Posted on 04/28/2004 8:28:36 PM PDT by sonsofliberty2000
With all due respect, building human pyramids, writing slurs on their bare skin, and posing them in mock sexual acts have nothing to do with getting information in a timely manner.
If it were just a case of sticking a gun in guys mouth to get life-saving info that is needed "RIGHT F'n NOW", then they'd have my blessing.
This is a case of sheer stupidity, and this kind of humiliating treatment tends to make prisoners clam-up rather than open-up. They defeated their own purpose and handed the enemy a propaganda victory they never could have achieved on their own.
If they did what they are accused of, they need to be punished, hard. I say that as a former Army officer. And whoever was their immediate supervisor needs to get the ax, too.
And you know that because....? Welcome to Free Republic.
Here's where it seems to get muddy. Who were the "interrogators"? It sounds as if they were contractors. I've read similar information in the Brit press--that the interrogators were contractors from two different U.S. companies hired by the Pentagon.
Since I know that our U.S. military knows well the rules and regs of the Geneva Convention, I'm really wondering about these contractors and what influence they may have had on this atrocity and the soldiers who committed it.
My point was, that "it" is all about the WOT and our national security, and our self-defense repsonse to terrorism is completely warranted, whether this leads us to Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Iran, or wherever the terrorists are doing business -- a perspective that the Democrat Party and the sychophant media has chosen to completely ignore in this election year, after having chosen to almost completely ignore it the previous year.
My point was that the media has been remiss in failing to remind (and thus unite) the public against the threat to our national security posed by Islamist terrorism, as it has done in every threat to our security in the past (with the exception of the Viet Nam War).
And so, I add, that GW has been LEADING our best and bravest in the fight against our enemies, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq. I will not at this time task your sensibilities with the likelihood of other operations in Iran, Syria, etc. Suffice to say, a high school student could explain that Iraq was likely to attack the USA with WMD's (under development and manufacture in Iraq) through proxy agents such as al queda.
IMO, you seem to have adopted the leftist, anti-Bush, simplistic message: since we have found no WMD or link to al-queda, then there were none. This is frankly absurd. AND, I might add, there is actually plenty of evidence that Iraq WAS linked to al-queda (Salman Pak, etc.). This will likely come out in the next 6+ months. Are you suggesting that because YOU are not aware of such evidence that it does not exist?
Even though it is likely that GW has taken action based upon evidence that has not yet been made public, often, action has to be taken based upon strong probability, in lieu of "evidence". Iraq had to be dealt with following Afghanistan. Next will follow Syria and Iran. Then others, as necessary. This isn't an episode of JAG.
Perhaps somebody with practical experience in this could explain it.
Agreed. SA is the well-spring of course. But we have to be pragmatic about this. For example, after stomping the living crap out of the Afghanistani and Iraqi terro-sponsors, certain "leaders", such as Khadafy of Libya and Assad of Syria have "gotten some old fashioned religion". In time, other hold-outs can be likewise confronted. Time is, IMO, on OUR side, insofar as whack-job regimes is concerned. Time is NOT on our side when it comes to the nationless terrorists.
This is why the terrorist-supporting nations must be dispatched asap (as GW has been doing). Too bad the madcap Leftists cannot see that they are equivalent targets as are we (conservatives). But then again, the Leftists are inherently ignorant, pusilanimous, and foolish.
Influenced or not, contractors or not, they know the rules. And they know why the rules are there, and they know why it is so important to rigidly adhere to them. It's part of their training from day one. And MPs, which I'm sure these were, get lots of additional hammering about these rules. What is clearly shown in those photos is inexcusable.
Thanks to them, we have just lost the moral authority to complain if American's taken captive are mistreated. And, in fact, they have just increased the likelyhood that they will. And that is why we have such strict rules--not for the sake of enemy PWs, but for our own.
The rest of the world is already accusing us of being torturers, while ignoring the fact that these people will be punished for this crime.
I understand the desire to try and find an out for these idiots, and I'm sure that deep down they're all good folks, but they did more for our detractors than a dozen Hanoi Johns or Janes. And they smeared the reputation of the U.S. Army.
How smug Kerry must feel now. Now when we bring up how he slandered his fellows in Vietnam, all he has to do is point at these morons.
This coming from a news outlet that refused to show the horrors of 9/11, however they expound the want to impress upon us the mistreatment of our foe who are prisoners of war.
Well, CBS has convinced me of their patriotism and unbiased reporting as a corporation. NOT!
2. Crawl back in your hole, troll....
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