It seems like every week there is a new buzzword that comes out to the mass public through the Internet, newspapers and television. The media covers the issue for a while and then the buzzword is forgotten; remembered only if it comes up again in some future news story.
These buzzwords can be benign, like “Octomom,” for example. Or they can be serious, like the one that returned last week, “waterboarding,” an act many people are calling “torture” and damning the U.S. government for having practiced. When you look at the benefits of waterboarding, though, is it really that bad?
For those who don’t know, waterboarding is a technique used by officials in Guantanamo Bay while interrogating terror suspects, which has been viewed by many as torture. It involves placing the prisoner on a slanted board and wrapping a material over his face, then pouring water over the face to simulate drowning. The prisoner usually believes that death is imminent and will start “singing” usually within seconds.
According to the Washington Post, earlier this month the Obama administration released “long-classified” documents detailing how “the agency sought to pressure detainees through extreme sleep deprivation, violence and waterboarding.”
While many CIA officials, including former director Michael Hayden, have called releasing such documents detrimental to U.S. intelligence operations, there were “exceptional circumstances,” according to President Obama, which led to their release. In fact, on Obama’s second day in office he banned the use of harsh interrogation practices, including waterboarding, on detainees.
The whole issue here is obviously a moral opposition to the use of “torture” by the U.S. government. But in the tough times we live in, I would argue that certain stricter methods of acquiring information and confessions are necessary. Plus, with all of its criticism — much done by the left — waterboarding has produced results.
Take Guantanamo Bay detainee and Al-Qaeda poster child for terrorism, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. You know, the guy who looks like a fatter and hairier version of John Belushi after a three-day coke binge?
With a resume boasting a role in several major terrorist attacks, including the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, Mohammed is known as the person who has undergone the most waterboarding sessions.
According to The New York Times, “the CIA used waterboarding 183 times in March 2003 against … Mohammed, the self-described planner of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.” It was through these harsh interrogation practices that, according to BBC News, Mohammed has admitted his role in 31 plots, some of which occurred and some that were thwarted.
For every terror suspect that waterboarding works on, there is always another that critics claim it doesn’t work on, turning the whole thing into a game of “he said, she said,” but this is besides the point.
I’m not for flat-out torture either, but harsh times require harsh measures. Perhaps simulating a little drowning occasionally is needed to get difficult to extract information. Had Mohammed not confessed to his role in the 31 plots, the Library Tower in Los Angeles might not be still standing.
Fire needs to be fought with fire, and when our enemy is willing to behead its victims and go to great lengths to destroy our way of life, we need to get our hands a little dirty too.
Gerry Wachovsky is a graduate student and a columnist for the Daily Forty-Niner.
Mr. Wachovsky writes that “The whole issue here is obviously a moral opposition to the use of “torture” by the U.S. government.” In a Constitutional government, the matter of law must be considered regardless of moral values. Torture is an illegal act, whether committed by terrorists or by the U.S. government. It was declared so by the Congress. Additionally, the U.S. is a signatory to the international acts against torture. Waterboarding has been declared by our government and by the international community as torture. The U.S. participated in war crime trials where waterboarding was specified as torture. The opposition to the use of torture by the government is a legal issue and should be considered in that light. If, as many believe, torture is useful in obtaining information from alleged enemies, then the Congress should pass a law designating it as a lawful act by the U.S. government.
Mike Michaelson
Have you seen the documentary ” taxi from the dark side”. Innocent people, who had no informations, have been killed and injured from this “enhanced intorregation” techinques. It is barbaric .
Your name – Like usual, all my “liberally minded” pieces are lost on people like you and the only thing you see is what you want. I did not write this article with a “conservative” slant, but you can read into it however you want, I guess. And the Hannity comment is tired and used…I’ve heard it all before. Nice try though, brother.
If “enhanced” interrogation techniques are ineffective, why won’t the Obama Administration release the memoranda that provides the results of such interrogations. As I recall, Congress passed a law around 2005 or so that prohibited the practice of waterboarding. It appears that our interrogation teams have been in compliance since Congress passed that law. It now appears that Congress wants to have a “Truth Commission” and see whether or not it may persecute, sorry, prosecute, members of the previous administration for violating the law. The Attorney General will not rule out the possibility of prosecuting members of the previous administration either. The only elected Democrat that appears to be somewhat reluctant to go down that road is President Obama. His seeming reluctance may be because he doesn’t want to start out and out political warfare in Congress. He knows that there were Democrats and Republicans who were briefed on the enhanced interrogation techniques as early as 2002 and that no one raised any objection at that time. President Obama doesn’t want or need this kind of distraction to bleed time and attention from his legislative agenda or make the upcoming 2010 Congressional election any more competitive than what it appears it will be at this time.
Gerry,
Per FBI interrogation agent Ali Soufan, personally involved in the interrogations of Abu Zubaydah, in an op-ed piece in the New York Times 22 April 2009: “Defenders of these techniques have claimed that they got Abu Zubaydah to give up information leading to the capture of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, a top aide to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and Mr. Padilla. This is false. The information that led to Mr. Shibh’s capture came primarily from a different terrorist operative who was interviewed using traditional methods. As for Mr. Padilla, the dates just don’t add up: the harsh techniques were approved in the memo of August 2002, Mr. Padilla had been arrested that May.”
Also note that the Japanese used waterboarding on American troops during World War 2, and after the war, the US military was pretty consistent in terming it “torture.” (See US v. Sawada).
Mr. Wachovsky, your views are deplorable as usual. Would you be willing to join your co-star Sean Hannity on this right-wing sitcom you’ve been airing for the last few years and volunteer to be waterboarded yourself? I can only imagine how you’d react after “a little drowning!”
Chris Herrin – Here is my problem with what you said, as well as people like Robert Baer. I recently read an article in Time Magazine that was by Baer about this subject and how it “doesn’t work”, but he made one leap of judgment in the article that I hear every person who is against waterboarding always make. It is as follows:
“From the interrogations of Abu Zubaydah, Mohammed and other al-Qaeda prisoners, the CIA learned a lot more than it knew before about the group’s communications, its use of safe houses and codes, and the outlines of its worldview. Valuable stuff, but stuff that could have been extracted through patient and relentless persuasion.”
How can he, as well as everyone else who disagrees with waterboarding, be so confident that “patient and relentless persuasion” will work on EVERYONE? Granted, it has worked on some, but I have a problem with blanket statements like this. I know that Baer definitely knows more than me or you about this, but that quote from the Time Magazine article really sums up the view of people who are against waterboarding by pointing out that it is really just speculation whether “patient and relentless persuasion” actually works on everyone. And I think sometimes we don’t have the luxury for “patient and relentless persuasion” either…not to say that there is a ticking clock like in “24”, but sometimes time is of the essence.
Gerry refers to the dangerous times in which we live, but why is it that we were able to crush people like King George, Jefferson Davis, Hitler, and all the rest without resorting to these tactics? Also, people who know what they are talking about like the former CIA agent Bob Baer have said these techniques don’t work. He says, for example, that the Israelis no longer use them because they create more problems than they solve. The times we live in are dangerous, but not as dangerous as some other eras in our nation’s history.