Clear Evidence Waterboarding Works (but may still be a bad idea)

[ParanoiA]

For one thing, enemy soldiers have demonstrated that they oppose us. So their "due process" would be "caught in the act". But a soldier is just following orders; he's not intrinsically our enemy, more like an opponent. And once captured, he won't be getting in our way anymore. Putting a captured soldier to death would be considered far worse morally than torturing him. Combat and prison are different situations.

 

Good point.

 

Yet even in the old times when a fight to the death was considered some kind of honorable thing, there were things that were allowed and things that weren't. Using archery or poison were considered less honorable than matching swords with him. Killing someone who was defenseless was considered wrong.

 

I guess I take war more seriously than most. Just seems to me if you're willing to kill and maime humans to meet some end - then apparently the severity of the situation requires it or else you shouldn't be doing it - either way, it is contradictory to "rule out" things.

 

It's also why you shouldn't wage war so easily. The "mess" of war; the abandonment of basic human liberty and causing human suffering, creating torturous environments - this is WHY you don't wage war carelessly; (or grant war powers to "kind of" wage war...long, drawn out, vietnam-ish, Iraq-ish like warfare).

 

Think about it this way...what scenario makes it so dire and dramtic to kill people, but not torture them? That isn't consistent to me. If situation X is so damn important I'm willing to murder and maime to force compliance, then why isn't it important enough to torture for? And if it's not, why must it be "ruled out" to not do it?

 

An all or nothing response would probably not be a good idea. We'd either have to not respond to a little thing, hence not penalizing little things, or go to an all out war due to a little thing. That would look immature, and would make us far more disliked than we are now.

 

My moral obligation is to my countrymen over all others. We should never war over little things. If you're not willing to kill babies, then you shouldn't be doing it at all. No war is civil. It's all disgusting. There should never be "clean" war, or "honorable" war to me. The more you clean it up, the easier it is to wage and the more frequent it gets waged.

[Pangloss]

"Only Sith Lords speak in absolutes."

- ObiWan Kenobi

 

(hehe)

[ParanoiA]

Hard to argue with that...

[Mr Skeptic]

Well, how I see it, nobody wants to torture people nor kill them if it is not necessary. But to torture a person, you need to capture him, and once you capture him, he is no longer a threat.

 

I agree that there should be no honor in killing, but the fact remains that some forms of killing have always been considered much less honorable than other forms. Even though I dislike the idea of killing, I do think that it can be made even worse depending on the manner of killing.

 

Re "clean" wars, I don't think that "clean" wars encourage fighting. Back in the old days, wars were very nasty, but they were still fought. Nasty wars also make people hate each other more IMO. I mean, look for example at the hundred years war, we don't do that kind of thing nowadays.

[mooeypoo]

I'm quite happy to have a skeptical high-ranking government official undergo the process and rule one way or another.

 

That's what happened with waterboarding and Acting Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin. He had himself waterboarded, and decided it was torture.

 

Sadly this thread seems to be devolving into a big semantic argument over what constitutes torture...

That's why I was asking, actually.

 

I do believe this is torture, but I also believe a lot of other things need to be constituted as official torture. I also believe there is *never* an easy ansewr for anything, for the "simple" reason that we are humans, and that we live in an imperfect world that sometimes require a "Gray-Zone" decision, wether we like it or not.

 

If we are to talk STRICTLY moral-values here, then I don't see how this can be anything OTHER than an immoral act. But we're not talking *only* morality, we're talking life-applications, which makes the issue a lot harder to answer.

 

That, again, before I'm grilled for being immoral or 'evil' here, still doesn't mean I agree with the act. I am just not willing to commit myself to a strict answer for a generalization.

 

Another point is that it seemed to me that people said "that is immoral, so let's find other solutions" --> and *that* is what I was trying to say. The "other solutions" seemed to me to be very close - if not completely "in" - the definition of torture. The question of "where do we draw the line" isn't meant to ridicule morality, it's supposed to make us consider our real-life situation, and notice that people consider torture as different things.

