Bush White House-approved interrogation techniques amounted to "war crimes."

[whitehall]

The freaking "techniques" in question were part of the "Psy-Ops" manual for decades. Elite American Military units went through the same alleged "torture" during training. Democrats authorized the Iraq operation and then sat back and pretended they were bystanders or part of the jihad and undermined the Military effort for years. If anyone should be prosecuted it's Harry Reid who told the Troops that "the war is lost" just before the Troop Surge. Maybe someone should track down the $10,000 ad in the NY Times calling the US commander in Iraq "betray-us".

 

[starcraftzzz]

That is the thing right-wingers think the government should have to power to torture anyone, however the government making sure everyone has health care is going to far to right-wingers the only thing the government should do is ruin peopels lives and hurt them

 

[buckeye45_73]

That is the thing right-wingers think the government should have to power to torture anyone, however the government making sure everyone has health care is going to far to right-wingers the only thing the government should do is ruin peopels lives and hurt them

because your too stupid to understand the details. no go watch Keith Olbermann on .....which network again.......MSNBC.....no.....Current.....no.....back at ESPN?...who knows?

but hey as a liberal you want to government to do everything for people except protect them.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Classification as torture

Waterboarding is considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts,[1][37][38] politicians, war veterans,[39][40] intelligence officials,[41] military judges,[42] and human rights organizations.[24][43] David Miliband, then United Kingdom Foreign Secretary, described it as torture on 19 July 2008, and stated "the UK unreservedly condemns the use of torture."[44] Arguments have been put forward that it might not be torture in all cases, or that it is unclear.[15][45][46][47] The U.S. State Department has recognized "submersion of the head in water" as torture in other circumstances, for example, in its 2005 Country Report on Tunisia.[48]
The United Nations' Report of the Committee Against Torture: Thirty-fifth Session of November 2006, stated that state parties should rescind any interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, that constitutes torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.[49]
Waterboarding - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Waterboarding is considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts,...."

Even casual perusal of the above quote allows the following: "Waterboarding is hardly considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts,..."


Sad, isn't it, that 'a wide range' of American men have become effete....and, if I may, effeminate.

The job of men is to protect their women and children. By extension, the function of the federal government is, at the very least, the same.

Surely you see that, Junky?

Let me put it another way. The specific techniques used in enhanced interrogations are no more severe than those voluntarily accepted by your average college student....right down to the size of their cells...

Is it possible that we have defined ‘torture’ down to this level? I think not. Those claiming it’s torture are simply the same anti-war, America-hating liberals with Bush Derangement Syndrome, hiding behind some feigned righteous indignation as a strategy to impede the success of American policy, in the hopes of another Viet Nam debacle.

Winston Churchill famously said “We sleep soundly in our beds at night because rough men stand ready to do violence on our behalf."

Little did he suspect that we would, instead, become a nation of girly-men.



I challenge you to name any of the techniques...and I will show you a version of same in daily life.

 

[PoliticalChic]

That is the thing right-wingers think the government should have to power to torture anyone, however the government making sure everyone has health care is going to far to right-wingers the only thing the government should do is ruin peopels lives and hurt them

There was no torture.

 

[snakedoc]

Man if some people around here ever came face to face with real torture in probably two minutes you be in the corner curled up in a ball pissing your pants and sucking on your thumb.

 

[sealybobo]

Who's surprised?

Everyone knew that the Bush administration engaged in torture...despite the denials. Even the administration's 'tortured logic' (no pun intended) about detainees not being prisoners of war (and therefore not subject to the Geneva Convention's restrictions on torture), and John Yoo's memo's outlining why 'enhanced interrogation techniques' didn't violate the US Constitution, US treaties, and US laws did nothing more than make a mockery of our laws and stated ideals by simply attempting to rationalized (and legalize) illegality. I think that the Bush administration's attempts to destroy all copies of Zelikow's memo is acknowledgement enough of that fact.

