We tortured some folks

^This.

And it does not apply to terrorists.

You have no idea what information a prisoner will give. You aren't an interrogator. Neither am I, that's why it's foolish to say it never works.

If we were fighting a moral enemy that follows the rules of war, this would matter. We aren't, so it doesn't.

Hanns Scharff was a German Luftwaffe interrogator during World War II. Known as possibly the most effective interrogator in all of Nazi Germany, he was recruited by the United States because his techniques were humane and successful. Rather than torturing prisoners of war, he treated them well by giving them decent living conditions and respected their dignity.

I do not agree with Nazism, of course, but his techniques respect dignity. Torture does not. Despite thoughtlessly acting violently, terrorists do not lack the capability to think. That is something that we should remember. Otherwise, someone might underestimate them.

Would that also mean you'd be perfectly fine if another country tortured someone from the US or any other of the allied nations to protect their country?

They're already doing so. By cutting their fucking heads off.

No surprise. Do find it funny how two years ago government officials and the CIA were slamming 'Zero Dark Thirty' for its portrayal of torture - saying it was inaccurate - ...yeah.

So Is that a Yes or a No?
I'd assume it's a No but assumptions tend to be based on personal guessing and isn't needlessly correct.

No. We're not fighting nations, however. We're fighting organizations that aren't protected under the Geneva convention.

I already mentioned my opinion on torture earlier. My post is just pointing out that from a legal standpoint we are not breaking any U.S. laws torturing some al Qaeda fighter we captured during a firefight in Iraq. True, if a soldier captured him the soldier can't torture him because of the UCMJ prohibiting it but once the terrorist is handed over to the CIA it's out of military's hands since they're civilians.

When it comes down to it, when you're like me with four combat deployments and you see the aftermath of insurgents slaughtering locals for helping coalition forces (one example is in 2005 during my second Iraq tour insurgents slaughtered a man and his whole family because he helped us build a checkpoint a few weeks earlier) it's hard to feel sorry for them and I'm not looking at it through rose-colored glasses based on biased news reports that people read on the Internet. But at the same time, torture is not something that I would want us to do on a regular basis since we're supposed to be better than them.

Do you honestly believe that being nice will accomplish anything? ask yourself why would you betray your country, friends family over bratwurst und sauerkraut.

And what you probably don´t take into account is the torture and hardship those people went through before they came to Mr. Nazi Scharff. Not to mention the use of threats like "hey give me info or we have a nice Gestapo office down the hall" or "Dont you need a shower soon, we have a special one just for you"

And if those tortured are discovered are not part of the organizations but rather a civilian who do fall under the Geneva convention?

Collateral Damage?

I guess you missed my earlier post:

http://www.cgu.edu/pdffiles/sbos/costanzo_effects_of_interrogation.pdf

"As one CIA operative who participated in torture during the Vietnam War put it, “We had people who were willing to confess to anything if we would just stop torturing them” (Andersen, 2004, p. 3).Indeed, the Army Field Manual explains that strategically useful information is best obtained from prisoners who are treated humanely, and that information obtained through torture has produced faulty intelligence (Leahy, 2005)."

"However, many survivors of torture report that the truthful information they revealed was intentionally incomplete or mixed with false information (Harbury, 2005). The goal was to appease the torturer, not to reveal the truth. And, because the interrogators were not omniscient, they couldnot discern which bits of information were true and which were false. Misreading their victims, torturers often failed to recognize the truth and continued to inflict pain. Victims continued to disclose, often fabricating information to in an effort to stop the pain (Conroy, 2000; Haritos-Fatouros, 2003). Many survivors of torture report that they would have said anything to “make the torture stop” (Mayer,2005; McCoy, 2006). And, even in cases where torture may have preceded the disclosure of useful information, it is impossible to know whether less coercive forms of interrogation might have yielded the same or even better results."

Indeed.

Fair enough.

I appreciate you took the time to indulge my curiousity.

I do not have to believe it because I know kindness leads to accomplishments. Compassion, whether feigned or not, is at the core of American society. It is why the American Revolution occurred. The founders of America sought compassion from their British rulers in the form of representation for taxation. It is why the African-American Civil Rights movement was successful in ending de facto segregation in America, though Sunday remains the most segregated day of the week. Go to some churches to see for yourself.

Anyway, I actually did take into account the alternatives as likely did the prisoners of war and Americans who have learned from Scharff. I am uncertain why you say I probably do not as if it is likely I would be unaware of such a thing.

