Giving in to terrorism
President Bush and the “renegades� in The Senate have recently come to a compromise on following The Geneva Convention regarding torture—meaning the torture will continue and past abuses of basic human rights will be absolved. In other words, freedoms that are found in our Constitution have been trashed.
When Senator McCain—who knows about being tortured—spoke of what might happen to our soldiers because of what we were doing to their soldiers, he was pooh-poohed by the radical right. We heard Rush and Sean Hannity tell us that following The Geneva Convention in the treatment of POWs is pointless because our enemies don’t follow it anyway. Sort of like, “but everyone else is doing it, mommy.� Sort of like stooping to their level.
In WWII, both Germany and Japan committed atrocities against our soldiers, and yet we did not ditch the Geneva protocols. Why? Because we’re the good guys! We hold the moral high ground—at least, we used to.
Please don’t tell me that torture is necessary to extract information vital to our security. If you torture anyone enough, they’ll tell you anything you want to hear—whether it’s true or not.
In September of 2001, in a speech to Congress, President Bush told America that we were attacked on 9/11 because, “they hate our freedoms.� The President called the terrorists, “enemies of freedom.� The President used the word freedom no less than thirteen times.
Now, I don’t believe for a second that American freedoms were the cause of the attacks, but for the sake of argument, let’s assume they were.
If the terrorists “hate our freedoms,� and we trash these freedoms, doesn’t that mean the terrorists have won?
On the other hand, maybe Bush is the smartest guy ever. By taking away our freedoms, he’s taking away the terrorists’ reason to hate us!
Comments
Let's say I am a U.S. Army company commander serving in Iraq and my guys capture a known insurgent we've been looking for.
Let's say we have reliable and tested intel that this guy knows about plans to ambush one of our patrols in the next 1 to 24 hours.
So, during his interrogation I pull out my 9 mm automatic point it at his head. I tell him I will blow his [epletive] brains out if he doesn't tell me what I want to know. He still refuses. Let's say I slap him in the face to get his attention and then I tell him, he has one more chance to save his own life, then I fire a shot right next to his head and this scares the [expleteive] out of him and he starts spilling his guts. The information provided is good and we avoid the ambush and take out a large IED and 2 enemy snipers. The lives of at least several of my soldiers are spared because of this coerced confession.
Did I do a bad thing? It was torture, right?
If yes you think I was bad, do you think I should be arrested and sent to prison or just thrown out of the army?
Answer honestly please.
Thank you for reading and thank you for writing.
I'm not sure how I feel about dealing in "hypotheticals."
I don't consider what you described to be torture.
It's interesting to me that you, yourself have a question about it. If you feel you did a "bad" thing, that's between you and your God. I'm not certain if the Geneva Convention allows that sort of thing. I know when I went through E&E that technique was not used.
But let's take it back a little. Why does this guy want to kill you and your fellows?
If we're going to deal in hypothetical situations . . .
If the situation were reversed; if this were done to you, would you feel tortured?
If the US was invaded, the President arrested and held for trial, and some foreigners were trying to instill their way of life on us. How would you react?
What if they set up a zone in the middle of the country and in there was the most vile of the vices prohibited by your religion? What if they killed your family--accidentally--of course.
Do you think you might fight these infidels? I know I would!
OK, you're caught and captured by the enemy, your interrogator pulls out a 9mm and scares the [expletive] out of you because he wants information that will save his comrades'--the people who killed your family--lives.
Would you feel tortured?
Posted by: MILLERJCAPTUSA | October 31, 2006 08:27 PM
Actually the situation was real and the response was to expell the officer from the service.
Just wondered what you thought. Personally I have no problem with the actions taken by the Capt., especially when it saved American lives. The Army didn't agree.
Thanks for your honest answer.
Posted by: MILLERJ | November 1, 2006 08:13 PM
For the hypothetical situation of the Army company commander, I say good for you. That isnt torture in my book. In my humble opinion, I say do whatever it takes in this fight. This to me, is a no holds barred fight.
Thank you for reading and thank you for writing.
Turns out it wasn't hypothetical. See comment above.
Posted by: Leonard Dolan | November 2, 2006 07:56 PM