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Real Men Don't Torture
George
Washington's Blog
Friday, Dec 05, 2008
The experts on extracting information from enemy combatants say
that torture
doesn't work, and doesn't do much except create more enemies.
Now, a former US Air Force interrogator who has just
released a book called How to Break a Terrorist, told
Keith Olbermann:
"It's extremely ineffective, and it's counter-productive
to what we're trying to accomplish."
"When we torture somebody, it hardens their resolve," Alexander
explained. "The information that you get is unreliable. ... And
even if you do get reliable information, you're able to stop a
terrorist attack, al Qaeda's then going to use the fact that we
torture people to recruit new members."
"How long is it going to take to undo that damage?" Olbermann
asked, referring to Alexander's observation
that "I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters
flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib
and Guantanamo. "
(ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW)
And yesterday, a group of prominent
retired generals and admirals met with President-elect Obama’s
transition team to demand that he act immediately to put an end
to Bush’s torture policies.
Former Navy Judge Advocate General Admiral John Hutson also said
of the Bush torture program:
“Fundamentally, those kinds of techniques are ineffective.
If the goal is to gain actionable intelligence, and it is, and
if that’s important, and it is, then we have to use the
techniques that are most effective. Torture is the technique
of choice of the lazy, stupid and pseudo-tough.”
So not only does torture not work, and not only does it create more
terrorists, it is for the "psuedo-tough". In other words, real
men don't torture.
Its Also Illegal
Congressmen Conyers and Nadler pointed out today in a letter
to the Attorney General, the torture-facilitating lawyers were well
aware they were breaking laws.
Indeed, two prominent experts on the law of war - Professors Jordan
Paust of the University of Houston and Tony D’Amato of Northwestern
University - wrote
in the Chicago Sun Times yesterday that the Obama administration
has a duty to go after
the Bush torture team for war crimes:
Under the U.S. Constitution, the president is expressly and
unavoidably bound to faithfully execute the laws, and the Supreme
Court has recognized in many cases since the founding of our
government that such laws include U.S. treaty law and customary
international law. In fact, every relevant federal judicial
opinion over the last 200 years has affirmed that all persons
within the executive branch are bound by the laws of war, a
point famously recognized by President Lincoln’s attorney
general in 1865. Moreover, Obama has assured the American people
that he will work to restore the rule of law and integrity in
our government, which have been among clear casualties during
the Bush Administration’s “war” on terror.
The 1949 Geneva Civilian Convention, which is considered treaty
law of the United States, expressly and unavoidably requires
that all parties search for perpetrators of grave breaches of
the treaty and bring them “before its own courts”
for “effective penal sanctions” or “if it
prefers . . . hand such persons over for trial to another High
Contracting Party.” The obligation is absolute. The United
States must either initiate prosecution or extradite to another
state.
See also this.
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INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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