Another fine mess he got us into!

[JackLuis]

Now the international Red Cross report on the CIA rendition camps has been leaked.
Here is the link to the Report.

Here is the link to the article from the New York Review of Books.

" When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry.... These are evil people. And we're not going to win this fight by turning the other cheek.

If it hadn't been for what we did—with respect to the...enhanced interrogation techniques for high-value detainees...—then we would have been attacked again. Those policies we put in place, in my opinion, were absolutely crucial to getting us through the last seven-plus years without a major-casualty attack on the US....

—Former Vice President Dick Cheney, February 4, 2009" (and still evil bastard)

 

[oggbashan]

What I am sad about is the impact of this on the US's standing and influence in the world.

It is a long way removed from President Wilson's 14 points for the end of the First World War when the US had the moral standing to suggest that the winners should not try to reduce Germany by reparations.

President Obama has started to reverse the bad impression made by Extraordinary Rendition and GITMO. If the previous administration had been really aware of the impact that these policies had on their ALLIES, they should have stopped them immediately.

The gains for "National Security" were outweighed 100-fold by the new enemies they created.

Og

Edited for PS: The report although embarrassing, is flawed in that it details the allegations but not the other side - the US government's response. Although the US administration had defended waterboarding as a legitimate interrogation technique the Red Cross's report should have been balanced by a detailed response from the US. Those sent to GITMO have no reason to withhold any allegation they might want to make or even to lie. If they weren't enemies of the US before arrest their treatment since arrest would not have made them into friends.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

A lot of what goes on is beyond the control of political leaders.

I'm a student of the American Civil War. That war was filled with atrocities on both sides. Union cavalry slaughted livestock and slaves on Southern plantations. George Custer hanged Rebel prisoners until the South retaliated by kidnapping his staff officers and hanging them. A female ancestor of mine was murdered by Union soldiers. And the prisoner of war camps were awful on both sides.

This is what you get when the wrong people have power.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

What a chump! Anyone who really understands Intelligence will tell you that data gained from torture is always suspect. People will tell you anything you want to hear to get out of pain and suffering. Those orders must have come down from a bunch of political appointees whose own intelligence was about that of your average limpet. When Obama put the whole thing back under the rules of U.S. Army interrogation, it wasn't for 'mercy' or 'international opinion'. It was because it's more effective!

Damned shame Cheney survived that first heart attack. There'd be a lot more dead Al-Qaeda and fewer dead G.I.'s.

 

[sr71plt]

What a chump! Anyone who really understands Intelligence will tell you that data gained from torture is always suspect.

Bingo. It was all a waste of political capital.

 

[3113]

When Obama put the whole thing back under the rules of U.S. Army interrogation, it wasn't for 'mercy' or 'international opinion'. It was because it's more effective!

Torture, and "shock-n'-awe" for that matter, I don't think were ever about effectiveness. They were about an imagined loss of power and position. Those who felt they were necessary, also felt that the U.S., after 9/11, had to flex it's muscles or be seen as a weakling, a push over. We had to remind everyone that we were the "sleeping giant" (as we were called in WWII), and that we extract a terrible revenge for waking us.

It's the "24" thinking--actually the thinking of most Hollywood movies since Dirty Harry. A hero has to be tough and mean, never mind the law (or the facts for that matter)--scare the shit out of 'em, get answers fast, and leave them (and those who hear about what you did to them) cowed and forever trembling in fear of you.

What Cheney is lamenting, I think, ultimately, is the loss of our reputation on that score; it's the belief of every bully that people will walk all over him if he doesn't show them who's boss.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

I begin to have doubts as to the benefit of letting anyone who has never been a military commander serve as SecDef. Rumsfeld was simply a mach-snot cowboy, Cheney a warwimp. Neither of them had any business making any military decisions . . . and neither did Dubya!

 

[JackLuis]

Og

Edited for PS: The report although embarrassing, is flawed in that it details the allegations but not the other side - the US government's response. Although the US administration had defended waterboarding as a legitimate interrogation technique the Red Cross's report should have been balanced by a detailed response from the US. Those sent to GITMO have no reason to withhold any allegation they might want to make or even to lie. If they weren't enemies of the US before arrest their treatment since arrest would not have made them into friends.

