Ex-P.O.W. wants to streamline P.O. W. interrogation rules

Cyrus · #1 10-06-2005, 08:07 AM

CNN :

[ QUOTE ]
IN FAVOR
Arguing for his amendment, John McCain, R-Arizona, a former Navy pilot who spent more than five years in a North Vietnamese prison camp, said “our troops are not served by ambiguity.”
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“We demanded intelligence without ever clearly telling our troops what was permitted and what was forbidden. And then, when things went wrong, we blamed them and we punished them. We have to do better than that,” he said.
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McCain said an officer in the 82nd Airborne Division, Capt. Ian Fishback, urged his office to push for clear guidelines for the treatment of prisoners after unsuccessfully attempting to get answers from his superiors for 17 months.
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“The image of the United States was very badly harmed by the pictures of prisoner abuse. We have to send a message to the world that we will not ever allow such kind of treatment to be repeated,” he said.
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McCain said Wednesday that intelligence is needed to fight terrorism, but “the intelligence we collect must be reliable and acquired humanely, under clear standards understood by all our fighting men and women.” Torturing prisoners not only yields unreliable answers, but also endangers captured U.S. troops and allows “the cruel actions of a few to darken the reputation of our country in the eyes of millions,” he said.
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“The enemy we fight has no respect for human life or human rights. They don't deserve our sympathy,” he said. “But this isn't about who they are. This is about who we are. These are the values that distinguish us from our enemies.”

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[ QUOTE ]
AGAINST
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Alabama, question[ed] Capt. Ian Fishback's account. Sessions called it “sort of odd” that Fishback refused to disclose the names of sergeants in his unit who reported similar conduct. Sessions said the McCain amendment was unnecessary, since those responsible for the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib “are being held to account.”
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White House spokesman Scott McClellan said President Bush would likely veto the defense spending bill if McCain's language were included, calling the amendment “unnecessary and duplicative.” McClellan said existing law already prohibits the mistreatment of prisoners in American custody, and the amendment “would limit the president's ability as commander-in-chief to effectively carry out the war on terrorism.”

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Arnfinn Madsen · #2 10-06-2005, 08:15 AM

Very good, and very nice that it was approved by senate. Some sensible politicians there, nice to see. There is never going to be any global, coordinated war on terror until these problems are solved and this is a good step.

Matty · #3 10-06-2005, 08:30 AM

My girlfriend told me about this while she was watching C-SPAN and I was playing poker. I guess a few Republican Senators voted against this, all with different and ridiculous reasons.

Edit: These nine:

Wayne Allard - Colorado
Kit Bond - Missouri
Tom Coburn - Oklahoma
Thad Cochran - Mississippi
John Cornyn - Texas
James Inhofe - Oklahoma
Pat Roberts - Kansas
Jeff Sessions - Alabama
Ted Stevens - Alaska

Fucktards all of them.

mackthefork · #4 10-06-2005, 08:32 AM

[ QUOTE ]
“The enemy we fight has no respect for human life or human rights. They don't deserve our sympathy,” he said. “But this isn't about who they are. This is about who we are. These are the values that distinguish us from our enemies.”

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This is 100% correct. Plus torture is as stated a good way to acquire lies quickly, and get confessions from innocent people.

Mack

Arnfinn Madsen · #5 10-06-2005, 08:35 AM

The last reports on prisoner abuse created a rage in Norway. It became socially acceptable to name Bush terrorist or Hitler, and people started discussing how to become more independent of the US and instead EU and China (!) (they are not any better on this front though). It also lead to a sympathy wave for the insurgency, which is somewhat scary when you consider who is behind it.

I think it is difficult for Americans to grasp the extent of the image damage this has.

Matty · #6 10-06-2005, 08:37 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Plus torture is as stated a good way to acquire lies quickly, and get confessions from innocent people.

[/ QUOTE ]My Army counterparts in the military were interrogators, and they were always taught this.

Matty · #7 10-06-2005, 08:39 AM

[ QUOTE ]
I think it is difficult for Americans to grasp the extent of the image damage this has.

[/ QUOTE ]I don't think so. I think we'd just rather watch Lost, get drunk, and pretend this is the 19th century when we could afford to ignore the rest of the world.

The changing attitudes of the Korean students I mentor about the United States over the last few years has absolutely shocked me. Many of them are rooting for N. Korea to get the bomb now just to show us up. This (S. Korea) is a place where Americans used to be worshipped, and English proficiency is almost mandatory. Their word for America means literally "beautiful country."

Arnfinn Madsen · #8 10-06-2005, 08:43 AM

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think it is difficult for Americans to grasp the extent of the image damage this has.

[/ QUOTE ]I don't think so. I think we'd just rather watch Lost, get drunk, and pretend this is the 19th century when we could afford to ignore the rest of the world.

The changing attitudes of the Korean students I mentor about the United States over the last few years has absolutely shocked me. Many of them are rooting for N. Korea to get the bomb just to show us up.

[/ QUOTE ]

You have one very loyal ally though. I have just moved to Poland and the sentiment for US here is very positive still (they are new Europe after all [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]).

Matty · #9 10-06-2005, 08:44 AM

I don't know if you watched the recent Presidential debates, but there was a pretty famous line regarding Poland:

http://www.youforgotpoland.com/

Arnfinn Madsen · #10 10-06-2005, 09:14 AM

[ QUOTE ]
I don't think so. I think we'd just rather watch Lost, get drunk, and pretend this is the 19th century when we could afford to ignore the rest of the world.

[/ QUOTE ]

A post from a political forum in Norway after the last reports:

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So the Americans wonder why......
the world do not love them? Or, by the way, they do not wonder. They give a [censored]. Kill, torture, close out, lock in, bomb, pollute, massacre! Everything is ok! Go ahead!

[/ QUOTE ]

And this one, rather good:
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"It was not expected in this age, that nations so honorably distinguished by their advances in science and civilization, would suddenly cast away the esteem they had merited from the world and, revolting from the empire of morality, assume a character in history which all the tears of their posterity will never wash from its pages." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to Philadelphia Democratic Republicans, 1808. ME 16:303

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And the now usual nazi comparisons:

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SS...
once again. And these guys want to lead the world. Now the Americans should act and overthrow the nazi regime before hell brakes loose.

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And several posts defending the insurgency, calling for Bush to be executed etc. These kind of posts used to be on jihadist websites but are now written by ethnic Norwegian teenagers. This last development really scares me, makes me wonder if some of them eventually will blow their body up in front of the US embassy. Many of the youths there now think like HAMAS-people, it is not a good way to go.

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