Posted on 03/28/2016 3:24:03 PM PDT by Starman417
The ttb scenario has long been ballyhooed by critics as unrealistic. That such things only play themselves out in Hollywood movies and television shows.
“Ticking bomb” scenarioArguments in favor of executive use of foreign torture information frequently refer to variations on the so-called ticking bomb scenario. In the usual version of this hypothetical scenario, an alleged perpetrator of an imminent terrorist attack is in custody and will reveal information critical to preventing the attack if tortured.
Experts in the fields of intelligence-gathering, law enforcement and human psychology have forcefully discredited the use of this hypothetical situation to justify torture. It rests on the impossible combination of perfect timing (the information will be obtained in time to defuse the bomb), perfect information (the person in custody definitely knows the location of the bomb and it could not have been moved and those conducting the torture are certain the person knows) and absolute certainty over the outcome (the person in custody will definitely provide the correct information once tortured and the bomb will subsequently be defused).[34]
Given the rarity of perfect timing, perfect information and absolute certainty in real life situations, reliance as a matter of policy on the ticking bomb hypothesis creates a significant risk that human beings will be brutalized on the basis of mere possibility or assumptions.
"Brussels suicide bombers Khalid and Ibrahim El Bakraoui were planning attacks on Belgian nuclear power stations, Dernier Heure newspaper has reported.The newspaper exclusively reported that the arrest of Paris attacker Salah Abdeslam accelerated the plans of the terrorists."
Abdeslam's network may have decided it had a choice: Either attack at a time of its own choosing, or wait for a climactic showdown with the security forces, where the costs to civilian life would be limited. The network's leaders seemingly chose the first option, perhaps reasoning that it would generate greater publicity, and greater torment and pain.On the evening of Abdeslam capture, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel announced, “Tonight, we are celebrating a victory.” Belgian Interior Minister Jan Jambon echoed this. “I think it's a big blow, because [Abdeslam] is one of the most wanted foreign fighters in Europe,” he told CNN. Belgian security chief Jaak Raes was similarly sanguine, telling VTM News on the same day that it was “of the utmost importance that Abdeslam was captured alive, because we can now try to reconstruct the entire scenario … [and] learn lessons from the information that is gleaned.”
In other words, play out the past and introspectively navel-gaze- not proactively seek answers to prevent any immediate follow up plots that Abdeslam might be privy to.
Siobhan O'Grady, in a Foreign Policy article titled “Capture of a Paris Ringleader Could Lead to Intelligence Bonanza,” paraphrased Patrick Skinner, a former CIA case officer and director of special projects at a security-intelligence firm in New York: “The priority in the immediate aftermath of [Abdeslam's] arrest will be finding out what the Islamic State has planned next.”Skinner now works for The Soufan Group (of Ali Soufan fame- the FBI "go-to" interrogation expert and darling of the media left for his rabid criticism of the CIA RDI Program- and I say this as a fan of Ali Soufan's patriotism and contributions to the GWoT).
Skinner also told her that the “downside to Abdeslam's dramatic capture … is that other members of the militant's cell would have immediately heard about it and will now ‘try to scatter or shut down.'”Or accelerate the planning of their next terror attack to an earlier date.
No one yet knows exactly who perpetrated the attacks, how they did it, or why. But it is possible that rather than scattering or shutting down the cell with which Abdeslam was associated, his capture accelerated the violent denouement the cell had long been planning. It is a common argument on the left that killing terrorists is counterproductive, serving to further radicalize the communities in whose name they proclaim to act. But it now seems that capturing terrorists may also have dark, unintended consequences, dangerously raising the stakes for those in the wider terrorist network and for their potential victims.
The explosions that tore through Brussels international airport and a metro station were the realisation of fears that have been weighing on Belgian authorities since at least last November.They finally happened four days after the raid in Brussels’ Molenbeek neighbourhood that led to the capture of French citizen Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving militant of the group who carried out the jihadist attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015.
“But these attacks [in Brussels] aren’t just revenge for Abdeslam’s arrest,” said Wassim Nasr, FRANCE 24’s specialist on jihadist networks. “These kind of attacks can’t be planned in 48 hours. It is very clear that they were well-prepared.”
However, Nasr does think that jihadists sped up the execution of the attacks after Abdeslam’s arrest.
So authorities basically had about 4 days to extract information out of Abdeslam that might have prevented the next attack. So how did that rapport-building standard interrogation methods work out for them? Maybe it was working. But it certainly did not work in time to possibly have prevented last Tuesday's attacks in Belgium.
Marc Thiessen in today's WaPo:
(Excerpt) Read more at floppingaces.net ...
It’s not over. Love peace and understanding AIN’T GONNA WORK.
Honestly, given that every Muslim alive contributes to terrorism, I wonder to what extent we even need to bother torturing these captives. “We all know what needs to be done to the Muslims, why pretend otherwise?
blabbing they caught the guy didn't help... kinda like 0bama blabbing about 0sama, these fools never heard of the words operational security
Only one viable solution. Drain the swamps and incinerate all the mosquito larvae.
Keep them guessing for crying out loud.
The police in Thailand have a good technique of not quite torture. If a guy is arrested for a brutal rape, child molestation, murder or some other shocking crime, the police will take him back to the scene of the crime and force the guy to reenact the crime. The implied outcome is either confess or we’ll leave you to your neighbors. It’s effective but on occasion the neighbors take the punishment into their own hands in spite of attempts of the police to stop them. A little girl was raped and killed in a neighborhood near our house and the outcome was execution by angry neighbors.
The solution: Take no prisoners.
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