What Interrogation Techniques are Acceptable?

[Andy]

I think most rational people the world over would think that in many cases the things you described would be alright if the situation called for it.

So if the situation calls for it, then it's ok? Like if we know for a fact, that a guy, who was the member of a terrorist faction, had information about future terrorist attacks, and even indicated he did prior.... then what does that situation call for?

I am not surprised to hear you say this. Bush tried to do it, and was successful in some ways.

In what way was Bush successful at dismantling the justice system?

OK, reality check here. To start, the first amendment would abolish any of those efforts. I was more referring to the 4th, 5th, 6th and 8th amendments.

Bunz... the first amendment... was added to the constitution. It can be removed, just like it was added. Right? Isn't that what happened with prohibition?

In 1919, the 18th amendment banned the production, distribution, and consumption of alcohol. In 1933, the 21st amendment was adopted that repealed the 18th amendment.

So... if all morals are based on simply what the constitution says... then we can change that, now can't we? So if I elect enough crazy Christian law makers, we can adopt an amendment to repeal the 1st, and adopt a national, state-sponsored, mandated religion. That will be YOUR moral code, if you believe the constitution is our moral code.... right?

 

[Bunz]

-------------------------------------------------
So we don't stray too far off the topic and purpose of the thread,
I.E. What Interrogation Techniques are Acceptable?

Bunz, if you could be so kind as to offer just one tecnique you would find acceptable for interrogaters to use for the purpose of gaining information, I would very much appreciate it.

If each of you give just one suggestion, it will have <only> taken 11 pages to get a list of approved tecniques started.

Well first off, this has been a rather good discussion I think. Spirited, but respectful, and overall intelligent, isnt that what most of us are here for?

As for specific tecniques, Ill start with any that are generally accepted by American law enforcement agencies...
Good cop-bad cop routine
pitting one party against the other
shouting

Then for especially hardened prisoners, depending on the value of the prisoner, I think various periods of sleep deprivation, some stress positions, some sensory deprivation. I am sure there are others that I dont know of that are used, that are fine, and probably some others that we dont know about that are unacceptable.

 

[Mr. Shaman]

All o' you Pro-torture folks are (STILL) wrong.

Hell.....just ask Dick "de Sade" Cheney!!​

"The military agency that provided advice on harsh interrogation techniques for use against terrorism suspects referred to the application of extreme duress as "torture" in a July 2002 document sent to the Pentagon's chief lawyer and warned that it would produce "unreliable information."

"The unintended consequence of a U.S. policy that provides for the torture of prisoners is that it could be used by our adversaries as justification for the torture of captured U.S. personnel," says the document, an unsigned two-page attachment to a memo by the military's Joint Personnel Recovery Agency. Parts of the attachment, obtained in full by The Washington Post, were quoted in a Senate report on harsh interrogation released this week."​

All ya' gotta do is ask a PRO....you know, a NON-Chickenhawk!!​

"Al Qaeda is comprised of a variety of individuals each with their own unique motivations for having joined. I can only remember one true ideologue in all the interrogations I conducted or supervised (more than 1,300) and even he started to come around at the end because we treated him with respect. The overwhelming majority of Sunni Iraqis who joined Al Qaeda did so out of need, not want. For some the reason was economic, for others tribal obligations, and for a large number it was for protection from the Shiite militias–the militias that we allowed, after the removal of Saddam, to conduct reprisal killings. When my group of interrogators reached out to these Sunnis and offered them an alternative to fighting against us –fighting with us–they were easily convinced to cooperate and rejected Al Qaeda. Sometimes all it took was an apology from an American for the mistakes we made at the beginning of the war. General David Petraeus proved this point by facilitating the Anbar Awakening. Interrogations are best conducted in the spirit of cooperation and negotiation, not domination and retribution. This is a metaphor for how we should use all of our instruments of power in fighting this war."​

 

[top gun]

But I do believe that we need to have hearing on this specific 'water-boarding issue'...not to be a head-hunter search for who said what/when/why...but for fuller understanding and hope for the future too not repeat the 'justification' for bending a rule about what is allowable and why was this allowed this time in this instance! That's what I hope for anyway. That we admit what we did was wrong and that we snug up those 'wording loop-holes' to keep it from happening again! IMO

You make good points.

