This post is part of a series, "Interrogators Speak Out Against Torture," organized by Human Rights First.
Another round of torture debates is soon to ensue on the one-year anniversary of the killing of Osama bin Laden. Jose Rodriguez, the former CIA agent notorious for destroying 'the torture tapes,' will release his new book, Hard Measures, on the same date. Rodriguez argues that torture is required to get the information needed to thwart terrorist attacks and save lives. In other words, like his former bosses George Bush and Dick Cheney, he is saying that torture works.
But before we get into those arguments, let's back up a second. Because to have an honest evaluation of the definition of 'works' when the torture advocates say torture 'works,' we have to start with all the relevant data. Some of that data was lost when Rodriguez destroyed the torture tapes, which makes one wonder -- if torture was so effective, why didn't he simply release the tapes to the public (with classified portions redacted) so that we could judge for ourselves? Those tapes were just a small fraction of the amount of information available on detainee matters.
Perhaps the largest accumulation of data on interrogation practices post-9/11 is the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence's (SSCI) comprehensive report on detainee handling. Since President Obama made transparency a cornerstone of his administration, I call on him and the SSCI to release the full report to the public. The president lived up to his transparency promise when he released the 'torture memos.' It's time for him to do so again.
Once we have all the data, then we can account for all the negative long-term consequences of torture as well as any alleged short-term benefits. We can consider the fact that it helped al Qaeda to recruit thousands of new members, degraded America's ability to preach for the rule of law to other countries, made other detainees less willing to cooperate, and a host of other consequences. When these factors have been weighed, then we can decide in totality whether or not torture works. I'm sure the conclusion won't be the one backed by Rodriguez' bravado. In the end, all the tough-guy talk won't be enough to counter the fact that torture cost American lives, it didn't save them.
Well...let's take a look at the largest most systematic torturing organizations and movements in history...
1) Where are the Nazis ?
2) Where are the Stalinists ?
3) Where is the Khmer Rouge ?
4) Where is the Warsaw Pact ?
...and finally the most systematic organization that tortured possibly millions for hundreds of years and put to death tens of thousands in often horrific ways...the Roman Catholic Church.
If torture was so effective in finding information about opponents and stamping out those who believe differently then why are there so many Protestants today ?
Because torture produces martyrs, strengthens beliefs, produces new recruits and makes nondescript persons into heroes....and no cause however noble, just or vile succeeds without heroes.
Good job Bush Administration...good job emboldening and strengthening the radical rallying cries of those whose only wish is mayhem and murder.
If we are supposed to forgive those who authorized and performed torture on innocent people because the torturers commited those heinous acts for a cause they truly believe in, then Al Qaeda terrorists deserve the same forgiveness for their crimes for the same reasons. The obvious answer that avoids monumental moral relativism and hypocrisy, or having to forgive Al Qaeda, is to make those who order and perform torture on innocent people pay for their sins in the same way we made Al Qaeda pay for theirs.
If you torture, you better be right and there better be some information that prevented a terrorist attack or you should dragged off to a lifetime of misery in the US Gulag system. That kind of accountability would probably mean torture would happen at most once every thousand years. What POTUS would risk his own freedom just to save peasant's lives? None and we all know it.
1. Does torture work?
2. Is birth control moral?
It should be the reverse.
1. Does birth control work?
2. Is torture moral?
If there is a god of any kind, he must be twisting in his grave over this.
Are you so enamored of the idea that our enemies are "not like us" that you believe they react any differently to the idea of THEIR sons and daughters suffering humiliation and repeated fear of death at our hands than we do at the idea of the same happening to our loved ones?
The idea that ANY human is tortured should be offensive. The recruitment potential ought to be a none issue. Every person on the planet is someone else's child, parent or sibling. Think about how you'd react if your mother or father were being waterboarded by Afghanis. Would you try to save them? Would you try to get justice for their suffering?
to experts, is to overvalue the potential to obtain information from detainees and undervalue tips
from the local population. 90% of the best intelligence comes from open sources and walk-ins
according to a recent report from Major General Michael Flynn, an intelligence officer with
extensive experience in Afghanistan. “The real intelligence hero is Sherlock Holmes, not James
Bond,” Flynn says.
.
Sure, I can defend robbing banks in that regards as it is an easy money making occupation (to which, some would say apples and oranges, but you should get my point).
The United States has taken the biggest hit in regards to our standing in the world, not from our wars (though, those hurt) but with what we do with our prisoners, in the realm of our national hypocricsy. We CANNOT continue to chide regimes that torture their citizens, while we do the same thing. There is absolutely no excuse for it, because we KNOW that we can get valuable information from subjects (not just suspects because we have people in custody who are not even charged with any crime) with legal and non-traumatic methods. Just ask the FBI.
I feel that this could be one of the albatrosses around President Obama's neck, that and Gitmo (as they often go hand in hand), because of his failure to deal with both in a substantial and definitive fashion (condeming and charging those that performed the first and shutting down the second), and could be a key reason for him losing the 2012 election.
this concern in explaining why they oppose torture.
Here's the list of interrogators: Matthew Alexander
Glenn Carle
James T. Clemente
Jack Cloonan
Barry Eisler
Mark Fallon
Mike German
Robert McFadden
Joe Navarro
Torin Nelson
Jack Rice
Patrick M. Skinner
For now, let's just conclude torture and atrocities are morally wrong and nonproductive. That, and the next time anybody in government proposes to do it in the name of the country we Fire the SOB and replace them with somebody competent!
What further convincing does anybody need?
For example, throughout history torture has "worked" to punish people and to extract confessions where there was insufficient other evidence to prove that someone had committed a particular offense.
For those who support the use by the CIA and the US Military of "enhanced interrogation techniques," it's important to remember that most of those techniques were either the same or derived from techniques successfully used during the Korean War by North Korea and China to obtain false confessions from American military members who had been captured.
Semper Fi