Let the conservative apologists begin their usual spin. Then when they're done doing that, they can again start up with their argument that President Obama is a thug.

WASHINGTON -- A six-year-old memo from within the George W. Bush administration that came to light this week acknowledges that White House-approved interrogation techniques amounted to "war crimes." The memo's release has called attention to what has changed since President Barack Obama took office, but it also raises questions about what hasn't.


The Bush White House tried to destroy every copy of the memo, written by then-State Department counselor Philip Zelikow. Zelikow examined tactics like waterboarding -- which simulates drowning -- and concluded that there was no way they were legal, domestically or internationally.


“We are unaware of any precedent in World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, or any subsequent conflict for authorized, systematic interrogation practices similar to those in question here," Zelikow wrote.



The memo has been obtained by George Washington University's National Security Archive and Wired's Spencer Ackerman.
On his second full day in office, President Barack Obama formally disavowed torture, banning the types of techniques Zelikow had objected to so strongly in his memo.

New Bush-Era Torture Memo Released, Raises Questions About What Has Changed And What Hasn't

Watch this interview and clearly waterboarding didn't work on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. He would count with his fingers the seconds so he knew how far they would go with torturing him, or he knew they wouldn't kill him. And they got nothing from him. Not Bin Ladins whereabouts that is for sure. So torture clearly didn't work, end of story. They didn't stop any terrorist attacks. This guy says WHO KNOWS well fact is, you can't point to any and give examples of how they worked, and you shreaded the evidence. Doesn't matter because Republicans will even defend torture AND we don't go after past presidents so that is why they are coming clean now. What you gonna do about it? Put Bush and Chaney on trial? I wish. But I'd have to be to think that would ever happen.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_1...ief-defends-waterboarding-of-al-qaeda-leader/

 

[sealybobo]

Pressed by Stahl about charges that Zubaydah, who was waterboarded and sleep deprived, gave false information that wasted U.S. resources, Rodriguez replies, "Bull****!, He gave us a roadmap that allowed us to capture a bunch of al Qaeda senior leaders," says the ex-spy. But not Bin Ladin?

Rodriguez says the interrogation program, which also included stress positions, nudity and "insult slaps," was "about instilling a sense of hopelessness...despair...so that he [the detainee] would conclude on his own that he was better off cooperating with us."

Stahl then suggests that KSM was never really broken, because he never gave up Osama bin Laden. "There is a limit...to what they will tell us," replies Rodriguez.

But when Stahl reminds him the CIA's own inspector general said that his enhanced interrogation program did not stop any imminent attack, Rodriguez says, "We don't know. ...

Stahl then suggests that KSM was never really broken, because he never gave up Osama bin Laden. "There is a limit...to what they will tell us," replies Rodriguez.

Rodriguez regrets the cancellation of his enhanced interrogation program by the current administration, accusing the White House of tying America's hands in the war on terror.

 

[blackhawk]

President Obama ordered the assassination of a American citizen you remember the American born cleric Anwar Awalki this raid also killed another American Samir Khan who made Al-Queda online propaganda.Were these war crimes as well? Are those of you who claim outrage over the water boarding of terrorist under Bush equally outraged over the assassination of American citizens under Obama? I'm not outraged over either but if your outraged over the water boarding I dam well hope your just as outraged over these drone strike assassinations.

 

[sealybobo]

President Obama ordered the assassination of a American citizen you remember the American born cleric Anwar Awalki this raid also killed another American Samir Khan who made Al-Queda online propaganda.Were these war crimes as well? Are those of you who claim outrage over the water boarding of terrorist under Bush equally outraged over the assassination of American citizens under Obama? I'm not outraged over either but if your outraged over the water boarding I dam well hope your just as outraged over these drone strike assassinations.

Let me explain to you the difference because you clearly do not understand. If I'm an Ameican living in Afganistan, I can be killed on the battlefield.