The main thing to me is that the new administration has quickly come out and made efforts to turn some of the worst things the Bush administration did in these regards around. Strong & clear statements saying America will no longer torture anyone and setting the time line to close Gitmo does help us to regain some of our lost moral high ground.

The problems with going after so many people involved is complex though. Once the President says something is OK it sets up a lot of cover for those who can say they went to the top and were given absolute permission.

And while it's true we prosecuted Nazi officers for "just following orders" saying that was no legal excuse for human rights abuses... the water here has been severely muddied up by the previous official Bush/Cheney policy.

And with all the other Bush messes President Obama is also left trying to turn around our new President seems reluctant to go directly at and prosecute the prior President & Vice President of the United States of America.

And if you don't do that... then it seems somewhat wrong to prosecute the underlings who will say they were just following orders.

It may end up that worldwide embarrassment & a certain type of shame put onto the Bush administration and the Republican Party will be all that really will happen... but a political cost is at least... something!

 

[GenSeneca]

Well I just went back and I could not find any post where you were saying what you are willing to do to a terrorist who is in your custody to get information. You are going to have to point it out for me.

Like I said, my illustration was lost on those who needed to hear and understand it most...

If this thread were about dieting and food:

GenSeneca: I know what not to eat. I have a vague idea of what I should eat but I need specifics to actually prepare the meals. My wife wants to go shopping and she said "fruits and vegetables" was not a proper grocery list and neither was an actual list of foods that she shouldn't buy.

Person #3: Now I know your a racist homophobe... I clearly said "fruits and vegetables" but you continue with your didactic tirades and dreams of chugging gallons of lard... I agree with Person #2, I hope you die.

 

[ASPCA4EVER]

Well, thank you TOPGUN, for reading my post {I was beginning to suspect that my point of view was being ignored}.

We don't have to adapt/change/modify/create new techniques in torture...not when what they able to achieve as a successful information flow from Saddam Hussein with the techniques that they used on him {no physical torture was ever done to him}. 3rd time I've said it!

BUT...I think that with the 'rush to implement the aggressive action into Iraq' {WMD my arse}...Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, even General Colin Powell would want and desire a 9-11 type of commission to study the events and protocol that lead up to the expeditious rush to judgement for holding those 'assumed terrorist at Guantanamo and the approval for additional torture techniques to be used above and beyond what was in the 'field manual guideline'.

I mean that we were all operating off of a heightened sense of injustice and FEAR that allowed some many things to just be an acceptable way to do things and this has come back to just smell up our wonderful country in so many heinous ways.

Same mindset and thought process immediately after Pearl Harbor and the incarcerations of all Japanese Americans...Holy Bat Crap it only took what 50 years for us to apologize for doing that to that race of people.

We allowed the misguided...'don't call those terrorist any type of P.O.W.'s' terminology and we'll be able to skirt around that issue of the Geneva Convention...but we'll hold them as 'terrorist' and just tell everyone that they will be given the full-meal-deal of our justice system!! Ya, right, 1 year passed and they were still there, 2nd year came and went, 3rd/4th/5th year rolled on by and they are still there...some of those men have been in our American prison for well over 6-7 years and are still waiting to be proven guilty {according to our Judicial system they are innocent}.

We should take a real hard look at this excuse/logic/reasoning behind this poorly executed/highly mismanaged knee jerk reaction to 9-11 and the way that we treated those detainees.

For Christ sake we can manage to blow $80 million impeaching a seated President for lying about his sexual exploits...and we should turn a blind eye and become tone deaf to this power struggle and mindless thought process that has lead us to this point in history.

 

[Pandora]

Like I said, my illustration was lost on those who needed to hear and understand it most...

Well I really do want to know what these guys are willing to do when a terrorist has information on an attack to one of our cities like LA.

If anyone ever really does give a list will you let me know, I am tired of reading the various posts of all the things they think are bad. I want to know what they are willing to actually do.

