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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: greenspirit who wrote (109805)	4/25/2009 5:50:39 PM
From: Travis_Bickle	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541459

Do you think the Nazis enjoyed crowding people into gas ovens and that's why they did it? "Or canning you like the Singapore government" Usually you have to pay extra for that.

To: greenspirit who wrote (109805)	4/25/2009 5:57:04 PM
From: freelyhovering	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541459

The 'torture' of US Marines in training had a very important difference, in terms of physical and psychological pain than the 'terrorists' that we tortured. If you know it is a training exercise and you are not going to be killed, there is limited psychological damage. If you are an 'enemy combatant', you have no idea if you are going to drowned by waterboarding or not. That causes severe psychological damage--of a lasting kind. When I was in the Army, we went thru gas mask training and while in a hut filled with gas, were instructed to take off our masks for several seconds and then allowed to leave the hut. Even though we knew it would not kill us logically, the feeling of not being able to see and breathe was quite frightening. It was done by friendly folks but if I had been a prisoner, it would be a completely different story.

To: greenspirit who wrote (109805)	4/25/2009 6:04:56 PM
From: Bread Upon The Water	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541459

I have been stationed at the JFK School of Special Warfare in the late 60's and knew SF personnel in the reserve's in the 80's and attended a class at JFK in the early 90's--and that's the first I've heard of waterboard training for SF or any military personnel. Secondly, the military itself has said it doesn't want to be apart of these activities lest our soldiers experience the same. Thirdly, over a 33 year active duty and reserve military career with my primary MOS in the Infantry I have never seen, heard of, or engaged in any exercise or training involving "running 5 miles with an 80 lb. pack" on one's back (Hike maybe, yes). Additionally, although the actual submarine down times are classified, my daughter-in-law's father is a retired Submarine CPT and 6 months under water is not the way it goes.

To: greenspirit who wrote (109805)	4/25/2009 10:30:46 PM
From: Cogito	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 541459

>>I think the intelligence agencies know a heck of a lot more about how to obtain information than we do. Do you think they enjoy water- boarding terrorists and that's why they went about it? Or do you believe as I do their training and experience taught them this would get the job done? Which BTW looks like it may have worked. Unfortunately, the transparent Obama administration has decided to keep that part of the incident hidden at this stage.<< GS - I agree that the intelligence agencies know more about interrogation than you or me. So I've been very interested to read the many articles by former members of our intelligence agencies which have said that torture does NOT yield better information in general, and that it didn't in some of the specific cases here. Some of those articles have been posted right here on this board. As for waterboarding not being torture because its effects are purely psychological, that's just not a valid standard. Lasting injury does not necessarily result from all kinds of torture. Once again, I will remind you that the United States has prosecuted foreign officers for torture because they waterboarded our soldiers. And yes, I do believe that the US military would torture its own solders as part of their training, if the specific goal of the training was to enable them to withstand torture. I note that Christopher Hitchens didn't believe waterboarding was torture, and to prove it had himself subjected to it. He concluded that if it isn't torture, nothing is. - Allen