ABUSE CRISIS: ACLU : Bush Authorized Torture

Curious of one thing......

If all this is true.. then what is the difference between a Sadaam run Govt and the Govt that Bush put in there and the military?

Sadaam had innocent people killed. the military shot dead any man of fighting age whether armed or not.

Sadaam tortured and killed people in their prisons and the US has done it also.

Sadaam took away people rights and did not give them access to legal avenues. We are doing that as well.

Does that mean that Bush and Sadaam are the same? Does it mean that that is the only way to govern Iraq? Why so many deplorable comparisons? hmmmmmm.... Just some thoughts that came across, not putting blame anywhere in this post... just observations.

JCMinJapan

Hush there now, JC, is a big difference between Mr. Bush and Sadam, Mr. Bush has the Christian god to back him over, Sadam is Satan himself.

So what Mr. Bush is doing to Iraq is justify in the eyes of the christian god.

Well, I would like someone to investigate and tell me how many american soldiers were dying on a daily basis before the Abu Greib story broke, and how many began dying afterwards. Would anyone consider that just maybe, it was our "forbidden tactics" that saved a fair portion of our own soldiers?

That just maybe, with this story breaking, it was our sudden "hands off" switch of tactics (and it should follow, a sudden lack of info coming from the prisoners) that led to MORE soldiers dying?

Just a thought...

[edit on 28-12-2004 by Toelint]

Well, if we have to do all of this just to keep the peace there, then was Sadaam as bad as everyone is saying he was? Maybe he HAD to do that to keep his soldiers from dieing..... My question is... what is the difference between what we are doing and what sadaam did, I mean other than in the NAME OF DEMOCRACY. If we take out the wording, is the path to a democratic Iraq any different from the path that they were taking?

The only difference that I see is that a different group of people are getting killed than the ones before and the soldiers are wearing US Flags and not Iraqi uniforms. Does Iraq have to be governed in this way? I mean it is one clan or another that has to be murdered, abused, and humiliated for the country to be at peace? Do not get me wrong, I am not condeming either side in this... just asking a socialogical question.

Soldiers die on both sides... any difference? Other than they are American and not sadaams Iraqi army..... Lets not forget about all the Iraqi policeman dieing now also... There are more of them dieing than Americans as well. You only think about the AMERICANS dieing, but Iraqis are suffering now also. The question, are they suffering more now or before? But, then I guess it depends on which group you talk to now..... This is a HUMAN issue... It needs to be dealt with in a humanitarian way....

I must say I'm impressed with many arguments along this thread from both those who "support" and those who condemn George Bush.

The thread does seem to wander, though and I haven't had time to read all of the recent terms but I'd like to comment on the original article.

Until someone can show that the FBI has a vested interested in making up the existence of an executive order from the president, I will assume that there was one, but let's be clear about what is in those emails.

The "executive order" emails make reference to using sleep deprivation, load noises and shouting at prisoners as well as "the use of working dogs"
other abuses in other emails are not specifically correlated or even from the same people. The ACLU site has documented emails about the horrific tortures that no one was denying had happened in the detention facilty in Abu Ghraib. These do not discuss executive orders.

It is fallacious to assume from the emails that George Bush signed an executive order stating, "You boys g'ahead an' sick yer dogs on some genitals and give me somethin' ta read! God bless America."
It is more likely that the "use of working" dogs was for some legitimate purpose like tracking escaped detainees, or some other task for which the dogs were trained. Can we assume that the military does not train torture dogs and that the dogs were being abused, too? Probably.

How long are executive orders, anyway? I don't know. There were lots of "etc." in the FBI emails. Does that mean that they were being kind and ommitting the worst offenses? How would that make their point? If genuine, the emails are likely accurate.

I am familiar with torture techniques used by the British army in their interrogations of IRA "terrorists". I am not Irish or a member of the British army. At the time, the army saw nothing wrong with this and saw fit to document the information which was presented in a lengthy sociology report that I read one afternoon in my university library some twenty years ago. Their findings stuck with me.

