Probably the Most Practical Reason Why the U.S. Shouldn't Torture

[Michael Tee]

from today's Reuters, 2 hours ago

<<(Reuters) - Seven U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi army interpreter were attacked while on patrol in an al Qaeda stronghold south of Baghdad on Saturday. Five were killed and three are missing, the U.S. military said.

<<The attack, one of the worst against American ground forces since a U.S.-backed security crackdown began in Baghdad three months ago, took place near the town of Mahmudiya, in the same area where two U.S. soldiers were abducted by al Qaeda insurgents last year before their mutilated bodies were found.

<<U.S. forces have launched a search operation for the missing soldiers, using helicopters, unmanned drones and jets, and have set up checkpoints in the area.>>

Of course, even if the U.S. had observed the Geneva Conventions to the letter, raping a 14-year-old girl and then murdering her and her family in cold blood is not the best way to ensure favourable treatment of your captured servicemen anyway.  Somebody always pays for Dubya's "mistakes" - - too bad it's never Dubya.

[BT]

Are you saying that absent torture al-queda would not have attacked that patrol?

[Mucho]

Are you saying that absent torture al-queda would not have attacked that patrol?

I am almost ( I say ALMOST) surprised that you are so dense as to not understand that these 3 poor souls are going to be the most and most publicly tortured unfortunates to ever existed on planet earth.

[Michael Tee]

<<Are you saying that absent torture al-queda would not have attacked that patrol?>>

I'm saying the odds of these guys being tortured and mutilated by al Qaeda were astronomically increased by the abominable treatment of Arab prisoners in U.S. custody and increased again as much by the rape of the 14-year-old girl and the subsequent murder of the girl and her family.

The most practical reason in the world not to torture prisoners is that your own guys could be treated in the same way.  In its arrogance and cruelty, the U.S. did not believe the racially inferior "ragheads" would be able to take and hold U.S. prisoners, but - - once again - - it appears that Dubya has miscalculated, and the price for his miscalculation will likely be paid by the unfortunate schmucks who have fallen into Iraqi Resistance hands.

[Michael Tee]

<< am almost ( I say ALMOST) surprised that you are so dense as to not understand that these 3 poor souls are going to be the most and most publicly tortured unfortunates to ever existed on planet earth.>>

I was an active member of AI for about 15 years, so I probably understand it better than you do.  I was active in the campaign against torture back in the day when Saddam Hussein was a U.S. client and was virtually immune from any retaliation for some of the worst torture on the face of the earth.  That I would need a lecture from you on the significance of torture is ludicrous.  What is likely to happen to these three ass-holes probably shouldn't happen to any person or animal  in the world.  But the question Americans have to be asking themselves is what moral right do they now have to protest anything done to their men and women when they - - under the sterling leadership of G. W. Bush - - have trashed every safeguard against torture that was painstakingly and laboriously built up over most of the 20th Century?  They didn't care, or they thought the strictures of international law did not apply to them or to their captives.  They were special, and because they were so special, they were outside the law.  Because Bush told them that.  Because Alberto Gonzales told them that.  Now they are going to learn some painful lessons.  Unfortunately not at the expense of the real criminals.  Painful lessons rarely are.

[Lanya]

And this is why I say, trial and imprisonment by the Hague is really too good an end for many of these people.  And it probably won't be their end. 

[BT]

Um so Al queda doesn't have a record of torture and beheading, this behavior is all post abu ghraib?

To be honest mikey I think your if/ then scenario is pretty weak.

Capture of the soldiers is a move to get media attention. They think americans will lose the will to fight if we have soldiers captured and paraded through show torture and executions.

I think they are a bit behind the curve.

According to the latest polls, the vast majority of americans do not have the belly for a fight.

[Michael Tee]

<<Um so Al queda doesn't have a record of torture and beheading, this behavior is all post abu ghraib?>>

"torture and beheading" is BS.  Beheading itself is a traditional form of execution and was used in France and other liberal Western European societies for decades. Torture is not beheading and beheading is not torture.

As far as I know, al Qaeda does not have a record of torture.  The U.S.A. does.

<<To be honest mikey I think your if/ then scenario is pretty weak.>>

I don't have an if/then scenario BT.  The guys might have been tortured anyway.  It's a tradition in that part of the world.  The Brits in the 1930s gave their pilots cyanide capsules to use if captured in Iraq.  What I said was that the odds of their being tortured would be greatly increased because of U.S. torture of prisoners.  Also that regardless of U.S. torture, these guys' fates might have been sealed by the rape of the 14-year-old girl and the murder of her and her family by U.S. "liberators."

<<According to the latest polls, the vast majority of americans do not have the belly for a fight. >>

But Bush and Cheney are still as gung-ho as ever.  They must be very courageous men.

[BT]

The guys might have been tortured anyway.

My point exactly.

