A controversial move to attach legislation that would ban torture of any prisoner of the United States came to a head Wednesday night as the Senate was asked to ignore a White House threat of a veto and attach the new law to a $440 billion military spending bill.
Republican Senators John McCain (R-Ariz) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) proposed the law that would ban “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” against anyone in U.S. custody. They would require American troops–and others–to follow procedures in the U.S. Army Field Manual in detaining and interrogating suspects. The amendments would also define “enemy combatant” and put into law procedures for prosecuting detainees.
When did it become “controversial” to require soldiers to go by the book?
The White House said the law would “tie the President’s hands” in a time of war. Senate Republican leader Bill Frist tried to keep it from coming to a vote. And powerful Senate Armed Services chairman John Warner and equally powerful Senate defense appropriations subcommittee chairman Ted Stevens locked horns for a time over procedural matters of which Defense bill to use as a vehicle for the amendments.
Into this struggle was injected a letter signed by 28 retired high military officers declaring their strong support of Sen. McCain’s amendments.
A separate letter from Gen. (ret.) Colin L. Powell, who was President Bush’s secretary of state in his first term, arrived just prior to the vote declaring his support for the amendments.
But, then, everything that Bush and his bubbas think they know about warfare they sure as hell didn’t learn in the military.
Update: The amendment passed the Senate, last night [5th October] by a vote of 90 to 9. Let’s see what the rest of Congress and the White House will do.
yeah, right, why don’t we just capitulate and left the terrorists rule our world.
yeah, right, why don’t we just capitulate and left the terrorists rule our world.
I hope that was sarcastic.
The laws don’t apply to the Bush administration. They’re much smarter than regular folk, and besides, the laws are only for the little people. I feel so much safer with the Bush team in office. Golly, they are just so darn competent. If they think torture is necessary, then, by gosh, that’s OK by me.
because the terrorist can’t rule our world, it’s not posible for their organisation to inflict more than nuisance damage. ultimately, short of a radiological attack, terrorists have no way to inflict actual damage on our scociety. while, the loss of life is a tragedy, it is the lives of a few that we are fighting for, not the control of our nations.
the only way they can win in any way is for us to live in such fear of them that we debase ourselves to the point where we are willing to torture and humiliate fellow human beings.
The harsh fact is the intel from torture has always been poor. You hurt people enough, they’ll say what they think you want to hear to make it stop. These captives aren’t a regular army either. They are grouped by the classic cell system, so any one individual can only compromise a small group at best. For those of you that think terrorism doesn’t work best take a look at the Republic of Ireland, and the future of North Ireland. Look how well the heavy handed British tactics worked there. The west is falling into the same trap with Islamic fundamentalist. You can’t defeat these people with an army.
Besides being inhumane, torture is pointless because you cannot obtain any reliable information from it. Let’s face it, if any of us were being tortured, we’d tell exactly what they wanted to hear, whether it was true or not.
“The White House opposes legislation that would impose restrictions on the Pentagon’s detention, interrogation and prosecution of prisoners, arguing that it would tie the president’s hands in wartime.”
http://tinyurl.com/c2xkc
“Everyone’s worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there’s a really easy way; stop participating in it.”
-Noam Chomsky
Some of these terrorists shouldn’t even be considered human.
McCain et al are trying to protect our soldiers and sailors by banning torture and mistreatment of others. If we practice those kind of behaviors it increases the likelihood that others will do the same or worse to our captured military. McCain knows what he’s talking about. He was tortured. How does torture and maltreatment help fight terrorism. Seems hypocritical if not just stupid and immoral. Some of the biggest terrorists are in our government and institutions.
To those who feel as Mr. Harvey: One of the reasons we oppose the terrorists is that they torture, kill and maim their prisoners. If it’s ok for us to torture folks then what is the difference between us and them?
but if we continue to torture, we’re no better than the terrorists, and we’d just be adding more fuel to thier fire, and the war would never end
Unfortunately, Powell lost much of his moral authority (did he ever have any? he looks good in pctures though) when he showed us incontrovertible evidence that Iraq had WMD. After that he had to change his middle name to Doofus.
(So why should any country even need a law that says torture is wrong?)
Sounds OK as long as they don’t try to force Geneva Convention level of protection on these people. No torture or humiliation, but less than hotel treatment, and outright exedcution should be allowed.
yeah, right, why don’t we just capitulate and left the terrorists rule our world.
So, we can’t win the “war on terror” without torturing everyone we imprison?
Actually, torture is incredibly effective at getting information. Its effectiveness has absolutely nothing to do with reasons for abandoning it at least in word. The problem with torture is that it is wholly inhumane and is fundamentally contrary to a society based on laws and human rights not to mention it’s political effect of painting the torturer as the “bad guy.”
It is so easy to be ethical when you have nothing at stake. Here is a not to far-fetched scenario.
You are in charge of interrogating a senior al’Qieda operative that was picked up yesterday as he arrived in New York. He was in possession of a city map with several buildings circled in red, the UN, the Empire State Bldg, the school your daughter attends … There is also the date “10/7/05” written across the top.
So how’s your ethics holding up?
Would it be acceptable to torture Karl Rove to get the truth about the outing of Valerie Plame?