Should We Waterboard For Information

[skydived19006 4]

Interesting that the current administration will release details of our "torture", but refuses to release any details regarding intelligence we gained.

If we could have used waterboard "torture" on one, two, 10 terrorists in advance of 9/11, and have saved those 3000 plus lives, would have it been "ok"?

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[skydived19006 4]

100% "yes, if it saved 1 life" so far!

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[marks2065 0]

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100% "yes, if it saved 1 life" so far!

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it doen't even need to be an american , just a good / innocent person

[skydived19006 4]

I find it hard to believe that people would forfeit their children's lives. If your child were kidnapped, and a person with the knowledge to recover them was in custody, but refused to talk. You'd say, "let my children die" before you'd say "subject the guy to the Bush era restrictive rules of water-boarding."

It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[billvon 3,116]

>It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

If you had the ticking time bomb scenario (i.e. terrorist knows how to stop the bomb but isn't talking and your friends/family are at risk) and the ONLY way to make him talk would be to rape one of his children in front of him - would you do it? (Assuming you take precautions so no one is permanently harmed, of course.)

Or would you let your children die?

[skydived19006 4]

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>It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

If you had the ticking time bomb scenario (i.e. terrorist knows how to stop the bomb but isn't talking and your friends/family are at risk) and the ONLY way to make him talk would be to rape one of his children in front of him - would you do it? (Assuming you take precautions so no one is permanently harmed, of course.)

Or would you let your children die?

I'd resort to old school torture in that case. Really Bill, you equate the rape of children with what was done to the three theorists at Gitmo? Interesting.

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[rushmc 23]

It will be really interesting when ALL the info comes out. Now that we know we used this on "3" of the bastards......

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[dreamdancer 0]

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>It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

If you had the ticking time bomb scenario (i.e. terrorist knows how to stop the bomb but isn't talking and your friends/family are at risk) and the ONLY way to make him talk would be to rape one of his children in front of him - would you do it? (Assuming you take precautions so no one is permanently harmed, of course.)

Or would you let your children die?

I'd resort to old school torture in that case. Really Bill, you equate the rape of children with what was done to the three theorists at Gitmo? Interesting.

you'd torture a child

stay away from moving propellers - they bite
blue skies from thai sky adventures
good solid response-provoking keyboarding

[dreamdancer 0]

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>It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

If you had the ticking time bomb scenario (i.e. terrorist knows how to stop the bomb but isn't talking and your friends/family are at risk) and the ONLY way to make him talk would be to rape one of his children in front of him - would you do it? (Assuming you take precautions so no one is permanently harmed, of course.)

Or would you let your children die?

I'd resort to old school torture in that case. Really Bill, you equate the rape of children with what was done to the three theorists at Gitmo? Interesting.

death to all theorists
(but what should we do with the illiterate)

stay away from moving propellers - they bite
blue skies from thai sky adventures
good solid response-provoking keyboarding

[billvon 3,116]

>I'd resort to old school torture in that case.

And let your children die? Fair enough. As I suspected, you have moral limits as to what you are willing to do (as we all do.) Some people just draw the line in a different place.

> Really Bill, you equate the rape of children with what was done to the
>three theorists at Gitmo? Interesting.

Not Gitmo, Abu Ghraib. From Seymour Hersh:

"The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling."

And if you don't believe him, an Army general investigated and found several cases of "sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick"

Now, is that the same as waterboarding? Nope. But it does fit the same definition of "non-torture" that is used to justify waterboarding. After all, rape does not permanently harm anyone or cause organ failure, and demonstrably several US soldiers thought it was OK.

Which is the problem with OKing torture however you define it.

[rushmc 23]

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>It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

If you had the ticking time bomb scenario (i.e. terrorist knows how to stop the bomb but isn't talking and your friends/family are at risk) and the ONLY way to make him talk would be to rape one of his children in front of him - would you do it? (Assuming you take precautions so no one is permanently harmed, of course.)

Or would you let your children die?

I'd resort to old school torture in that case. Really Bill, you equate the rape of children with what was done to the three theorists at Gitmo? Interesting.

death to all theorists
(but what should we do with the illiterate)

Please please,

dont kill yourself!

The dems will want you.

