f13.net

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/05/25/malaysia.rights.reut/index.html


Oh noes!!! It cant be true!!!!! The US isnt the only ones who use these tactics. *sobs* Betcha this is gone in a day or so.

I think the liberals just think it shouldn't happen and we shouldn't be the ones doing it, not that it doesn't happen.

Add that to the liberal list of the way they think the world should turn though and you get a wishbook worthy of a fairytale.

The best you can do is to be reactionary to the screwups, and proactive with good training.

So close, yet so far.  We think it shouldn't be happening, and we think we shouldn't be the ones doing it if it does happen, but we understand that there will be bad seeds and occasionally even nations great as ours will produce people that do these things and those people will be punished.  And we agree that the best you can do is be reactionary to the screwups when the screwups are just soldiers.

What we won't stand for, however, is our leaders ordering the torture of troops.  The outrage isn't that it happened, the outrage is that the Bush Administration ordered it to happen.

I was moreso focusing on idealogy rather than your latest "wait and see" proof against the current administration. If they have enough to go on then by all means, start the justice wheel rolling.

I think we both know they don't, not to say they won't. Until then, it's the ravings of a media built on shock factors and me-tooism in my book.

I'm shocked! Shocked and appalled that MALAYSIA of all countries is using torture techniques for interrogation. What's next? Petty dictators cutting people's hands off?

In other news, the fucking sky is blue.

The shock and outrage over our troops abusing prisoners is from the double-talking president claiming that the torture chambers of the former dictator are no more, then finding out that not only are they just under new management, that management apparently has orders from one of his appointees.

We (the US) are supposed to be better than that, and so are our allies, by our own moral bluster. The fact that we aren't shouldn't be a shock to anyone.

What I read from that, once I got past the words "New Yorker" and "fact" next to each other as if they belonged there, was that the Pentagon might have authorized sexual humiliation and physical coercion to extract information, which in and of itself is not torture, by definition.  And that said humiliation and coercion got out of hand when they allowed a few, I believe the word was hillbillies in the article, to enforce this.  It got out of hand because these kids didn't know what they were doing.  I seriously doubt the Pentagon authorized dog bitings, or killings.  Maybe the human pyramid, and maybe a bit of the chicks pointing at dicks, but so fucking what?  We are in a WAR and I don't think a bit of degredation is going to hurt anything.  
So from what I read of this article, the Pentagon authorized a program, one that did NOT include torture, as the Geneva defines it, and it got out of hand when some untrained people were brought in.  I don't see how this is the Bush Administration ORDERING torture and murder.  I see this as those in that prison doing stupid things and needing to be punished for it.  Which they ARE.  Those who knew or authorized the violations of the GC should and will be punished.  How you trace that back to Rummy and even farther the President himself, I don't get.   I never once saw in the article where Rummy or Bush said themselves, "Have dogs bite them and maybe even kill a few to get the message across."  You show me THAT and you'd have a case.

What the article said is that Rummy and Bush authorized a program that created the culture where such abuses could happen. They also did so by essentially classifying people as "illegal combatants" who are not protected by the Geneva Convention. They allowed the program to expand the definition of illegal combatant to anyone who might know a little something something about insurgency, such as the relatives of possible insurgents. There's the big problem. These people SHOULD have been protected under the Geneva Convention. And the article finishes it off with the most salient point:



We have no right to complain if our enemies don't follow the Geneva Convention, because we only follow it when it's convenient for us. That's what this administration has done.

Well, considering the fact that I never saw a fucking terrorist sit down for scones and tea whilst we delicately discuss the whys and wherefores of the cessation of hostilities, I don't see how that matters.  They NEVER followed the Geneva Convention, and if substantial evidence comes out that we did, then we were wrong and we are going to FIX it.  Whereas, they will keep mutilating Americans.  Tell me again how that doesn't give us the right to complain about them sawing the head off of a noncombantant?

It's about having the moral high ground.  It just doesn't sound as good when we say "Yes, we violate the Geneva Convention; but they violate it worse than we do."

If you're going to say you're better than the other guy, try to make sure the other guy isn't a fucking psychopath.

I just think it's odd to try and put moral high ground and war in the same ideal. The only reason we even give two shits as a country about moral high ground is because we know we kick ass. In fact I wish I could put up a nice little sliding scale for you comparing the two. You'd see that the less ass you can kick, the less you care about morals when people are on your turf.

Of course, the moral code that we choose to live by can be very relative in a war. Utilitarians would be all for the torture of enemies if it led to saving allied lives. The truth is the Geneva Convention is very much like a contract between warring parties to play nice. That idea in and of itself is completely ridiculous in the terms of a war. What if somebody doesn't live up to the agreement, we're going to declare MORE war on them?

The point is it's easily broken with no recourse. Why should our enemies live up to an agreement when they know it gives them an advantage not to? They also know that instead of it being an agreement between two sovereign nations to keep the grisly part of capture out of war, it's merely a handcuff on the US to keep us from retaliating in kind. It basically plays right into the terrorists hands, they have nothing to fear and nothing to lose by violating it. So basically, when you get down to the bottom of the agreement, its there to make us feel better as a nation about our wars. Because, as we all know, if we responded in kind, that wouldn't make us better, and we need to be better than them. Because we're America, and we're the beacon on the hill for Democracy.

I can tell you one thing though, if stripping down all the prisoners we had and dressing them as Little Bo Peep would end the hostilities, I'd do it in a heartbeat and not think twice.

