Waterboarding Is Torture, Says Ex-Navy Instructor (SERE)

The Washington Post ^ | Nov 9, 2007 | Josh White

[Graycliff]

Well, if we’re not allowed to get information from them through water boarding, then i don’t see much need for trying to take them alive.

[DarthVader]

Get your head out of the clouds and get real.

[MNJohnnie]

You base your whole argument on a phony accusation and then demand that everyone debate on the base of your phony house of cards.

Sorry this is a Conservative site. We have spent decades learning how to demolish these fraudulent debate tactics of you knee jerk hysteric Leftists.

Try actually debating the facts rather then your manufacturing fraudulent arguments and we will take you seriously.

Until you actually try a rational debating point instead of clinging to your emotion based hysteria and ignorance, no one is going to take you seriously here.

[arderkrag]

I’m not a leftist. Nice try though. I’m still not debating on emotion.

[gridlock]

"We the People of the United States, in Order to ...provide for the common defence...do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America"

The common defense. That is the key.

People are advocating torture in order to prevent individual terrorist acts. While these acts may be brutal and horrible, they do not threaten our common existance as a country.

People are advocating extending the common defence to the point where we are protecting each individual and preventing each individual act of violence. This is a whole different matter, and requires a much heavier hand of government.

Great mischief has been done by various governments in the name of protecting the innocent.

[MNJohnnie]

Using your “logic”, the Allies were morally equivalent to the Nazis because they bombed German cities and killed German civilians

Either your argument is an ignorance based on a knee jerk hate for the current occupant of the WH or you are an utter fraud who doesn’t have the slightest clue what they are arguing.

So which is it, fraud or fool?

[snowrip]

I am not the one engaging in emotion based arguments.

You're absolutely right. In your attempts to not become emotionally involved, you have actually circumvented any logicical process whatsoever... and have arrived at the point where all you're able to do is attempt to claim moral superiority by refusing to engage in linear thought. You have suceeded in avoiding any commitment to defending your point of of view in any rational manner, and instead are able to just declare any other argument null and void. Bravo for your intellectual prowess!

[Brad from Tennessee]

If torture didn’t work there would not be a debate about it. Waterboarding—or “water torture” as it was called during the Vietnam era—is a humane technique because it doesn’t physically wound the subject. Simulated drowning produces laryngospasm—a muscular contraction of the laryngeal cords. “The condition typically lasts less than 30 or 60 seconds, and causes a partial blocking of breathing in, while breathing out remains easier.”

[Old North State]

Who has been water boarded? I’ve heard that 3 were, and thousands of lives saved, with no damage to the 3.

I think that goes to the crux of the issue. Waterboarding isn't torture, it is a technique designed to induce psychological terror, nobody gets killed, nobody gets injured(well, maybe their feelings get hurt). It should only be used in extreme situations in time of war. If it is outlawed in total then the democrats will start on some other technique claiming it is ‘just as bad as water boarding’. They want a way to criminalize the administration and the military for war fighting when they see it as an effective political tool, nothing more, nothing less.

[arderkrag]

No, it doesn’t work that way, and that’s not using my logic. In actual combat, the rules are simply: don’t be killed. But you simply do not torture prisoners of war.

[safeasthebanks]

Sorry, but you don't get to determine what a "proper phrasing" is on this board. If you can't answer the question, just admit it, don't try and weasel out by playing word games.

And, yes, the "ticking time-bomb" scenario is EXACTLY on point and appropriate for this discussion. Just because you don't have a good answer for it doesn't make it invalid. If waterboarding is being used, that's what it is being used for, to stop planned activities that would result in massive deaths and casualties of innocent people. It's not being used to obtain money, or to get political power, or even to learn battlefield secrets in a traditional war, all of which I think most on this board would be against.

So again, clarity over agreement, for you, the ideal of NEVER torturing ANYONE is more important than even one innocent life being saved. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, I just want clarity.

[MNJohnnie]

Your so called “point” is emotion based ranting full of absurd nonsense.

Using your “logic” any action taken by the defenders to protect innocent life is morally equal to any action taken by the aggressors to end innocent lives.

Yours is an utterly absurd dogma that any rational adult mind would reject as childish nonsense

Nice you have opinions, please learn the difference between your emotion based dogmas and facts.

[arderkrag]

Yes. It can’t be possible that most of the arguments in favor of an action I oppose are actually null and void.

[RDTF]

If I ever see a photo of Mohammed, I hope he is missing several fingernails.

[M Kehoe]

My 'give a damn meter' seems broke.

5.56mm

[arderkrag]

Using your “logic” any action taken by the defenders to protect innocent life is morally equal to any action taken by the aggressors to end innocent lives.

No, it's not. But torture is wrong. There is a difference between defense of the country and torture. The latter is what I oppose, the former is what I am for. See the difference?

[MattinNJ]

Oh I don’t know, maybe the &*(&^% who blew up the WTC in front of my eyes...or perhaps it’s the gov’t who insists on fighting a PC WOT.

[snowrip]

In actual combat, the rules are simply: don’t be killed.

Careful, you've begun to show your hand as well as your ignorance. Did you just say the "rules of war" can be boiled down to "RUN AWAY!"?

[chrisser]

People are advocating torture in order to prevent individual terrorist acts. While these acts may be brutal and horrible, they do not threaten our common existance as a country.

You can't be serious.

Raising the bar to "threatening our common existance as a country" eliminates defending anything short of a massive nuclear attack.

Further, any war is a series of battles, and none of those individual battles will determine the full outcome. Should all battles with a national enemy be forfeit because none individually threaten the entire country?

Any attempt to inflict mass civilian casualties in order to force action or prevent action on the part of the entire country (a pretty decent definition of terrorism) sure falls under the "common defense" clause in my book.

[arderkrag]

No, to me, the principles are equal. Our principles are all sacred. To compromise one compromises them all.