 

I will also state here, that I believe torture is subjective. There are, of course, definite-answers; Physical pain is considered torture within the entire world (i would imagine, even if not by all *governments*).. but psychological torture is more diverse in the 'judgement' it receives.

 

A third-world person who never experienced what we are experiencing in our relatively very comfortable lives in the western world probably will consider 'torture' things that we may not, and vise versa.

 

In order to say "TORTURE IS BAAAAD!" we need to understand that "torture" is a very hard-to-define term, or - at the very least - it is not "EASY" to define.

 

Morally, we need to consider what is hurting someone else on the expense of others. Real life sometimes requires us to make moral decisions that are not ideal.

 

That was all I meant to say in my point.

 

 

Torture is generally evil.

Life is not perfect.

Morality is far from easy.

 

~moo

[PhDP]

Even if it was proven to be effective, and I don't think this proof has been made, there's still at least two problems.

 

First, well, there's the Geneva convention. It's illegal to torture prisoners of war. What kind of message the U.S. administration is sending ? Don't torture our guys, but if we need to, we'll torture your guys, well, because they're *bad* ?

 

Also, again, I think the U.S. should take into consideration the impact of waterboarding on its reputation. "Reputation" isn't an abstract concept, it has concrete consequences. The Iraq war has been used by terroritsts to increase recruitment. Of course, this is nothing compared to the Iraq blunder, but it's part of a general pattern of arrogance from the current U.S. administation and it will help terrorists achieve their goals.

 

From a purely utilitarian perspective, even with absolutely no considerations for the victims of torture, I doupt this is worth it for the U.S.

[Pangloss]

Is there an official definition of torture legally associated with the Geneva convention? And is waterboarding on that list?

[Mr Skeptic]

The legal definition has been posted at least twice. I explained why I think waterboarding is torture according to that definition in post 16

 

Where I said about lawful sanctions, I shouldn't have written "not convicted" in this case anyhow, since the example you gave was of a captured al Qaeda member and he probably was convicted. I have heard of torture being applied to non-convicted people in Guantenamo which is why I put that. However, I think what it actually meant by "lawful sanctions" was the punishment for a crime, so that part I said wrong anyhow.

[bascule]

Hmmm...

 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article3086937.ece

 

Ron Suskind’s masterful 2006 book The One Percent Doctrine recorded FBI sources as saying that Zubaydah was in fact mentally unstable and tangential to Al-Qaeda’s plots, and that he gave reams of unfounded information under torture - information that led law-enforcement bodies in the US to raise terror alert levels, rushing marshals and police to shopping malls, bridges and other alleged targets as Zubaydah tried to get the torture to stop. No one disputes that Zubaydah wrote a diary - and that it was written in the words of three personalities, none of them his own.

 

A former FBI agent who was involved in the interrogation, Daniel Coleman, said last week that the CIA knew Al-Qaeda’s leaders all believed Zubaydah “was crazy, and they knew he was always on the damn phone. You think they’re going to tell him anything?” Even though preliminary, legal interrogation gave the US good – though not unique – information, the CIA still asked for and received permission to torture him in pursuit of more data and leads.

 

Yeah, this case certainly isn't as cut-and-dry as presented in the OP...

[Pangloss]

Why not?

[bascule]

The story in the Times indicates his torture also lead to a number of false positives, i.e. the information obtained under the duress of torture was unreliable, even for the individual you're using to make the argument.

 

Is it your contention that one success trumps all the failures?

[Pangloss]

What I think is that your argument needs work. First of all, there's a big difference between an author quoting unnamed sources and an actual source stepping forward himself.

 

Second, I looked up Suskind's book in the Wikipedia and found a whole chorus criticizing it. In fact, former acting CIA director John McLaughlin told Wolf Blitzer outright on CNN that Suskind was completely wrong about Zubayda.

 

I totally disagree with the view that the capture of Abu Zubaydah was unimportant. Abu Zubaydah was woven through all of the intelligence prior to 9/11 that signaled a major attack was coming, and his capture yielded a great deal of important information.