And again the point can be raised that what GIVES us that moral high ground is not how delicate and nancy-boy we are about the war, but by how we respond to our own violations of what civilized war (snort) should be.  It's not that we lost the moral right to do what we are doing, we still have it, and I think that a quick and effective punishment to those responsible will clarify our position as the 'good guys' if you want to use that term.  We aren't honoring or clapping on the back those who violated those prisoners, the way I bet the beheader of that noncom American is getting lauded by HIS buddies.  Oh yeah, and ditto to everything paelos said.

Which is exactly what DV said, pretty much, and exactly why the terrorists are so easily able to do what they do.

However, think of the consequences to the world if our military and our government operated on the same principle. Do we really want to sink even close to the level of these nutjobs? Maybe that's the only way to beat them, but I'd like to think we're better than that. And when our leaders out right STATE that we are better than that with a condescending tone, speaking to the Iraqi people as if they were retarded children who we are going to magically bring into peace and fairy democracy land, I expect that the entire chain of command knows how to act to make that shit not seem hypocritical.

In the 1700's, warfare changed faces, and was nicknamed, "the sport of kings." It was a reaction to the bloody massacres of the previous centuries religious wars, such as the Thirty Years War. Certain rules were instituted and agreed to by all the combatants (except the Turks). Generals even had tea with each other before battles. And in the end, the great wars of the middle century barely changed the maps a few miles one way or the other.

There's a lesson in there somewhere.

We have to.  If the current War on Terror is to have any chance of succeding, it cannot be just about kicking ass and taking names.  The Rumster said it when he wrote the memo questioning if we were stopping (killing) terrorists faster than they were being recruited.

Haemish is right to compare this to the war on drugs, this isn't a war on a physical enemy as much as it's a war on the idea that America is the Enemy and must be destroyed.  Unless you want to open up a can of genocide on all Muslims, the only way to win this war is to try and convince people that we are not the Great Satan.

You do realize you are talking to neocons, right?

We just let out a bunch of people from that jail. They weren't terrorists. Almost none of the people in that jail are terrorists.



Who said that? Straw man, anyone? Complain all you want, it's sick.

This thread is stupid. WE DON'T LIVE IN MALAYSIA! We don't control what Malaysia does - we DO control what we do.

I wouldn't feel good if Malaysia decided to invade other countries to defend freedom and democracy, because that would be hypocritical.

See, and I would say that about every country that did such things.

How about "stronger", not "better? That's what it really is (and always has been) when it comes down to it.

Malaysia never claimed they were so much better than iraq that they were entitled to invade.

Hence the usage of the word...

If

Be sure to say that the next time an american suffers degredation.

And I'm glad you agree you are at war. This the Geneva conventions apply. Seeing as they have been broken and ignored by BushCo, I assume you too want Rumsfield's head on a pike too?

Last time I checked, Americans don't suffer degredation, they suffer decapitation, let's try to see this with a modicum of perspective, shall we?

I wasn't aware that our justification was that we are "better", or even necessarily "stronger"....I believe our justification was that regime change in Iraq would improve our national security.

Our military and economic power merely made it feasible for us to invade without UN support and achieve a swift and decisive military victory. Which we did....the subsequent occupation has been another matter entirely.

The unfortunate side of this is that we are bound to Geneva conventions as an occupying country against mistreatment or abuse of POWs or Iraqi citizens. The Geneva convention totally ignores the fact that some of these folks are terrorists and/or insurgent groups that do not have the backing of any sovereign nation. Thus, they are NOT bound by the Geneva convention.

Our enemy has learned that they can gain an advantage by effectively being an army without a country or state sponsor. They will exploit that advantage to be a formless, shapeless force with quick strike ability and a near-constant advantage in the element of surprise. A good deal of their tactics read like something out of Sun Tzu's The Art of War. Essentially, they've learned how to get around any 'rules' that apply in modern warfare....it leaves us like the redcoats in the 18th century, lining up properly and honorably on the battlefield, and crying foul when the Native Americans, French, and revolutionaries don't fight fair.

Not that naked pyramid photos are going to give us some substantial advantage against them, or that it needs to be done at all. I just think perhaps the subject should be revisited, and the rules updated to reflect the very different world in which wars are being waged today.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

War is not all that different today. I mean, the aims are the same. The use of guerilla tactics still accomplishes the same thing. Do you think the Catholic and Protestant armies of the Thirty Years War were somehow LESS brutal than Al-Qaeda? Or for that matter, the armies of the Crusaders and the Muslims, where the very idea of the "assasin" comes from? All of these motherfuckers burned entire villages, women, children, raping and pillaging and the like. Shit, William Wallace was every bit as brutal as Al Qaeda, and when he rampaged and sacked York, he was technically an army without a country. He sent the King of England the head of York's baron in a basket. The entire war of the Scottish Independence, with the exception of a few battles was fought with guerilla tactics which we would today consider "terrorist" acts. And those people were the same religion, almost the same ethnicity and all.

The details may differ, but the tactics are the same. Terror may be easier to spread via the easily-led, always salivating for the next story media, but it is the same core tactic. We use a loophole in the Geneva Convention to justify acts we perpetuate on terrorists, because they won't play on our set of rules. They don't "fight fair."



That was one of our justifications, which was subsequently proven to be a line of horse shit. We then switched justifications to the moral high ground, "freeing the oppressed Iraqi people!"

Haemish, it takes a couple extra steps of logic....but removing an oppressive regime that is hostile to the US, and installing a democracy that is decidedly more US-friendly does have the long-term potential to improve our national security and help stabilize the region.

Turning an enemy into an ally is a good thing IMO, even if it does give the people of France and Germany another excuse to resent us, and another excuse for the left to despise the GOP. The goals of "freeing Iraq" and "improving our national security" are not mutually exclusive....after all, even when the administration was harping on WMDs, they still called the invasion "Operation Iraqi Freedom".