The report was addressed to the CIA as a critic of their practices, as reported by their detainees. It is the allegation as it were.

I'd like to see the Government give their side of the story too. I doubt we'll hear much about it. If the Justice Dept ever actually looks at the Bush Administration there will be a lot of them going to jail.

First the Politicians and then the Bankers! Al-Quida can wait a month or two.

 

[amicus]

Browsed this thread and left it; usual bleeding heart liberal crap.

But I thought about it and came back.

If I knew the threadstarter was involved with kidnapping one of my kids and I could get to him/her/it, I would use a serrated blade to saw off the little finger first, a joint at a time until you told me where my child was being held.

After I got an answer, and I would, even if it took sawing off all the fingers and working on the toes; I would follow the information and if it wasn't valid and if I didn't find my child, I would return and continue.

If you think I am alone in my thinking; you motherfuckers better have a second thought when you decide to violate my rights or those I love, because I am coming after you.

Just thought you ought to know.

Amicus

 

[sr71plt]

Browsed this thread and left it; usual bleeding heart liberal crap.

But I thought about it and came back.

If I knew the threadstarter was involved with kidnapping one of my kids and I could get to him/her/it, I would use a serrated blade to saw off the little finger first, a joint at a time until you told me where my child was being held.

After I got an answer, and I would, even if it took sawing off all the fingers and working on the toes; I would follow the information and if it wasn't valid and if I didn't find my child, I would return and continue.

If you think I am alone in my thinking; you motherfuckers better have a second thought when you decide to violate my rights or those I love, because I am coming after you.

Just thought you ought to know.

Amicus

Oh, Amicus, Amicus, Amicus. Such big talk. Unless someone opened all the drawers in the kitchen for you, you couldn't even find the serrated knife to begin with.

Those who've never "done" are always the quickest to bluster about what they'd "do."

 

[DeeZire]

[

If you think I am alone in my thinking; you motherfuckers better have a second thought when you decide to violate my rights or those I love, because I am coming after you.

Just thought you ought to know.

Amicus

Take it to the General Board, Ami. You would undoubtedly find much adulation and respect there. On your way, you might call your therapist for an appointment to address your paranoia issues.

To ease your fears - no one here is coming after you, unless you're in an upper-income tax bracket, in which case we're only coming after your money - or what's left of it after your free-marketer cronies pissed it all away.

 

[amicus]

Less than a hundred days in office and the new administration has already bungled just about everything they have dabbled in.

It might be interesting to observe April 15th, as I understand nationwide demonstrations are on tap presenting a resistance to the far left policies evident in Washington D.C. I cannot recall a new administration under such negative pressure or even reading of one.

There may be more backbone in the common folk than you are willing to acknowledge.

We shall see.

Amicus

 

[3113]

To ease your fears - no one here is coming after you

[whisper]Don't tell him that! This may work to our advantage.[/whisper]

Ohmygawd, Ami! Evil foreign terrorists are coming after you! They know how much you love liberty and America and manhood! They know how anti-socialist you are! They're coming Ami! Grab the kitchenware and get to your compound in the woods where you can hold out with the wives and daughters--the one with no internet because they can trace that stuff. Yes, of course it will be hard on us not to have you posting here...but we know how important it is to freedom that you hunker down with the guns and the survival rations and fight the good fight.

 

[JackLuis]

Browsed this thread and left it; usual bleeding heart liberal crap.


If I knew the threadstarter was involved with kidnapping one of my kids and I could get to him/her/it, I would use a serrated blade to saw off the little finger first, a joint at a time until you told me where my child was being held.

, because I am coming after you.

Just thought you ought to know.

Amicus

I thought this was a free country, Amicus old dear?

The use of torture is so old fashioned. There are much better ways of getting what you want. Legal ways that don't cause the relatives of the accused to mount in righteous anger, bringing their own brand of cutlery.

What I want to hear is where the intel this gave us was of any benefit in the War On Terror?

Oh still Secrete? Then in the interests of fact we must assume it resulted in squat!

When I see Dick Cheney hanging, then I will know that the Rule of Law is once more an American Value.