I'm for doing whatever works. If torture gets us the information we need, then torture the bastards. If something else works better, then do that instead. But for God's sake, stop all the hand-wringing, wailing, and gnashing of teeth about these animals' "rights." All that does is give the enemy an impression of weakness, which, along with the lack of information, goes a long way to undermining the WOT.

>>But for God's sake, stop all the hand-wringing, wailing, and gnashing of teeth about these animals' "rights."

Of course torture works. Everyone who is tortured long enough will confess to being a terrorist (whether or not they are one.) Everyone who is tortured long enough will rat out their friends and relatives (regardless of their innocence.) With a proper tribunal that admits evidence gained through torture, the legal machinery can grind up "suspected terrorists" forever. Prosecutors would love the job of trying these people, since they'd get a 100% conviction rate. Polticians could claim every conviction as a victory in the War on Terror.

And since no real American who obeys their masters without question would ever get caught up in the machinery, torture is perfectly safe.

>>All that does is give the enemy an impression of weakness, which, along with the lack of information, goes a long way to undermining the WOT.

Yes, if we can just convince the world of our utter ruthlessness, lack of discrimination, and capacity for barbarism, our enemies will all quake in fear and kneel before our awesome might. Dismantling the last restraints on state power will surely make bin Laden think twice before attacking us again.

TJ, I said whatever information we need. If torture helps with that, so be it. If drugs, rewards, or other methods are more effective at getting useful information then so be that. And yes, I believe being tougher on the terrorists would in fact make us safer. True, you can't deter lunatics like Bin Laden, but as he said himself, people (I would add especially people in the ME) tend to back the strong horse. If we get Roman on the terrorists and the states that support them, then other states that might support terrorism or people who might become terrorists would think twice or thrice about signing up with OBL. And since I'm not a lunatic fringe libertarian, I don't agree that state power is always evil. In fact, I would argue that too much restraint on state power can be a much greater evil.

As for al Qaeda, let us describe the most coercive interrogation technique that was ever actually authorized. It's called "water-boarding," and it involves strapping a detainee down, wrapping his face in a wet towel and dripping water on it to produce the sensation of drowning.

Seriously if this is the worst that we’ve authorized in interrogating terrorist suspects, then everyone who screamed “torture” at the Bush administration is an idiot.

It seems to me that the real question is less "Is torture okay?" and more "What is torture?".

What are the differences between torture and deprivation, or torture and interrogation? Is sleep deprivation torture? What about scare tactics? I suppose it depends on your point of view. By some definitions (not mine) putting a couple of guys through a Prisoner's Dilemma type of scenario could be considered torture.

It comes down to limitations. What is an appropriate amount of deprivation or discomfort or pain? I would much rather have that defined and find that its most cruel form is waterboarding, than not.

In the absence of guidelines there are only the consciences of the interrogators acting as a guide. And as numerous studies have shown conscience easily takes a back seat to emotion.

I think that this whole thing has been blown out of proportion. From what I can gather this memo was about defining appropriate interrogation techniques. Some people are looking at it and finding some of those techniques unfair or unjust. These are the people who are crying "Torture". I wonder if some of their problem is less the techniques defined and more the fact that the administration was looking at something that falls under the torture heading in the first place.

It has turned into nothing more than noise, just another political tool to be used as a means to an end. I'm not saying that the question shouldn't be looked at. I think it should. Repeatedly. Otherwise we risk losing sight of our moral guidelines and that's when the vise grips and razor blades come out.

But we need to make sure that the argument doesn't obscure the true goal, making sure that terrorist attacks don't happen. It's like that adage about being so up to your ass in alligators that you forget the job was to drain the swamp.

The is a very interesting and enlightening "survey of the landscape of persuasion" called "The Dark Art of Interrogation" by Mark Bowden that everyone should read. You can find it on line by searching for the title. (There is a PDF online that you can print easily)

Essentially, my disagreement with all the clamor is the fact that the USG has not defined the term "torture" beyond some ambiguous word with evil connotations. Once the word is defined properly, we can move beyond the concern. Yelling at terrorists is PROHIBITED now!! Is that torture? Give me a break.

Hmm. I have the distinct feeling that the kind of "debate" the WSJ would prefer is "hot irons or the rack?".

