On Waterboarding.

[pecunium]

From Malcom Nance (One time Master Instructor, and Director of Training, US NAVY SERE School)

With regards to the waterboard, I want to set the record straight so the apologists can finally embrace the fact that they condone and encourage torture.

You should read the rest

One of the things his article points out is one of the things I've been saying for years.

On a Mekong River trip, I met a 60-year-old man, happy to be alive and a cheerful travel companion, who survived the genocide and torture … he spoke openly about it and gave me a valuable lesson: “If you want to survive, you must learn that ‘walking through a low door means you have to be able to bow.’” He told his interrogators everything they wanted to know including the truth. They rarely stopped. In torture, he confessed to being a hermaphrodite, a CIA spy, a Buddhist Monk, a Catholic Bishop and the son of the king of Cambodia. He was actually just a school teacher whose crime was that he once spoke French. He remembered “the Barrel” version of waterboarding quite well. Head first until the water filled the lungs, then you talk.

Which is, of course, more evidence that torture is not only immoral, but ineffective.

I will close with a section heading, because it sums up the present problem.

There is No Debate Except for Torture Apologists

So there it is, from someone else who knows, the only "debate" on the issue is from torture-mongers and apologists.

Comments

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

Except we now have 3 star generals who're in favor of torture

"As long as we're responsible for hunting those SOBs down, finding them and preventing them from killing our sons and daughters," Honore said, "I think we've got an obligation to do what the hell we've got to do to make sure we get the mission done."

3 star weasel is more like it. (http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/horsesmouth/2007/11/top_onduty_gene.php) ()

[quercus.livejournal.com]

3 star idiot. The hard-ass argument against torture isn't over its morality, but over its effectiveness. We don't need a whole camp of people who'll all swear blind they're both Bin Laden and Spartacus. What does that tell us?

[quercus.livejournal.com]

There's a Wikipedia image linked from that article:
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Waterboard3-small.jpg)

With this truly bizarre bit of fair-use copyright haggling:

Actually please note that Jonah Blank [the photographer] does not own the copyright to this image as photographer, as it is a photograph accurately (other than some glare and a bit of framing) representing 2-dimensional work of art. The original illustrator has the copyright on the depicted work, so this is of unknown provenance and copyright. The museum itself may not have rights to the image beyond displaying it. At best this is fair use now. NTK 19:45, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

It's nice to know that Wikipedia are so carefully guarding the copyright of a Khmer Rouge torture manual.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Gah.

Copyright and photography are so bizzare.

TK

[sethg]

When torture is used as an instrument of state policy, the state does not torture its prisoners for information. It tortures its enemies for confessions. The purpose of the confessions is to legitimize the state that authorized the torture.

So if people are saying to one another, "hey, it's a good thing the army roughed up those al-Qaeda bigwigs, because it saved lives, etc., etc.", then torture is effective--at justifying and perpetuating its own existence.

[prodigal.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the link to the article, sir.

I refuse to condone torture

[dragonet2.livejournal.com]

And want everyone in public office that condones or approves of torture to be fired outright.

At one point I thought Mr. McCain a good candidate. Until he allowed as he thought torture was okay.

It's a slippery slope into hell. Because there is no possible good excuse for it.

All I can think of is our guys in the armed forces, getting captured and the bad guys going, "Well, the US thinks this is an okay way to treat prisoners so let's do it too. They certainly can't complain."

I don't think anyone on the congress or the senate gives a shit though.

I despair.

Re: I refuse to condone torture

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

I'd say, "don't get me started," but it's a little late.

I had to give up on the comments there. Chief Nance has said more than I need to, and I can't bear the level of willful ignorance.

TK

Re: I refuse to condone torture

[cjmr.livejournal.com]

I waded through all 178 comments that were there when I clicked the link. Some of the arguments...oy, vey!

[yuripup.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

Not that it wasn't anything I didn't know or suspect already, but its good to see it from people "in the know".