More/Latest Torture News--From the CIA's secret prisons
POSTED BY: R1Z
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 2, 2025 07:01
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Quote:"Trying to get no one killed is what can get everyone killed."
Originally posted by AURaptor:
that's how wars are won.
...I get it.....
*hangs down head in realization of the sad fact*
Still, having douchebags like Clinton and Bush running things ups the body count. Only people with serious military experience should run the military....
I'm with Dreamtrove's minnimum death thing.
Chrisisall
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Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:Quote:"Trying to get no one killed is what can get everyone killed."
Originally posted by AURaptor:
that's how wars are won.
...I get it.....
*hangs down head in realization of the sad fact*
Still, having douchebags like Clinton and Bush running things ups the body count. Only people with serious military experience should run the military....
I'm with Dreamtrove's minnimum death thing.
Chrisisall
I find truth (and agreement) in your words. But then that raises up a whole other question about elected civilians running the military, but I don't want to get side tracked.
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Civilians should run the military. The way I see it if a requirement of your ultimate military decision maker is that they are military (ex or otherwise) means you have one of two things.
Either the Military is divorced from government, which sounds incredibly scary to me, because I can't see any 'good' coming of it, or that we move back to an almost feudal situation, where the civilian sector exists to support the military, rather than the other way around.
Best to keep ultimate decision making on the part of the civilian sector, but keep the experienced military personnel as advisors, for when making military decisions.
More insane ramblings by the people who brought you Beeeer Milkshakes!
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Quote:
Originally posted by Chrisisall
Only people with serious military experience should run the military....
Thanks, I agree btw on this. A lot of people on the left said "oh yay, on non-military president, now we can have peace" but it's definitely been no end of war. I don't think Kerry had the military experience to lead though. McCain and Hagel do. I'm sure there are some other republicans and some democrats who do. Daniel Inouye definitely does.
I would be in favor of an additional clause, if we're going to have non military pres. they should have military vps, and the two would have to agree on any course of military action. You get a couple of oil industry ceos planning a war with socialist intellectuals as advisors and you get a mess.
I think wes clarke also has experience, but i don't like his tactics, which are very anti-civilian, imho. but that's just a personal aside. he's probably not going to lose a war though.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Citizen
Civilians should run the military.
Okay you already know I disagree. There are just so many problems with this.
1. At the moment we've been trying this for 13 years and we have killed 1.3 million people. That makes us as bad as Slobodan Milosevic, except that we didn't kill our own people. Still, I call this a stunning record of failure on the plan.
2. The civilian leadership will appoint it's support. Bush has managed to find General Myers, a man who seems to be completely insane, but willing to back up Cheney at every turn. My point here is your civilian leader will always be able to find a freak of nature, or vietnam headjob, who will support his bad decisions. Myers on his own howeever, could never have been elected president. No nutjob hopefully will be elected. I don't think Cheney's a nutjob, btw.
3. Civilian leadership really has no concept of war. They get their knowledge from board games, and thus are not realistic in their tactics, or their willingness to accept the loss of human life, as collateral damage.
4. The history looks on this even worse. WWI was made of this sort of thing. Some 60 million people died because the people at the top didn't know what they're doing.
5. Military leaders who are in an administration are unlikely to gainsay a president, especially if, as is the case with Bush, that president has a record of firing people who disagree with him.
There are probably some other problems with it that I haven't yet thought of :)
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Quote:I like what Dreamtrove said about either the prez or vice prez having military experience; nobody worse to make decisions about a thing than someone who has no real knowledge about that thing.
Originally posted by citizen:
Civilians should run the military.
I can teach ya how to snap someone's neck, but I don't know diddly about guns. Wanna put me in charge of munitions?
EVERY prez deals with war, not every one has had war experience. They make psychiatrists get psycho-analyzed....
Chrisisall
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Ahh, I think we're talking different things. I'm not saying the president prime minister whoever is in charge of the military, i.e. they decide what targets, when where and tactics etc.
The military should, however, be ultimately responsible to, and therefore in service of, the civilian authority.
Thing is, if you start making military experience a prerequisite to civilian service then your moving in to dangerous territory. Think about it, firstly your admitting that military action isn’t just a ‘last resort’ but a requirement to the smooth running of the civil authority. Secondly you’re cutting down on who can run your government.
Think of it another way. Think of Starship Trooper (book or film doesn’t matter). Think of the distinction they made between those who could vote and those who could not vote. It’s vaguer in the film but a prerequisite to having the vote is to be a ‘citizen’ and a citizen is someone who takes personal responsibility for the defence of democracy.
That is someone who has served in the armed forces.
Doesn’t sound to bad, I mean it’s not the draft, since people still have a choice to join the military or not, and taking personal responsibility for the ‘defence of democracy’ sure sounds like a good think to promote don’t it?