I believe the Gonzales hearing, political circus aside, is an invaluable platform for bringing two issues to the forefront of discussion:

1) How effective is physical coercion in interrogation? Does it produce useful results in the WoT? Can we learn anything from the Israelis or Brits in this regard?

2) Are the techniques of physical coercion used by our interrogators (in Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, and elsewhere) consistent with our moral values? For example, would we consider them moral if they were performed on our own family or friends, under similar circumstances (arrested yet not convicted via due process)? If believe such actions to be inherently immoral, can we justify them or create a fair process to justify them?

The first person I recall seeing who advocated the use of torture against terrorists, was - believe it or not - Al Franken, on the Bill Maher show.

And the specific method he prescribed was a red-hot poker up the gastro-intestinal tract.

I don't listen to Air America (who the hell does?) so I don't know if Franken has the nerve to criticize Gonzales or not.

When Prime Minister Aldo Moro was kidnapped by the Red Brigades, Italian authorities had good reason to believe that terrorists already in custody knew of his whereabouts, and they seriously considered using torture to get the information. They didn't, because in the words of one official "Italy can survive the loss of its Prime Minister, but it cannot survive the introduction of torture."

Of course that meant that Moro wasn't found until he was already dead. If it had been the entire city of Milan at stake instead of one individual, they might have thought differently.

I think that the discussion of torture needs to take into account the possibility of "extra-legal" activities - undertaken in extraordinary circumstances - that are neither sanctioned nor punished by law. That too is a troublesome question, and I don't have the answer.

I dunno why we can't do this.
I thought the use of the Qu'ran as an interrogation tool was brilliant.
Joe, what do you think of "rendition"?

Unsurprisingly, the email bounced.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Armed Liberal [mailto:armed-at-armedliberal-period-com> Sent: Friday, January 07, 2005 1:27 PM
> To: 'bensyper87@myway.com'
> Subject: Pulled your comment
>
> 1) Don't post under other people's names
>
> 2) Try and post things that promote a debate of issues.
>
> This isn't an elementary school lunchroom.

Are you the real Andrew Sullivan?

Oh. Guess not.

Seems bensyper87@myway.com has a bit of history in the USS Clueless bozo bin

When will we stop playing with these people and finally let them know what war is all about?
The idea of trying to fight a war but not trying to hurt "civilians" is simply absurd. Fighting a politically correct war only serves to get our sons and daughters killed. During World War II no one tried to sort out and kill only Nazis!!!
Cities were bombed to rubble and innocent people were killed but so be it!!
There is no way that we will be able to make these people love us but we can sure make them afraid to kill us!!!!

I'm for doing whatever works. If torture gets us the information we need, then torture the bastards.

Stipulated, for the moment, that torture is an acceptable and effective interrogation tool, and that there is nothing immoral about using it against terrorists. I disagree in the strongest possible terms, but I stipulate it for the sake of argument.

Even so stipulated, can you justify using these techniques against people who may or may not be innocent, as has already happened and will continue to so long as detainees are denied due process? Think carefully--this is a slippery slope down which lies the justification of nearly any evil so long as it strives towards a noble end.

Many believe we are the "good guys" because we are America. That comes with a responsibility: we cannot get by with simply being "less bad" than the alternatives. If we are going to lay claim to any moral high ground in this struggle, it will be because the principles we believe in and fight for are better, more humane, and will make the world a safer and freer place. Absent those virtures, we are just another side in a game of moral equivalency.

Torture has no place in a free America. And certainly not the toture and detainment of people who may be innocent without due process.

Catsy,

Stipulated for the moment that torture is an acceptable and effective interrogation tool, and that there's nothing immoral about using it against terrorists. I disagree in the strongest possible terms. . .

I agree to disagree--at least about the second clause of your first sentence. I don't know enough about torture or its effectiveness to argue for it on those grounds. All I said is do it if it works; do something else if something else works better.

Will some innocents get caught up in the process? Possibly maybe even probably. Unfortunate but it could be necessary. Remember, they started this. Any innocents tortured or killed in our efforts to finish it are on their heads, not ours. As for the moral high ground, I don't want to be there if it just makes us a more visible and more easily hit target. We're in an existential struggle. In such a struggle some very nasty things may become necessary. We should avoid them if we can, do them brutally and unapologetically if we must. That's about as high a moral ground as you can expect to occupy if you want to win a war, especially against the kind of rabid animals we're fighting in this one.