As to the rest of your post, the various examples you cited all share a commonality....a clear and achievable military objective. Al Qaeda has about as much of a military objective as the DC snipers (i.e. Muhammad & Malvo). It's not about land, or wealth, or political power....it's just about lashing out at "the Great Satan" in any way possible.

Since the enemy has no clear ties to any sovereign nation, nor any type of endorsement from a sovereign nation, we are fighting a war where there is no achievable military objective for the US, beyond "eternal vigilance". Go figure that in the pursuit of that objective, Bush has come off as a vigilante to some, due to his belief to be proactive and aggressive about prevention and pre-emptive efforts against terrorist organizations.

Obviously, the Geneva convention did not apply to William Wallace....though I see and agree with the parallels you've pointed out. But fundamentally, he fought for land and sovereignty. All I was getting at is that our modern "rules of war" are a standard which terrorists will never follow...perhaps the rules need to be modernized to account for such a conflict.

I'm not saying "let us torture prisoners", I'm saying that the terrorists gain strength, and inflict damage upon us based on advantages that we have granted them. Perhaps we need to re-examine what advantages we've allowed them is all.

But just to tread the other road, my personal take is that if it's a choice between treating terrorists with the same level of decency as a foreign soldier, citizen, or domestic prisoner versus preserving American lives...I tend to lean toward the "fuck the terrorists" side.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

Potentially, yes.  Remember though, that the fall of the USSR seemed like a good thing, but in the long term decreased our security by allowing former client organizations free reign.

Yes, but I don't think that is what is going to happen.

Bah, what were they going to call it. "Operation Make Saddam Our Bitch"?  These stupid military operation names all sound like they were thought up by focus groups.  Did that start under Ronnie or Bush Sr.?  


Which might work well in the short term, but will not win the long term battle.  You can fight terrorists, and prevent them from striking using military power.  But to actually stamp out terrorism, you have to change the environment so that people don't want to commit acts of terror.  You could do that by using force to strike back at terrorists, and make the cost so high that people are too scared to attack you.  However due to the nebulous nature of most terrorist organizations, this is difficult to do.  Additionally you would need to maintain this high level of fear, otherwise terrorists would think you were soft and potentially attack.

The other choice is to combine military force (to prevent immediate attacks) with various types of touchy-feely actions in an attempt to get the people of the world to like us.  The theory being, if they like us, they won't be as likely to try and kill us.

Actions like "fuck the terrorists" might gain us a short term tactical advantage in the form of intelligence, but they hurt what should be our long term strategy by giving A-Q and its ilk the ability to recruit new members.

Sorry for the Brucing.

Al Qaeda most certainly does have a military objective, and it is the same one as William Wallace. They seek to found a holy land, free of what they consider the sinful influences of non-Muslims, and with a more pure form of what they consider Muslim law. In other words, Taliban-style Afghanistan. It isn't just about "The Great Satan," these wackjobs do actually have an aim. Unfortunately for everyone involved, their aim is removed from the reality of the situation that most Muslims don't really follow their whacked-out fanatical views of Islam, and we aren't going anywhere so long as there is sweet, sweet crude beneath them sands.

As batshit insane as terrorists are, they DO have a goal other than just creating chaos and anarchy. Chaos and anarchy are tools, not aims. The Palestinian terrorists (Islamic Jihad, Hamas, the PLO), have an aim of a Palestinian state, free of Zionist influence and control. Most of the radical Islamic fundamentalists have a similar aim.

As for removing a hostile regime (which we put into power in the first place), I do not feel that Iraq could have really been considered a credible enough enemy to be a threat to national security. They would have had to take over every oil field in the Middle East to really put a serious dent in our security. By 2002, they barely had a military capable of denting a brick shithouse.

EDIT: And now that I think about it, the biggest problem I think we have in fighting terrorists is our own mindset, and the lack of understanding of the Islamic mindset.

To an Islamic person, death is preferable to things like sexual humiliation. Shame is a more powerful fear than the fear of death, especially in the mind of someone who believes their death serves a greater cause that will be rewarded in the after life. Americans (and most Westerners) cannot grasp that concept. To us, saving lives is more important than inflicting pain and suffering on the enemy.

Yes. Advantages such as coalition forces being found torturing prisoners.

other stuff...



Are you trying to tell me that photographs of piles of naked american hostages (men or women) with iraqis stood about leering, wouldn't cause significant comment if the previous week the Washington sniper had chosen to shoot an iraqi visiting the US?

Key point: the iraqis who killed that guy were *other iraqis*.

Yes, the US government is being held to higher standards than murderous ex-tyrants of third world countries. Or murderous gangs of terrorists. And even being held to higher standards than dubious governements of mostly democratic third world countries. This should neither be a surprise, nor something to get antsy about.

I would hope it's something to be proud of.



100% true - unless of course you sink to the level of the previous bastards through the sort of crap discovered in the iraqi prison, in which case, regardless of intention, and regardless of morality, the effect will be to increase the power of islamic terrorists.

Removing tyrants is partly a military operation.

Installing democracy is not. It is entirely a political activity. And guess what, in politics, appearences matter.

Two seperate tasks.

So despite calling it "Operation Iraqi Freedom", freeing the people of Iraq wasn't one of our stated objectives? It may not have been our primary concern, or the main topic of discussion prior to the war, but once the term "regime change" crept into the conversation, it was pretty clear that freeing Iraqis was one of our objectives.

