Khalid Sheik Mohammed Waterboarded 183 Times

[ParanoiA]

In any ticking bomb scenario' date=' if the info gained turned out to be incorrect, the bomb would likely go off before the prisoner could be re-tortured.

 

Misleading your captors is a great incentive when time is on the prisoner's side. What are they going to do to you after the bomb detonates, torture you in revenge?[/quote']

 

To play devil's advocate here...what's there to lose then? Ok, so we torture the dude and he lies and we don't find the bomb. Presumably, we weren't going to find the bomb anyway - or else why did we torture? I have no love for any jackass coward planting bombs to kill innocent people. If torture leads to nothing, we're no worse off than letting him sit comfy in his cell.

 

So, amid all the definitions and quibbling over various techniques, the real issue is coming to a collective conclusion about what we, as a society, deem to be the boundary. How far is too far for us, as a nation?

 

And the answer is directly proportional to the reality in the public's faces. Take a look at some photos of little japanese kids after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed. Does waterboarding compare to that?

 

We will do the most evil shit as long as we don't see it. As soon as we actually see people with disfigured faces and bodies, chemical burns, amputations and etc we being to question ourselves.

 

I resent this. We know this and yet we comply with it. That's why these torture threads annoy the hell out of me. One hypocritical post after another. People drawing a line at a technique that doesn't kill nor cause any kind of permanent damange, other than maybe psychological, yet are perfectly ok with all of the other atrocities we commit but don't see on TV.

 

Hell, we are actually ok with annihilating an entire country with nuclear weapons. We depend on that commitment to respond if we are attacked. How can you draw a line at waterboarding, yet remove the line on nuking a country full of innocents?

 

It's good we ask these questions. But I really wish everyone would get a little more real about this. Question yourselves. Why do you draw the lines you do? And why do you excuse yourself from the inconsistencies with your lines?

[iNow]

To play devil's advocate here...what's there to lose then? Ok, so we torture the dude and he lies and we don't find the bomb. Presumably, we weren't going to find the bomb anyway - or else why did we torture? I have no love for any jackass coward planting bombs to kill innocent people. If torture leads to nothing, we're no worse off than letting him sit comfy in his cell.

Implicit in your comments is the assumption that your prisoner has the knowledge you seek. How do you prove that, and how do you ensure you're not torturing someone totally unaware of the knowledge you ultimately seek? (Note, I know you were playing devils advocate, just pointing to a deeper flaw in the logic).

 

 

 

I resent this. We know this and yet we comply with it. That's why these torture threads annoy the hell out of me. One hypocritical post after another. People drawing a line at a technique that doesn't kill nor cause any kind of permanent damange, other than maybe psychological, yet are perfectly ok with all of the other atrocities we commit but don't see on TV.

Again, very flawed logic. Demonstrating that information can be obtained through other means, that torture is not necessary and often not helpful, that the information obtained by these techniques is questionable at best and cannot be relied upon to be accurate... IS NOT THE SAME as "being okay with all of the other atrocities we commit."

 

 

Hell, we are actually ok with annihilating an entire country with nuclear weapons.

No, I'm not. Try again.

 

But I really wish everyone would get a little more real about this. Question yourselves. Why do you draw the lines you do? And why do you excuse yourself from the inconsistencies with your lines?

Because every change begins with a few small steps. You are basically asking why all of us don't try to eat the entire elephant, when we've been taking small bites out of it for years and continue to chew. You are asserting that our inability to immediately swallow the elephant whole makes us have double-standards, and that's laughable.

[The Bear's Key]

To play devil's advocate here...what's there to lose then?

Our nation's ideals and moral footing, a respectable government.

 

If torture leads to nothing, we're no worse off than letting him sit comfy in his cell.

If the torturer acted without official permission from government, then I agree. Otherwise, I'd have to strongly disagree.

 

The torturer must accept a price for going to extremes. A real hero who did manage to extract critical ticking-nuke information would almost certainly receive a pardon. If the torturer erred, the price and risk is jail time. Few would be concerned about jail time if the nation was at such threat -- but only the gutless would cover up the error by lying to the nation to escape a prison sentence -- instead of admitting it.

 

My concern is for what happens to a government infected by the "torture is OK" bug.

[iNow]

what's there to lose then?[/quote']Our nation's ideals and moral footing, a respectable government.