There comes a point when innocents will suffer due to circumstance. There are times when this can not be avoided. If one is certain that the culprit is in the twenty detained but uncertain as to which of the twenty the circumstance will justify the release of all or the release of none.

Fred:

Will some innocents get caught up in the process? Possibly maybe even probably. Unfortunate but it could be necessary. Remember, they started this. Any innocents tortured or killed in our efforts to finish it are on their heads, not ours.

This horrifies me. This is the exact same kind of rationalization that terrorists use to justify civilian death in the name of achieving their goals. Bin Laden has, in fact, used practically this exact fomulation in at least one of his videotapes when he tells us that our policies are responsible for the people al Qaeda kills.

You could not be more wrong in laying the blame here: we are responsible for our own actions. You cannot sanitize it with language that distances us from those actions: innocents do not get "caught up in the process", /we/ keep them detained /without/ process and torture them because we deem it too much effort to determine whether or not they're innocent before we start treating them like terrorists. This could not be more un-American.

As for the moral high ground, I don't want to be there if it just makes us a more visible and more easily hit target.

We sacrifice a great deal of security because Americans choose not to live in the police state that would be necessary to come even close to absolute safety. While holding oneself to higher moral standards entails putting yourself at a disadvantage to those who don't play by the rules, most reasonable people understand that you have to draw the line somewhere--if someone's holding a gun to your family, you do whatever it takes to make them safe and worry about morals and consequences later. The question is where to draw that line.

Anyone can invent a "ticking time bomb" scenario that justifies torture with immediacy, in the same way that the immediacy of a threat to your family justifies whatever it takes to make them safe, but ticking bomb scenarios are dishonest: they attempt to use the exception to justify the rule. I draw a line in front of the torture of anyone in the name of my safety, and I draw an exceptionally hard line in front of the torture and detention of people who may be innocent.

We're in an existential struggle.

No, we are not. This is the kind of overblown rhetoric that makes it so difficult to take the whole "war on terror" concept seriously. Our conflict with Nazi Germany in WWII was an existential struggle. Then, we were in real credible danger of having our allies conquered and eliminated, and our homeland invaded. There was a very real danger that we could cease to exist.

Right now the only real danger to our existence is that in throwing away the principles for which we stand, our country /as we know and love it/ will cease to exist. Terrorism? A blip on the radar of history. They can kill people. Given weapons of mass destruction, they can kill lots of people, which is why I believe our primary focus should be nonproliferation. But an existential threat? Please. They have no ability to conquer or hold any territory larger than a city, and that's with a sympathetic population. The amassed might of every armed terrorist on the face of this planet would become a red smear in direct combat against our armed forces. Strategically speaking, they pose no threat to the United States, which is part of why they use the tactics they do.

Insofar as this is actually any kind of war, it is foremost a war of intel, police action, image, and message. Military action will occasionally be necessary against targets too hard for conventional law enforcement. But the idea that al Qaeda poses any kind of credible strategic military threat against the United States is a fantasy.

USMC:

There comes a point when innocents will suffer due to circumstance. There are times when this can not be avoided. If one is certain that the culprit is in the twenty detained but uncertain as to which of the twenty the circumstance will justify the release of all or the release of none.

This is what I was talking about above, with the "ticking bomb" scenario. Almost anyone can think up an extreme circumstance where torture or indefinite detention of civilians would be justified. The problem is that right now these aren't relegated to extreme situations, they are commonplace.

As for letting one guilty man go free to save twenty innocent, we have concepts in our criminal justice system for that, among them being habeas corpus and the presumption of innocence. If we are intent on exporting democracy to the Middle East, we might start by treating those we detain with one of the fundamental rights we recognize all mankind as deserving.

Catsy: "Our conflict with Nazi Germany in WWII was an existential struggle. Then, we were in real credible danger of having our allies conquered and eliminated, and our homeland invaded. There was a very real danger that we could cease to exist."

Well, not really. In spite of the scare scenarios that circulated during the war (ably illustrated by Frank Capra in Why We Fight) Germany had no chance of invading the United States. For that matter, they stood no chance at all of holding Western Europe once we mobilized against them.

