You might want to check out the actual text of the Geneva Convention. Prisoners of war are defined in Article IV. The section that deals with insurgencies in occupied territories goes like this:
Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions: (a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; (b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance; (c) that of carrying arms openly; (d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.
If Saddam was taking any hand at all in directing the Baathist terrorist campaign, he is an unlawful combatant since the Baathist "resistance movement" obviously fails on points b, c, and d. Otherwise he is a deposed usurper -- a political criminal, not a soldier. I see nothing in the Geneva Convention that covers forcibly retired tyrants. Our captured soldiers were on the other hand indisputably prisoners of war according to the Convention.
Furthermore: there are acts which are inherently degrading (rape, torture, all Saddam's specialties), but there is also a range of acts which might or might not be depending on context. Showing a video of a small child being checked for headlice to all his friends would be degrading. Showing a tyrant, who worked for thirty years to convince the Iraqi people and the Arab world that he was a god, getting checked for headlice, like a mere mortal, is not morally repugnant degradation -- it simply does a little something to restore the balance after his decades of blasphemous posturing and inhuman cruelty.
The Cardinal spoke like a jackass. Speaking as a friendly-minded Protestant, and an admirer of the present Pope, I would point out that there has been braying heard from Rome before, but in the long run the deep moral and religious dignity of the Roman Catholic Church has prevailed. It will this time too. Your church is too big a thing to need a defence of every jumped-up clerical bureaucrat who runs off at the mouth in her name.
So the question is: was the display for the purpose of the greater good? There is nothing immoral about the display, thus this is not a "double effect" trick question....
In the opinion of the USA (possibly even including the Department of State), making it crystal clear that Saddam is now a prisoner produced a greater good in reassuring Iraqis (and others) than simply asserting that we had him and showing 'holy pictures' later.
Maybe the USA is right. On the other hand, it is up to the Martinos of this world to prove otherwise.
The ends do not necessarily justify the means, so that a ‘greater good’ analysis of a course of action is incomplete. And shifting the burden of proof is a fallacy, since Cardinal Martino could just shift it right back to you, and the discussion would be no closer to the truth. In March, Rumsfeld said on CBS, “The Geneva Convention indicates that it's not permitted to photograph and embarrass or humiliate prisoners of war.” In particular, the Geneva Conventions prohibit the use of prisoners of war for propaganda purposes, or subjecting POWs to violations of their personal dignity, including humiliating and degrading treatment, and “public curiosity”. These Conventions are in part based upon an underlying ethical foundation regarding the proper treatment of the human person. The Catholic philosopher Jacques Maritain and the Greek Orthodox philosopher Charles Malik, who both deeply influenced the framing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Geneva Conventions, were themselves both deeply influenced by the Catholic encyclicals Rerum novarum and Quadragesimo anno, texts which set forth a clear philosophical foundation for human rights. So insofar as Cardinal Martino is speaking as a Catholic, his concern is grounded in a consideration of the ethics of the treatment of any human person. The ethical concern transcends any technicality concerning whether Saddam is legally a prisoner of war or not. Saddam is still a human being; that is the basis for the Cardinal’s concern.
Republican Wildcat wrote: "You are equating the treatment of the U.S. Soldiers being interrogated on television to showing Saddam on video to prove that we had captured him? Am I reading your post correctly?"
I did not equate these two incidents. They do, however, have in common the using of video of a prisoner of war for propaganda purposes, violating their dignity, humiliating them, and subjecting them to public curiosity.
I wrote: "The Cardinal’s having pity on Saddam does not indicate that the Cardinal lacks pity for Saddam’s victims, or does not wish Saddam to be punished for his crimes."
Catspaw replied:
“You know this how? Some sort of clairvoyance, perhaps?
No. By logic. It is merely a matter of deductive reasoning.
If the Cardinal has said so in print, please post the story. If you cannot show me where this Cardinal has shown one iota of compassion towards Saddam's victims, his silence is telling.
If you are not familiar with the Vatican’s (and thus the Cardinal’s) position on genocide and all other such violations of human rights, see the documents I linked above. I also recommend Pope JPII’s Address to the United Nations General Assembly, his Evangelium Vitae, and Gaudium et Spes.
This Cardinal's sole concern seems to be how Saddam was being treated so rudely by US forces.
Undoubtedly, the Cardinal should have supplemented his comments with the obligatory denunciation of genocide, torture, gassing, death-by-insertion-into-plastic shredders, and the mass murder of innocents, since there are many who will reason from his failure to supplement his remarks in that manner that his sole concern is the well-being of Saddam and that he has utter disregard and apathy for Saddam’s many victims.