Also we lose the ability to minimize recruitment on the side of the enemy we are fighting. Our decision to circumvent our values for a questionable and non-certain short-term gain does us much harm in the long-run. When we stand by our ideals, we make the decision to fight for our enemy that much more specious and difficult to make... It makes their propaganda seem that much more vacuous, based on lies and misinformation, and removes it as a tool which hurts us.

[Mr Skeptic]

And the answer is directly proportional to the reality in the public's faces. Take a look at some photos of little japanese kids after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed. Does waterboarding compare to that?

 

According to John Stewart, the Japanese waterboarded us seeking information about weapons of mass destruction we might use against them -- yeah, right. And we gave them life imprisonment or execution.

[The Bear's Key]

According to John Stewart, the Japanese waterboarded us seeking information about weapons of mass destruction we might use against them -- yeah, right. And we gave them life imprisonment or execution.

I'd like to find sources of evidence detailing that.

[Mokele]

People drawing a line at a technique that doesn't kill nor cause any kind of permanent damange, other than maybe psychological, yet are perfectly ok with all of the other atrocities we commit but don't see on TV.

 

I love the way you trivialize and dismiss pscyhological pain, as if it doesn't matter.

 

The truth is that death, for all its finality, usually represents a short period of suffering, followed by none at all. Torture and other psychological trauma leaves lasting, permanent psychological damage that can leave a person in daily suffering for the rest of their life. Are you familiar with the sort of damage PTSD can inflict on a person's life? Guess what the most common and mildest consequence of torture is? PTSD.

[ParanoiA]

Again, very flawed logic. Demonstrating that information can be obtained through other means, that torture is not necessary and often not helpful, that the information obtained by these techniques is questionable at best and cannot be relied upon to be accurate... IS NOT THE SAME as "being okay with all of the other atrocities we commit."

 

Well, I guess I'm confused as to why you thought I was speaking to this point. I agree, efficacy trumps all. My comments are about the moral rejection of the method.

 

No, I'm not. Try again.

 

So if some country launches a hundred nukes at our country, your position is to reject nuclear retaliation? Just die and take it for humanity?

 

Even so, I think that's quite a minority position. Most are hopeful this kind of thing would never happen, and admit it's no easy decision, but would retaliate in kind. In fact, risking subsequent potential nuclear warfare might just require the business end of MAD.

 

Because every change begins with a few small steps. You are basically asking why all of us don't try to eat the entire elephant, when we've been taking small bites out of it for years and continue to chew. You are asserting that our inability to immediately swallow the elephant whole makes us have double-standards, and that's laughable.

 

No. I'm really asking.

 

Why do you draw the lines where you do? "Because every change begins with a few small steps" is not an answer - that's a rebuttal.

 

I'm asking you to ask yourself. Not to answer me.

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My concern is for what happens to a government infected by the "torture is OK" bug.

 

My concern is for what happens to a republic that lies to itself, voluntarily; does intellectual acrobats to condemn waterboarding, but ok mass murder of innocents.

 

I love the way you trivialize and dismiss pscyhological pain, as if it doesn't matter.

 

I suffer from psychological pain, and I know it matters. My point was a clinical one.

 

The aftermath of bombing Japan with nukes was *both* pyschological ( on a scale that dwarfs waterboarding and my personal issues to laughable ) as well as physical. That was my point.

 

Psychological pain only, one person, one case at a time = no.

Psychological pain and physical suffering/disfigurement on mass innocents = yes.

 

What a proud country I live in.

 

Are you familiar with the sort of damage PTSD can inflict on a person's life?

 

Yes, I've been married to such a person for 18 years. That doesn't make indiscriminate nuclear mass murder and disfigurement any better.

Edited April 25, 2009 by ParanoiA
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[DrP]

I can't be doing with any of it. Some bloke in the UK is suing for mistreatment. He came to the UK illeagally in the first place, but was given asylum. After 2 years he left and lived in Taliban ruled Afganistan. He then went to the training camps in Pakistan and tried to enter the UK under a false passport during a time a war. He was arrested and locked up. Now he's suing. **** him!!! Send him back to pakistan or afganistan - or anywhere, I don't care - Don't give him asylum here again - too many links to the terrorist organisations. Deport him instead on grounds of national security. Or just shoot him.

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My post has been Auto eddited - in this case I ment the word to be as strong as possible. I'll say it againF*ck him! Deport him or shoot him - don't give ANY money or a place to stay here.