It's wrong to discount the terrorist threat as a historical footnote. The entire country witnessed the murder of thousands of people, and when they're told it means nothing they get mad. The fact that we're even debating torture shows how serious the situation is.

The entire country witnessed the murder of thousands of people, and when they're told it means nothing they get mad.

Don't put words in my mouth. I never said anything of the sort.

What I did do was scoff at the notion of Islamic terrorism as some kind of existential threat to Western civilization. They are a "blip on the radar of history", as I put it--my opinion, to be sure. Is it wrong? History itself will judge.

If that's what made you think I was belittling those killed on 9/11, think again--and read the next few sentences more closely:

They can kill people. Given weapons of mass destruction, they can kill lots of people, which is why I believe our primary focus should be nonproliferation. But an existential threat? Please.

I take the ability and intention of terrorists to kill our citizens very seriously. Because of this, I think our first priority should be ensuring that they never have access to the kinds of weapons that can kill large numbers of people easily. What I do not take seriously is the idea that they pose such a dire strategic threat to our nation that we must throw away our principles and morality in order to hunt them down and stop them from killing us.

Catsy, I'm curious as to how you would define an existential threat. Germany had no practical ability to bring the war to our shores. No more than we would have had the ability to bring the war to their shores if Britain had fallen. They did have the ability to threaten our way of life.

The death of 3,000 people by terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 had substantial effects on our national economy and our national behavior. The cost to our economy is estimated at a trillion dollars and a million jobs. We've invaded two countries and imposed restrictions within our own borders (as you've experienced yourself if you've flown lately).

An attack with a nuclear weapon in an American city like New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago has been estimated to be likely to cause between 250,000 and 1,000,000 deaths. Using the low estimate that's eighty times 9/11 (at the high estimate it's 300 times). Consider the damage to the economy. Could either our health care system or our insurance industry survive? Our legal system would be hamstrung for a decade trying to resolve the liability and estate issues.

Some level of social and military response to such an attack is inevitable. And considering the magnitude of the loss some pretty big responses should be expected. The society that remained after the attack would not resemble our society society in, say, 2000 any more than it did the society of 1860 in my estimation.

In my book that is an existential threat. What do you mean by “existential threat”?

Catsy,

What Dave said. I would also add that they can, with the right attacks using the right weapons, disrupt our economy to the breaking point. Just look at the damage done by 911. Imagine the economic damage done by nuking or causing a smallpox epidemic in New York, L.A., Chicago or other big cities. They can disrupt oil production and shipping. They can induce a paranoia that would cause real political oppression in this country and not just harsh treatment of enemies. Your highflown rhetoric sounds great, but we are fighting people who would not hesitate a second to behead you, torture or kill your children, or destroy your hometown. They have, in my view, forfeited their humanity. Not only is harshness toward them justified to protect ourselves, it's what they deserve. And I don't like the idea of torturing innocent people any better than you do. Nor do I like killing innocent people in bombing cities during a war. I think we should avoid them wherever possible. But I think your kind of sentimentality about it will undermine the war effort and ultimately cost lots more innocent lives.

Even so stipulated, can you justify using these techniques against people who may or may not be innocent, as has already happened and will continue to so long as detainees are denied due process?

Am I mistaken? Has there in fact been anything even remotely close to torture used by the US in interrogating detainees? Remember, Abu Ghraib doesn't count here.

CATSY

Insofar as this is actually any kind of war, it is foremost a war of intel, police action, image, and message. Military action will occasionally be necessary against targets too hard for conventional law enforcement. But the idea that al Qaeda poses any kind of credible strategic military threat against the United States is a fantasy.

Islam requires that infidels are either converted or killed. This is not hype or conjecture...this is in the Quran. How many Muslims are there in the world? It is only a matter of time before radicals like Bin Laden recruit enough converts to Wahhabism to constitute a threat of significant proportions. The export of the Wahhabi virus has been going on for years now...just look at Bosnia, Kosovo, or Chechnya for starts. Saudi Arabian Wahhabis spend billions of dollars to build mosques for the purpose of spreading Salafist doctrine. Do not underestimate the threat. PM Chamberlain underestimated the threat when he proclaimed "peace in our time"...he was wrong and so are you.