I agree that the naming convention is trite...much as I felt the same about the Patriot Act. There are certainly political issues with voting against such things....but it's nothing new to politics. Lawmakers have been mixing in urine with the sugar for years.



Ultimately, when you are fighting a battle without a clear military objective, there is no long-term solution. "Making everyone like us", while effective, is also ridiculously unrealistic. Since all it takes is a pissed off individual with explosives to bring terrorism upon us, my opinion is that the only solution is eternal vigilance.

Bring the noise.
Cheers...............

Do me a favor....go look up the definition of torture (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=torture). Then look up the definition of abuse (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=abuse). Christ, it's amazing that nobody has started referring to the naked pyramid as an atrocity (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=atrocity) yet.

I will concede that US forces abused prisoners, I will not concede torture. They are being used as synonyms in the discussion, and in this context, I do not agree with it.

You also miss the point entirely...I'm just suggesting that perhaps the "rules of war" be reviewed periodically to ensure that they remain relevant. Not suggesting that we tolerate the abuses that took place, merely that we recognize that this type of conflict is uniquely different from fighting war with a sovereign nation, and that perhaps the rules should be slightly different to reflect that.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............[/url]

There are a few thousand US troops in Iraq right now that would disagree with this sentiment.

Also, please read up on the sort of torture Saddam inflicted upon his prisoners. I don't care if we took enough naked photos to publish a weekly version of "Iraqi Playgirl", we are a far cry from anything done under the previous regime.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

How is this any sort of valid argument? It's like saying we're abusive pricks, but just not as bad as "those" abusive pricks. We're the "Saddam Lite" of prison abuse and torture (yes, sticking flashlights up prisoner's asses is torture).

We should be proud.

Not really the issue, I was saying that the name of the operation doesn't mean shit.

When you say eternal vigilance, you mean eternal vigilance.  Unless something is done to improve people's idea of what America is, we will not win the war against terrorism.  The terrorists simply have too many juicy targets here, and we cannot be everywhere.

We need to 1: Shut down the current crop (generation) of terrorists, and 2: Stop the creation of new terrorists.  I'm not sure we're doing the former, and I'm damn sure we aren't doing the latter.

Correct me if I am wrong, but they HAD better than Taliban-style Afghanistan...they had the full blown thing. Yet, they decided to fly some planes into our buildings to lash out at us. They had a land for this shit, and merely used it as a planning ground to coordinate attacks on the sinful non-Muslims.



That is an idealogical battle, not a military one. When it comes to making everyone follow their purified Muslim law, or killing them, that is not a military objective. Their aim is based on what people think and believe, not about a specific piece of land or wealth or power. Converting people to their system of belief or wiping them out is more akin to the Spanish Inquisition or the introduction of Christianity to the Native Americans than it is to the plight of Scotland or Vietnam.



The Palestinians are fighting for what they believe to be their homeland....that's why we can't just carve out a section of Wyoming and send them to live there. They don't just want land, they want THAT specific piece of land.



Don't think in terms of Iraqi military forces attacking our country. It doesn't take air strikes and tanks....our national security can be compromised with a dozen boxcutters. The bigger concern was that Iraq would harbor, train, or otherwise support terrorist actions against us.

When you consider the possibility of WMDs, now you've got a serious threat. A terrorist with a very small amount of VX could do a lot of damage. Whether you believe the reports on WMDs were intentional deception, bad intel, or something else, that kind of potential represented a fairly serious threat. Hindsight is 20/20 on the matter.



Agreed.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

While they did have Taliban Afghanistan, Israel still existed and defiled their holy land, Palestine did not have its own state, Saudi Arabia was still linked at the hip to the US, etc.

They don't just want Afghanistan. They want the entire Middle East. They will not stop until all American influence is gone from the Middle East, what they consider their holy land. Afghanistan was just going to be the start of it. That's why the sent the planes into the buildings.

Again, nothing the intelligence Washington has at the time (at least that I've heard, or that I've heard that intelligence officials had) was credible enough to say that Iraq was training or trading with terrorists. While they COULD have been, the truth of the matter is that Saudi Arabia has provided more aid to known terrorists than Iraq ever thought of.

We can't even do this within the bi-partisan system of American politics. How in the fuck do you suggest we make everyone in the world happy with our country and it's government?

There's this thing called unrealistic expectations. Making everyone like each other enough that terrorism goes away falls right in the middle of that category.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

So instead of making even a token effort, we should just stay the course and keep fucking everyone over. That will surely help stem the growth of terrorists.

What you or I call it is irrelevant. All that matters is what random_iraqi01 calls it when choosing to put his or her support behind western democracy or islamic fundamentalism.

(And actually, if the iraqis were doing this to Americans - words like torture, abuse, and atrocity are exactly the words the west would be using)

*I* don't doubt that US forces interrogation is mild compared to what Saddam, the Taliban, or any number of other tinpot dictators did. But it's not *me* you need to convince. It's millions of arabs who have grown up being told the US is evil and that have no particular reason to give the US the benefit of the doubt. This is why the US operation is judged to a higher standard.

If the coalition fail to convince these millions of arabs then they will lose. On the other hand the terrorists and islamic fundamentalists need do no such thing to achieve their aims.

This is the natural advantage terrorists have. It is not an advantage we give them through our observation of standards of common decency and human rights; it's an advantage we can only neutralise by maintaining these standards.



If true then they've been badly trained.

(Which I doubt).

Solidiers can make an area (reasonably) safe. This is a necessary but not sufficient condition for success.

The rest is PR and politics.



This is where the UK, and various other militaries really do get it right.

They have a book of names.

They pick one.

More or less at random.