 

[GenSeneca]

Well first off, this has been a rather good discussion I think. Spirited, but respectful, and overall intelligent, isnt that what most of us are here for?

You may be here for that...
I'm here to show my Dictionary is a foot long and three inches thick... Ladies?

As for specific tecniques, Ill start with any that are generally accepted by American law enforcement agencies...
Good cop-bad cop routine
pitting one party against the other
shouting

Thanks, that really is the kind of thing I was looking for here... Only took 13 pages to get some specific ideas for interrogation. Hopefully we don't have to go another 13 pages before someone else offers more.

Then for especially hardened prisoners, depending on the value of the prisoner, I think various periods of sleep deprivation, some stress positions, some sensory deprivation. I am sure there are others that I dont know of that are used, that are fine, and probably some others that we dont know about that are unacceptable.

The only thing I take issue with here is the use of the word "Some"... I have gotten on you before about using vauge terms and its not without reason: I'll only steal "some" of your money... I'll only kill "some" of your children... seriously.. can you get more specific on these because it really cuts to the heart of a point I made early on; what you find acceptable, someone else, who agrees with you now, will consider it torture.

 

[The Scotsman]

Thanks, that really is the kind of thing I was looking for here... Only took 13 pages to get some specific ideas for interrogation. Hopefully we don't have to go another 13 pages before someone else offers more.

...........go on then..... perhaps you may wish to have a try if its so infuriately slow and dazzle everyone with your ideas of how to extract information out of someone!

 

[top gun]

Well, thank you TOPGUN, for reading my post {I was beginning to suspect that my point of view was being ignored}.

We don't have to adapt/change/modify/create new techniques in torture...not when what they able to achieve as a successful information flow from Saddam Hussein with the techniques that they used on him {no physical torture was ever done to him}. 3rd time I've said it!

BUT...I think that with the 'rush to implement the aggressive action into Iraq' {WMD my arse}...Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, even General Colin Powell would want and desire a 9-11 type of commission to study the events and protocol that lead up to the expeditious rush to judgement for holding those 'assumed terrorist at Guantanamo and the approval for additional torture techniques to be used above and beyond what was in the 'field manual guideline'.

I mean that we were all operating off of a heightened sense of injustice and FEAR that allowed some many things to just be an acceptable way to do things and this has come back to just smell up our wonderful country in so many heinous ways.

Same mindset and thought process immediately after Pearl Harbor and the incarcerations of all Japanese Americans...Holy Bat Crap it only took what 50 years for us to apologize for doing that to that race of people.

We allowed the misguided...'don't call those terrorist any type of P.O.W.'s' terminology and we'll be able to skirt around that issue of the Geneva Convention...but we'll hold them as 'terrorist' and just tell everyone that they will be given the full-meal-deal of our justice system!! Ya, right, 1 year passed and they were still there, 2nd year came and went, 3rd/4th/5th year rolled on by and they are still there...some of those men have been in our American prison for well over 6-7 years and are still waiting to be proven guilty {according to our Judicial system they are innocent}.

We should take a real hard look at this excuse/logic/reasoning behind this poorly executed/highly mismanaged knee jerk reaction to 9-11 and the way that we treated those detainees.

For Christ sake we can manage to blow $80 million impeaching a seated President for lying about his sexual exploits...and we should turn a blind eye and become tone deaf to this power struggle and mindless thought process that has lead us to this point in history.

Well you shouldn't be ignored because you make a lot of great historical points.

You hit many nails right on the head.

Torture has been proven to be quite often unreliable. There are other ways that are similarly productive and often torture is used more out of anger or just plain frustration from the interrogators than as something that is believed to really give outstanding intel results.

The internment camps were a very similar overreaction to how the Bush administration played on everyone fears after 9-11... never mind Iraq had nothing to do with that at all.

And the whole Conservative get Clinton on something (anything) at all costs "because that SOB is just too damn popular". I finally saw the Republican Party for what it was... petty, mean spirited and self absorbed. That is what truly in the end converted me from a fence sitting Independent to an activist Democrat.

And then they went and Swift Boated, defamed and character assassinated a war hero... a decorated in theater fighter, John Kerry. It was just simply beyond disgusting! So I worked and volunteered harder!

