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Originally Posted by justplugit
I think our core value of not inflicting excuciating pain to our combatant prisoners is good. Having said that, stress standing positions, exposing prisoners to cold or 100deg heat and sleep deprevation is not ,imo excruciating pain.
Our own Seals and Special Forces go through that as part of their training.
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From what I've seen on special forces interrogation training makes it appear to be very intense and realistic, and I'd even bet that many people forget they are being trained.
But even that being said, it's not the same thing.
Oh and I might add that our troops have volunteered for the training!
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We need a new policy for ununiformed terrorists, whoops sorry-"man-caused disasters", somewhere between the Geneva Rules for uniformed comdbatents and those ununiformed who use terrorist tatctics to kill innocent citizens.
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Terrorists are still terrorists, you're reading the talking points wrong
But I'd agree and it's something I argued Bush should have done once we were in Afghanistan. If other countries didn't agree at least you made the effort and can claim more freedom to do what you think is right. Instead, Bush simply claimed that rules no longer applied to the USA while he demanded every other country followed the letter of the law.
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Btw, ya didn't answer my question - Does bin Laden argue we have failed the Muslim people or their relegion?
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Bin Laden is a master manipulator so I wouldn't put it past him to have argued just about every aspect of this issue. But generally speaking, his ilk say that the current and past systems have failed the people. Some certainly will argue that the systems are not compatible with the religion.
But it's important to note here that not all militant Muslims take to violence for the same reasons. Most of it traditionally has been political in nature. Religious violence is newer and is exacerbated by the political violence. Most importantly though is that it's not a unified threat against the West as portrayed by Bush, who has lumped Iran, al Qaeda and Hamas into the same bucket and pretended there's a one size fits all solution. In reality there are multiple facets to the overall threat and groups derive motivation from many, if not often local, inputs.
In the end we should stay true to our values, carry a big stick and see problems for what they really are. I think the American people are smart enough to comprehend a little nuance.
-spence