Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive…
Now, for those of you who turn on the news occasionally, and especially those with a political inclination, we have a heated controversy between the left and the right about these “enhanced interrogation techniques” used on accused terrorists during the last administration. For the sake of brevity, I’ll stay with waterboarding for this opinion.
What we know: Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded 83 times. Kalid Shaik Muhammed was waterboarded 183 times. They gave up valuable information, and they’re terrorists anyway. So far, sounds pretty good. Hey, the whole country was scared shitless and we did what we had to do, right? Not so fast…
Our former VP Dick Cheney (the one who spent most of his 8 years in office in a “secret, undisclosed location”) is now on various talk shows (FOX news, Face the Nation, State of the Union, and even a small time talk show in North Dakota or Montana) at least once every few weeks, and twice so far this week alone. He’s admitted that he authorized these “techniques” but disputes that they’re torture. His lawyers wrote legal memos saying so. Others who side with him go so far as to say that even if they’re torture, they were effective in extracting vital information from our enemies and thus justified — despite the fact that they are prohibited by the Geneva conventions, and that “it worked” is expressly forbidden as a defense to committing these crimes.
Yesterday began the first of many congressional investigations to come. Who’s testifying? One of the first was an FBI agent directly involved in the interrogation of both Abu Zubaydah and KSM. According to him and his records, virtually ALL of the information was gained in the first few hours by the FBI using traditional techniques. Enter the CIA (under orders of Cheney). They began to waterboard them, and they immediately shut down and would give no further information. In case you aren’t up to speed, the FBI withdrew from the interrogations about 4-6 months after the CIA came in with the head telling all agents to steer clear of this, it’s not going to turn out well. More to come later….
So, how does everyone feel about what was done in the name of our country? Is waterboarding torture? Jesse Ventura, a former governor, former wrestler, and former Navy SEAL who was voluntarily waterboarded in the SERE (survive, evade, resist, escape) program says it absolutely is. He describes it as the complete sensation of drowning, even though he knew it was unlikely to cause his death in those controlled circumstances. If it was done to a member of your family, would you call it torture?
If it is torture (which it has been determined to be by the Red Cross, official authority as per the Geneva conventions), was it ok for us to do it to these horrible people who attacked us? If so, why? Because it kept us safe? No, that’s being debunked as I type. Then maybe it’s ok because we hate them so much? If that’s justification, then why did we prosecute our own soldiers when they waterboarded prisoners of war in Viet Nam? Why did we put to death those who did it to our soldiers in Japan? Why were our soldiers in Iraq prosecuted (one still in jail today) for doing this at Abu Ghraib? The government said they were “a few bad apples” to justify punishing them, while we now know the orders came from Rumsfeld who got them from Cheney.
So, what are everyone’s thoughts on this period in our country’s history? Did we do what we needed to and had to do? Did we overstep our bounds, sacrifice our morals for our safety? Are we, as Al Quada claims, a nation of hypocrites?
Now, for those of you who turn on the news occasionally, and especially those with a political inclination, we have a heated controversy between the left and the right about these “enhanced interrogation techniques” used on accused terrorists during the last administration. For the sake of brevity, I’ll stay with waterboarding for this opinion.
What we know: Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded 83 times. Kalid Shaik Muhammed was waterboarded 183 times. They gave up valuable information, and they’re terrorists anyway. So far, sounds pretty good. Hey, the whole country was scared shitless and we did what we had to do, right? Not so fast…
Our former VP Dick Cheney (the one who spent most of his 8 years in office in a “secret, undisclosed location”) is now on various talk shows (FOX news, Face the Nation, State of the Union, and even a small time talk show in North Dakota or Montana) at least once every few weeks, and twice so far this week alone. He’s admitted that he authorized these “techniques” but disputes that they’re torture. His lawyers wrote legal memos saying so. Others who side with him go so far as to say that even if they’re torture, they were effective in extracting vital information from our enemies and thus justified — despite the fact that they are prohibited by the Geneva conventions, and that “it worked” is expressly forbidden as a defense to committing these crimes.
Yesterday began the first of many congressional investigations to come. Who’s testifying? One of the first was an FBI agent directly involved in the interrogation of both Abu Zubaydah and KSM. According to him and his records, virtually ALL of the information was gained in the first few hours by the FBI using traditional techniques. Enter the CIA (under orders of Cheney). They began to waterboard them, and they immediately shut down and would give no further information. In case you aren’t up to speed, the FBI withdrew from the interrogations about 4-6 months after the CIA came in with the head telling all agents to steer clear of this, it’s not going to turn out well. More to come later….
So, how does everyone feel about what was done in the name of our country? Is waterboarding torture? Jesse Ventura, a former governor, former wrestler, and former Navy SEAL who was voluntarily waterboarded in the SERE (survive, evade, resist, escape) program says it absolutely is. He describes it as the complete sensation of drowning, even though he knew it was unlikely to cause his death in those controlled circumstances. If it was done to a member of your family, would you call it torture?
If it is torture (which it has been determined to be by the Red Cross, official authority as per the Geneva conventions), was it ok for us to do it to these horrible people who attacked us? If so, why? Because it kept us safe? No, that’s being debunked as I type. Then maybe it’s ok because we hate them so much? If that’s justification, then why did we prosecute our own soldiers when they waterboarded prisoners of war in Viet Nam? Why did we put to death those who did it to our soldiers in Japan? Why were our soldiers in Iraq prosecuted (one still in jail today) for doing this at Abu Ghraib? The government said they were “a few bad apples” to justify punishing them, while we now know the orders came from Rumsfeld who got them from Cheney.
So, what are everyone’s thoughts on this period in our country’s history? Did we do what we needed to and had to do? Did we overstep our bounds, sacrifice our morals for our safety? Are we, as Al Quada claims, a nation of hypocrites?
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