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

[Plane]

<<I have read this book and I highly reccomend it.>>

I didn't read the book but a magazine - - I believe the New York Times weekend mag - - had a good article on it.  I believe Patton got into some very deep shit on this not only because the whole column was lost but because he was said to have ordered the project out of pure nepotism.  If his son-in-law had not been a prisoner there, it would never have happened.  Maybe the book dealt with that accusation more fully - - the magazine article just mentioned it in passing.

This book treats the circumstances and suffering of both sides with cold eyes , it is one of the best sources I know of to lean about the standard of treatment of POWs in that theater.

This is where one may read of the routine punching of German Officers and the necessity for some American prisoners to hide their ethnicity.

[Michael Tee]

<<This is where one may read of the routine punching of German Officers and the necessity for some American prisoners to hide their ethnicity.>>

The debate about American atrocities has very little to do with punching, as you well know.  It has to do with anal rape, attack dogs, electric shock, waterboarding, dislocating joints, beating to death, suffocating to death and sadistic sexual perversion.  Nice attempt to divert attention from your side's horrendous atrocities, though. 

The necessity for some American prisoners to hide their ethnicity I presume was a reference to Nazi policies of racial extermination.  It sounds from your post as if that came as a real shock to you.

[Plane]

<<This is where one may read of the routine punching of German Officers and the necessity for some American prisoners to hide their ethnicity.>>

The debate about American atrocities has very little to do with punching, as you well know.  It has to do with anal rape, attack dogs, electric shock, waterboarding, dislocating joints, beating to death, suffocating to death and sadistic sexual perversion.  Nice attempt to divert attention from your side's horrendous atrocities, though. 

The necessity for some American prisoners to hide their ethnicity I presume was a reference to Nazi policies of racial extermination.  It sounds from your post as if that came as a real shock to you.

No ,not a shock I have seen several sorces that could point to Natzi propaganda accuseing the US of being a tool of the Jews and of useing Negros as rapists as a matter of policy .

Little is really new.

[Michael Tee]

<<No ,not a shock I have seen several sorces that could point to Natzi propaganda accuseing the US of being a tool of the Jews and of useing Negros as rapists as a matter of policy .

<<Little is really new.>>

Well, I'm glad, because I got the impression from your post that the book was telling you stuff you didn't already know.

[Plane]

<<No ,not a shock I have seen several sorces that could point to Natzi propaganda accuseing the US of being a tool of the Jews and of useing Negros as rapists as a matter of policy .

<<Little is really new.>>

Well, I'm glad, because I got the impression from your post that the book was telling you stuff you didn't already know.

I know that Natzis propaganda , KGB propaganda , never went away , the same charges get leveled nowadays.

[Michael Tee]

<<I know that Natzis propaganda , KGB propaganda , never went away , the same charges get leveled nowadays.>>

Abu Ghraib, Baghram Base, Guantanamo, secret CIA torture chambers and renditions are all just Nazi and KGB propaganda?

WOW, good to know the U.S. military really AREN'T a bunch of torturing, murdering thugs.  Thanks for filling us in, plane.  I'll send off a letter right away to the editors of the major metropolitan dailies and tell 'em to stop printing Soviet and Nazi propaganda.  How dumb can they be, eh?

[Plane]

<<I know that Natzis propaganda , KGB propaganda , never went away , the same charges get leveled nowadays.>>

Abu Ghraib, Baghram Base, Guantanamo, secret CIA torture chambers and renditions are all just Nazi and KGB propaganda?

WOW, good to know the U.S. military really AREN'T a bunch of torturing, murdering thugs.  Thanks for filling us in, plane.  I'll send off a letter right away to the editors of the major metropolitan dailies and tell 'em to stop printing Soviet and Nazi propaganda.  How dumb can they be, eh?

Guntanamo is an example of Propaganda purely , Bagram and Abu Graib are still being investigated but serve as good examples of how hard it is to get away uncaught with that sort of misbehavior. Whistleblowers abound as never before , news media are eager to expose as never before , and the public is involved more directly in first hand knoledge than ever before.

I wouldn't doubt that the rate of catching wrongdoers like this is much higher than ever , if you shot a handfull of Japaneese Prisoners in the middle of the Phillipine campaign covering it up would have been easy and only barely necessacery.