Sometimes it takes Americans a little while to detect the smear merchants from the victims... but if it goes on long enough the middle of the road voters jump over to try and see that the right thing finally gets done.

And that's exactly how President Obama was elected.

 

[GenSeneca]

...........go on then..... perhaps you may wish to have a try if its so infuriately slow and dazzle everyone with your ideas of how to extract information out of someone!

Scotty, your post style is all wrong. I'm not going to tell you what post style is acceptable though, I'm just going to drone on and on, ad nauseum, about how incredibly wrong you got it. If you attempt to defend your post style as anything other than wrong, wrong, wrong, I will attack you and encourage others to do so as well. By the way, don't bother asking me to point out specific posts that meet my approval, I'll only give you vague generalities such as "intelligent and thought provoking" while continuing to berate those I think are terrible.

 

[GenSeneca]

Torture has been proven to be quite often unreliable.

Torture is bad... This is what we should NOT do.

There are other ways that are similarly productive

But don't expect to hear any specific examples of what we SHOULD do.

And the whole Conservative get Clinton on something (anything) at all costs "because that SOB is just too damn popular". I finally saw the Republican Party for what it was... petty, mean spirited and self absorbed. That is what truly in the end converted me from a fence sitting Independent to an activist Democrat.

And then they went and Swift Boated, defamed and character assassinated a war hero... a decorated in theater fighter, John Kerry. It was just simply beyond disgusting! So I worked and volunteered harder!

Sometimes it takes Americans a little while to detect the smear merchants from the victims... but if it goes on long enough the middle of the road voters jump over to try and see that the right thing finally gets done.

And that's exactly how President Obama was elected.

To cover his inability to answer the 3 questions posed in the Original Post, and in an effort to deflect attention away from the topic, TopGun launched an attack with his usual Progressive Campaign Propaganda, a tactic reserved for the: petty, mean spirited and self absorbed.

 

[The Scotsman]

Scotty, your post style is all wrong. I'm not going to tell you what post style is acceptable though, I'm just going to drone on and on, ad nauseum, about how incredibly wrong you got it. If you attempt to defend your post style as anything other than wrong, wrong, wrong, I will attack you and encourage others to do so as well. By the way, don't bother asking me to point out specific posts that meet my approval, I'll only give you vague generalities such as "intelligent and thought provoking" while continuing to berate those I think are terrible.

..............

........I'll take that as a "no" then?.......

 

[Pandora]

Apparently water boarding is a very bad thing to do to people who wish to blow up our cities and kill our citizens but there are some liberals out there who want to see it just for the fun of it and are willing to pay to see it done, as long as it’s done to Americans they hate.


Keith Olbermann is one of those sick twisted freaks who seem to think the enemy of our country is Americans who don’t think like them. So he is willing to give to charity 1000 dollars for every minute that he gets to watch Sean Hannity get water boarded.


I hope Sean does it if for no other reason than Olbermann would have to actually give something to our troops.


Its so strange to me that there are Americans who want to see other Americans water boarded and are willing to pay to see it but how dare we do it to some terrorist who wants to blow up one of our cities. Every day I discover the left is more sick and more twisted than I thought the day before.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Sm8Os3mXv8

 

[top gun]

GenSeneca;94429]Torture is bad... This is what we should NOT do.

We seem to be in agreement here.

But don't expect to hear any specific examples of what we SHOULD do.

We should do everything we possibly can up to the torture threshold. This is in line with both the Army Field Manual regarding prisoners & interrogation and International Law... as well as how we ourselves would want out prisoners treated whether they are or not.

This really doesn't appear all that difficult to understand.

To cover his inability to answer the 3 questions posed in the Original Post, and in an effort to deflect attention away from the topic, TopGun launched an attack with his usual Progressive Campaign Propaganda, a tactic reserved for the: petty, mean spirited and self absorbed.

I believe what I did was simply answer a specific post (actually commend another poster for his post) and explain to him some of my personal observations, reasons and motivations as to why I can't and don't support the Republican Party and their tactics.

Feeling this way drove me to the more Progressive side... not the other way around.