Michael Mukasey, the nominee for the position of Attorney General, claims not to know if waterboarding is torture or not. Rudy Giuliani claims it depends on who does it. Well, I would urge everybody to read this frightening post by Malcolm Nance, a former master instructor and chief of training at the U.S. Navy Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape School (SERE) in San Diego, California (hat tip: Grant Gallicho). Remember that the SERE program was designe to teach American agents and soldiers how to deal with torture if they were captured. In Nance’s words, the program “was designed to show how an evil totalitarian, enemy would use torture at the slightest whim”. SERE focused on the most odious techniques known to have been used by (among others) the Soviet Union, World War II-era Japan, the Khmer Rouge, the Viet Cong, and the Gestapo. Torture techniques that did not mark the body were deemed especially valuable, as then the prisoner could be paraded publicly to confess to all sorts of crimes, without clear evidence of coercion. SERE taught how to cope with these techniques. When seeking acceptable means to torture prisoners, the Bush administration simply picked up the SERE handbook and adopted its defensive techniques offensively. One such technique was waterboarding.
Nance knows waterboarding “personally and intimately”, as SERE staff were required to undergo waterboarding. His conclusion? “Waterboarding is a torture technique. Period”. He explains why:
”Waterboarding is not a simulation. Unless you have been strapped down to the board, have endured the agonizing feeling of the water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel your throat open and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs, you will not know the meaning of the word.
Waterboarding is a controlled drowning that, in the American model, occurs under the watch of a doctor, a psychologist, an interrogator and a trained strap-in/strap-out team. It does not simulate drowning, as the lungs are actually filling with water. There is no way to simulate that. The victim is drowning. How much the victim is to drown depends on the desired result (in the form of answers to questions shouted into the victim’s face) and the obstinacy of the subject. A team doctor watches the quantity of water that is ingested and for the physiological signs which show when the drowning effect goes from painful psychological experience, to horrific suffocating punishment to the final death spiral.
Waterboarding is slow motion suffocation with enough time to contemplate the inevitability of black out and expiration –usually the person goes into hysterics on the board. For the uninitiated, it is horrifying to watch and if it goes wrong, it can lead straight to terminal hypoxia. When done right it is controlled death. Its lack of physical scarring allows the victim to recover and be threaten with its use again and again.
Call it “Chinese Water Torture,” “the Barrel,” or “the Waterfall,” it is all the same. Whether the victim is allowed to comply or not is usually left up to the interrogator. Many waterboard team members, even in training, enjoy the sadistic power of making the victim suffer and often ask questions as an after thought. These people are dangerous and predictable and when left unshackled, unsupervised or undetected they bring us the murderous abuses seen at Abu Ghraieb, Baghram and Guantanamo. No doubt, to avoid human factors like fear and guilt someone has created a one-button version that probably looks like an MRI machine with high intensity waterjets.”
Read the whole piece, if you can stomach it. This is not 24, or some sanitized macho thriller. This is a real life horror story, sanctioned by a regime that claims to be pro-life. And no, there is no earnest “muddling through” in trying to figure out what constitutes torture and what does not. There is only a willingness to embrace evil in a cold, calculating fashion.
October 31, 2007 at 3:34 am
The irony is that people often cite SERE as proof that waterboarding is *not* torture. Talk about missing the point.
October 31, 2007 at 2:15 pm
Oh my goodness… I couldn’t finish reading it.
October 31, 2007 at 2:51 pm
Where has my country gone?
October 31, 2007 at 3:43 pm
What utter rot. Rather than grandstanding the Democrats in the Senate could attempt to pass a law banning the use of waterboarding. They won’t. Anyone care to guess why?
October 31, 2007 at 3:49 pm
Because W will veto it like he vetoes everything else? :)
October 31, 2007 at 4:11 pm
Brzzt! Wrong Katerina! Thanks for playing! Next guess? Here is a piece yesterday from that right-wing rag the Washington Post, that touches on the fact that Congress hasn’t passed such legislation since the Democrats took over but doesn’t address the much more interesting question of why.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102901849.html
October 31, 2007 at 4:21 pm
So, Donald: What are you saying? It’s the Democrats’ fault that the Bush administration uses torture?
October 31, 2007 at 4:31 pm
From Donald’s link:
But Congress has failed to pass laws that explicitly ban waterboarding and other acts that constitute either torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, a lesser category of abuse also banned by international treaty. Instead, legislators have repeatedly agreed to definitions of inhumane treatment that have allowed the abuse of foreign detainees to continue.