But if I'm an American in America and the government arrest me, I want my due process. I want my lawyer. I want a speedy trial, etc. I don't want Bush calling me an unlawful enemy combatant and sending me overseas to be tortured. That's not how you treat American citizens. No matter how bad they were. Did you torture Timothy McVeigh? And if you tortured Saddam, where are the WMD?

And if you don't know the American his name was Jose Padilla. And he wasn't the only one Bush locked away and tortured for years. American citizens. Guilty or not, you don't do that to American citizens.

Now if an American is in a terrorist training camp in the mountains of Pakistan, he is fair game.

 

[blackhawk]

President Obama ordered the assassination of a American citizen you remember the American born cleric Anwar Awalki this raid also killed another American Samir Khan who made Al-Queda online propaganda.Were these war crimes as well? Are those of you who claim outrage over the water boarding of terrorist under Bush equally outraged over the assassination of American citizens under Obama? I'm not outraged over either but if your outraged over the water boarding I dam well hope your just as outraged over these drone strike assassinations.

Let me explain to you the difference because you clearly do not understand. If I'm an Ameican living in Afganistan, I can be killed on the battlefield.

But if I'm an American in America and the government arrest me, I want my due process. I want my lawyer. I want a speedy trial, etc. I don't want Bush calling me an unlawful enemy combatant and sending me overseas to be tortured. That's not how you treat American citizens. No matter how bad they were. Did you torture Timothy McVeigh? And if you tortured Saddam, where are the WMD?

And if you don't know the American his name was Jose Padilla. And he wasn't the only one Bush locked away and tortured for years. American citizens. Guilty or not, you don't do that to American citizens.

Now if an American is in a terrorist training camp in the mountains of Pakistan, he is fair game.

All your trying to do is set up two different sets of rules to suite your political ideology the plain honest truth is you have a problem with the water boarding because it was done under Republican President your ok with the drone strikes because they were done under a Democrat President.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

President Obama ordered the assassination of a American citizen you remember the American born cleric Anwar Awalki this raid also killed another American Samir Khan who made Al-Queda online propaganda.Were these war crimes as well? Are those of you who claim outrage over the water boarding of terrorist under Bush equally outraged over the assassination of American citizens under Obama? I'm not outraged over either but if your outraged over the water boarding I dam well hope your just as outraged over these drone strike assassinations.

Let me explain to you the difference because you clearly do not understand. If I'm an Ameican living in Afganistan, I can be killed on the battlefield.

But if I'm an American in America and the government arrest me, I want my due process. I want my lawyer. I want a speedy trial, etc. I don't want Bush calling me an unlawful enemy combatant and sending me overseas to be tortured. That's not how you treat American citizens. No matter how bad they were. Did you torture Timothy McVeigh? And if you tortured Saddam, where are the WMD?

And if you don't know the American his name was Jose Padilla. And he wasn't the only one Bush locked away and tortured for years. American citizens. Guilty or not, you don't do that to American citizens.

Now if an American is in a terrorist training camp in the mountains of Pakistan, he is fair game.

All your trying to do is set up two different sets of rules to suite your political ideology the plain honest truth is you have a problem with the water boarding because it was done under Republican President your ok with the drone strikes because they were done under a Democrat President.

Further Bush nor any other Government official had the power to detain without charges American citizens nor send them overseas. That is a simple lie by Sealy. However Obama does have authority as granted by Congress. And I don't see any democrat complaining about it.

 

[Misty]

This is why I don't give a shit about some terrorist asshole getting some water up his nose;

Daniel Pearl

“I am Jewish. My mother is Jewish. My father is Jewish.” He said what they forced him to say, but they killed him anyway.
From the friends of Danels Pearl’s captors: “We assure Americans that they shall never be safe in Muslim lands. And if our demands are not met, this scene shall be repeated time and again.”

» "My name is Daniel Pearl" (WARNING: VERY GRAPHIC IMAGES) Bare Naked Islam

 

[The Rabbi]

And you somehow believe they've stopped using these interrogation techniques...