Torture against the unconvicted is a criminal, immoral act.

Those who commit it are criminals. They are anti-american and cause hatred of my country. I will not be silent, as some suggest, as they work in my name and cause great harm to what my country stands for. They are enemies of the people and the state.

They have no right to decide who is and is not guilty and who is lowly enough to be treated as a subhuman. I live under law. They live under law. If they ignore to the great harm of others they deserve my scorn.

Torture against the convicted is sick and pointless. It is also a criminal and immoral act.

Airshocker remains the undisputed king of knuckle draggers. Pretty damn awesome. How lost has it been since kraychik left? Three years?

Well... it kind of was. In Zero Dark Thirty the interrogators got shit loads of information using torture when in actuality during the Bush years torture methods yielded very little if any useful intelligence, as evidenced by this report.

But you forget that in the case of the german, the only reason kindness worked was because they already had or were facing torture. Its the good old "good/Bad cop" routine and that works but you cannot deny that torture also works, does it work all the time , no its not a sure fire way, like with kindness it works sometimes and sometimes it dont.

Anyways how do you imagine the same tactics would work today? most are terrorists and not wanted by their home country and in most cases haven't done anything that would pass go in most western legal systems. Not to mention that most are religous fanatics who for most would gladly blow themselfs up. So how do you get intel out of them unless you use torture, how do you see kindness would work?

Et tu Alijosa? The torture in the film did not get "shit loads of information". The main torture shown, in the beginning, was not useful at the time. It wasn't until YEARS later, when they sat down with the original individual and had an actual conversation that they began to put the pieces together. Did they get information? Yes. The report shows that some individuals who were put through torture gave up bits of information - including the one who gave up the courier info at the beginning of the film. But it wasn't torture alone that led to results. Plus, the main criticisms thrown at the film were that those forms of torture were not used...which the report contradict. It specifically mentions things such as chaining people upright, etc.

For those arguing with airshocker...

Do you think it is at all possible for one to have a civilized conversation about moral responsibility with a sociopath?

They deserved it.

You're probably right I haven't seen the film since it came out so my details on it are fuzzy lol. I don't remember disliking it at the time though. I really should watch it again.

Wait a minute. This is the same thing you said I did not take into account reiterated. I am not going to go back and forth with you about this; I understand the scenario that the prisoners of war were in during World War II when faced with Scharff or the alternatives. Please understand that.

Anyways how do you imagine the same tactics would work today? most are terrorists and not wanted by their home country and in most cases haven't done anything that would pass go in most western legal systems. Not to mention that most are religous fanatics who for most would gladly blow themselfs up. So how do you get intel out of them unless you use torture, how do you see kindness would work?

You seem to be of the opinion that terrorists are beyond reason. When they commit acts of violence, I would agree. I do not agree that such a mentality is without change or a constant. That is because human beings are creatures of change. Not only do we age, but our minds alter. Science calls it neuroplasticity. If they can be indoctrinated into thinking one way, they can most certainly be changed to think another. The agent of change, an interrogator, is an instructor of sorts.

During WWII or any war, for that matter, impending death and other less than ideal living standards are present. Scharff took POWs out of that terrible situation and gave them decent standards of living during their stay at his facilities. I argue that great change in standards of living was very important in relaxing the POWs so much that they gave Allied information without even knowing it.

We can relate Scharff's techniques to other methods of persuasion. Criminals in Sweden are being rehabilitated rather than punished and the decrease in repeat offenders is low, and crime in general has diminished since choosing to treat their prisoners in a dignified way. Their mentalities before entering rehabilitation were one which viewed committing crimes as acceptable. After that, many of them were of a different opinion.

Contrasting that is a system which uses punishment to enact justice. America utilizes it. I argue there are a high amount of incarcerations and repeat offenders because of it. Similar to torture, one seeks to use positive reinforcement to bring about acceptable behavior. Imprisonment takes away freedom, a seemingly negative reinforcement, but contextually it replaces living conditions with new ones, a positive reinforcement (psychologically speaking).

One method has a high success rate of acquisition of honest information and, in another context, reform while the other is not as sure to result in less crime or acquisition of said information.

Our categorization of one person as a POW and another as a terrorist has obfuscated the truth from some that they are both human beings with ideals and mentalities can change within either.

@commonfate: It beats getting no information there by increasing the danger to the people. I will take my chances on any information we can get by any means possible and be alive to debate how we got the info.