Operation Iraqi Freedom (US)
is
Operation Telic (UK)
is
Operation Falconer (Austrailia)


Gulf War I was Operation Granby (iirc). etc...

Australia is cool.  I'm guessing we didn't pick Iraqi Freedom out of a hat.

How do we make everyone love us?  I have no clue.  I doubt it's even possible.  But we need to do something to bring about a net decrease in the number of terrorists.

People see those prison photos and some of them will decide that we need to die.  What we need to do is try and convince them that we aren't really that bad.

Saying "It's just a few bad apples." doesn't really cut it.  Much, much more needs to be done.  It's a marketing thing.  We have a product (America and it's values), and we need to tell the people of the world about that product.  Right now people are getting their image of America from satellite TV and commercial products.  Lets just say that Coke, Pepsi, Baywatch, and Al Jazera (sp) are not doing a good job of selling our product.

Agree. It'll take an eternity to win a war of ideals. How is that going to work? It's "Freedom, Democracy, Apple Pie..and McDonald's" vs "Allah". I'm sorry, but as far as ideals go, America is a joke. There are only two ideals greater than Freedom in this world: Money and God (and I think we can all agree that an eternity is an entirely too long a time to wait and convince otherwise).

I understand the world today frowns at byzantine-like methods, but just because it's a "jihad" or whatever doesn't make terrorists any less difficult than other milatary targets. In fact, it should make it easier. As far as an Iraqi soldier (or soldiers in general) goes, yeah, we should be nice. Following the Geneva convention is in our best interest. As far as terrorists go, you just have to be worse than them. Stronger, not better. They're just humans. Give them enough pain and misery and "jihad" just becomes another word for "stupid". If you crush enough of their fucking heads in, they'll quit. Simple as that.

Scratch that. There are three ideals greater than Freedom in this world: Money, God, and Power. If we can't do it, maybe we should at least let the Turks have a go at it. Or we get some real "ideals" and then we can talk about who's "better" or not.

I agree with what you're saying here, but this line is precisely what I feel is the problem. Sure, dismissing the problem as a few bad apples who abused their power doesn't cut it with most folks.

But consider the possibility that this actually was the case....national guardsmen that were not trained for this type of assignment, and they misinterpreted orders to "soften the prisoners up" before interrogation.

Or the possibility that they just did this shit because they could....put young people in a situation like that, given all circumstances (American corpses paraded through the streets, etc), and it's not unreasonable for some to become complete idiots with the power they've been given. Note that I don't feel it is acceptable, merely that I can understand how it could happen.

Now just thinking about those possibilities, if either one is actually the case, we are saying that the truth doesn't cut it. Let me say that again....that statement, which I agree with, means that ITS POSSIBLE THAT THE TRUTH DOESN'T CUT IT. That disturbs me very deeply.

From all reports I have heard, the soldiers involved are being disciplined in a rather expeditious fashion, and the situation being investigated. I was under the impression that this process had begun even before the photos hit the press.

Beyond that, what can we do? You cannot un-ring the bell...all you can do is try and prevent future incidents. At the end of the day, we're talking about soldiers doing stuff they KNOW isn't acceptable. Do we really need to add a rule that says "don't break the existing rules"?

Bring the noise.
Cheers.................

even if it is a few bad apples, and evidence suggests that these kind of practices were OK'd at high levels, then the US army, government and and the US itself is still responsible because these people were either badly trained, not properly supervised, there were coverups etc etc

Thats why saying 'its just a few bad apples' doesnt cut it.  Because its shifting away the blame from the US and its organisations and onto individuals, when it is the responsibility of the US and its organisations to ensure this kind of thing doesnt happen, regardless of whether or not there are bad apples or not.

Stand on a small box, with your arms held up for hours. Hell, try doing it for a few minutes. Call what you want. I call it pain. Hours of it. Or not be allowed to sleep for 4+ days. Or be beaten by gun stock for small "infractions". And this all to an American allies citizin (2 Australians at Gitmo).

It is and was (AND STILL OCCURS this very minute at Gitmo) an unforgivable and undefendable act.  

And as for atrocities, does that wedding bombing/ground assault count?

Huh? Are you claiming that the rebels fighting the US Occupation in Iraq shoudn't be corvered by the Conventions!?!?!

The point is that we have placed ourselves in a position where the rules do not apply for our enemy, yet they apply to us.

Not saying we shouldn't hold ourselves to a higher standard, just irritated by the fact that scenarios exist where some of our troops get killed because we follow the rules, and they don't.

Since they are not the army of a sovereign nation, there is no accountability....they have no reason to follow these same rules. When they do the shit to our guys, we are the only ones that pay the price.

When that price is the lives of American soldiers, I get a bit irritated. Nobody on the other side is giving a second thought to the humane treatment of our soldiers. Particularly from the staunch anti-war crowd, I get really irritated when they seem more concerned about an Iraqi being photographed naked than they are with how American soldiers are treated.

That sort of thing just causes me to believe that there has got to be a better way....that perhaps the current rules need to be modernized to reflect this type of conflict. I don't see the harm in looking into it, if there is the potential to add accountability for the enemy and ultimately save the lives of our troops.

Bring the noise.
Cheers...............

Abusing Iraqis costs American lives.

You are not adding accountability. You are telling terrorists that if you harm us, we will harm more people you don't know and turn more arabs over to the terrorist cause. You think that the terrorists were anything less than delighted when those pictures came out?

People are not getting pissy (only) because it's immoral. People are getting pissy because it's counter productive.

Defeating Al Qaeda is a political objective - not a military objective.

I'd also note that this is exactly the reason you won the American war of fricking Independence.

