>>> tell me again that the prosecution of the Japanese soldier was not about torture by waterboarding.
The Japanese soldier, Yukio Asano, was sentenced to 15 years. But not for waterboarding. In fact, his trial was for:
1. Mistreating and torturing POWS, and
2. Taking and converting to his own use Red Cross packages and supplies for POWs.
Now, as it turned out, this trial was NOT for "waterboarding".
"Specifications: beating using hands, fists, club; kicking; water torture; burning using cigarettes; strapping on a stretcher head downward"
So, to begin with, there were many more items besides anything involving "water", not merely "waterboarding". More importantly, the "water torture" that was referenced was NOT "waterboarding" as we now refer to it:
"Twenty-one years earlier, in 1947, the United States charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for carrying out another form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian. The subject was strapped on a stretcher that was tilted so that his feet were in the air and head near the floor, and small amounts of water were poured over his face, leaving him gasping
for air until he agreed to talk"
The details of the "water" portion of the treatment were in Specification 5:
"...brutally mistreat and torture John Henry Burton, an American Prisoner of War, by beating him; and by fastening him head downward on a stretcher and forcing water into his nose."
As can readily be seen, this is NOT the same as the "waterboarding" the CIA applies. In the CIA's treatment, there is no "forcing" of water into the nose.
From the article by Evan Wallach, in footnote 67, we have:
... was taken into the corridor, strapped to a stretcher, which was tilted so his head was toward the floor .... [w]ater was then poured down his nose and mouth for about twenty minutes.
Again, there is a vast distinction -- this "torture" involved 20 full minutes, whereas the CIA treatments lasted seconds, and in the most extreme reported case over 2 minutes.
Further, the "poured onto his face so that it was almost impossible for him to get a breath". Of course, that is NOT what happens in the CIA waterboardings. In fact, there is a physician present at all times.
This Japanese fellow was convicted for many other crimes, but CIA-styled waterboarding wasn't one of them. |