The problem I see, besides it's ineffectiveness, is that it creates the resources and the urge to use it whenever enemies may be different. It's already been shown that the U.S. is willing to engage in assassination campaigns against it's own citizens. Why not torture (that is, it's own citizens)?, it's a lesser crime than murder. Fact is, no state, even a relatively free democracy such as the U.S. is immune to the urge to opress and delve into authoritarian practices. Degeneration of the political system seens to be a trait common to many democracies, that's why such acts should be as clandestine and tabu as possible, imo (if not completely forbidden).

Yeah, if only Obama wasn't such a sissy Putin would NEVER have invaded Georgia. Oh wait, that was during Bush's presidency. I meant he would never have waged brutal war on the Chechens. What? That was under Republicans too? Putin did what he did because he feels its right for the long term interests of Russia and maybe because he is trying to defray short term dissatisfaction. He did it the way he did it because he is an authoritarian prick,

No, I don't regret not voting for Mr. "I want an 80 front war and I want it now" McCain

I'm all for executing every last terrorist. I do, however, take issue with torture for some of the reasons stated in this thread.

Bush/McCain fan.

Except McCain is a well known advocate against torture. Way to be informed.

Wait till the U.S empire completely falls only then will people know the enormity of U.S government's crimes. It's just crazy that something like this which every nation would try to cover has hit the news. It shows the degree and depth of these inhumane torture methods and the barbarity of the torturers. There are more effective torture methods (that can't really be called torture since they don't harm your mind or body but they WILL exhaust you in a matter of hours) and yet CIA has implemented these savage torture methods and it seems to me that they didn't use these godawful methods to extract information but rather to enjoy themselves and satisfy their sick desire for torturing people. In my opinion this report alone can call for a complete reform of the CIA from head to toe.

And for people to call this a necessary evil. LOL. You people should change the name of your country from U.S to "the land of the hypocrites."

Sure there is.

I'm absolutely with that CINO, retrograde, big government dinosaur by the name of John McCain on this one.

I find it crazy that anyone here thinks torture is okay... you're supposed to be better than the bad guys, not do horrible things to them because they might plan to do horrible things to us.

Somebody is upset.

Disagrees with me, must be a sociopath. Nice logic there.

I'm sorry that I don't believe the people trying to murder us should be given any of our rights. That doesn't make me a sociopath.

Thanks, I guess? Somebody has to have a backbone. While the rest of you wring your hands in faux outrage for the horrible things done to people who wouldn't think twice of doing worse to you, some people have to do things to keep others safe.

No, it has nothing to do with having a backbone. That just sounds utterly pathetic. Besides the fact that torture is a depraved and immoral act, it has been shown throughout this thread to be incredibly ineffective at garnering useful information. Several people in this thread have shown how ineffective torture is, and I myself posted evidence in this thread showing how the use of torture is a terrible tactic for gathering information.

"Some people have to do things to keep others safe." How it committing torture keeping people safe? Torture produces more inaccurate and unreliable information than the actual facts. So inaccurate information keeps people safe? If the information is useless, then what purpose does the torture serve? The only conclusion to draw from this is that the torture is to merely inflict pain on the victim. All it has shown is that the US is no better than these terrorists.

It is not an immoral act if it's being committed for a worthwhile reason.

You can post whatever you want, dude. Nothing you say is going to change the fact that torture sometimes works.

That' wasn't the argument at all, thick one.

Human rights are not ours to give and.attempting to justify any sort of abject, deprived and immoral act towards another, for any reason does indeed make you a sociopath.

I find it interesting how people supporting this use words such as "I'm ok with this because they're terrorists, they deserve it". How can you possibly know that only terrorists were tortured? It's almost certain that innocent people were tortured. So you guys are ok with this too? Is this what the US stands for now? Or is this just what you tell yourself to avoid facing reality?

@nunovlopes: it's actually spot on correlated to American values

not surprised really

I would like for people who aren't US citizens on OT to not overlook those of us who are against torture instead of just painting everyone with a fucking broad brush.

didn't know it was possible, but it seems ISIS just got knocked to second place as the worlds biggest fuckery

congrats US

Even if they are innocent?

Are you also perfectly fine with Americans' being tortured to protect other countries from American aggression?

If not, then why the double standard?

Jack Bauer comes to mind.

You have no argument. Sorry, that's not what a sociopath is.