 

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0606/20/sitroom.02.html

 

That's not to say that McLaughlin is right and Suskind is wrong, it just says that there is reasonable doubt about Suskind's conclusion, which was drawn much earlier and, again, based on unnamed sources.

 

So I don't believe I am being unreasonable in suggesting that the situation has changed. But like I said in the OP, I consider this as having reopened the question, not put a final nail in the coffin of opposition waterboarding.

[bascule]

Yes, he relies on unnamed sources like Daniel Coleman attest to Zubaydah being crazy...

 

Do you have any actual counterargument against the false positives, or are you just going to lodge an ad hominem argument supported by strawmen and outright falsehoods?

 

Or do you even care? Your original argument as stated completely glosses over false positives. One positive result equals success! Never mind how many false positives there were.

[Pangloss]

We don't know that there were false positives, so it's erroneous for you to say "never mind how many false positives there were". That is a false premise. Do you have any substantive evidence of false positives that's not from a secondhand source that's been directly and clearly refuted, and which flies directly in the face of testimony from an expert who was directly working on the events in question?

 

You're clearly being rude towards me and aggressively distorting my arguments for no other reason than the fact that I have an open mind about waterboarding, and I don't think that constitutes an argument. And I don't think pointing that out constitutes an ad hominem, either. I'm sorry you feel otherwise, but if you have a problem with it you can take it up with another mod or admin here.

[iNow]

Pangloss - Unless you plan to argue that there's never been a false positive, or that we get useful information more than false information, this seems like a pretty blatant distraction from the real issue at hand.

 

If you are planning to argue those things, then please clarify.

[bascule]

We don't know that there were false positives, so it's erroneous for you to say "never mind how many false positives there were". That is a false premise.

 

Oh please, we have high ranking military intelligence officials testifying before the House Judiciary Committee that waterboarding produces false information and is torture:

 

http://www.abajournal.com/news/waterboarding_is_torture_and_ineffective_military_witnesses_tell_house_pane/

 

You're clearly being rude towards me and aggressively distorting my arguments

 

Let's call it quid pro quo

 

for no other reason than the fact that I have an open mind about waterboarding

 

To spin that in the other direction... you're defending torture

[ParanoiA]

Let me get this straight...is someone really under the delusion that torture doesn't work?

 

And just for fun, tell me how a million false positives and one true positive isn't success.

[Pangloss]

To spin that in the other direction... you're defending torture

 

Why is it necessary for you to spin my argument at all? Why can't you argue with me on the basis that I've stated, that I have an open mind about whether waterboarding constitutes torture? Your opinion is that it's torture, fine, I respect that. I'm trying to have an open discussion between intelligent people, and you're finding it necessary to demonize me by accusing me of defending torture. Why?

 

I think everyone on this web site should be demanding an answer from you to that question, and I think it's typical and ridiculous that nobody will do so, because your position represents the politically correct position for this board.

 

Pangloss - Unless you plan to argue that there's never been a false positive' date=' or that we get useful information more than false information, this seems like a pretty blatant distraction from the real issue at hand.

 

If you are planning to argue those things, then please clarify.[/quote']

 

See what I mean? Bascule distracts and deflects and when Pangloss responds somebody swoops in, ignoring all the politically correct rhetoric from Bascule and focusing on the politically incorrect rhetoric from Pangloss. This is so typical.

 

iNow, I never made that statement and I agree that this is a distraction from the matters at hand. That is exactly why bascule brought it up. Why you are supporting this nonsense is beyond me, but as far as I'm concerned this is just another typical example of people ignoring 98% of the posts that agree with their viewpoint, no matter how ridiculous they get.

[iNow]

iNow, I never made that statement and I agree that this is a distraction from the matters at hand. That is exactly why bascule brought it up. Why you are supporting this nonsense is beyond me, but as far as I'm concerned this is just another typical example of people ignoring 98% of the posts that agree with their viewpoint, no matter how ridiculous they get.