But Bush and Cheney are still as gung-ho as ever.  They must be very courageous men.

or they think they are correct. I think they are.

 

[Michael Tee]

<<My point exactly [that the guys might have been tortured anyway.]">>

The operative word is MIGHT.  Your point is pure speculation, with nothing to back it up.  There is no evidence that al Qaeda has tortured Westerners who fell into its hands.  Al Qaeda's hands are cleaner than America's when it comes to torture.

[BT]

The operative word is MIGHT.  Your point is pure speculation, with nothing to back it up.  There is no evidence that al Qaeda has tortured Westerners who fell into its hands. 

Your point is speculation also. You conceded that point earlier.

Al Qaeda's hands are cleaner than America's when it comes to torture

In your previous post you said torture is an old Arab tradition, so i don't see where their hands are any cleaner.

[Plane]

"I'm saying the odds of these guys being tortured and mutilated by al Qaeda were astronomically increased by ................"

What isthe diffrence btween 100% and certainty?

Al Quaeda had good reason to not torture Richard Pearl ,who went to them empty handed and eager to get their side of the story told , but haveing a helpless victim in their hands it was just too good to resist.

Al Queda has a history that includes rape , murder and torture more than is usual even in their neck of the woods.

The US military is procicuteing such deeds more eagerly than any armed force in history ever has. How can you take the trials and convictions of such wrong doers as eidence of Naional wrongdoing ? How can you cut Al Queda so much slack that they have your approval to torture at every oppurtunity they get and never one time call in any way for any reduction in torture?

They send commendations to a guy that beheads with a small dull knife , their own shira law would not allow them to treat a pidgion that badly.

[Michael Tee]

<<In your previous post you said torture is an old Arab tradition, so i don't see where their hands are any cleaner.>>

You think the members of al Qaeda today should be held responsible for the actions of rebel tribesmen in the 1930s?  But by that standard, the Americans of today should be held responsible for the lynchings of the 1940s and 1950s.

When I said al Qaeda's hands are cleaner, I meant that we know for a fact that the U.S. military tortures its prisoners; we can only speculate on al Qaeda because there is no evidence they do.  So we know America's hands are dirty.  We don't know about al Qaeda.

[Michael Tee]

<<Al Quaeda had good reason to not torture Richard Pearl ,who went to them empty handed and eager to get their side of the story told , but haveing a helpless victim in their hands it was just too good to resist.>>

Untrue.  They did not torture Daniel Pearl.

<<Al Queda has a history that includes rape , murder and torture more than is usual even in their neck of the woods.>>

Only the U.S.A. has a rap sheet that includes all three: rape, murder and torture.  I'm not aware of rape or torture attributed to al Qaeda.  Maybe you could enlighten me. 

<<The US military is procicuteing such deeds more eagerly than any armed force in history ever has. >>

That is a joke.  Hundreds of U.S. soldiers were executed for rape and murder in WWII.  Not one executed for rape or murder in Viet Nam or Iraq.  You just make stuff up as you go along with no factual background at all.  How eagerly are they prosecuting anything when the executive branch itself finds the Geneva Conventions "quaint and old-fashioned?"  The Allied leadership of WWII respected and honoured the Geneva Conventions.  How is an executive branch that trashes the Geneva Conventions going to realistically prosecute violations?  You haven't the faintest clue what you are talking about.

<<How can you take the trials and convictions of such wrong doers as eidence of Naional wrongdoing ? >>

The trials and convictions are a joke.  No high-ranking officer charged, let alone convicted.  Nobody sentenced to death.  Nobody sentenced to life without parole.  Nobody sentenced to life, period.  Nobody sentenced to ten years.  With time off for good behaviour, appeals of sentence and convictions still in progress, the examples of Viet Nam and the fate of the mass murderer Wm. Calley, everybody with half a brain knows that the trials are charades and the sentences are kissy-kissy shams.   

<<How can you cut Al Queda so much slack that they have your approval to torture at every oppurtunity they get and never one time call in any way for any reduction in torture?>>

When did I approve torture by anybody?  al Qaeda so far has not tortured anyone, it's too bad they botch some of the beheadings, but the U.S. supervises hangings that are just as badly botched.  To compare what happened to Pearl with the victims of U.S. torture, some 40-odd of whose deaths under "interrogation" are being investigated, is ludicrous.  Some of the victims of U.S. torture were tortured for days before they died.

<<They send commendations to a guy that beheads with a small dull knife , their own shira law would not allow them to treat a pidgion that badly.>>

That's torture?  Negroponte should send some of those guys to visit his proteges in El Salvador and Guatemala to learn what real torture is all about.

[BT]

Last June, followers of al-Qaeda captured two US soldiers at a checkpoint in Yusufiya.

Their mutilated and booby-trapped bodies were found days later after a search by thousands of troops.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/12BF4584-1F11-4A20-A45C-FB95F6202D33.htm