Various elements in the British army and British government at the time felt that if they shot at and pissed off enough colonials you'd all come around to their way of thinking. Didn't really work out for them either.

Because Americans were thinking the same thing.

That didn't work in Algeria, Israel, Vietnam, South Africa, or Sri Lanka.  Why exactly do you think it will work in Iraq?

The trick is not to get them to love us. The trick is to keep them from hating us with the white-hot passion of the sun. Shit, I'm not sure we love the Brits, but we don't hate them.

We have to change the perception of Americans and American corporations as a bunch of carpet-baggers who will come into your country and pay someone to enslave the populace to make cheap-ass goods for the lazy Americans back home. We need to change the perception that Americans will blow shit up whenever we feel like it, especially if there is money to be made in it.

EDIT:

The Fedayeen, during the actual war before we toppled the regime, were using tactics like hiding in schools, firing into crowds, and all other manner of non-Geneva convention style shit while they were members of a sovereign nation. So they changed the rules. Should we then have ignored the Geneva Convention because they were?

See, it doesn't matter if your enemy doesn't follow it, because it only works if you DO follow it. It's an agreement. You agree to it. The minute a nation doesn't agree to it, after having criticized another country for not following it, you give the opponent the excuse to not use it as well. And then no one uses it. And we descend back into an even more brutal form of warfare than we already have.

No, as a nation who agreed to the Geneva Convention, YOU STICK TO IT. It's called keeping the moral high ground.

Our administration apparently doesn't care about that, which is why they only agreed to sign that treaty about war crimes so long as their soldiers were exempt from being prosecuted for any war crimes under that commission.

You seem determined to believe that I'm asking for the rules to be changed so that the prison abuses are made okay. I'm not....stop reading that into my posts.

I happen to think that the prison abuses are shameful, and have given our entire military a big black eye. I'm pissed off about it....and I'm equally pissed off that the left is donning their Michael Moore caps and trying to point the finger at Rumsfeld and even Bush. I'm pissed off that this overshadowed the execution of Nick Berg, because our enemies immediately displayed for us that they are more than happy to outdo our worst on exponential levels.

I just think that we need to evaluate the rules....to what extent can we adhere strictly to the rules, when our enemies are more than willing to use mosques and hospitals as staging grounds? Or when insurgents are willing to ambush our soldiers in the midst of the civilian population?

Are you familiar with the Geneva conventions as they apply to civilians (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva07.htm) and POWs (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva03.htm)??? When reading through them, it strikes me that POWs are entitled to conditions that are significantly better than the daily lives of most Iraqi civilians...possibly even better than some American civilians.

The rules regarding what constitutes a POW (Article 4) do not appear to include terrorists that have come into the country. Yet, they enjoy the same protections under Article 5...they get protection by default. This is in contrast to the civilian rules, including:



Iraqi insurgents are clearly covered...I'm thinking more along the lines of foreign terrorists that are fighting alongside them. Could we hold their nation of origin accountable for their actions, provided that that State is bound by the conventions? Or perhaps a state that had harbored or supported them? That'd be my preference...certainly moreso than simply saying that the conventions not apply.

If they are going to act in that way, they would be bringing hardship upon their country, or the country that harbors them....this is not only potentially undesirable for them, but could further motivate countries not only to refuse to harbor terrorists, but to active seek to expel them from their country.

Bring the noise.
Cheers...............

Well they WERE an "army of a sovereign nation" till you broke it.  Or do you think ther're working for ANOTHER nation? Iran perhaps? Or that's right, the PENTAGON was working for Iranain intellegence.

The iraqi's fighting the occupation are fighting for Iraq, or at least thier version of it.

Besides if you want it so the other side DOES treat you with the geneve convetions, dosn't that mean you have to too?



"...don't see the harm...". Uh huh. That prison and the ensuring photos that destroyed america's credability for the next 10 years, you did not see?

It dosn't save you're troops. It only adds to the size of the enemy. it generally does not give you information you want, it just gives you bad info you think you want.



Any anyway, why is this war DIFFERENT??? Example: London took 10000+ (30000?) causlties during WW2. You seem to be aruging that the british should have tortured the luftwaffe bombing crews.

Want to know how the Luftwaffe got THIER intel later in the war? NICE TREATMENT. It's amazing how much intel you can get when you're supringly NICE rather than using the expected Gestopo methods.


Hey here's a nice thought. When I said "Gestopo methods" you knew what I was talking about right? Well, if I said Abu Garihib" methods, everyone knows that THAT means too.

And they weill for a long time to come. THAT is one result BushCo has accomplished.

That all depends on if you think it only applies to oppressors, not the oppressed. I'd say Vietnam crushed our heads in, so my statement still applies. Apartheid was ended in much the same way, because the whites were overwhelmed. South African law didn't change because of the ideals neccesarily, they changed because of bloodshed. Sri Lanka, ditto. I guess Israel remains to be seen. Why I think it'll work is because it works in nature all the time. I don't want to come off as too Nietzschian, but just watch the Discovery channel.

I didn't say to apply cruelty to Iraqi soldiers, just terrorists. I love MLK and Gandhi and all that, man, but do you really think those kind of methods will ever work for terrorists? We can see that it works with politicians, who have some kind of status and reputation to uphold. But terrorists? These guys are far unreasonable than your average redneck. I bet Nicholas Berg tried a FUCKLOAD of reasoning, persuasion, and acted out his best impression of a "Good American"..but it didn't do him any good.