 

Uhhmmm... Okay. I'm confused, but I don't dare challenge you or request clarification or I'll be accused of supporting the politically correct view point and demonizing you.

 

 

 

Let me get this straight...is someone really under the delusion that torture doesn't work?

I believe the argument is not either "it works" or "it doesn't work." I believe the issue being discussed is whether the instances where it doesn't work result in enough damage such that this damage cannot be fixed by those few times where it does work.

 

 

And just for fun, tell me how a million false positives and one true positive isn't success.

 

Long-term, it's the false positives that will be remembered, due to sheer volume if nothing else. That one positive is only a success in the short-term, and also please define success before attacking me for this position.

[ParanoiA]

Long-term, it's the false positives that will be remembered, due to sheer volume if nothing else. That one positive is only a success in the short-term, and also please define success before attacking me for this position.

 

Attacking you? Now you're going to start the spin technique?

 

I would say if torture gained a pile of false positives that wasted time and resources and one true positive that stopped a suicide bomber then that's a success. Or do you put a price on lives?

 

Notice I didn't say it was a good idea, a moral idea, an efficient method, nor any of that - I said that it's a success. Shouldn't have to point that out to a board of scientists...but then, shouldn't have to have your arguments spun either.

[iNow]

I spun nothing. I asked you to clarify success first IF you were going to attack me for my views.

 

You seem to define success by the stopping of one suicide bomber. I agree that stopping a suicide bomber is a successful action. This does not, however, automatically translate into waterboarding (or torture) itself being successful. If waterboarding (or torture) of one prisoner led to this information, then that INTERROGATION was a success, but not the process of waterboarding (or torture) itself.

[Pangloss]

Uhhmmm... Okay. I'm confused, but I don't dare challenge you or request clarification or I'll be accused of supporting the politically correct view point and demonizing you.

 

I apologize if I gave you that impression. Maybe I was too harsh in my last reply to you, but my feeling is one of repressed not repressee. But I understand where you're coming from and I will endeavor not to push those buttons, as it were.

 

Again, I'm not saying that just because waterboarding works sometimes, or in one case, means it will work every time. I believe that we've got clear evidence here that waterboarding has worked and it may work again in the future if it is applied again. I agree that this doesn't mean that it will work in all cases.

 

But I think it's a bit disengenuous to require evidence that it will work every time in the future, or even that it will work more often than not. That's not the issue here. If the treatment is humane then it could be combined with any number of treatments, and there's no reason why they can't all be tried. So just because it has a low percentage of success (IF it does, which hasn't been established!) doesn't mean that it's a bad idea. What would be more important in that case would be whether or not it's humane, wouldn't you agree?

 

So why do I have to be demonized in order to make these points? Are my arguments not logical and reasonable? What's with all the ad hom and accusations of logical fallacy? I don't think that's fair, and I think it should be called out by people who share Bascule's viewpoint, not just those who agree with me.

[bascule]

And just for fun, tell me how a million false positives and one true positive isn't success.

 

I don't think something with is correct one time out of a million can be considered effective by any stretch of the imagination.

 

Why is it necessary for you to spin my argument at all?

 

Call it counterspin...

 

Why can't you argue with me on the basis that I've stated, that I have an open mind about whether waterboarding constitutes torture?

 

Acting Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin had himself waterboarded and concluded: waterboarding is torture.

 

Former CIA operative John Kiriakou defended the utility of waterboarding while conceeding: it is torture.

 

Former U.S. Navy instructor Malcolm Wrightson Nance says: "Waterboarding is torture, period"

 

Lt. Col. V. Stuart Couch, a judge on the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals, maintains: waterboarding is torture.

 

You're not exactly finding sources who argue it isn't torture, much less sources who themselves have undergone waterboarding. Instead you've taken a neutral position, ostensibly for the purpose of dodging the moral issue entirely.

