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Originally posted by Adder
I don't have personal experience with the results of torture, but those that do suggest that you have it exactly backbard. Aways you get bad information, but sometimes you get good information.
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Who has had experience with torture? Who has admitted that they have tortured people? That is what is wrong with these statements from the so called "experts". No one wants to admit they have tortured. And everyone wants to hear that torture does not work. If I have tortured people effectively, am I going to come out an announce that publicly? In addition, anyone in the military is going to pretend they don't torture, and if they argue for torture that is a very strong admission that they are doing it. There is absolutely no up side for the military to argue for torture and everything to gain for publicly arguing against it.
The whole argument that torture doesn't work is self fulfilling wishful thinking. Of course it works. But people don't want to face the moral dilemmas having to choose between torturing prisoners and saving innocent lives. It seems to me that most of the people that say torture doesn't work are the ones that say it is always immoral. In other words, they have already plotted out their position and are just grabbing anything to back it up.
But as I have said again and again you just have to have a rudimentary understanding of history to understand that torture has been used very effectively through the years. If it doesn't 1)Why were the underground groups in WWII forced to limit everyone’s knowledge on who they worked with 2) How come groups who had an operative captured were immediately wiped out by the Gestapo 3) In Vietnam why did all the men buckle. And give out information more than just name rank and serial number. Did you read a Nightingales Song? When the men were being interrogated they were always amazed (and discouraged) by what the North Vietnamese knew. The discouragement came because they knew the NV had obtained this information from other pilots. If it was not torture, why did these pilots give up so much information?
Information is a commodity just like anything else. Extortion has been used for years very effectively. The collection rackets have used it for eons. If you don't give me what I want, I am going to hurt your. Countless criminal enterprises have been built on that business model since man first walked upright. Why wouldn't it work with a captured prisoner? You give me what I want or I am going to hurt you.
I was just watching the history channel the other night and they were talking about how in pirate raids in the Caribbean, that towns people would hide their treasurers before the pirates came. So the pirates tortured the town folk to find the location of their treasure. They talked about the different techniques that were used and which was the most effective. It was also stated that people rarely held out under torture. But if torture doesn't work, why did these town people give up the location of their hidden treasurers? Did they feel the Pirates were down on their luck or because of the effort they put into capturing the town they deserved their treasure?
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Originally posted by Adder And, of course, you only know who had good information after you already tortured them.
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Who says you can torture them only once? Who says you can't punish then for giving you bad information, so that they start giving you good information?
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Originally posted by Adder
And how do you punish someone you are already torturing?
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Are you trying to be obtuse? Are you kidding? Do you think there may be levels of torture? Have you heard of negative reinforcement? Once you have been tortured, if you give us good information we will stop hurting you, if it turns out to be bad we will come back and hurt you again. If an extortion racket received some counterfeit money from someone they are extorting do you think they say, "well, we have already beat this guy up once, so there is nothing we can do to make sure he doesn't give us counterfit money again"?
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Originally posted by Adder
When you said you are okay with torturing people if there is a .001% chance of getting something useful.
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If they don't have useful information does that make them innocent?
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Originally posted by Adder
How many is many? And how many of these heroic thwartings required the use of torture?
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If one more 9-11 was thwarted that is all I need to hear to justify torturing all A Queda members for the rest of time.
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Originally posted by Adder
Try not to venture too far past the obvious there, Spanky.
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Why venture beyond the obvious, when the obvious proves your point.
1) Al Queda can only pull off effective terroist acts to kill innocent people if certain information stays secret.
2) Al Queda operatives have varying levels of access to such information
3) We have captured and continue to capture Al Queda operatives
4) Many captured operatives won't want to give to our interrogators this pertinent information.
5) Not always, but in many cases pain and the threat of pain can induce people to do things they are reluctant to do.
You can tell me that it is UnAmerican to torture, you can tell me that it is always immoral to torture, you can tell me that if we use torture that will increase the chance our people will get tortured, but don't try and tell me that there is not a trade off between using torture and saving innocent lives. The connection is just way too obvious.