How cute...

Of course theyhave. They just assassinate them instead. That's more humane.

 

[Mr. Shaman]

Bush White House-approved interrogation techniques amounted to "war crimes."

Here he is....BUSHCO's Grand Inquisitor....with all his bullshit, White-Wing excuses for torture!!!​

April 29, 2012

Ex-CIA Head Defends
Post-9/11 Tactics

"Jose Rodriguez has no regrets about the CIA using "enhanced interrogation techniques" -- methods that some consider torture - on suspected al Qaeda members detained and questioned after 9/11.

Jose Rodriguez: "We made some al Qaeda terrorists with American blood on their hands uncomfortable for a few days. But we did the right thing for the right reason. And the right reason was to protect the homeland and to protect American lives. So yes, I had no qualms."

Rodriguez spent 31 years in the CIA's Clandestine Service where spies are revered as "fighter jocks". He rose thru the ranks, eventually running covert operations as head of the Latin America division. When al Qaeda struck on 9/11, he'd had no experience in counterterrorism or the Middle East. But he wanted "in" on the war on terror, and went to the CIA's Counterterrorist Center, where the main objective was to stop another attack on the U.S. homeland.

Jose Rodriguez: "We were flooded with intelligence about an imminent attack. That al Qaeda had an anthrax program, and that they were planning to use it against us. And that they were seeking nuclear materials to use in some type of nuclear weapon. So we were facing a ticking, time bomb situation and we were very concerned."

*​

Lesley Stahl: But I mean, these were enhanced interrogation techniques. Other people call it torture.This was-- this wasn't benign in any-- any sense of the word.

Jose Rodriguez: I'm not trying to say that they were benign. But the problem is here is that people don't understand that this program was not about hurting anybody. This program was about instilling a sense of hopelessness and despair on the terrorist, on the detainee, so that he would conclude on his own that he was better off cooperating with us.

He says once Abu Zubaydah became compliant, the harsh treatment stopped and he became a fountain of information. But the FBI interrogators remember it differently.

Lesley Stahl: In fact, what they say is everything important that he gave up, he gave up to them before the harsher interrogation techniques kicked in.

Jose Rodriguez: Well, that is just not true. It's not true.

Lesley Stahl: Well, now they say that. And you say, "It's not true." What am I supposed to think? I don't know.

The FBI and CIA disagree and it's impossible for us to resolve the argument because details of the interrogations remain classified. But what about the fact that detainees will say anything to stop the pain.

Lesley Stahl: Here's something that was told to me. Abu Zubaydah's stories sent the CIA around the globe. Not a single plot was foiled. We spent millions chasing phantoms."

 

[Mr. Shaman]

Prosecute Jose Rodriguez!!

.

.

.

.

 

[Mr. Shaman]

September 30, 2011​

"The FBI interrogator who bluffed al Qaeda detainees into giving up significant intelligence began his career in an unusual way.

Ali Soufan's fraternity brothers bet him that the agency would never hire a guy like him.

A Lebanese-born American studying international relations at a Pennsylvania college, Soufan had just returned to his frat house after talking with a school official about what he should do with his life. It was 1994. His buddies gave him some good-natured ribbing. They said the agency would mark his application, "return to sender."

He laughs at the memory, joking that he thought the idea was crazy, too.

But Soufan's nature has always been to take the dare, he writes in his new memoir "The Black Banners: The Inside Story of 9/11 and the War Against al-Qaeda."

Soufan's book details some of those interrogations of al Qaeda operatives, which he says led to the naming of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as the mastermind of 9/11 and led to the arrest of alleged dirty bomber Jose Padilla.

The book weaves vivid, inside details about the war on terror, and asserts that playing "mental poker" with terrorism suspects is far more effective at making them give up their secrets than being physically aggressive.

Soufan handled a key interrogation of Osama bin Laden's bodyguard. Through what Soufan calls "mental poker," he got Abu Jandal to unwittingly give up the names of several 9/11 hijackers, he writes in his book.