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In case you haven't noticed - this subject makes me angry.

[The Bear's Key]

...to condemn waterboarding, but ok mass murder of innocents.

You're entirely wrong, and missed a critical qualifier (in bold) which equalizes the reasoning of both those variables in your quote.

 

Being against the use of torture by official means.

Being OK with the potential dangers that abiding by the Constitution might bring.

 

That doesn't mean we lie down and take the attack, it means we use our heads, intellect, creativity, technology, and every possible means within Constitutional bounds -- even if the price of not lowering our standards is danger from attack.

 

Give up if you want, like other states less threatened by attack did in 2004 elections, but the real heroes in my eyes were the areas most likely to be terrored* having voted against the promisers of national safety, crafters of the "Patriot" Act, gutless chickenhawk politicians, and that a vote for Dems was an efective surrender to terrorists.

 

And the other real heroes are those living in the panicked states who tried valiantly to fight against the grain and tide of fear.

 

*(New York, California, Washington DC, plus virtually all major hubs of finance and commerce).

[Mokele]

Psychological pain only, one person, one case at a time = no.

Psychological pain and physical suffering/disfigurement on mass innocents = yes.

 

So, if less people suffer than will be saved, it's OK?

 

By this logic, it's OK to extract information from someone by tying them to a chair and bringing their 8-year-old daughter in, then skinning her alive in front of him until he speaks? After all, that's just two lives, versus dozens, hundreds, or thousands. Would you be OK with that?

[ParanoiA]

You're entirely wrong, and missed a critical qualifier (in bold) which equalizes the reasoning of both those variables in your quote.

 

Being against the use of torture by official means.

Being OK with the potential dangers that abiding by the Constitution might bring.

 

That doesn't mean we lie down and take the attack, it means we use our heads, intellect, creativity, technology, and every possible means within Constitutional bounds -- even if the price of not lowering our standards is danger from attack.

 

Give up if you want, like other states less threatened by attack did in 2004 elections, but the real heroes in my eyes were the areas most likely to be terrored* having voted against the promisers of national safety, crafters of the "Patriot" Act, gutless chickenhawk politicians, and that a vote for Dems was an efective surrender to terrorists.

 

And the other real heroes are those living in the panicked states who tried valiantly to fight against the grain and tide of fear.

 

*(New York, California, Washington DC, plus virtually all major hubs of finance and commerce).

 

Well, I'm having a hard time fielding your posts because your points aren't really what I'm taking issue with.

 

Here, let me clear up my position, and then I'll go back. I don't condone nor condemn torture. It's open to me, if they are not a citizen, and if it's believed it will work and the cost in human life is justified - in the same way that the cost in human life is justified for nuclear retaliation.

 

The key here is, "if it will work" - which everyone believes it won't. I've read plenty of articles detailing why it doesn't work and so forth - so its efficacy is nil. So I can't see a scenario where I'd support torture.

 

In other words, appeals to effectiveness and constitutionality are good arguments against the use of torture. Appeals to cruelty, and moral objections are not sound arguments to me, at all. That's what I'm arguing here in this thread.

 

 

And it's because of the obvious. I'm not going to sit here and pretend as if I wouldn't rape a baby to save the world. Sounds hideous huh? But you wouldn't do something horrible to prevent an even more horrible thing? That's a false dilemma, to be sure. But the point builds off of Mokele's earlier in the thread, about societies drawing moral lines.

 

I have to deal with the notion that nuclear retaliation is necessary. I have to deal with the reality that war devastates innocent people and collateral damage is a freaking insulting idea to the entire human race. Yet we use these excuses to commit atrocities. We feel like we're justified, that we've thought it all out and this is the nature of the beast. As long as we're not "aiming" for kiddos, then it's justified to slaughter them - because of some greater good or the best of a bad situation.

 

The moral repugnance of torture enjoys no exclusive boundary to me. If it's good for slaughtering babies in vietnam, then it's good for dunking innocent ones in water until they almost drown.

 

If I'm to draw a line at torture - for moral reasons - then I'd better become a pacifist, or I'm a hypocrite. Hypocrisy requires you to ignore what's wrong with your logic - it's the klaxon for truth evasion. It may make you feel better, but then, believing in Zeus might make you feel better...

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So, if less people suffer than will be saved, it's OK?