In those conflicts, the dominant party thought that the best way to win was to kill members of the other side until they gave up.  In the end the French left Algeria, the Palestinians hate the Israelis more then ever, North Vietnam won the war despite losing every battle, apartheid ended with negotiations, not revolution, and Sri Lanka's conflict is being negotiated (sorta) after umpteen years of suicide bombings and army raids.  I see no reason why the US won't eventually be forced out of Iraq.  Of course we won't say we were forced out, we'll just say we've achieved our objectives, pledge our support for the poor suckers in charge of Baghdad (and probably damn little else), and walk (quickly) towards the exit.

All stick, no carrot doesn't work.  Existing terrorists won't respond to a carrot, that's what the stick's for, but potential terrorists might be stopped from signing up for the cause if our carrot convinces them that we aren't such bastards.

Hey, let's see if you can possibly misunderstand me any more than you already have, okay? Maybe you can try and put more words into my mouth.

Asking for accountability != asking for torture. Stupid fuckers can't get past that. Asking for account ability is not asking for torture. Read that a few more times until it sinks the fuck into your thick skull.

Modernizing the rules, and periodically re-evaluating them != a request to rip up the geneva conventions. The conventions are based upon mutual agreement, mutual adherence, and the notion that a state can be held accountable for the actions of it's troops. Guess what? Terrorist groups, such as those that went into Iraq to take potshots at our guys, are 0 for 3 there. I'd like to see someone held accountable, ideally any state that has harbored or aided those terrorists. Iraqi insurgents, of course, are another issue....they are fully and specifically protected by the geneva conventions (though with the tactics employed by many, they are only covered under the provisions of Article 5)....the conventions themselves don't have a situation where a combatant isn't covered, yet they have situations where civilians are not covered. Back-fucking-asswards.

I'm all for a higher standard, I'm all for the moral high ground. Read the language of the conventions. Some pretty broad, sweeping rules there....some that border on the ridiculous. After reading them, I'm not sure that ANYONE has ever abided by them all. Based on the vague language, some would argue that I can't call a POW a "fucking idiot" without breaking the rules. I'm not in favor of physical or psychological torture, or even what I'd categorize as abuse.

Some terrorist wants to saw the head off of Nick Berg, that's just fine....but if we take that guy into custody, we must permit him the use of tobacco products. WTF is that all about? They can decapitate prisoners, we can't put in a frickin no smoking policy.

They can take an American corpse and parade it through the street, we cannot take $20 from their pocket unless an officer handles the process and documents what was taken from the prisoner, and then secures those funds.

I'm not saying that we should be able to parade them through the streets, or photograph them in naked pyramids. I'm just saying that we should have the ability to hold states accountable that have harbored them, and IMO, we could probably go ahead and take away their cigarettes.

But I'm sure you'll tell me how that means I want to advocate the slaughter of Iraqi children or some nonsense. So please proceed.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

Holding states that have harbored terrorists accountable really doesn't have much to do with the Geneva Convention, unless you are trying to say we shouldn't afford those states the rights of the Geneva Convention. Because they are still sovereign states whose combatants deserve the rights of the Convention.

And it still has fuckall to do with the terrorists themselves.

I think this (http://www.angryflower.com/bombso.gif) really captures the problem with Bush foreign policy so well, I just had to share.

Heh. A little too close to the truth!

Nice.

You can execute him if you like (after a trial and so forth).

What you can't do is drag other iraqis off the street and on only the say so of people smart enough to pose for photos of naked prisoner pyramids, start assuming they must have been terrorists and therefore declare abusing them to be less bad that it otherwise might be.

They wont work on terrorists but what the US has to concentrate on is increasing its standing in the international arena (which is at an ALL time low, and I mean all time as in since the USA came into existence) and stop using violent methods which draw recruits to the terrorists.

Superficially it may seem like bombing the hell out of Fallujah because 'terrorists' are there is going to hurt the terrorists but in actuality it hurts the US even more.  Because the international and esp Arab news media show the pictures of the dead and mutilated children and women who die at American hands.  And Al Qaeda gets even more recruits.

Fine. Tell me which ones are the terrorists.

When you're orbital mind scanner satallite is finished, it can clear the streets of muggers too.



I am all for putting various members of BushCo through the same things you want terrorists to go through! Mabye then the'll admit to making any mistake.

Lol, I'm sorry, but America hasn't really done shit. We're dealing with a bunch of jealous cavemen, that's all. Jealously: It's goes with being a superpower. Probably the most tame superpower the world has ever known. I'm not saying the USA is perfect, I'm just saying it's no different than anywhere else..and in some cases, a helluva lot better. When citizens of other countries like calling out America as less than civil, I call out hypocrisy.

This thread is evidence enough of how many well meaning Americans are out there, how they view their country's place in the international scene. We don't deserve to die (Do you get it?!). As for the violent methods thing again: Yes they will work. You see, it's already working on us (so quick too).

Ah, so violence does work, eh?

You might have been dealing with a bunch of jealous cavemen once upon a time, but Bush drove you well into the "Everybody who is not slavely devoted to kissing your ass at least distrusts you" area. And we are talking about countries that find themself to be better off than you (if thats true or not is another debate of course, but what counts here is their perception, just like Jealousy is about perception).

Please continue to delude yourself, it is different in other countries, and it has been different in your own country. Thats not critizicing your country, but current events in your country. If you can't keep those two things apart, its really hard to discuss things with you.

And we still are dealing with them, and it'll probably get worse. As for the kissing ass comment, I honestly have no idea what your talking about. I must have missed that. Clue me in please.



And it's really hard to discuss things with someone who doesn't accept that "Shit happens"...Everywhere I might add. The soldiers will be punished, probably even more than they deserve, end of story. What's to discuss?

