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Every schoolchild knows that Gen. George Washington made extraordinary efforts to protect America's civilian population from the ravages of war. Fewer Americans know that Revolutionary War leaders, including Washington and the Continental Congress, considered the decent treatment of enemy combatants to be one of the principal strategic preoccupations of the American Revolution.
"In 1776," wrote historian David Hackett Fischer in "Washington's Crossing," "American leaders believed it was not enough to win the war. They also had to win in a way that was consistent with the values of their society and the principles of their cause. One of their greatest achievements was to manage the war in a manner that was true to the expanding humanitarian ideals of the American Revolution."
The fact that the patriots refused to abandon these principles, even in the dark times when the war seemed lost, when the enemy controlled our cities and our ragged army was barefoot and starving, credits the character of Washington and the founding fathers and puts to shame the conduct of America's present leadership.
Fischer writes that leaders in both the Continental Congress and the Continental Army resolved that the War of Independence would be conducted with a respect for human rights. This was all the more extraordinary because these courtesies were not reciprocated by King George's armies. Indeed, the British conducted a deliberate campaign of atrocities against American soldiers and civilians. While Americans extended quarter to combatants as a matter of right and treated their prisoners with humanity, British regulars and German mercenaries were threatened by their own officers with severe punishment if they showed mercy to a surrendering American soldier. Captured Americans were tortured, starved and cruelly maltreated aboard prison ships.
Washington decided to behave differently. After capturing 1,000 Hessians in the Battle of Trenton, he ordered that enemy prisoners be treated with the same rights for which our young nation was fighting. In an order covering prisoners taken in the Battle of Princeton, Washington wrote: "Treat them with humanity, and let them have no reason to Complain of our Copying the brutal example of the British Army in their treatment of our unfortunate brethren . Provide everything necessary for them on the road."
John Adams argued that humane treatment of prisoners and deep concern for civilian populations not only reflected the American Revolution's highest ideals, they were a moral and strategic requirement. His thoughts on the subject, expressed in a 1777 letter to his wife, might make a profitable read for Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld as we endeavor to win hearts and minds in Iraq. Adams wrote: "I know of no policy, God is my witness, but this Piety, Humanity and Honesty are the best Policy. Blasphemy, Cruelty and Villainy have prevailed and may again. But they won't prevail against America, in this Contest, because I find the more of them are employed, the less they succeed."
Even British military leaders involved in the atrocities recognized their negative effects on the overall war effort. In 1778, Col. Charles Stuart wrote to his father, the Earl of Bute: "Wherever our armies have marched, wherever they have encamped, every species of barbarity has been executed. We planted an irrevocable hatred wherever we went, which neither time nor measure will be able to eradicate."
In the end, our founding fathers not only protected our national values, they defeated a militarily superior enemy. Indeed, it was their disciplined adherence to those values that helped them win a hopeless struggle against the best soldiers in Europe.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
The final arbiter is the law. The US signed treaties specifically oulawing waterboarding. Those treaties when ratified by the Congress became Supreme US law according to the Constitution.
There is no doubt that we tortured and there is no doubt it was against the law.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
The final arbiter is the law. The US signed treaties specifically oulawing waterboarding. Those treaties when ratified by the Congress became Supreme US law according to the Constitution.
There is no doubt that we tortured and there is no doubt it was against the law.
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
The final arbiter is the law. The US signed treaties specifically oulawing waterboarding. Those treaties when ratified by the Congress became Supreme US law according to the Constitution.
There is no doubt that we tortured and there is no doubt it was against the law.
The fact that the US deemed it a war crime and prosecuted others for water torture controlled drowing against our guys is good enough evidence for me. The fact there are laws and treaties saying its illegal tops it off.
You don't get to say it's a crime when someone does it to us but it's ok for us to do it to others. That is hypocritical.
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
... asking you to undergo a certain procedure just to prove your words or maybe in my attempt to get you to change your mind. 
my point has always been, not everything you guys consider torture is in fact torture
Who is the final arbiter on what is and what is not torture?
Should a panel of conservatives be compiled to make that determination? Maybe it should just be Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck that make the decision.
The final arbiter is the law. The US signed treaties specifically oulawing waterboarding. Those treaties when ratified by the Congress became Supreme US law according to the Constitution.
There is no doubt that we tortured and there is no doubt it was against the law.
The fact that the US deemed it a war crime and prosecuted others for water torture controlled drowing against our guys is good enough evidence for me. The fact there are laws and treaties saying its illegal tops it off.
You don't get to say it's a crime when someone does it to us but it's ok for us to do it to others. That is hypocritical.
how many times do you have to be told the methods were not identical. funny how you libs rush to judgment without knowing all the facts....yet scream bloody murder when repubs do it.
politics, the greatest hypocrisy on earth
The fact that the US deemed it a war crime and prosecuted others for water torture controlled drowing against our guys is good enough evidence for me. The fact there are laws and treaties saying its illegal tops it off.
You don't get to say it's a crime when someone does it to us but it's ok for us to do it to others. That is hypocritical.
how many times do you have to be told the methods were not identical. funny how you libs rush to judgment without knowing all the facts....yet scream bloody murder when repubs do it.
politics, the greatest hypocrisy on earth
Doesn't matter there were variations. Controlled drowning -- "water torture" in all its forms was deemed torture and prosecuted as such by the military tribunals.
how many times do you have to be told the methods were not identical. funny how you libs rush to judgment without knowing all the facts....yet scream bloody murder when repubs do it.
politics, the greatest hypocrisy on earth
Doesn't matter there were variations. Controlled drowning -- "water torture" in all its forms was deemed torture and prosecuted as such by the military tribunals.
please find me the code that says what was committed is torture....
military tribunals convicting other people are not binding precedent in this case. these guys are not going to be tried in a military tribunal...and even if they were, those former holdings are merely persuasive...you can keep arguing this until you 1000 years old, but it is not going to change the fact that those tribunal's and their finding of guilt are not binding law in this situation. they are outside normal jurisdictionl....
i suggest you read up on military tribunals and their role in the american legal system...because you're comparing apples/oranges
i guess you also don't believe that in america, people are presumed innocent until found guilty...
i guess you also don't believe that in america, people are presumed innocent until found guilty...
Never been accused of a crime you did not commit, have you? If you had, you would not make such a statement.
Immie
unfortunately for you, the legalities do in fact matter. also unfortunately for your POV is that you do not have all the specific facts and no matter how often you repeat your opinion, it does not make your opinion fact.
i guess you also don't believe that in america, people are presumed innocent until found guilty...
apparently the law is meaningless to you and you would rather have mob justice just because you feel you can ignore the law and form your own opinion....
