensured By Torture


And I think all you pro-torture fans should pay special attention to this little tid-bit!



And some more articles for your reading pleasure about how ineffective and counterproductive torture is.

Talk, not torture, gets the information - Los Angeles Times

Top Interrogators Declare Torture Ineffective in Intelligence Gathering

Torture To Get Information Doesn't Work

Torture Is Illegal, Immoral and Ineffective

Why Is Torture Ineffective?

Torture isn't just morally sick -- it's also ineffective and counterproductive

[edit on 1/16/2009 by Keyhole]

No kidding, you'd bet your daughters life on that, would ya?
So what's your suggestion on how to get your daughter back?

Its not even a question of justification. I don't believe in absolutisms of wrong/ right.

Its just that the victim of torture will be likely to become a terrorist- and given the previous events I wouldn't be surprised.

I don't really care about words like "justification" and "condoning". I stand in my camp, the terrorists stand in theirs. But I can acknowledge that if I were a muslim, and I were tortured unduly, then I would be more inclined to become an extremist (its a protection response, they know they won't be tortured by other muslims at any cost).

Oh don't get me wrong, I would torture the crap out of him. But I would later still understand if he then went over to the "dark side"... and for that I wouldn't be surprised.

I would have to be pretty sure of myself that the man captured is definitely a terrorist and not some average joe who was just in the same mosque at the wrong time.

You know, I understand that you're trying to make me out to be the "bad guy" because I would refuse to torture someone, even if they had information about my daughter, but I am not going to buy it. To me, torture is very much like rape. If someone had my daughter, I would feel very powerless and angry and torture would be a way to feel like I was powerful over this person, "forcing" them to give me what I wanted... and it would at least seem like I was doing something to make the situation better. But it's a fantasy. Torture doesn't work. That's why evidence obtained by torture is inadmissible in court. Because it's unreliable.

Torture is like rape. And I would not do it to anyone for any reason.



I don't believe in these scenarios. But I would try everything I thought would be effective. I would not, however, torture them. It's just not something I could do. It would be as effective as doing a jig. I wouldn't do that, either.

Torture for the most part is wrong. I am just a SGT in the Army and if I was caught and tortured for info I would only be able to give a small portion of what I would probably be asked. So I would have to give false info to please my torturers.

So yes in that essence, the torturer would not get valid information.

Now if we capture a known high ranking official, say the equivalent to a MAJ or higher. Then he would have valuable information. If we know for certain that the info he had would save hundreds or more lives, then I am all for getting that info at all costs.

I am against torture just for the sake of torture. I am for torture when there is no doubt that the individual holds information that is critical in saving lives.


There are a few people here who say that torture would not get valid information. In my first example that would be true, in the second you would get the info you need.

Don't believe me? Next time you injure yourself, say a compound fractured arm, try and tell the doctor you broke your leg. It is very, very hard, if not impossible, to lie when you are under severe distress. The part of your brain that lies all but shuts down because the pain is so bad.

The problem with using various scenarios to justify torture is that for every scenario constructed to justify it, one can be constructed to demonstrate it is not justified.

The problem is that torture degrades the torturer, even without regard to what it does to the tortured person.

One of the biggest dangers in fighting evil is for the tendancy to become what one fights.

We have to examine why this is even under discussion in the US. And it brings us back to why so many people around the world have the desire to do us harm. And the old 'they hate us for our freedoms' hokum is purely garbage.

Various people around the world hate us and want to do us harm because the US has for years imposed our way of life on people who don't want it, has based our military on their lands, has supported extremely repressive governments that torture and kill their populations, has enforced commercial situations that impoverish local populations, and more.

The US has done this for years, and it is going to take years to undo the damage done to us by this behavior.

So in the meantime, engaging in torture just takes us lower... it does not help. If for no other reason, as is the subject of this thread, once someone has been totured, they cannot be prosecuted under US law. So now what?

For torture to be an accepted national policy is never right, and in the long run will do us immeasurably more harm, by increasing the number of people who hate us.