Go right ahead and criticize, but the good thing is that you don't want to kill us for it...Which brings me back to the cavemen, who do. Like it or not, we need to go beyond criticism, and someone needs to be villianized. I just want to point out that it has to be those guys, not us.

"Shit happens" is indeed something I'm not comfortable with. That statement too often leads to a shrug and "Well, can't do anything about it, can we?".

I certainly don't want to discuss the events, there are procedures in place to punish all responsible parties, or all responsible parties that are not important enough to have somebody else fall on his sword for them, time will tell.

What I'm discussing here are your comments, which border on excusing everything your people do because the other people are bad. Whereas I think the one thing has nothing to do with the other. Everybody who does things worth to be called villainous has the right to be villainzed. So no, it doesn't have to be them, it can be everybody who lets himself to be dragged down into the dredges.

Listen up, you fuckwitted cockgobbler, because I'm only going to say it one more time.

I don't want shit like Abu Ghraib happening. I don't want anything similar to it. I don't WANT us to execute the terrorists and/or Iraqi insurgents in our custody....and certainly not without some form of due process. I JUST THINK WE SHOULD CONSIDER TAKING AWAY THEIR MARLBOROS.

But if you insist on pounding home the point that "we shouldn't be allowed to torture prisoners", go right the fuck ahead. I agree with that.

ABU GHRAIB = BAD. That's what you are saying...I've agreed with that several times now. So what the fuck are you babbling about?

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

According to a radio broadcast by O'Reilly last night, Abu Ghraib has been the subject of front page stories in the NY Times for 28 consecutive days.

IIRC, this would rival NY Times coverage of 9-11, Watergate, and Pearl Harbor.

I agree that Abu Ghraib was bad...I'll even concede that it was bad on a historic level. But is it bad on a historic level that rivals Watergate, Pearl Harbor, and 9-11? Is it being blown out of proportion?

I guess it really depends on which candidate you plan on voting for this fall.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

Lets see, Iraq is the biggest story of the year, and Abu Ghraib is the biggest story of Iraq.  Yeah, they should be focusing on stories of puppies or something.  Damn left-wing conspiracy!

BTW: The front page today covers the end of the fighting in Najif, and the large amount of Iraqi scrap metal (some of it with UN inspector tags) that is showing up in Jordanian metal yards.

And how long was Clinton's blowjob front page news? It may not have been the lead story every single day, but it was in the news cycle for the better part of 2 years. I don't recall anyone being beheaded in retribution for it either (although one could argue that decapitation would go a long way towards improving Linda Tripp's looks and personality).

If you're looking at me to defend the media sensationalism surrounding that fiasco, I'm sorry to disappoint you.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

WAY TOO FUCKING LONG.

I was working at the local paper when all the shitstorm started to hit about the blowjobs. I had to post a page specifically to link to the PDF of the transcripts on the paper's web site (despite the fact that they purposefully didn't publish any news content on the site at the time, only advertising stuff). That entire run just sickened me, finally driving home the point that unless you are dedicated to journalism, you do not need to be working at a paper.

As for the media putting so much attention on Abu Ghraib, don't go there, mainly because the media will fling any shit it can for as long as it sells papers and gets ratings. How much garbage did we hear about Gary Condit's intern disappearing, until OOOPS, Arabs ram airplanes into buildings. Same with the Laci Peterson stuff, Jessica Lynch, etc. The American media especially is a vampiric liche, constantly scanning graveyards and scenes of carnage for the next barely-living story/person to suck the life out of then reanimate the corpse.

People are STILL making Lewinsky jokes. It's quite possibly the worst crime perpetrated against taste ever. They need to stop...

...and if Hillary gets elected I fear that they may come back.

Hmm, I must be getting the wrong news feed. That or your watching Al-Jazeera. What exactly is it that my people are doing? Don't tell me this is about a few degenerate soldiers anymore, because now you're saying I'm excusing "everything". What "everything"?

If you mean I'm just as inexcusable only because I see the value of war and the necessity of violence, then I guess I'm the "bad guy" too. Oh well. Just remember that we don't cut off heads for petty crimes, and we don't ram our fucking airliners into tall buildings for "crimes against humanity!"..We're the "not as bad" guys.

MY people wanted no part of this war, so I am absolved.

I never heard that Monica had a problem with the taste. Linkage?

How do you think the dress got stained the first place?

Great. Now you guys are making Lewinsky jokes. Don't make me drag Old Yellar out back and beat the crap out of him. Again.

(http://www.columbia.edu/itc/tc/cstudies/imagesequence/old_yeller_1/yeller_2_6.jpg)

Don't fuck with Yeller.

I tried the news thing for a couple years too Haemish - it was the low pay that convinced me it wasn't worth it.

As for the ethics thing. I think Stripes said it best. When Bill Murray starts his "Who cried when Old Yeller died..." speech. Ok - maybe not - but full circle and all that..

It seems to me - as Americans it's part of our culture to think we are better then everyone else (But not in the same way the French do). Because historically - we have been - (I'm resting a lot of laurels on our late entry into WWII - and of course economically - How many superpowers are there now days?). We have not always done the right thing (Remember the Maine? Remember the United Fruit Company? Heck - remember any of your South American history).

This is one of those times when we have to admit, that would have been better to not have gotten on film...Ok - I kid - it would have been better to never have had happened. I don't like feeling ashamed for actions fellow countrymen of mine have made. I have enough for for my own actions thank you.

(http://www.columbia.edu/itc/tc/cstudies/imagesequence/old_yeller_1/yeller_2_7.jpg)
edited - a bit for clarity
and to add - you don't f with the yeller cause he's rabid.