Some of the tactics: deprivation, use of hoods, standing for 24 hours at a time without being allowed to sleep were all methods employed by the British military and later DENOUNCED by the British government. It is interesting to note that the deprivation techniques did not employ any beatings, presumably because they would allow the detainee some proprioceptive awareness and ground them. When they were completely disoriented, they would take them up in a helicopter, descend to four feet above the ground and push the hooded detainee out backwards.

What was relevant for our thread is this. That technique made people talk but did not provide reliable information. Tortured people will tell their torturer what they believe the torturer wants to hear, much the way abused children will appease their abusers. That's the first point.

The second is that a sociologist who underwent the same deprivation treatment found that he was able to keep it together. If you know someone is trying to mess with your mind using deprivation, you can resist it.

I was happy to see the reply from the US serviceman describing his training. Why would you assume that Iraqi troops or anybody with any real information wouldn't have had such training as well?

I think that interrogation techniques were authorized but the sick nonsense happening was a result of someone not minding shop and the monsters that were being created were allowed to express what they would naturally become.
Please respond. I have much more to say.

There are some things to add to my last posting.

Someone made a comment that if some information was gained that could save the lives of innocent Americans, then torture would be permissible (or even desirable) behavior.

Two wrongs reasoning is fallacious, unless:
1) One wrong is morally less wrong than the other, and
2) The lesser wrong eradicates the greater.
3) There is no other means that is less wrong than the lesser wrong.

So let's say for the sake of argument that the prisoners at Abu Ghrab have secret information about attacks on American soft targets.
Is degradation and humiliation of these prisoners the only way to obtain that information? Why not chemical interrogations or more sophisticated methods? So, NO!
Will information held by servicemen of the Iraqi army be likely to contain any detailed information about attacks on the US, that is to say any more than they could have just read on the internet? Impossible to say. My guess would be unlikely.
Is there any possibility that ANY ONE tortured detainee had no information whatsoever. Most certainly.

Is the real brutal humiliating (and how humiliating is it for a Muslim man in his traditional culture to just be stripped naked in public, let alone covered in feces and stacked on other naked men . . . we have no idea.) torture of an actual innocent human being of another nation more morally permissible than the potential deaths of a number of potential Americans. Think carefully on this one, we may not all agree.

Let me curtail the "those people" aren't innocent arguments. Ask yourself some questions.
1) Did all Iraqi soldiers choose to fight in this war or were some of them coerced? Naw, the Bathist regime was all flowers and sunshine, they'd never force conscription.
2) Who invaded whom? Does a man have a right to defend his homeland?
3) Did the incidents at Abu Ghrab help or hurt the US war effort in Iraq? What was our agenda?

In favor of Bush, the plan was to win some hearts and minds over there, and that was a pretty good plan which sounded pretty fair to the American people, I'd imagine. These incidents flew a big honkin' monkey wrench into those plans. It's doubtful that humiliation of POW's was part of the plan.
Were the US personel involved in the torture following orders? We don't know but we can be damned sure they weren't ordered to take digital photos of the whole mess or even allow cameras in if keeping this secret was the plan. On that level at least, they were almost certainly disobeying orders.

Bush is, however, the commander in chief. He is ultimately responsible for what happened at Abu Ghrab. If his executive order was too vague that it could be interpreted as using dogs to turture people, then it is the President's fault, at least partially.

Did this fiasco cost American servicemen their lives? You bet it did. If Iraqi resistance hadn't given safe haven to foreign terrorists before, they certainly will now.

These guys really think they are above the law, but in truth who is gonna stop them doing just about anything they like.

Toelint asks:

tell me how many american soldiers were dying on a daily basis before the Abu Greib story broke, and how many began dying afterwards. Would anyone consider that just maybe, it was our "forbidden tactics" that saved a fair portion of our own soldiers?

Really, Toelint. Do you think torturing naked Iraqis saves American lives?

More likely it was the revelation of this mistreatment of their countrymen that led the Iraqi resistance fighters ( or "insurgents" or "enemy combatants" for those who absolutely must see those words in order to get what someone is saying) which fortified their resolve.

[edit on 1/17/2005 by dubiousone]