 

By this logic, it's OK to extract information from someone by tying them to a chair and bringing their 8-year-old daughter in, then skinning her alive in front of him until he speaks? After all, that's just two lives, versus dozens, hundreds, or thousands. Would you be OK with that?

 

We can do this all day. By your logic, it's OK if the earth explodes if Captain Marvel hands you a sadistic choice between the end of all humanity or skin an 8 year old alive. Really, 6 billion people dead because you can't step up and make the tough decision?

 

I'm not arguing utilitarian extremism, I'm arguing that we stop acting like we're "above" this and that with blanket statements on torture - although "officially" we probably should. Be real. It's always open whether you like it or not.

 

That's why I prefer no absolutist positions here. Torture is a bad idea for plenty of good reasons, there's no point in appealing to inconsistent notions of morality.

[iNow]

Torture is a bad idea for plenty of good reasons, there's no point in appealing to inconsistent notions of morality.

 

I think we can all agree on that. Also, I think we can all agree that there have been several good reasons against torture articulated (namely a lack of efficacy, questionable accuracy of the data obtained, providing powerful recruiting tools for our enemies, etc.), so why are we still here arguing?

 

It's because, on top of the objective arguments against torture, there are also subjective/morality based ones, and we're trying to find consensus there. The point is though... we have all the reasons we need not to do it, and that's the thing we should continue to reinforce in the midst of these grayer morality based exchanges.

[Dudde]

it's finding the evidence to support the torture that makes it a hard decision in my eye. Of course it's going to be difficult to determine that if you subject Person A to so much torture, he can tell you where the next attack is planned - and then that the information will be reliable.

 

I'm not against torture to get information as long as there's no mistake that the person under question has the information you're looking for - but I wouldn't trust 99% of any information obtained during torture personally.

[Mr Skeptic]

I'd have to disagree that the effectiveness is nil. There is a middle ground in how much physical/psychological discomfort is the best to use on prisoners. Too little, and it becomes a powerful recruiting tool (they're wimps, they won't hurt you), and too much, and it also becomes a powerful recruiting tool (they're monsters, look what they do to prisoners). The optimal middle ground for this is not an absolute; it would depend at least on who we're dealing with.

 

Likewise for the effectiveness at extracting information. Too little physical/psychological discomfort, and they might just comfortably sit there with no reason to say anything. Too much, and they'd have already said anything they'd be willing to say under any circumstances. But what I see here is a continuum; no sharp dividing line between an acceptable level and an unacceptable level -- it would depend on circumstances. Personally, I would not trust what a prisoner says regardless of whether he was tortured. I think that there is also a statistical bias making it particularly unlikely that someone who was tortured would divulge valuable information -- the fact that he was tortured most likely indicates an unwillingness to talk.

 

If torture is completely ineffective, one might wonder why the government would encourage it (or at least getting as close as they think they can legally get away with). They'd presumably be the ones best in the position of knowing its effectiveness. A thought experiment: If someone in uniform were to walk up to a random person off the street and ask them if they knew of any crimes someone had done, what are the odds that they will tell? What if instead of just asking, they started pulling off their fingernails with a pair of pliers?

[Dudde]

I do agree with what you're saying, don't get me wrong - and I'm sure we've extracted a margin of useful information from torturing suspects - the government also has a lot of physicians hanging around I'm sure who monitor the torturees and tell the interrogators when the stress is too little or too much.

 

But such as in the example dealing with a person in uniform walking up and pulling fingernails with a pair of pliers - even if most people didn't know who the uniform was talking about, don't you think they'd get some mighty vivid memories once that first fingernail came off? What if we started torturing somebody who knew nothing about what was going on - I'm sure we'd still receive information out of them, but how accurate is THAT going to be? A lot of people just say things to get the pain to stop - a test you could easily learn if you have a younger sibling.

[The Bear's Key]

If torture is completely ineffective, one might wonder why the government would encourage it (or at least getting as close as they think they can legally get away with). They'd presumably be the ones best in the position of knowing its effectiveness.

The functional parts of government would know (and they do say "ineffective").

 

But as for ideologically-minded politicians, they usually wouldn't have a clue.

 

As for why they'd encourage something dubious, it's possible they're compensating against market forces at work. Our type of business model depends on growth. Without it, a huge business enterprise/structure fails -- and creating a recruitment tool for jihadists might keep demand up for the businesses that get military contracts. Plus it likely also boosts demand within the politisphere in the form of votes (on increasing military action).