[Lanya]

Plane: <<Guntanamo is an example of Propaganda purely..........>>

Source?

[Plane]

Plane: <<Guntanamo is an example of Propaganda purely..........>>

Source?

I have been to Guntanamo , long ago.

Lately I have seen a lot of spurious charges leveled at the new prison there.

Pick your favoriate spurious charge and I will look something up .

[Michael Tee]

<<Guntanamo is an example of Propaganda purely ,>>

Do you really believe this bullshit?  Guantanamo is a place where men captured in battle are kept detained without trial and without charges for five years in conditions including sensory deprivation which have driven one of them, a Canadian teenager Omar Khadr, to the brink of insanity.  It's a violation of every legal and humanitarian principle.  These men served a cause with at least as much dedication as your Green Card-driven G.I.s and because of some absurd legal technicality are being deprived of all the protections of the Geneva Conventions.

<< Bagram and Abu Graib are still being investigated >>

That's bullshit.  The atrocities at Baghram Base took place at least two years ago.  The Nuremburg War Criminals were  tried and executed in less time and that's for plotting and carrying out WWII and the Holocaust, something a little bit more complex than the torture and murder of a few prisoners and also involving four-party judicial and prosecutorial entities.  "Still being investigated" my ass!

<<but serve as good examples of how hard it is to get away uncaught with that sort of misbehavior. >>

Who got caught?  The small fry.  Not the officers in charge.  Who got punished?  Nobody, beyone a ridiculous slap on the wrist.

<<Whistleblowers abound as never before >>

Bullshit.  On what possible evidence can you make that statment?

<< news media are eager to expose as never before >>

more bullshit.  where's the evidence?

<< and the public is involved more directly in first hand knoledge than ever before.>>

That's absurd.  Totally unlike WWII and Viet Nam, the public is dependent on the "embedded" reporter.  The exact opposite of what you claim is true.  The combat reporting has never before been as tightly controlled as it is under Bush and Cheney.

<<I wouldn't doubt that the rate of catching wrongdoers like this is much higher than ever , if you shot a handfull of Japaneese Prisoners in the middle of the Phillipine campaign covering it up would have been easy and only barely necessacery.>>

That's because of the Japs' atrocious treatment of Allied prisoners.  The fact is, even with that atrocious treatment, there is no recorded case of US torture of prisoners after 62 years in a war fought by millions of Americans.  Not one.  There was no torture.  

[Plane]

None reported is not none.

[Plane]

<<Guntanamo is an example of Propaganda purely ,>>

Do you really believe this bullshit?  Guantanamo is a place where men captured in battle are kept detained without trial and without charges for five years in conditions including sensory deprivation which have driven one of them, a Canadian teenager Omar Khadr, to the brink of insanity.  It's a violation of every legal and humanitarian principle.  These men served a cause with at least as much dedication as your Green Card-driven G.I.s and because of some absurd legal technicality are being deprived of all the protections of the Geneva Conventions.


POWs do not need trials , since they were fighting sans uniforms or government sanction , I suppose we could try them as spys or as pirates snd hang most of them , is this your suggestion?

When were the captured combatants of WWII given trials? This is an example of sillyness.

The brink of insanity is where one must start when one joins the Al Queda , if a dark quiet room counts as torture what wouldn't?

<< Bagram and Abu Graib are still being investigated >>

That's bullshit.  The atrocities at Baghram Base took place at least two years ago.  The Nuremburg War Criminals were  tried and executed in less time and that's for plotting and carrying out WWII and the Holocaust, something a little bit more complex than the torture and murder of a few prisoners and also involving four-party judicial and prosecutorial entities.  "Still being investigated" my ass!


Am I wrong? American trials tend in recent years to grow longer and longer this is a problem for everyone involved. A crime this serious deserves te full treatment. But I agree justice delayed is not an improvement in disapline.

<<but serve as good examples of how hard it is to get away uncaught with that sort of misbehavior. >>

Who got caught?  The small fry.  Not the officers in charge.  Who got punished?  Nobody, beyone a ridiculous slap on the wrist.