Problem is you’re almost guarantying the perpetuation of the ‘status quo’ as those who choose service, and make it through selection will be of a certain type. Throw in the necessary indoctrination of any successful military and you’ll end up with the only people that can vote being of a certain mindset, likely to mirror that of the people in charge.
So if you take military service as a prerequisite to civilian service then you’re necessarily cutting down your options as too who can lead your civilian government. They’ll have a ‘militaristic’ way of looking at things, which is not necessarily a good thing.
Think of those cheesy America saves the world movies, where the General is saying “We can wipe them off the face of the planet sir!” if your president is the General there’s no one saying “That’s the last resort”.
I guess the question is do you really want the individual who’s main job it is to deal with civilian issues not military one’s to be a civilian, or a ‘military man’?
PS:
Dreamtrove:
I’m surprised to see you make such a case, as it seems to be quite a militaristic standpoint to me.
More insane ramblings by the people who brought you Beeeer Milkshakes!
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Citizen,
We cut down who can operate on patients the same way by saying only people who have gone to medical school. If someone wants to, they can join the military whenever. But I think the either Pres. or VP would work.
Also, the military is already responsible to a civilian authority. At least in theory. Congress. Right at the moment congress is saying "You can't torture people."
But really we need to assign some sort of breaking the constitution penalty. If we make presidents swear an oath to it, then if they break that oath, they break their word, and they cross America. And I don't mean on a bike. So it would make sense that that should be an impeachable offense. Now if this were so, every presdident since Eisenhower should be impeached, with the possible exceptions of Ford and Carter. But I think it would be a good rule. Then the constitution would be something that presidents actually had to follow to keep their jobs, rather than just something they have to pretend that they believe in. Sure, initially there would be one or two rediculous partisan impeachments, but after that, people would be a little more careful about stomping on the rights of the people and ignoring the role of congress in govt.
Just a footnote here. Most Americans are of the opinion that congress is a bunch of knuckleheads. This is because every administration has forwarded this idea, and the average american has never actually watched a senate session, and so it flies. But administrations want to do this because they want more executive power, and the more we the people let them, they will slowly turn Amereica into a dictatorship. One with a revolving dictator, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton, etc. No don't blame congress here, we the people need to not let them get away with it by organizing to get non-thugs into office.
In reality, congress is full of educated but pragmatic, people, many of whom are level headed realists. Those who do not fit this description, we should also remove by organizing to get non-thugs into congress.
Any democrat or republican should recognize how much better it is that congress, which is always roughly split, have to decide the most serious matters by supermajority, so that a wide array of people agree, rather than have the executives make supreme decisions that may alter our lives.
Lots of folks here like me hate both Bush and Clinton more or less equally, but most people here hate at least one of the two, and realize how supreme executive power would be really bad.
Like the white house, it's a good idea that this "civilian" authority also have a good number of military men in it, but it always does, so I see no need to legislate that.
Generally though, I tend to think the general is the level head. More the Reginald Priest in Lexx saying Damn Cubans, nuke 'em. But best to have checks and balances, but also to have someone doing what the know how to do. President is commander in chief of the armed forces. I'm not going to hire someone to be head of General Motors on the grounds that they were once on a TV show.
PS.
Citizen,
In case you haven't noticed, I'm a tad conservative. But I favor a strong level headed military bent on defending America, not a jackass cowboy overseas invasion or a social justice righter of wrongs and upholder of the rights of the, well I can't think of anything that's not going to offend someone or other, but you know, sticking our nose in someone else's business and telling them how to run things.
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Quote:I have to very strongly agree with Citizen here. Civilians should control the military. Military experience should not be a requisite for the presidency.
Originally posted by Citizen:
Civilians should run the military.
Originally posted by Dreamtrove:
There are just so many problems with this.
1. Thirteen years? Thirteen years? The United States have been around for over two hundred years. We’ve been “trying this” for the past two centuries and it seems to be working pretty well so far. After all the man who led us through our greatest national crisis had no military experience either. I’d rather take Abraham Lincoln over General George McClellan any day. Lincoln was the guy who refused to give up even when McClellan and others were telling him to throw in the towel. Lincoln was the one who kept sorting through a sea of mediocre generals like McClellan, trying to find someone who would *fight* and eventually landing on Grant and Sherman, mid-ranking guys who wouldn’t have gotten very far if it weren’t for Mr. Lincoln’s influence. That right there is one case of a civilian doing far more than all the high-ranking generals around him. And I got plenty of other examples. So, we’ve not been doing so well over the past few years. We’re a democracy. It’s our fault (generally) for electing leaders who haven’t been as good as they could be. Let’s do better next time. You want to talk about history, look further back than the last few elections.
2. The military leadership will do the same thing. And, to be frank, even presidents with military experience would do the same thing. That’s what politicians do. They appoint supporters, people who think like they do. Every military leader can also find plenty of nutjobs to support their positions. And with a rigid chain of command, the folks at the top really don’t have to pay attention to the advice of others, they just bark an order. Civilians have to do a lot of persuading, they need to convince people of their idea. General What’s His Face? Not so much.