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[jcd11235 0]

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If we could have used waterboard "torture" on one, two, 10 terrorists in advance of 9/11, and have saved those 3000 plus lives, would have it been "ok"?

No.

Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

[skydived19006 4]

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If we could have used waterboard "torture" on one, two, 10 terrorists in advance of 9/11, and have saved those 3000 plus lives, would have it been "ok"?

No.

Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

Very interesting. Hell, if you said it would save one life, I'd put my hand up and say water board me! Maybe it's not torture though if I volunteer?

Martin

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[nerdgirl 0]

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Interesting that the current administration will release details of our "torture", but refuses to release any details regarding intelligence we gained.

Actually a fair amount of what was obtained has been released. And it was released during President Bush's second term.

What it shows is that waterboarding is not effective. I.e., we didn’t gain. Conversely, bad information was passed along to policy makers.

Details:

The DefenseLink transcript listing of things Khalid Sheik Mohammed confessed to – from a plot to assassinate former President Carter to a plot to kill Pope John Paul II to the February 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center – he confessed to everything. Some of the things he claimed to have been responsible would have required him to be in multiple places at the same time. I only somewhat facetiously ask Was he asked if he was on the grassy knoll in Dallas in November 1963?

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed also compares himself to President George Washington – is that what you mean by “intelligence”?

How about the 2nd detainee who the CIA has confirmed was waterboarded: Abu Zubaydah. Of what was cited as useful intelligence gained from Abu Zubaydah, the leading piece that is mentioned – the identity of Ramzi bin al Shibh – was already known. FBI agent Dennis Lormel told Congress who Ramzi bin Al Shibh was in February 2002, i.e., a month before Abu Zubaydah was even apprehended.

Former FBI agent, Mr. Ali Soulan has described, under oath, in some detail, how much information was obtained from Abu Zubaydah initially using traditional interrogation methods: “gave us important actionable intelligence.” And then, once what he calls CIA contractors arrived and began using “enhanced interrogation” methods on Zubaydah, there was no useful, actionable intelligence produced.

“Through our interrogation, which was done completely by the book (including advising him of his rights), we obtained a treasure trove of highly significant actionable intelligence. For example, Abu Jandal gave us extensive information on Osama Bin Laden's terror network, structure, leadership, membership, security details, facilities, family, communication methods, travels, training, ammunitions, and weaponry, including a breakdown of what machine guns, rifles, rocket launchers, and anti-tank missiles they used. He also provided explicit details of the 9/11 plot operatives, and identified many terrorists who we later successfully apprehended.

“The information was important for the preparation of the war in Afghanistan in 2001. It also provided an important background to the 9/11 Commission report; it provided a foundation for the trials so far held in Guantanamo Bay; and it also has been invaluable in helping to capture and identify top al Qaeda operatives and thus disrupt plots.

“The approach used in these successful interrogations can be called the Informed Interrogation Approach. Until the introduction of the ‘enhanced’ technique, it was the sole approach used by our military, intelligence, and law enforcement community.”

Abd al Rahim al Nashiri is the 3rd terrorist suspect on whom the former CIA Director acknowledged “enhanced interrogation” techniques were used including waterboarding. How accurate and useful was the information obtained from al Nashiri? Again from reading the Defenselink transcript, he asserts he made up a long list of al Qa’eda plots and attacks so his captors would stop torturing him, even telling interrogators that Osama bin Laden had a nuclear bomb. Al Nashiri, in all likelihood, had very useful information. What was lost & how many opportunities were wasted because ‘enhanced interrogation’ methods were used? When the signal to noise ratio becomes so low, it ceases to be effective for anything other than distracting US investigatory efforts.

Information obtained through torture by third-party states has produced bad/faulty intel that has been passed on to US policymakers, e.g., Ibn al Shaykh al Libbi.

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To be explicit: it’s not about the prisoners/detainees. That’s a red herring that some (not all) folks seem to argue against. It’s about doing what is most effective for US interests.

Taken in consideration with the other 3 arguments (reciprocity on US service members, impedance of US foreign policy and national defense goals, and morals/ethics), there is no strategic, operational, or tactical advantage to employing waterboarding or “enhanced interrogation” as a euphemism for torture as part of investigatory process. Quite to the contrary, one may argue that such a policy has (strongly) negative strategic, operational, and tactical repercussions.

