I find it very disappointing, but not surprising, when writers such as C. Jiron (April 30) put pen to paper before they know what they’re talking about. It happens quite often. In this case the allegation that torture “doesn’t work” and “is useless.” My assessment is expressed below based on publicly known facts. Sometimes facts get in the way of emotionally charged authors. If they are going to speak out on an important issue, they should consider the source of their biases first.
Three terrorists were ever waterboarded: Khalid Sheik Mohammad (KSM), Abu Zubayda and al-Nashiri, and ONLY when an imminent attack had been reasonably anticipated. Prior to waterboarding little information could be obtained from these men about the planned attack. By using other interrogation techniques, not only were these men non-cooperative, they were contemptuous of the U.S. With waterboarding this changed. With it KSM revealed the plan for another aerial attack on a L.A. skyscraper (no doubt the 1000-foot high U.S. Bank Tower). Also the information given up permitted the terrorist cell responsible for carrying that attack out to be eliminated. Waterboarding also allowed the capture of other high-level al Qaeda officials, Riduan Isamuddun, the Guraba cell and others…So the personnel who obtained this valuable data are heroes in my book.
I would think that any humane individual should value the saving of many American lives at the expense of some temporarily painful moments for a terrorist is a no-brainer. Dick Cheney is right: if you’re going to release the CIA’s interrogation techniques to the public, then the materials that reveal the positive developments that result should also be made public.
I find it very disappointing that the decision was made to make these techniques public, and that waterboarding has now been pulled from the table. Big mistakes.
F. Baldwin
Editor’s note: President Bush acknowledged in a 2006 news conference that the LA plot was foiled in 2002, several years before waterboarding and other tactics were approved, according to an April report by McClatchy newspaper that also revealed that a formerly classified inspector general’s report from 2004 showed that there was no evidence to show that torture tactics had yielded information about any specific terror plots.
This article appears in May 28 – Jun 3, 2009.
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Another bit of evidence that one should never, ever believe “publicly known facts”.
Also: “I would think that any humane individual should value the saving of many American lives at the expense of some temporarily painful moments for a terrorist is a no-brainer”… complex ethical problems are only “no-brainers” if in fact you have no brain. The world is not Black and White (the way Republicans imagine it to be) it’s problems are in multiple shades of grey and every conceivable tone.
Mr. Baldwin,
Your failure to cite primary sources (National Review and Fox News are NOT primary sources)for your assertions renders your argument entirely impotent. Perhaps you too should heed the first two sentences of your letter…
I agree with you C. Jiron is an idiot- no need to elibirate more than that.
Back in the bad old days of the Cheney Administration the bumpersticker of choice was “What was a war crime in 1945 is U.S. policy today”.
Those who support and admire ‘Darth Vader’ Cheney should reflect upon the fact that we used to be the good guys who won the war against fascism (WW II), ran remarkably fair trials at Nuremberg and in occupied Japan and punished criminals who engaged in waterboarding. Perhaps F. Baldwin is unaware of this history?
The Army’s SERE program, the purported basis for the Guantanamo waterboarding/interrogations was instituted because of the propaganda purposes to which waterboarding was put by the North Koreans and Chinese Communist interrogators during the Korean War. What was the result of this waterboarding? It was a lurid display of tormented Americans denouncing their country in order to placate their captors and avoid further sadistic treatment by their captors. I wonder if F. Baldwin has compared the falsity of the words of tortured American soldiers in the 1950s to the words of tortured al Qaeda prisoners today. Does he appreciate the irony of how the obviously false testimony of our soldiers in Korea reflects upon the right wing’s delusional faith in the testimony of frightened prisoners in Guantanamo today?
Furthermore, it is a pretty well established observation that much of what drove Nazis and Imperial Japanese to torture their prisoners was an inherent sense that the prisoners were “untermenschen” who deserved the cruel sadism that superior beings took great pleasure in inflicting. How can we be sure that we don’t have cruel and sadistic men taking pleasure from humiliating their prisoners among the ranks of our interrogators? Surely it is un-American and un-Christian to attempt to extract false information from prisoners through state terrorism. And yet that is exactly what it appears has occurred in the case of the Guantanamo waterboardings.
Now we all know that uber-Republican Rush Limbaugh loves torture and compares it to fraternity hazings. How then to explain the contents of Rush’s luggage as he traveled back to the U.S. from a private weekend fling in the Dominican Republic, a country notorious for its child prostitutes? The item in question was an illegal supply of Viagra. Could this be part of the profile of a sadistic megalomaniac with a penchant for little boys? Google “Rush Limbaugh sex tourist” for more on this leader of the GrOPe and staunch defender of torture.
Now Ray, just because Rush was in DR and they have lots of child prostitutes doesn’t mean he rented a few little boys while he was there! And the Viagra … he could have been bringing a stockpile back for his friends or as prizes for his listeners. Say what you like … El Rushondo is THE perfect representative of America’s Right Leaning “Men”: he’s under-educated, over-fed, over-paid, arrogantly opinionated, loud, boorish and vacuous; immune to reason, logic, learning; ignorant of art, literature and history; he’s a hypocrite and he lacks compassion, empathy and culture. Leave Rush alone … the truth will come out eventually, no doubt about that. Then we can all don our aluminum foil hats, fire up the bong, sing kumbyahhhhhh!, roll a fat one, read our Communist Manifesto while watching Barbara Streisand movies and petting our French Poodles.
Baldwin’s attempt to justify the unjustifiable suggests he has failed to learn important lessons from history. He, and others who share his views, would do well to ponder why people went to the trouble of writing the Geneva Convention on Torture and why the United States and other nations purporting to be civilized were signatories to that document. Hint: It was another slow step along the path towards a civilized society. Reneging on that treaty and resurrecting these barbaric acts meant America made a U-turn on that desirable highway.
As for Baldwin’s claim of saving American lives, a solid case has been made that abuses of prisoners at Guantanamo, Bagram, Abu Ghraib and several “black sites” has contributed to more deaths and maimings of Americans than 9/11 because of a desire for revenge.
Our new chief spook, Admiral Blair said that useful information was obtained through “enhanced interrogations.” That was well reported. What he also said, but was scarcely reported, was that what information they received by these methods was not worth the cost. That cost can be measured in lives lost, vigilant enemies with long memories gained, and puncturing the myth of American moral stature.
Balwin and others sharing his view might also consider an old Chinese saying: He who strikes the first blow admits to having the weaker mind.