3. Typically, the civilian leadership is very unwilling to accept high civilian or military casualties. This is because the civilians are aware of public opinion. The military, on the other hand, is concerned with getting the job done. Obsessed with it, almost. Which is why, rather than give up, military leaders almost always want to keep going to try and *somehow* accomplish their mission. Like in Vietnam. After the Tet Offensive demonstrated that 2.5 years of heavy fighting hadn’t accomplished anything, the military wanted 200,000 more men and an expansion of the war into Cambodia, Laos, and possibly North Vietnam. This was insane. By that point, the war was unwinnable--but because the military is so focused on “accomplishing the mission,” they were unwilling to look at it objectively and see that the mission could no longer be accomplished. You say “civilian leadership really has no concept of war,” but I have to say the military has too much concept of war. It’s the military that wanted to use nukes in Korea and Vietnam--the civilians were the ones who said “Are you
ing crazy?? That’s a crime against humanity! And it’ll start World War III!” It’s the military’s job to think of how to get the particular job done; it’s the civilians who look at the big picture--at public opinion, at diplomacy, at other potential problems, at economics.4. First of all, your casualties are way off. Combined civilian and military casualties were 15 million ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I), not 60 million, that’s World War II. Secondly, World War I is the perfect example why civilians should control the military. When the crisis first broke out, the military high command in Austria-Hungary, Germany, and Russia all heavily pressured their civilian leaders to mobilize else they could be outraced by the mobilization of the enemy. All three of those civilian leaders were very hesitant to take any hostile steps (the matter
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washingtonpost.com
Out of a Bad Spy Novel
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, November 4, 2005; A23
The men from the pages of a bad spy novel throw people they don't like into secret prisons that officially do not exist, snug little dungeons hidden away in undisclosed countries. These spy-novel men keep to the shadows; if a ray of sunlight happens to fall upon one of their lairs, they scurry away to some other dark corner. They make their "high-value" prisoners simply disappear -- no charges, no hearings, no exit.
They tell us that we shouldn't worry, that every one of these prisoners is evil beyond redemption. And, anyway, what prisoners?
To interrogate these prisoners who don't exist, the spy-novel men use practices that international agreements classify as torture. Again, they tell us not to worry. They produce legal opinions, written by lawyers from the pages of a bad spy novel, proving definitively that torture is not, in fact, torture. Besides, the spy-novel men outsource the really messy business to cooperative regimes for which the word "qualms" has no meaning.
The spy-novel men have not lost all self-awareness. They know this Kafkaesque system would never survive public scrutiny. So they go to any lengths to keep their dirty work hidden. They fear exposure more than they fear anything in the world.
It's not 1965, and these men are not Soviet or East German spymasters playing the role of villains in the Cold War. It's 2005, and the spy-novel men are American officials whose un-American treatment of prisoners in the war on terrorism has shamed our nation.
As reporter Dana Priest revealed in The Post this week, the Bush administration has held dozens of al Qaeda prisoners in secret prisons, with no regard to due process. It was a "small circle of White House and Justice Department lawyers and officials" who approved this archipelago of "black-site" detention centers, The Post reported.
These CIA-run prisons have been operated in eight countries, The Post said -- Afghanistan, Thailand, the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and "several democracies in Eastern Europe." Officials prevailed upon The Post not to disclose the names of the European countries, citing national security concerns. The real reason, no doubt, was that if citizens of those countries knew their governments were hosting secret American prisons, they would surely object.
That's what happened in Thailand two years ago when the public found out about a secret CIA prison where two top-level al Qaeda officials were being interrogated. As soon as the prison came to light, Thai officials told the CIA to shut it down and move the prisoners somewhere else. Already, in the wake of The Post's report, European Union officials are questioning member states to learn whether they have allowed the CIA to set up "black-site" prisons on their soil.
From earlier reports on interrogation practices, we know how the prisoners are being treated. The John le Carre wannabes in the administration are fighting tooth and nail against a move by Sen. John McCain and other responsible leaders on Capitol Hill to require the military and the CIA to bar cruel and inhuman treatment of prisoners.
Why does it matter how we treat a bunch of Islamic radicals who are sworn to bring death and destruction to the United States? It matters because the United States draws its strength and its moral authority in the world from its ideals. We preach about due process, we preach about the rule of law, we preach about humane treatment -- and now we're ignoring our own pronouncements.
But there's more at stake than American standing in the world. Our ideals are the heart and soul of this nation. We are not an ancient nation united by language or blood. Our ideals, rather than ethnicity or even territory, hold us together and make us a nation. When we betray those ideals, we weaken America.
Would it be so risky to do the right thing -- to bring al Qaeda operatives into American courtrooms and give them proper trials? There might be a risk, but this is
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