Jandal, Soufan said, opened up to him after the agent engaged him in a long debate about theology.

Soufan said he wants a detainee to think he already knows what they're hiding, a tactic he learned from watching experienced interrogators.

In 2002, Soufan found himself in another al Qaeda interrogation, this time playing his hand against training camp chief Abu Zubaydah, who had been captured in a Pakistan firefight. Zubaydah was injured in the battle, and Soufan and his partner worked over many weeks to soften the detainee. It wasn't working. The terrorist continued to try to lie to his interrogators.

Zubaydah, Soufan writes in his book, would go on to accidentally give up Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.

The revelation came after Soufan's partner mistakenly printed a picture of Mohammed. Soufan showed the photo briefly.

Zubaydah saw it and startled Soufan when he indicated Mohammed was behind the attacks."

Jose Rodriguez Is FULL OF SHIT!!​

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-wC8TYNOq0]Keith & The Torture Timeline - Former Interrogator Matthew Alexander Interview 4/23/09 - YouTube[/ame]

BUSHCO Fairy Tales = BULLSHIT History

​

 

[Mr. Shaman]

4/30/2012​

"In setting up last night's interview, Stahl highlighted Rodriguez's lack of experience in counterterrorism and the Middle East when he was appointed Chief of Staff of the Counter Terrorism Center directly after 9/11. Last week the Washington Post's Dana Priest reported that Rodriguez appeared to be "beyond his depth" when she met him in 2005. A similar description could be used to characterize the CIA when it established an interrogation program in 2001-02 despite its lack of experience and institutional expertise in the field.

Reuters recently reported that an ongoing extensive Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the CIA interrogation program has found no evidence that cruel interrogations have resulted in counterterrorism breakthroughs. In a statement released this morning Sens. Carl Levin, Chair of the Armed Services Committee, and Dianne Feinstein, Chair of the Intelligence Committee, lay out the myth propagated by Rodriguez that CIA torture led to the location of Osama Bin Laden and dismantle it point by point with the facts. Levin and Feinstein state:

"We are disappointed that Mr. Rodriguez and others, who left government positions prior to the UBL [Usama Bin Laden] operation and are not privy to all of the intelligence that led to the raid, continue to insist that the CIA's so-called 'enhanced interrogation techniques' used many years ago were a central component of our success. This view is misguided and misinformed."

1. Start Shredder
2. Insert "conservative" Book.​

Lying Asshole; By BUSHCO​

 

[Unkotare]

Who's surprised?

Everyone knew that the Bush administration engaged in torture...despite the denials. Even the administration's 'tortured logic' (no pun intended) about detainees not being prisoners of war (and therefore not subject to the Geneva Convention's restrictions on torture), and John Yoo's memo's outlining why 'enhanced interrogation techniques' didn't violate the US Constitution, US treaties, and US laws did nothing more than make a mockery of our laws and stated ideals by simply attempting to rationalized (and legalize) illegality. ]

The enhanced interrogation techniques are not illegal, the detainees in Gitmo do not fall under Geneva protections, and none of this lefty hand-wringing will EVER amount to anything. Whine and cry all you want but those are the FACTs.

 

[Mr. Shaman]

Who's surprised?

Everyone knew that the Bush administration engaged in torture...despite the denials. Even the administration's 'tortured logic' (no pun intended) about detainees not being prisoners of war (and therefore not subject to the Geneva Convention's restrictions on torture), and John Yoo's memo's outlining why 'enhanced interrogation techniques' didn't violate the US Constitution, US treaties, and US laws did nothing more than make a mockery of our laws and stated ideals by simply attempting to rationalized (and legalize) illegality. ]

The enhanced interrogation techniques are not illegal.....

Yeah.....funny, how that all.....

....WORKED-OUT.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkHNcgNI1fY]Headzup: Bush On John Yoo's Torture Memo - YouTube[/ame]


​