If Democratic senators are serious about eliminating the use of waterboarding and other abusive interrogation techniques, they should seek to mandate that all questioning of foreign detainees be governed by the Army’s interrogation field manual, which was recently updated. Top military officials, who have repeatedly argued that torture yields unreliable information and could expose U.S. soldiers to mistreatment, say the techniques contained in the field manual provide all the tools needed to obtain intelligence even from difficult subjects.
That’s a good point.
October 31, 2007 at 6:52 pm
So two take home messages. First that SERE should stop this training technique as it is torture. Second, that the Democrats are the Party of Abortion and Torture.
October 31, 2007 at 7:40 pm
Why are people always surprised by evil emanating from this accursed nation? Yeah, this is one more evidence of an evil presidency, but does anyone pause to think that it came into effect because people voted(however flawed)? These guys shouldn’t have had enough votes to even talk about a recount.
This is probably the only time I have agreed with Donald on anything, but he is right: what is Congress doing to reel this in? Democrats? The answer is that politics of fear is very much potent – nobody (especially Democrats) want to be labelled a surrender monkey. When people continue to vote out of fear then the politicians will be blindingly dense to stand on principle with regards to waterboarding, rendition, Blackwater, etc.
Bin laden gave his reason for targeting American civilians and it was dismissed as the rantings of a genocidal maniac, but his point is very much relevant: the American people have chosen a democratic system of government and are ultimately culpable for whatever perceived grudges that other nations have against the US government. No matter how much we are mired in denial, the government IS a reflection of American people and the choices made on election day.
October 31, 2007 at 7:44 pm
I also have a grudge against Islam, as that it invaded the country of my ancestors and committed grave evils. So I guess I can approve of a war against them. Right?
October 31, 2007 at 10:45 pm
The answer to my question above is Mrs. Clinton. I agree with her on very little but I do admire her usual shrewdness. She has long been weasel worded in her comments on torture:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/10/clinton-and-tor.html
Clinton expects to be the next president, and she isn’t about to give away any tool that she might find useful in waging war. In some ways she is a throwback to the liberal hawks so common in the Democrat party prior to Vietnam, and anyone who doesn’t believe that she would be ruthless in doing whatever it took to achieve victory simply hasn’t been paying close attention to her statements
.http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/10/10/ap_interview_obama_criticizes_clinton_war_torture_stances/
Clinton also realizes that if her party were to ban waterboarding a terrible political price could well be paid after a big terrorist attack that causes mass casualties in the US. It is one thing to yell at the Bush administration, rake their hapless AG nominee over the coals, score political points with their base and generally have a good time. It is another to actually pass legislation and assume responsibility for the consequences. As Rudyard Kipling noted, “Power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.”
As a student of skillful political manuevers, I tip my hat to Mrs. Clinton. She is playing her political cards well in this case, if not ethically. Or perhpas she is merely taking advice from her cheatin’ half. I have always thought that she was far brighter than him, but I also thought he had the best raw political talent since Reagan left office.
http://infowars.net/articles/october2007/011007Clinton.htm
November 1, 2007 at 5:51 am
Donald:
I’m sorry, but you seriously need a spine implant.
Seriously.
Landsakes, man. Have you no courage? What is this desperation for the government to torture the big, bad terrorists before they do something mean to you? You’re giving the terrorists way, WAY more power…more attention, even… than they deserve.
Think about this, Donald: Why is it called “TERRORism”?? Forget moral considerations for a moment. Don’t you realize that when you beg the government to stop at no means, no matter how vile and subversive of democracy and human decency, to save your sorry, fear-addled hide – “I’m scared! Trash the constitution! Take away my rights! Do anything, but don’t let them hurt meeee!” – you’re actually doing exactly what the terrorists want you to do? Why are you helping the terrorists?
November 1, 2007 at 1:41 pm
Exactly, Phillip. Therefore, why try to bitch and demonize the ‘mullahs’ who feel they are doing exactly the same?
November 1, 2007 at 2:03 pm
Ah, that was a joke. Unless you think that what Islam did from the seventh century on to Europe justifies anything we do against them.
November 1, 2007 at 11:49 pm
“Donald:
I’m sorry, but you seriously need a spine implant.
Seriously.”
And Matt I think you need a brain implant. Seriously. Now that we have exchanged obligatory insults, let’s talk. I was describing the position of Clinton above. My own position, repeated ad nauseum on this blog and other blogs, is that I am opposed to physical coercion interrogation techniques. I include in this category waterboarding. If I were in the Senate I would support legislation banning this technique. I also believe that any politician or party supporting such legislation will pay a very heavy price when an American city is attacked with a nuclear device, something that I anticipate happening in the next decade. I doubt if waterboarding and other physical interrogation techniques can stop this, but I also doubt that the American people will be in a mood to draw nice distinctions in the wake of a tragedy that leaves several hundred thousand Americans dead. Clinton is bright enough to understand this.
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