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[billvon 3,116]

>Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to
>all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood
>between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

As Marg has pointed out, if such an issue ever happened in the real world (god forbid) you might be tasked with explaining to all those families that interrogators could have gotten the information to save 3000 lives - but you wanted to waterboard him instead, and thus got the wrong information.

[nerdgirl 0]

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Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

Perhaps the more realistic question is would you be willing to explain to those families why use of an unreliable technique was chosen over the ones that have proven to be more effective?

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[skydived19006 4]

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>Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to
>all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood
>between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

As Marg has pointed out, if such an issue ever happened in the real world (god forbid) you might be tasked with explaining to all those families that interrogators could have gotten the information to save 3000 lives - but you wanted to waterboard him instead, and thus got the wrong information.

All right, I give up. I vote we close Gitmo, and simply shoot the rest in the field. We can't get good information out of them anyway regardless of how nice, or mean and nasty we are.

I know I'm an ass hole.
Martin

Experience is what you get when you thought you were going to get something else.

AC DZ

[billvon 3,116]

> We can't get good information out of them anyway regardless of how nice,
>or mean and nasty we are.

?? We DID get good information out of a lot of them! We should keep doing that, methinks. Might prevent another 9/11.

>I know I'm an ass hole.

That's OK, so am I.

[wmw999 2,588]

Do you think we'd better information by waterboarding?

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[nerdgirl 0]

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We can't get good information out of them anyway regardless of how nice, or mean and nasty we are.

Ummm ... uh ... *very* good information/actionable intelligence has been obtained using traditional interrogation methods.

Actionable intelligence can also be obtained through human intelligence and other methods.

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I know I'm an ass hole.

I'm not sure what the metrics are for determining that. But by my metric, asking the questions doesn't make you such. Even for asking them insistently. If one (in general) stubbornly refuses to let go of notional ideas only for ideological/partisan reasons, maybe ... I'd rather have the questions asked.

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[jcd11235 0]

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Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

Considering the fact that experience shows overwhelmingly that other interrogation methods are far more likely to result in accurate intelligence in a timely manner than can be obtained via water boarding or other methods of torture, such a job as you propose would most likely be unnecessary unless interrogators screwed up and tortured the detainees.

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Very interesting. Hell, if you said it would save one life, I'd put my hand up and say water board me! Maybe it's not torture though if I volunteer?

Torturing the enemy doesn't save lives, it costs them.

Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

[Skyrad 0]

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I find it hard to believe that people would forfeit their children's lives. If your child were kidnapped, and a person with the knowledge to recover them was in custody, but refused to talk. You'd say, "let my children die" before you'd say "subject the guy to the Bush era restrictive rules of water-boarding."

It's an interesting world. Really, "let them die?"

The poll options are stupid and biased. I voted no not even if my childrens life depended on it Fir starters we live in the real world not a episode of 24 and especially if my childrens life depends on it would be more acurate as you couldn't guarentee that the victim isn't just telling you whatever you want to hear to stop the torture. Actually I don't know why I bothered to vote its a crap poll.

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[Skyrad 0]

LOL

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[Skyrad 0]

If you had a gun with one round in it, a axe, and were in a shed and pinned to a table by a nail through your prick and someone set fire to the shed would you chop off your prick with the axe or shoot yourself?

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[rushmc 23]

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>Then, if it were up to me I'd have given you the job of explaining to
>all those families that you had the power to stop it, but your morals stood
>between the terrorists, and the death of their loved ones.

As Marg has pointed out, if such an issue ever happened in the real world (god forbid) you might be tasked with explaining to all those families that interrogators could have gotten the information to save 3000 lives - but you wanted to waterboard him instead, and thus got the wrong information.

All right, I give up. I vote we close Gitmo, and simply shoot the rest in the field. We can't get good information out of them anyway regardless of how nice, or mean and nasty we are.

I know I'm an ass hole.
Martin

Hey, You are my kind of ass hole!

Screw the sexual shit.

More agree with you than post here. Dont give up

Cheny is making Obama look like the minority party today. Stay proud. You are not wrong

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln