Prosecute Torturers and Their Bosses

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/22/opinion/prosecute-torturers-and-their-bosses.html

by rpicard • 12 years ago

521 214 12 years ago

fargolime2• 12 years ago

They won't be prosecuted, of course. I ostracized those in my life who supported it. That may be the best anyone can do against it, given our 2-party oligopoly.

jameskilton• 12 years ago

At least, as long as they stay in the US. I've read that a few countries will be arresting and prosecuting any participating agents the second they enter their borders. Not that that will solve problems here though.

Correction: The UN has said that anyone can if they want to.

http://amanpour.blogs.cnn.com/2014/12/12/cia-agents-who-tort...

darkarmani• 12 years ago

For anyone doubting the claims you can go right to the Senate Committee's report: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/12/09/world/cia-tort...

Page 10 is the start of the findings and conclusions.

higherpurpose• 12 years ago

The very least that I expect out of this is for the International Criminal Court to convict them as war criminals. Whether those convicted will actually do any prison time is another issue. However, US will have to live with the shame for decades that it's harboring war criminals, and it may even impact its dealings with other countries in the future.

US will be in the history books as a country that not only allowed, but keeps condoning torture by refusing to punish the torturers. Brennan even implied that he's not ruling out the use of torture in the future.

Maybe eventually, some new US president will decide that it's time to prosecute and imprison them so US can have a "clean start" in its international relations.

scarmig4• 12 years ago

On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely do you think it is for President-elect Bush or President-elect Clinton to announce this fresh new start?

gorbachev3• 12 years ago

-1000000

a3n2• 12 years ago

Zero. It's called professional courtesy, from one President (or President-elect) to another.

enlightenedfool• 12 years ago

What? nah. The number of countries that officially have no-torture policy are few. They need US for their economic growth. So, they would be silent. The other countries don't care. And I don't think USA officially feels any shame. I know many of its people do though but they are powerless and minority

DanBC3• 12 years ago

It's in the UDHR (article 5) and the ICCPR (article 7), so most countries have firm legal restrictions against torture.

at-fates-hands2• 12 years ago

>> US will have to live with the shame for decades that it's harboring war criminals, and it may even impact its dealings with other countries in the future.

Clearly not a student of history.

The US has been harboring criminals since WWII when Operation Paperclip brought Nazi scientists back here to help build the atomic bomb.

>> US will be in the history books as a country that not only allowed, but keeps condoning torture by refusing to punish the torturers.

Just like every other country in the world. I certainly don't condone what they did, but on a relative scale, it's a pretty minor considering what other countries have done and still actively do. If they don't include the atrocities the US committed in Vietnam in history books, you can be assured they won't touch this either.

> Maybe eventually, some new US president will decide that it's time to prosecute and imprison them so US can have a "clean start" in its international relations.

Obama already tried being nice to these people we're at war with and look what it got us. He tried to have a "clean slate" with the terrorists, even said he would negotiate with the Taliban. Yes, the same Taliban who behead criminals, do not allow women rights and approve of honor killings. Because you know, he thought you could reason with these people - right?

tilc• 12 years ago

The ICC can't do anything. "The ICJ held that the U.S. had violated international law by supporting the Contras in their rebellion against the Nicaraguan government and by mining Nicaragua's harbors. The United States refused to participate in the proceedings after the Court rejected its argument that the ICJ lacked jurisdiction to hear the case. The U.S. later blocked enforcement of the judgment by the United Nations Security Council and thereby prevented Nicaragua from obtaining any actual compensation."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaragua_v._United_States

happyscrappy• 12 years ago

Shouldn't Europe be boycotting the US? They are not in a very good position to do so but maybe they should work on unraveling their dependencies.

refurb• 12 years ago

I think Europe would rather not have the spotlight turned on them.[1]

[1]http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/09/cia-tor...

spacefight6• 12 years ago

Yes. Prosecute them, put them all in prison. If the US won't do that, the rest of the world has to oblige the moral and legal duty of prosecuting anyone involved in the torture of humans. That will restrict their travels wastly, right Dick?

gorbachev3• 12 years ago

It would be an interesting bit of schadenfreude, if countries imposed some sort of sanctions against the US over harboring war criminals.

The State Department would probably release statements of insane hypocrisy given how they're perfectly fine preaching about human rights when OTHER countries violate them.

spacefight6• 12 years ago

Alone watching those statements would be of such a great pleasure...

geoka9• 12 years ago

It gets old very quickly and becomes painful and then you just stop caring for the most time, only occasionally flaring up with righteous indignation.

scarmig4• 12 years ago

False equivalence. We freedom-torture enemies of the People, other countries evil-torture their freedom fighters.

cyphunk2• 12 years ago

http://youtu.be/tQhIRBxbchU?t=2m8s

tempodox• 12 years ago

That's why the U.S. can never recognize the International Court in The Hague. If they did, half of D.C. (among others) would go to jail.

g0v• 12 years ago

I just feel sick when I think of how helpless I am as a citizen while I watch my government's officials get away with shit like this. Yeah, I can sign petitions, vote, contact my congressman, but I always have the feeling of someone that's just watching from the outside.

My hope is that those people that we don't see or hear about that work around injustices like these are doing what they can to keep some sort of balance. I try to convince myself sometimes that these people that love their country and want to do good are trying to use what power they have to make things right. I know for a fact that there are amazing people working in government and I hope the good stuff these people do just doesn't get much attention.

I love my country, I served, I consider myself a patriot, but I worry about my children and their children. I don't expect much, if anything, to come of this and the fact that that feeling is common for me as an American puts knots in my stomach.

dangerlibrary5• 12 years ago

Try living in DC.

It's a special kind of hell to live in the city where all this is taking place - where the local news IS what is going on in Congress (good and bad) - and not even be able to write to a voting representative in either house.

spacefight6• 12 years ago

If you can - take your tax money elsewhere.

Dylan168073• 12 years ago

There was one itty bitty spot in the entire middle band of this continent that people could move to and wouldn't be able to vote. So hundreds of thousands of people did. Still confuses me.

discardorama2• 12 years ago

San Francisco is similar in a way. Nancy Pelosi keeps winning with massive margins, simply because of her name and the fact that she's part of the political machine here; and no one goes anywhere in SF politics without the backing of the machine. And the machine prevents viable challengers from coming forth. For all practical purposes, we don't _have_ a representative who will represent us; she just represents the rich and the powerful.

justcommenting3• 12 years ago

we often believe we can't do anything about all the bad things we see in the world, but it's almost always necessary for people to first decide that things will change before they do.

please join others and continue fighting for the democracy you want to live in and that you want your children to live in. it's going to take all of us.

harryf3• 12 years ago

The biggest problem when your nation tortures people is you've trained people to torture; you've created institutionalized psychopaths. What do you do with them when their mission ends? Are they properly supported back into society or just dropped like most vets? Do the go home to become nightclub bouncers or security guards at your kids school?

That's why we have to clean up this mess.

smeyer• 12 years ago

The biggest problem when your nation tortures people is you've trained people to torture

No, I disagree. I think the torturing itself and the moral failings it entails are a bigger problem than the (admittedly substantial) problem of reintegrating the individual torturers back into society.

mkramlich2• 12 years ago

Another problem is that it can be used by others to justify torturing US soldiers, agents or officials that fall into their hands, if those others see the US as an enemy, and feel the US gov was conspiring or operating against them. That's not a world we want to live in. Torture is wrong, period. We're not the Good Guys because we wave a wand and say so. If we want to act like we have moral authority, and have credibility, and be able to show international leadership in the future again when there may be another major good-vs-evil rallying cause, requiring a coalition, then the US needs to maintain a certain image. But one based on facts, not on lies and contra-factual propaganda.

gaius• 12 years ago

The US already incarcerates more people than anywhere else. You guys can fit in a few more.

Someone2• 12 years ago

One might almost say the creation of psychopaths is the goal of military training. Without training a small fraction of soldiers ('natural psychopaths') will kill for pleasure, another small fraction will be the heroes that kill and put themselves in danger for the good cause, but the majority twill try and come out alive. The goal of military training is to make the army more effective by increasing that second fraction, but increasing the first fraction isn't that bad, either, from a direct military perspective.

(http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Killing:_The_Psychological..., http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killology)

spinlock• 12 years ago

I'd consider the _biggest_ problem to be invading Iraq under false pretenses. We've destroyed millions of lives because we tortured people until they told us what Dick Cheney wanted to hear. Yes, we love our children more than Iraqi children but it's not a hypothetical in the latter case.

InclinedPlane2• 12 years ago

The biggest problem is that people are talking about whether or not its effective and inventing euphemisms. It's torture. It's immoral. It's illegal. It's also not actually very effective but that's just the icing on the cake, the rest is what's important.

xorcist2• 12 years ago

The normal answer would be to vote for a party that would stop this. This is democracy's answer.

(I don't want to discuss much futher because of the downvotes, but the Five Why's can probably be utilized here.)

einhverfr10• 12 years ago

I am an American expat living abroad. One thing that bugs me about this is that there is a shrill hyperpartisanship that underlies a lot of this discussion. Yes, we should be prosecuting torturers, their bosses, and those who aided and abetted this via existing CIA programs or via extraordinary rendition during the current and last two administrations.

But Democrats won't sign on to something that will implicate Democratic party Presidents, nor will the GOP sign onto anything that will implicate a Republican president, no matter how despised he is by the Republican base.

The result is a lawless government and a strict reminder that there is no such thing as a "government of laws." In the end, all governments are "governments of men."

MCRed• 12 years ago

As an norte american who was an expat for many years I agree. IT's amazing how different the perspective is when you get out of the US media bubble. Nobody, not CNN, not Fox, not MSNBC, etc, none of them really are critical of the US government. It's all whitewashed in a way that's hard to see when you're inside the bubble.

And that whitewash is not just to defend the national government, but to defend the parties.

I believe this is exactly the reason that the founders didn't want to have a party system. Some of their choices (like the original make up of the senate) I believe were specifically to prevent this.

Further, the entire goal of having strong state governments and a weak federal government was to prevent these kinds of crimes.

For the very reason that the federal government will not prosecute itself, a strong federal government is bad. (Principle agent problem.)

Can you imagine if states were doing extraordinary rendition and torture? Highly unlikely. While at the same time, for a real war, there would be no problem fighting with a bunch of state militias banding together (and it would cost us a lot less... much of our problem is due to the adventurism of our permanent military-- hard to justify keeping it around if you aren't constantly finding wars to start, er, fight.)

samstave5• 12 years ago

We need a tax holiday. Everyone should refuse to pay taxes unless we are actually represented.

rayiner4• 12 years ago

Painting this as a "government versus citizens" situation is simple minded. Latest polls show support for the CIA methods by 2:1 margin after the Senate Report: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/new-po....

I'm not a big fan of Obama, but he's gotten an unfair shake on the national security front. The fact is that the broader electorate is indifferent about drone strikes and enhanced interrogation, but would pillory him if a terrorist attack happened "on his watch." If your theory of the world depends on Obama being duplicitous and going against the will of the people to do these things he promised he wouldn't do, I submit that it's not just republicans that may fairly be accused of ignoring reality when it comes to politics.

The issue isn't why won't the government do what we want it to do. The issue is: why do we still want revenge after 14 years, after Iraq and after Afghanistan?

canjobear• 12 years ago

The article is about prosecuting people not just because of the torture was depraved but also because it was illegal. The Senate report finds that the CIA knew its actions were illegal and acted to cover them up. The fact that the majority of the populace approves of an illegal action in polls should not make the perpetrators less worthy of prosecution.

samstave5• 12 years ago

An interpolating poll is simply not acceptable when it comes to this. I am in no way going to accept that 2:1 in support of torture is a true number unless every single person asked that question were shown videos of the actual torture conducted by US military in an IMAX theatre.

Show me anal-rape-feeding on the big screen and ask me if I support it.

lstyls• 12 years ago

'The fact is that the broader electorate is indifferent about drone strikes and enhanced interrogation, but would pillory him if a terrorist attack happened "on his watch."'

Your position begs the question of whether the drone policy is actually effective at reducing the risk of terror attacks. Many if not most critics of Obama's policy argue that they are in fact counterproductive in their stated mission.

InclinedPlane2• 12 years ago

Run. For. Office.

It's sad that this isn't seen as an option anymore, but it should be. There are tons of offices out there that people have a reasonable chance at attaining and can kick start a political career. Not everyone will do a good job and not everyone should do it, but too many people don't even consider it as an option. The result is that the people in office tend to be people who are driven by ambition, lust for power, or desire for fame, precisely the least suitable people for office, with abundantly visible results.

orbifold4• 12 years ago

To someone from a nation responsible for a large genocide in the 20th century and at least one world war, Germany, the notion that you could "love your country" has only become non controversial again, recently. For example, flags are really only displayed by the population for major sport events, like the world cup and not for National Day. In fact a major part of political indoctrination in school was that the idea of the nation state is largely a thing of the past, nationalism is "dangerous" and that the future is the European Union. The majority of the political elite can't wait to see a "United States of Europe" emerge and says so openly at various occasions.

This is to illustrate, that the perception of the country you live in largely depends on the indoctrination you received in your youth and the overall agenda. In most countries of Europe strong nationalistic tendencies are inconvenient for long term political goals, so the emphasis is on international cooperation and adherence to international law. In fact German politicians rarely state they "love their country" and would be crucified, if they described their country as "exceptional".

The US instead has been a rogue actor for much of its existence, basically ignores international law, routinely blocks inconvenient UN resolutions, has supported some of the most oppressive regimes in recent history (South Africa, Honduras, Egypt, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia come to mind) has constantly waged war and bullied countries in Middle and South America.

Restricted to foreign politics there is little America justifiably can be proud of in recent history and yet there is this whole quasi religion around the USA as a nation, "manifest destiny" etc., that apparently serves as a mental block even among many educated Americans to coolly and rationally evaluate the appalling record of most of their administrations in the past 50 years and maybe come to the conclusion that you should have persecuted many, who claimed they served your country and "loved it" a long time ago.

MatthewWilkes• 12 years ago

Is that Belgium, Russia, Japan or Germany? They all have legitimate claims to that title, having killed 5 million or more in time frames containing the 20th century.

DanielBMarkham2• 12 years ago

I'm voting this up even though I think it's a horrendous idea. Here's why:

The problem isn't that there wasn't a crime: it certainly looks like there was. I am outraged by parts of what I've read. The problem was that the system sought to legally justify it. The problem is that we changed the system so that a good portion of people believe there was no crime. If somebody is told by the system that there is no crime, we can't then go backwards in time and declare there was one. History shows us that such legal application is always more destructive to society than the original incident.

An important concept to understand is "criminalizing politics". That's when politicians, who rotate through office and are expected to spend most of their lives as private citizens, make decisions that could be criminal but do not involve personal gain.

We elect people to make hard choices that involve results that could be construed in other contexts as criminal, especially with respect to foreign policy. We always have.

I do not like any of this, but it's very important to understand that the problems here are systemic. A different president and VP were just as likely to make the same choices. Want to go back and try people for Japanese interment? All the rendition done prior to 2000? Assassinations and coups overseas? Spying on MLK? Such an emotional attitude is understandable, but you just can't continue a government like that. If the system was acting as best as it could, and it screws up? You fix it. You don't get the firing squads out. That's banana republic territory.

So let's fix the system so it doesn't happen again. If we want somebody to hang, start a nice show trial. But since folks were acting in good faith (which is more important than "just doing their jobs"), pardon them and let's move on. There is no justice to be had here. We need to learn. This is not the time to let emotional outrage lead us into hurting each other needlessly.

fargolime2• 12 years ago

All gov't workers take an oath to uphold the Constitution. When a law is clearly unconstitutional they have the obligation to work against it, not abide by it. So we can definitely declare that torture was illegal retroactively.

gorbachev3• 12 years ago

Torture is not politics.

RyanMcGreal• 12 years ago

The problem is that we changed the system so that a good portion of people believe there was no crime.

I don't think any of the principals in this atrocity ever really "believed" there was no crime. They decided, as Dick Cheney told Meet The Press earlier this year, "I have no problem as long as we achieve our objective." They didn't (and still don't) care whether torture is a "crime". All they cared about was making sure the system didn't get in their way.

justcommenting3• 12 years ago

indeed, the rule of law and rule by law are not the same thing. just because something is legal doesn't mean it's just.

i think it's important to continue fighting for justice and for people to show that they don't want to live under a legal regime that accepts these kinds of things.

hemantv• 12 years ago

Nazi's had very similar logic to yours.

davidw5• 12 years ago

Aaaaand here's exhibit #1393 for "why political articles on HN should be flagged out of existence".

gizmo6862• 12 years ago

And Justice Douglass (from the US supreme court) agreed with that: "I thought at the time and still think that the Nuremberg trials were unprincipled, Law was created ex post facto to suit the passion and clamor of the time." [1]

Ex post facto is also explicitly forbidden by the US consitution (Article 1, sections 9, 10) [2], and by the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 11, section 2) [3].

On a technical level, you can argue that torture was already illegal under US law, however the torturers were advised by agents of the State that what they were doing was legal, so ex-post-facto could very reasonably apply. There may be people high up on the chain of command who can be prosecuted under US law, but for the most part prosecutions would have to go through international law.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials#cite_ref-reapp... [2] http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_trans... [3] http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/

cdash• 12 years ago

Prosecuting people for human rights abuses is not the same as criminalizing politics. It doesn't matter if they thought it was legal or even if it actually was legal.

ObviousScience• 12 years ago

I don't believe the claim of good faith that you propose: I think that they knew they were committing crimes and that they intended to get away with it, because they could count on people like you to not hold them accountable.

I'm so displeased with the government taking actions like this, I think it's preferable if we do cause a massive panic and shut down the system at a high level -- even while we let some of the bureaucracies run -- until we can sort this out.

I think that we need to make it clear that it's unacceptable to cross some lines in the name of "making a hard choice", and that there are personal consequences to signing off on those kinds of crimes -- that as a nation, we mean it when we declare certain kinds of actions beyond the authorization of government.

Were it more timely, I also think that we should prosecute on a number of the other things you listed. Alas, we didn't, because of thinking like yours, and it seems merely to have encouraged more lawlessness from officials.

You didn't actually propose fixing anything: you merely advocated doing more of the same and hoping that it just gets better, nor did you propose any reason that prosecuting people for knowingly breaking the law wouldn't lead to a change in the behavior of officials.

Your answer was a non-answer.

DanBC3• 12 years ago

You already had laws preventin torture. Your politicians ignored those laws and used devious contructions to avoid those laws - "enemy combatants" and "no longer an enemy combatant" being a useful example. You pay Afghan forces for prisoners, you torture those prisoners, and then when they haven't given you any useful information you declare them "no longer an enemy combatant". This construction avoids the need for trial; for innocent until proven guilty; for observing the geneva convention; for observing the UDHR and a bunch of other international law.

Your post, and I say this politely, fucking sucks. They knew they were breaking the law; they paid lawyers to create bizarre interpretations of those laws; they then strongly suggested to subordinates that torture was desirable without actually ordering it, leaving those low pay employees to take the fall and the prison sentences.

"Only following orders" has never been an excuse for committing atrocities and war crimes.

tmorton• 12 years ago

This is a great point, but I don't think it leads to no prosecutions. As you point out, the problems here are systemic - and a vital part of the system is accountability.

In a better world, the mid-level bureaucracy of the military and CIA would be a bulwark against this kind of abuse. Politicians will always be opportunists, and the low-level ranks will always contain psychopaths. But the mid-level people can keep both in check, if they have the motivation.

Twenty years from now, when a president asks "is there anything else we can do to this guy?", the answer from the CIA director should be "no, or I'll be prosecuted". The answer from the DOJ should be "no, or we'll be disbarred". The answer from the military should be "we'll resign before following that order, because it will get us sent to the Hague".

logfromblammo• 12 years ago

The problem in the system is not the layers of obfuscation and flimflammery. The problem is that too few people are willing to not only question authority, or even just peer pressure, but also to defy it outright.

As long as dilution of responsibility exists, that problem will remain intractable. When someone follows an unlawful order, both the person that issued it and the person that obeyed it need to bear the responsibility. And to support that, then when someone refuses an unlawful order, that person has to be shielded from retribution and retaliation.

And if someone tries to blow the whistle on unethical behavior, they shouldn't be imprisoned for life or be forced to flee to Russia.

You're not going to cultivate a culture of individual responsibility by pardoning everyone who should have plonking known better than to kidnap and torture people while thumbing their nose at due process.

ScottBurson• 12 years ago

I don't necessarily agree that prosecutions would be a bad idea, but I do agree that for reasons given by plenty of other people in this discussion, they're not going to happen.

So you're right: we should turn our efforts to fixing the system.

suprgeek• 12 years ago

"Whoever fights with monsters must be careful lest he become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you." - Nietzsche

Based on their actions (which ultimately may have not yielded anything useful either) the torturers and their masters are monsters of the worst kind - state sanctioned.

So now why stop at just releasing the report? Take the next logical step & prosecute these sociopaths.

innguest• 12 years ago

Take the next logical step & prosecute these sociopaths.

But they're friends with the cronies!

So it's not going to happen. No matter how many "voters" beg daddy Govmints. Keep cheering though. Maybe something will change. Not.

a3n2• 12 years ago

"Whoever fights with monsters must be careful lest he become a monster."

I believe this is one of the overlooked but very important reasons not to torture. The torturers are also damaged, in their own way. We should not require this of anyone.

orbifold4• 12 years ago

The "School of the Americas" a US military training facility for middle and south american militaries has been known for training some of worst human rights violators in the region. So it is not like the US government is new to the idea of creating monsters.

DanBC3• 12 years ago

A few low level torturers were prosecuted and put in prisons. Their bosses had the political language to endorse and encourage torture while using language vague enough to escape prosecution.

tacon• 12 years ago

I'm still searching for a society in history that engages in torture against its opponents that doesn't eventually turn to torturing its own citizens. They will, of course, be labeled terrorists when that happens, but that time is coming.

When that story came out of Chicago a few years ago about a two decade history of torturing inmates to get them to confess to crimes, we asked how that could go on for so long. Well, apparently you can torture powerless people of color in Chicago without consequence. They were only torturing "bad" people, weren't they?

I get ill listening to the "arguments" for torture. "Well, it works." I want to drop my head into my hands. The efficiency expert's answer to moral questions. But what about a ticking bomb? Can't Jack Bauer put a bullet in a prisoner's knee to get him to talk? The Israeli's have the process down: They torture supposedly because of a ticking bomb, a time limit, whatever, but then they take a break for the Sabath. Gotta keep those priorities in mind.

If torture "worked", does that mean we have no limits? Just animals ripping the face off our prey?

I'm not very religious. What are Christians thinking when they allow this to happen? Has the iron law of Paul taken over from the Prince of Peace? If there is one piece of evidence that the US is a post-Christian country, this is it.

scarmig4• 12 years ago

Not post-Christian enough: https://sullydish.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/12-20-14.jpg

The non-religious are the only group of which a majority opposes torture.

mleonhard• 12 years ago

Source data for that article is at http://www.washingtonpost.com/page/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/...

Select "Show results by: Race/Religion".

aaronharnly• 12 years ago

I'm non-religious myself, but I have to think those results are conditioned by an underlying partisan divide. If there were sufficient numbers to support it, I'd want to see crosstabs for religiosity controlling for political ideology.

dragonwriter7• 12 years ago

The non-religious are the only group of which a majority opposes torture.

Notice how all the "religious" groups aren't defined by religion alone, but also by the qualifier "White". That's important, because if you go to the source [0], you see that the Race/Religion combination suggests the conclusion you describe because of its blend of race and religion together in some of its categories, but if you look at the Race breakdown, you see that Whites have large majority support for torture (66/25), while Non-Whites do not. Which makes the fact that the Race/Religion breakdown shows that the identified "religious" groups it breaks out all have majority support -- when those "religious" groups are White evangelical protestant (69/20), White non-evangelical Protestant (75/22), and White Catholic (66/23)-- somewhat less significant in religious terms than it seems at first.

[0] http://www.washingtonpost.com/page/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/...

xorcist2• 12 years ago

Pretty much all oppressive states have at one time or another used torture to stay in power. The good news is that we can learn from their mistakes: No torture method publicly known has been shown to "work" in the sense that you can trust the results.

A person under torture will tell you whatever it is you want to hear. This has been shown again and again. The only time where this is useful is if you can keep the methods under wrap and use the confessions to your advantage PR-wise. This is important to keep in mind to understand a proponent's agenda.

justcommenting3• 12 years ago

"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?" - Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago

warfangle2• 12 years ago

This is the kind of self-prosecution that you can't trust the USG to pursue with the necessary zeal.

This is what the International Criminal Court at The Hague is for.

stefantalpalaru• 12 years ago

Not a chance. The US took the necessary measures to authorize military action against the International Criminal Court if one of its criminals is brought to justice there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Pro...

warfangle2• 12 years ago

Huh. Thanks for the education on the matter.

I didn't realize that we had not ratified the treaty. Considering how involved we were in the Nuremburg Trials, I had assumed we would be just as keen about the ICC.

Naïvely, I didn't take into effect the extent of the USG's cranial-rectal inversion syndrome.

dreamweapon• 12 years ago

Prosecute Torturers and Their Bosses

And while we're at it, we should sanction those -- like the New York Times -- who enabled and shielded the torturers via a consistent editorial policy -- solidly in place for 12 years -- of never referring to the practice of torture by name, but instead employing that famous dystopian euphemism: "Harsh Interrogation Techniques."

colinbartlett• 12 years ago

Doubleplus interrogation is one of the best parts of Miniluv's joycamp.

at-fates-hands2• 12 years ago

I guess this means we should throw all the Democrats under the bus who suddenly had amnesia about knowing anything about the techniques being used too?

http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2014/12/feinsteins-duplicity-...

The report (embedded below) shows that the CIA briefed at least 68 members of Congress on the CIA interrogation program, including "enhanced interrogation techniques" (EITs) . It details the dates of all congressional briefings and in most cases, the members of Congress in attendance and the specific subjects discussed. Keep in mind though, that the topic for each one of these meetings was interrogation of prisoners.

For example in April 2002 both the House (HPSCI) and Senate (SSCI) committees on intelligence were briefed on the "Ongoing Interrogations of Abu Zubaydah, who was mentioned in the Feinstein report. According to the report, at this time EITs were referenced but there is no evidence they were discussed in detail. However later meetings not only discussed but gave examples of EITs being used, (but attendees weren't mentioned). Finally near the end of 2002 we see that the most Senior members of the House and Senate committees had meetings totally devoted to EITs.

diafygi• 12 years ago

If you want to see torture prosecutions, write a letter to your editor calling out your elected officials by name (source below). I did it, so can you!

How to get your senators' and representatives' attention on any issue without being a wealthy donor | Protip from a former Senate intern[1].

--------

An email to your senator or representative may result in a form letter response and a phone call to the office may amount to a tally mark on an administrative assistant's notepad. But, for any given policy concern, if you want to get their attention a letter to the editor in one of your state's 5-10 biggest newspapers that mentions them specifically BY NAME is the way to go. If your message is directed to your representative, pick a newspaper that is popular in your district.

That is the crucial thing to know--the rest of this post is an explanation of why I know this is true.

I know this because, when I interned in the D.C. office of a senator one summer, one of the duties I shared was preparing a document that was distributed internally both online and in paper format. This document was made every day and comprised world news articles, national news, state news, and any letters to the editor in the 5-10 largest newspapers within the state that mentioned the senator by name. I was often the person who put that document on his desk, and it was the first thing he read every morning after arriving to the office.

I began to suspect that this was standard operating procedure because several other senators' offices share the same printer in the basement of the Russell Senate Office building, and I saw other interns doing the exact same procedures that I was involved in.

Since the internship, I've conferred with other Senate and House employees past and present and determined that most--if not all--offices use essentially the same procedure.

--------

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1os8rz/how_to_get...

us0r• 12 years ago

Vices News interview with the "Architect":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmNUi0itl-8

mkramlich2• 12 years ago

I still find it interesting what the major news websites and channels choose to make front page headlines with or not. In the world I want to live in, there'd be a lot more daily hammering with (apparently factual statements) like: "US Gov Violates Geneva Convention on Torture" ever since the Senate CIA report came out. The US is signatory to that, ratified it by Congress, and indeed was one of its architects in the post-WW2 landscape. They repeatedly posture themselves as one of the Good Guy nations, the ultimate White Hat lawman. They have tortured and violated international law, to which they are signatory, on basic human rights and ethical behavior.

fredgrott• 12 years ago

question: how exactly do you prosecute the to bosses in a democracy? As the top bosses is the voters..So how will we prosecute the voters?

guelo• 12 years ago

Obama is a disgrace. The reason he was elected over Hillary was because he initially took a harder line against the war, the spying and the torture. At the end of the Bush administration the American people voted overwhelmingly to break from the recent past, and Obama inexplicably betrayed our democracy. And I have my doubts that it will ever fully recover.

d23• 12 years ago

And yet when polled, citizens seem to mostly be in favor of the torture the CIA was involved in.

The reason he was elected over Hillary was because he initially took a harder line against the war, the spying and the torture.

Have you considered that this is a vast oversimplification, and you're mostly just projecting your pet issues onto 70 million other people? I don't want to just regurgitate talking points, but saying he "inexplicably betrayed our democracy" is probably only inexplicable to you because you haven't wanted to take the time to think it through.

An attempt to prosecute Bush would basically be political suicide, severely damaging his legacy and cementing complete government inaction for the remainder of his term. You can say that's a betrayal of our country, but calling it inexplicable is just silly. Also, as far as I know, I don't remember one of his stump speech promises being to taking the unprecedented step of pushing for the prosecution of a former President. You can project these ideas onto people if you wish, but no one will ever be able to live up to your standards, much less the President of the United States -- a person that has arguably the hardest, most complex job in the world.

Spooky232• 12 years ago

That's a simplistic view.

The reality is, the president doesn't have a ton of power over the workings of the vast bureaucracy. And remember that the intelligence folks start the President's day, every day with their briefing. Makes manipulation of the executive easy.

A newbie like Obama didn't stand a chance.

WallWextra• 12 years ago

I can't think of a worse idea than prosecuting Bush administration officials. Jailing the previous administration would set a terrible precedent, and would fatally undermine the stability of our government.

There are many people who are convinced, e.g., that abortion is murder and that politicians who enable it ought to be prosecuted. Or, more on topic, that Diane Feinstein is a traitor for making these torture memos public. They believe this with as much moral certitude as anyone here believes torture is a crime. It is only a matter of time before another right-wing president is in the White House, and when there is I don't want there to be a precedent for jailing one's political rivals.

kansface2• 12 years ago

Under your proposed system, no politicians of sufficient office would ever be tried for a crime related to their office (as long as it was for the right reason)? This seems like a very poor incentive system.

I do agree with you that prosecution would not be good for stability. However, maintaining a separate rule of law for those in office is not good for stability, either.

mden2• 12 years ago

So you are saying we shouldn't prosecute the executive branch even though they clearly broke and sanctioned breaking existing laws. When should we prosecute them? What makes them different from tyrants?

Also your example doesn't make any sense. Creating a law for abortion is not even in the same category as breaking current laws. This is not purely an issue of morality, it's about the rule of law as well.

kansface2• 12 years ago

I believe you mean prosecute.

bvanslyke• 12 years ago

You're erroneously comparing actual on-the-books illegal crime with crimes against belief systems. Hypothetically if enabling abortion or publicizing documents were illegal the way torture is, then those people ought to be jailed, too, if the law means anything. What shouldn't matter is someone's occupation or status. This should be obvious.

will_brown2• 12 years ago

Since the day President Obama took office, he has failed to bring to justice anyone responsible for the torture of terrorism suspect.

This is such an important topic, that it is a shame it always has to be discussed in the political context (i.e. Obama failed to bring justice anyone from the Bush administration).

#1. Obama's administration continued using the Bush era Enhanced Interrogation Techniques; therefore, politically he could not pursue anyone from Bush's administration without subjecting his own administration to the same...including himself.

#2 From a legal standpoint anyone who actually engaged in these alleged acts of torture would have a legal defense, they relied on Government officials and attorneys who authorized/ordered them to perform these interrogations. Whether the officials/attorneys were right or wrong in their judgment, this is a lawful defense recorgnized by US criminal courts. See US v. Baker, 546 F.2d 940 (D.C. Cir. 1976).

irremediable3• 12 years ago

Out of interest, is #2 basically just the Nuremberg defence?

will_brown2• 12 years ago

This legal defense is embedded in US jurisprudence. Most people would be familiar with the concept of "mistake of law" not being a lawful defense. In other words, it is not a recognized defense to say one did the act, but should not be accountable because they did not know it was criminal. However, one exception is if a government official gives a interpretation of the law, even if that interpretation is wrong, then relying on the government official's interpretation becomes a lawful defense.

Therefore, it is a little different that the Nuremberg defense, as I understand it, where that defense is essentially claiming you were ordered by superiors to take an action that was unlawful.

So the practical difference being in one case you know or believe what you are being commanded to do is criminal and the other case you are specifically informed by some government official with authority that the act you are being ordered to do is lawful.

dragonwriter7• 12 years ago

Out of interest, is #2 basically just the Nuremberg defence?

It is somewhat different, its "I relied on the entity now trying to prosecute me". This does refer to the same entity as "Just following orders of my superiors" when the entity prosecuting you is also the one you worked for, but its a substantively different defense in the general case (and note, in the Nuremberg tribunals, this defense would not have been equivalent to the so-called "Nuremberg defense" even in the entity it refered to.)

There is a very good reason for a legal system to have this defense as a bedrock principle that applies without exception within the legal system, and there is a very good reason for crimes against humanity and war crimes to have international tribunals with personal jurisdiction to try them so that this defense doesn't become a shield for perpetrators that happen to be backed by the top officials of a government at the time they act.

phaemon• 12 years ago

I do find it interesting that the replies concentrated on point #2 as a stopping point.

On point #1: If I, personally, had to give up my job and perhaps even face personal abuse, in order to stop someone from being tortured....I think I might manage that.

Maybe Obama's administration could manage to summon a similar degree of bravery?

srenihwon• 12 years ago

If two people kidnapped your wife and children saying they would rape and slaughter them in 24 hours, and you somehow caught one of the two culprits, you would do whatever it took to save your family. Whatever it took. And if you say you wouldn't, then you're either a lier, or you are a cruel and cowardly person. On the world scale, performing non-lethal EIT on one terrorist in order to save 500 or 5000 or 50000 lives is both reasonable and moral. To think otherwise is just shocking.

alkonaut• 12 years ago

And to do it on 500 terrorists, where in 499 cases it didn't lead to anything and in the 500th case it led to saving 500 lives is it still moral and reasonable?

Apart of course from the fact that any information revealed during torture is usually useless. And of course the fact that it's, you know, illegal.

woah3• 12 years ago

If someone kidnapped, raped, and murdered your father and brother, would it be justifiable to join a militia opposing them? I think you're basically advocating for IS here.

jrochkind1• 12 years ago

Would you feel bad if person you found turned out to be unrelated, you had him confused with someone else? And then after keeping him locked in your basement for a few years and torturing him a bunch, maybe a little bit of rape too, you accidentally killed him? And it turns out it was just some dude?

Would you feel bad? Would you feel guilty? Would you think about the family of the guy you accidentally killed, because you thought that was how to save your family somehow, would you think about the family of the dead guy in your basement, and how they must feel? Would you think that, it turns out, maybe your methods had been disastrous, monstrous even, and should be revisited?

Not if you're Dick Cheney.

Okay, now let's say you're not the one who had the wife and children kidnapped, you're the brother of the guy THAT guy picked up accidentally thinking he was a kidnapper, locked in a basement for a few years, tortured, raped, and killed.

NOW what would you do?

drjesusphd• 12 years ago

you would do whatever it took to save your family

Including something illegal, yes?

