What's the deal with drugs like sodium pentathol or the modern equivalent. Is that considered torture? If they're affective, I think it's alot better of an option than water boarding.
Red as usual makes a very good case. The geneva convention is IMO outdated and in serious need of being revised. His point about what comes around goes around is spot on. Just ask that Marine regiment in nam that cut off those ears. Oh yeah, you can't because the NVA killed them. ALL of them. I can tell you the boots on the ground guys, the everyday soldiers are goverened by very strict rules to the treatmeant of detainees. I can tell you there are many of our guys that are under investigation for detainee abuse and quite a few that have been prosecuted for it. I don't however think that any of them are entitled to the rights that we have. This is why I think it is imperative that Gitmo remain open. If you close it and bring these animals to north cuba, errr Miami they will all become entitled to the same rights as anyone else in an American jail for whatever reason they are in there. Thats bullchit and I hope it never happens.
You highlight another major failing of the current administration. The Justice Department has not been able to find a legal leg to stand on with the enemy combatants. These men are not terrorists or they would be indicted and tried as such under the Clinton Anti Terror acts. That means they are either innocents, which no one believes to be the case or captured soldiers. Whatever the case these dudes need to be classified to satisfy the laws and international treaties.
Red, you're saying this as if it makes a difference. I agree, we should hold ourselves to a higher standard, and we most certainly do, but it doesn't make a bit of difference what we do, our guys will always suffer untold atrocities if taken prisoner by any of our enemies. Show me some pictures, or first hand accounts, of us, the US, chopping heads or limbs off of prisoners. Show me some pictures of the mass graves. Where are the work camps, the half submerged holding cells, the chain gangs? Hell, we treat American prisoners in Angola 100 times worse, and rightly so, than any prisoner held in cuba. If one of our guys, or gals, is taken prisoner in any current theater, you can write them off. Unless we're extremely lucky, they're as good as dead. And you can bet they'll suffer greatly before meeting their end. It's better to be killed on the battlefield, than taken prisoner. What really makes me sick, is that there are literally thousands of Americans, and I use the label loosely, that would spit on a member of our military, but march on Washington to have the prisoners held in cuba freed. Say it ain't so...
Two quick points. First, not all "torture" is torture. Temporary fear induced by moderate amounts of physical and mental discomfort isn't torture. Driving bamboo spikes under fingernails, dislocating limbs, starvation - that's torture. Second, we teach our military members to follow Geneva conventions but to not expect the other guys to do the same. So the argument that not following them will put our own guys at risk is, in the current environment, misleading. However, we should follow the Geneva conventions because it's the right thing to do. The biggest mistake we make with some of these folks is to ever admit we have them. The really bad ones should have any info extracted and then should just disappear, with just enough proof of their demise secretly forwarded to their buddies if able. And none of us should feel bad about that.
Not that simple. No ID. No uniform. Hiding in plain sight during the day, killing from the shadows, then back selling paninis to soldiers... In truth, I think these folks are closer to captured spies than enemy combatants. To me - they have forfeited any rights they might have under international law when they choose to fight like they do. It's a risk they take. Like all risk, there's a cost if it doesn't go your way.
But Red, it takes a pretty broad interpretation to determine that al-quaeda members are even entitled to the protections of Geneva. I know that's been a hot issue for years, and I would maintain that al quaeda is not a signitory of the convention, and does not adhere to its policies either in the treatment of prisoners of war or non-combatants. That having been said, I agree that America should not stoop to torture of our prisoners. But IMO, based only on the descriptions I've heard and read about waterboarding, I don't know that I would even label it as torture. It does no physical damage to the prisoner. Psychological damage? Perhaps, but that's a much more individual situation; many people would find imprisonment even under the most minimal conditions to be a form of psychological torture. The bottom line is, American treatment of POW's, even in the harshest condition, does not compare to what our enemies do their POW's. It infuriates me that anyone calling themselves an American would think otherwise.
