Let's Go Waterboarding!!!

[iplaw]

Why is this guy being allowed back on the board?  Also, if the Admin knows (and they can find out) it's AOX, why don't they let him use his old ID?

[FOTD]

Torture is ALREADY illegal. Waterboarding has been considered torture for over a century.
Bush/Cheney is playing cya.
Why do you support waterboarding? Just currious.

[Conan71]

Aox,

Allow me to re-quote myself.  This is why I like waterboarding:

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Someone please explain to me how this is a form of torture?



[}:)]

[tim huntzinger]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD

Torture is ALREADY illegal. Waterboarding has been considered torture for over a century.
Bush/Cheney is playing cya.
Why do you support waterboarding? Just currious.

Shooting someone is illegal, too, depending on the circumstances.  I wish one of the candidates would come right out and say 'If I knew that someone had information that could save lives I would personally pour the water.'
Scaring someone is a whole lot better than cutting a head off or slicing a face off with piano wire.  If the boarding is done just to punish someone it should be illegal and decried, otherwise grab a towel and a hankie.

[Hometown]

I admit I skimmed this thread.  All I have time for.  Has anyone mentioned the fact that we prosecuted the Japanese for waterboarding?  Following WWII we prosecuted it as a war crime.

[rwarn17588]

What Hometown said.

The trouble is with torture -- other than it's clearly illegal with the treaties we've signed -- is it doesn't work. The information extracted from torture is unreliable. This is indisputable.

The "ticking clock" scenario that a few people cite for justifying torture doesn't consider that the information you will get will have you going willy-nilly all over the place, looking for stuff that doesn't exist.

So not only will you have broken the law, but you be wasting a lot of resources in vain.

I find it despicable that we're using methods that the Nazis and Japanese used during World War II and were prosecuted for. The U.S. brass was adamant to not let our soldiers use those methods. Eisenhower would be appalled to learn what has been happening in the past few years.

[iplaw]

quote:The information extracted from torture is unreliable. This is indisputable.

Actually, it's not.  Brian Ross from ABC has directly contradicated your statement on a number of occassions.

The most effective use of waterboarding, according to current and former CIA officials, was in breaking Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, known as KSM, who subsequently confessed to a number of ongoing plots against the United States... -- ABC News Nov. 2, 2007

[tim huntzinger]

The US also summarily executed sabotuers in occupied Germany, you all good with that?  We bombed hellfire on civilians in both theaters, probably killed a million folk, so I guess it is OK to bomb Iran into universal martydom since WWII ethics reign supreme.

[iplaw]

quote:Originally posted by tim huntzinger

The US also summarily executed sabotuers in occupied Germany, you all good with that?  We bombed hellfire on civilians in both theaters, probably killed a million folk, so I guess it is OK to bomb Iran into universal martydom since WWII ethics reign supreme.

How would you have waged WWII more effectively General Timmy?  Limiting collateral damage is a convenience of war that, interestingly enough, only the US exercises, and certainly only one that is unique to the latter decades of the last century.

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by rwarn17588

What Hometown said.

The trouble is with torture -- other than it's clearly illegal with the treaties we've signed -- is it doesn't work. The information extracted from torture is unreliable. This is indisputable.

The "ticking clock" scenario that a few people cite for justifying torture doesn't consider that the information you will get will have you going willy-nilly all over the place, looking for stuff that doesn't exist.

So not only will you have broken the law, but you be wasting a lot of resources in vain.

I find it despicable that we're using methods that the Nazis and Japanese used during World War II and were prosecuted for. The U.S. brass was adamant to not let our soldiers use those methods. Eisenhower would be appalled to learn what has been happening in the past few years.

What you don't think some despicable **** wasn't happening under Ike's watch as a general in WWII and as President in the Korean War?  Maybe not stuff he was directly involved in but certainly things going on underneath his command.  It's called war, RW.

[guido911]

quote:Originally posted by iplaw

quote:The information extracted from torture is unreliable. This is indisputable.

Actually, it's not.  Brian Ross from ABC has directly contradicated your statement on a number of occassions.

The most effective use of waterboarding, according to current and former CIA officials, was in breaking Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, known as KSM, who subsequently confessed to a number of ongoing plots against the United States... -- ABC News Nov. 2, 2007

Here's an example of Ross' position:

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NWYxY2RkOGE2YjExNzc0OTBhMjQ5MGQ5MTUzYmNlY2Q=

[rwarn17588]

I remember that. He was confessing to everything up to kidnapping the Lindbergh baby to killing Jesus Christ.

The claim that plots were foiled is not credible.

This is what is so morally reprehensible: We've got Americans who are now defending the use of torture.

[Conan71]

Okay, fine, let's drop waterboarding and go back to just simply beating the **** out of these guys to get them to talk.

[iplaw]

quote:The claim that plots were foiled is not credible.

Really?  Do you have any evidence to contradict Brian Ross' claims that say you're wrong, other than more unsubstantiated claims that "it didn't work?"

[rwarn17588]

Ross' report is hardly definitive. Note that he used the words "if," "that's what we're told by sources" and "that's what the administration says."

The information he's getting is secondhand, and he also says that "it's an open debate" whether torture works.

That's hardly what I call a ringing endorsement of torture's effectiveness. Most military experts I've read say that standard interrogation to extract information is much more effective and reliable.

Mohammed's confessions have holes all over the place. He even claimed to attacking a bank that didn't even exist until after his arrest. And considering that criminals tend to exaggerate, it's fuzzy on what he did and what he didn't.

Since it's illegal to torture, you're putting your CIA officers and military members under a risk of war-crimes prosecution and the results are extremely erratic at best, why do it?