This is a stupid argument and has no bearing on whether ot not torture should be legal.

rdxm• 12 years ago

Does anyone honestly believe that the current administration which has: 1) doubled down on the Bush admins attack on the Fourth Amendment; 2) attacked the 1st Amendment directly (something even Bush/Ashcroft didn't do..) and 3) run what is an arguably similar program in its moral and ethical ambiguity(Drone strikes) to the interrogation techniques; would even think about going after the previous administration!?!? Give me a break, that's beyond laughable.

This piece by the Times is about what you'd expect from an organization that has lost its grip on reality. What's worse is that people actually pay attention to the Times at this point. Sadly, what we lack in this country is an honest journalistic broker that can objectively communicate about the political realities we have in front of us and our shortcomings as a nation and an electorate.

Here's the thing, all of us that vote (and those that don't), are responsible for the mess in D.C.. The people that inhabit the beltway are simply taking advantage of our apathy and incompetence as an electorate..nothing more, nothing less...it's up to us, as the electorate, to purge our government of the latent corruption and decay that has come to permeate that town. Until we take up that charge in a meaningful way, we can't even have a discussion about topics such as this, it's just a waste of time..

darasen• 12 years ago

Sorry, I can not take any organization seriously that complains of "torture" while fully supporting the act of siphoning out an unborn child's brain.

mtimjones• 12 years ago

For all you liberals out there who want to go after Bush, don't forget that Obama has been killing people indiscriminately with drone strikes. Something tells me you'll be less likely to go after him, indicating the real source of your outrage.

The CIA report was written solely by Democrats with an ax to grind, and sought no information from an opposing side.

Go back and watch any 9/11 news video (as it happened) and put yourself in the shoes of those who struggled to find direction during that time. I personally don't think torture is a good decision, but those in power did it out of precaution to identify possible future acts.

When the next terrorist attack occurs, please think about the bullshit you wrote here.

spankalee• 12 years ago

but those in power did it out of precaution to identify possible future acts.

That simply doesn't matter. Torture is illegal in all circumstances, reprehensible, and completely ineffective. There's no justification, period.

The "collateral damage" of drone strikes, and all of our quasi-war military actions, concerns me greatly, but the fact that drones are involves is immaterial. We've been killing civilians and combatants outside of declared war and emergency situations for a long time now. Maybe that all needs to be looked at again with the result being possible indictments. If so it would go back before Obama and Bush, to at least every post-WWII president.

dalke3• 12 years ago

If it helps any, I agree with Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch that US drone attacks in Yemen and Pakistan have likely broken international human rights law and should be investigated as war crimes.

I want a full, serious, and public war crimes investigation, to include drone attacks and torture. If we find out that Obama, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Frank had a secret meeting to allow torture then I want them and all who knew about it behind bars. Torture is illegal under US and international law. The law allows no extenuating circumstances.

Are you with me?

When ISIS dressed James Foley in orange then beheaded him, do you think that was a deliberate reference to Guantanamo or just coincidence?

If we find out that those predicted attacks of yours occur because someone wanted revenge for having their parent, or sibling, or friend anally raped by US orders ... then what? More torture? Which will help because?

"Sought no information from an opposing side"? Are you saying the CIA is on the same side as the committee members? Because the members certainly sought information from the CIA, which must count as 'an opposing side'. Good on you for saying there are multiple sides; what do you think the sides are?

And you must despise Senator Mike Gravel, who put the Pentagon Papers in the public record without first seeking information from an opposing side. Do you just like it when the Executive branch systematically lies, not only to the public but also to Congress, and tries to keep it hidden? I don't.

Omniusaspirer• 12 years ago

Your comment is partisan tripe, absolutely worthless. This has nothing to do with liberal/conservative/Rep/Dem and everything to do with a belief in fundamental human rights. 10,000 terrorist attacks on American soil would not convince me that torture is a valid tactic.

Even if you find yourself lacking all morality and humanity, you should still be aware that torture has been proven time and time again over hundreds of years to be utterly useless in getting truthful information out of the victim. There is no justification whatsoever, and there is no intel being gained via torture that could not be better gained in other ways.

The rational conclusion is that torture is not only barbaric, but pointless as well. 9/11 and the irrational stupidity that happened afterwards should not be held up as some kind of divine justification for war crimes.

auston• 12 years ago

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/prosecute-full-ext...

kvl7• 12 years ago

Just as Obama will never be impeached, imprisoned, or in any other way brought to justice for his atrocities committed against the Constitution, the people in the highest offices responsible for the torture will never see punishment. Rightly so I say, there is nothing wrong with interrogating terrorists.

orthecreedence• 12 years ago

I hope you're joking. Mainly because this line of thinking is easily shown to be slippery. Sure, let's say interrogating terrorists is always good. But what defines a terrorist? All of a sudden black and white becomes a murk, once again.

known• 12 years ago

Prosecute and Confiscate their properties/wealth

cyphunk2• 12 years ago

"looking forward" (as the article attributes to being Obama's argument for not prosecuting) is something one does to forgive others. self-punishment is something one does to prove trust to others. The looking forward policy of the US was important in the construction of the Marshal Plan. But now is the time they need to show they are trustworthy arbitrators of any moral ground. If they fail to prosecute anyone for torture they set a horrible precedent but more importantly the lack of correction turns any future moral arguments into platitudes.

This article deserves juxtaposition with this scene from the Act of Killing:

http://youtu.be/tQhIRBxbchU?t=2m9s

"We need our gangsters to get things done" @BarackObama

Prosecute Torturers and Their Bosses

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