 

Conceivably, it should take only a handful of people demanding continued secrecy in government to replenish the necessary variables/catalysts.

 

Question is...would the relevant politicians and/or industry heads be that unpatriotic (and especially, monstrous)?

 

 

Joint Personnel Recovery Agency

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/04/24/politics/washingtonpost/main4967676.shtml

Daniel Baumgartner, who was the JPRA's chief of staff in 2002 and transmitted the memos and attachments, said the agency "sent a lot of cautionary notes" regarding harsh techniques. "There is a difference between what we do in training and what the administration wanted the information for.....

 

Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said he thinks the attachment was deliberately ignored and perhaps suppressed.....

 

"It's part of a pattern of squelching dissent.....

 

But the JPRA's two-page attachment, titled "Operational Issues Pertaining to the Use of Physical/Psychological Coercion in Interrogation," questioned the effectiveness of employing extreme duress to gain intelligence.

........

"The requirement to obtain information from an uncooperative source as quickly as possible -- in time to prevent, for example, an impending terrorist attack that could result in loss of life -- has been forwarded as a compelling argument for the use of torture," the document said. "In essence, physical and/or psychological duress are viewed as an alternative to the more time-consuming conventional interrogation process. The error inherent in this line of thinking is the assumption that, through torture, the interrogator can extract reliable and accurate information. History and a consideration of human behavior would appear to refute this assumption."

........

The JPRA attachment said the key deficiency of physical or psychological duress is the reliability and accuracy of the information gained. "A subject in pain may provide an answer, any answer, or many answers in order to get the pain to stop," it said.

 

In conclusion, the document said, "the application of extreme physical and/or psychological duress (torture) has some serious operational deficits, most notably the potential to result in unreliable information." The word "extreme" is underlined.

 

 

@ Mr Skeptic: that article happened to echo Jon Stewart's claim....

 

...the planned techniques stemmed from Chinese communist practices and had been deemed torture when employed against American personnel, the former administration official said. The U.S. military prosecuted its own troops for using waterboarding in the Philippines and tried Japanese officers on war crimes charges for its use against Americans and other allied nationals during World War II.

 

 

McCain: Japanese Hanged For Waterboarding

 

Interesting what John McCain said....

 

...reminded people Thursday that some Japanese were tried and hanged for torturing American prisoners during World War II with techniques that included waterboarding.

.....

"I would also hope that he would not want to be associated with a technique which was invented in the Spanish Inquisition, was used by Pol Pot in one of the great eras of genocide in history and is being used on Burmese monks as we speak," the Arizona senator said. "America is a better nation than that."

 

 

Waterboarding Used to Be a Crime

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/02/AR2007110201170.html

After Japan surrendered, the United States organized and participated in the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, generally called the Tokyo War Crimes Trials. Leading members of Japan's military and government elite were charged, among their many other crimes, with torturing Allied military personnel and civilians. The principal proof upon which their torture convictions were based was conduct that we would now call waterboarding.

........

A towel was fixed under the chin and down over the face. Then many buckets of water were poured into the towel so that the water gradually reached the mouth and rising further eventually also the nostrils, which resulted in his becoming unconscious and collapsing like a person drowned. This procedure was sometimes repeated 5-6 times in succession.

 

 

The biggest drawback I sense about official torture is a look at who practiced it (scan the above).

 

Verification...

 

As to the facts and sources of info: the best lead so far is Google Books which lets you search many copyrighted books (with varying limits) and many in the public domain. The Project Gutenberg collection of free eBooks (over 100,000) and public domain works might be useful too.

 

The first set of 3 excerpts below is from 2007 (pg 519-522). The next set of 2 excerpts are from 1996 -- I wanted to include a source from before 9/11.

 

Neither of these have definitive evidence on the specific tortures the Japanese were hanged for, but there's a plenty to learn about the culture and effectiveness of torture.

 

 

From Torture and Democracy‎...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pages 1 & 2 of Hidden Horrors...

 

 

Edited April 26, 2009 by The Bear's Key
Added excerpts

[iNow]

And for anyone who is still deluded into thinking that torture is our best option, who have bought into this fallacious idea that other techniques at information extraction are some how less efficacious... Read this document which was put together by people who actually know what they're talking about on this subject:

 

http://www.fas.org/irp/dni/educing.pdf