What Officer was guilty of what in particular? Carreers have been truncated at the O-10 level and that is pretty serious for someone not actually charged with an actual crime , but only being unaware of a serious situation within their sphere of responsibility.

<<Whistleblowers abound as never before >>

Bullshit.  On what possible evidence can you make that statment?


What were the stats on whistle blowers during WWII ? None at all?

<< news media are eager to expose as never before >>

more bullshit.  where's the evidence?


Is the Media supportive of the administration , certainly not all of it.

<< and the public is involved more directly in first hand knoledge than ever before.>>

That's absurd.  Totally unlike WWII and Viet Nam, the public is dependent on the "embedded" reporter.  The exact opposite of what you claim is true.  The combat reporting has never before been as tightly controlled as it is under Bush and Cheney.


No I mean that there are more news men and more camera men and more analists in a much smaller theater , are they doing less of a job? It is not because the government controlls them more , they don't "embedded " does not describe half of the reporters in Iraq, but it would be a good description for all of the WWII reporters none of them were uncensored , was there a picture of a dead american at all during the first two years of WWII? The feild in Iraq is so crouded with reporters that the record for reporters killed and wounded is held not by Vietnam which was longer or WWII which was bigger but by Iraq which is saturated with reporters.


<<I wouldn't doubt that the rate of catching wrongdoers like this is much higher than ever , if you shot a handfull of Japaneese Prisoners in the middle of the Phillipine campaign covering it up would have been easy and only barely necessacery.>>

That's because of the Japs' atrocious treatment of Allied prisoners.  The fact is, even with that atrocious treatment, there is no recorded case of US torture of prisoners after 62 years in a war fought by millions of Americans.  Not one.  There was no torture.  

None reported ? I have heard first hand storys myself , the diffrence seems to be in expectation .

[Michael Tee]

<<None reported is not none.>>

So what?  Some reported is not some.  (I'm thinking of alien abductions here.)

In the absence of detailed questionnaires completed by each and every serving soldier with scupulous honesty, we have to rely on probabilities.  IMHO the absence of any reports, given the vast numbers of men involved and the length of time elapsed, I would say the absence of any reports of torture is a pretty reliable, high-probability indicator of the absence of torture.  Your idle speculation that torture might have occurred is IMHO extremely unlikely.  

[Plane]

<<None reported is not none.>>

So what?  Some reported is not some.  (I'm thinking of alien abductions here.)

In the absence of detailed questionnaires completed by each and every serving soldier with scupulous honesty, we have to rely on probabilities.  IMHO the absence of any reports, given the vast numbers of men involved and the length of time elapsed, I would say the absence of any reports of torture is a pretty reliable, high-probability indicator of the absence of torture.  Your idle speculation that torture might have occurred is IMHO extremely unlikely.  

Not when I have heard first hand accounts of things that would not be tolerated in the present.

The press is more free now , the public is more sensitive and the law is more strict.

Early in the invasion of Iraq an officer was fired for frightening a prisoner , can you find an example of FDR, or any president earlyer than Carter , doing anything as extreme as that to discourage mistreatment of prisoners?

Do not, just do not , simply repeat that FDR shot them , you have not yet overcome my scepticism on that point.

[Michael Tee]

<<Not when I have heard first hand accounts of things that would not be tolerated in the present.>>

Fudging the issue again.  The issue is torture, not what would or would not be tolerated in the present.  In any event, there seems to be an awful lot of stuff (waterboarding, for example) that is tolerated in the present.  That was never done (by Americans) in WWII under FDR.

<<The press is more free now  . . . >>

That's just TOTAL bullshit, the press is under tighter wraps now (embedding policies, never used before in American history from the Civil War to Viet Nam) than at any previous time.

<< the public is more sensitive . . . >>

Yeah, right!  Sensitivity just OOOZING from every pore of Rush Limbaugh's body and all the other fascists who try to sell torture as "frat boy pranks."  The public, my friend, doesn't give a shit.  If it did, every slimeball scum from the President on down would have been impeached for having this happen on their watch.

<< . . .  and the law is more strict.>>

Yeah.  As evidenced by five months being the highest sentence the Human Rights First probe could find for prisoner abuse and Granger's several years for torture and murder.  If that's what you call more strict, I'd hate to see what you call more lax.