 

Your opinion is that it's torture, fine, I respect that. I'm trying to have an open discussion between intelligent people, and you're finding it necessary to demonize me by accusing me of defending torture. Why?

 

Because you're effectively sidestepping the moral repercussions of waterboarding at the same time you defend its use as an interrogation technique.

 

I think everyone on this web site should be demanding an answer from you to that question, and I think it's typical and ridiculous that nobody will do so, because your position represents the politically correct position for this board.

 

You think torture is an issue of political correctness? Wow...

 

See what I mean? Bascule distracts and deflects and when Pangloss responds somebody swoops in, ignoring all the politically correct rhetoric from Bascule and focusing on the politically incorrect rhetoric from Pangloss. This is so typical.

 

Pangloss, I point out specific flaws in your reasoning, and you recoil with "You're clearly being rude towards me" (ad hominem), "Bascule distracts and deflects" (ad hominem), "politically correct rhetoric from Bascule" (ad hominem)

 

Your argumentation is consistently riddled with logical fallacies, and furthermore, even in cases where you argument contains a textbook example of a logical fallacy, it takes me some ten posts of back and forth before you'll even admit it.

 

Can you improve the substance of your arguments, rather than constantly attacking me as a person?

[Phi for All]

I would say if torture gained a pile of false positives that wasted time and resources and one true positive that stopped a suicide bomber then that's a success. Or do you put a price on lives?

You can't really measure the success until you factor in the potential of the wasted time and resources. Is torture effective when you waste so much time tracking down false intel? Could the time and resources be used in a more effective way that didn't waste so much to yield so little? If you do put a price on lives isn't the potential to save more than just the one suicide bomber's victims a bit more attractive?

 

I know I could easily spend a million dollars on scratch tickets in order to win a bunch of small prizes and maybe the $25,000 jackpot but common sense tells me I could find a more potentially effective way to invest the million, perhaps something that wasn't so crude and uneducated.

[ParanoiA]

You can't really measure the success until you factor in the potential of the wasted time and resources. Is torture effective when you waste so much time tracking down false intel? Could the time and resources be used in a more effective way that didn't waste so much to yield so little? If you do put a price on lives isn't the potential to save more than just the one suicide bomber's victims a bit more attractive?

 

I know I could easily spend a million dollars on scratch tickets in order to win a bunch of small prizes and maybe the $25,000 jackpot but common sense tells me I could find a more potentially effective way to invest the million, perhaps something that wasn't so crude and uneducated.

 

Torture seems to be grossly inefficient, but successful. So, obviously, I agree with you here. (Haven't we developed a James Bond truth serum yet?)

 

It's the morality angle that I call BS on. I would torture the hell out of somebody if I thought they had information about my son, were he to be kidnapped, and I don't know many parents who wouldn't.

 

The line is obvious. Now we're just haggling about where to draw it. I don't think it's unreasonable to fathom a scenario where torturing someone becomes an efficient and morally justifiable option. Just like mass murder on a battle field. It has it's place. To summarily throw it out of the playbook is illogical - as Spock would say.

 

I spun nothing. I asked you to clarify success first IF you were going to attack me for my views.

 

Right. You've repeated twice now that you are concerned about me "attacking you" for your views. This suggests to me that you are taking things personal. That you take disagreement as an affront, when it's actually meant to be more analytical. I would never attack you, you're a cool guy.

 

You seem to define success by the stopping of one suicide bomber. I agree that stopping a suicide bomber is a successful action. This does not, however, automatically translate into waterboarding (or torture) itself being successful. If waterboarding (or torture) of one prisoner led to this information, then that INTERROGATION was a success, but not the process of waterboarding (or torture) itself.

 

Yes, you're right, I do define success that way - but not efficient success. Since it was successful ONCE, then apparently there WAS a scenario where using it was effective. So, why not, at the very least, leave it open for that duplicate scenario to repeat itself in the future?

 

Instead of paying so much attention to absolutes like this, why not concentrate on these other methods which work so much better? The better we get at alternatives, the more morally unacceptable torture becomes altogether.