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To: SUSSA
This could be a problem if Bush authorized waterboarding in either of these memos. Things could nasty fast.

1. It is highly unlikely the President would not specify interrogation techniques in a memo.
2. "Waterboarding" is a psychological tool, not physical torture where pain is infllicted. At the time these memos were written, the technique was not even an issue and had not been addressed by Congress.

33 posted on 11/15/2006 1:36:00 AM PST by Lancey Howard
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To: Lancey Howard
The contents of the documents were not revealed, but one document, as described by the ACLU, is "a directive signed by President Bush granting the CIA the authority to set up detention facilities outside the United States and outlining interrogation methods that may be used against detainees."

The second document, according to the group is a Justice Department legal analysis "specifying interrogation methods that the CIA may use against top Al Qaeda members."

According to the article he did specify methods. Second, in 1901, a US court martial sentenced Major Edwin Glenn to 10 years hard labour for subjecting a suspected insurgent in the Philippines to the "water cure".

After the second world war, US military commissions successfully prosecuted as war criminals several Japanese soldiers who subjected US prisoners to waterboarding.

In 1968, a US army officer was court martialled for helping to waterboard a prisoner in Vietnam.

In April 2006, in a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, more than 100 U.S. law professors stated unequivocally that waterboarding is torture, and is a criminal felony punishable under the U.S. federal criminal code.

Also the UCMJ specifically outlaws it. This could, at the very least, cause a very nasty court fight. Just pray he didn't listen to Gonzalez and authorize it in writing.

36 posted on 11/15/2006 1:46:33 AM PST by SUSSA
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