Redstate

I would have a strong tendency not to take an al-Qaeda prisoner's word for it, and that's a gross  understatement.

But as Rush often says, with them "it's not the nature of the evidence, it's the seriousness of the charge."

 If a person has been released to the point where they can hire a lawyer to press charges, then it's a good bet they weren't Al-Qaeda members or even guilty of much.

 Not to say that the FBI memo, the Newsweek article, or this article is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, but dismissing former inmate's complaints simply because they are former inmates for reasons unknown is not a good validation for one's logic.

....while I'm not going to take this apart in-depth here, Craver doesn't do a particularly good job of substantiating his arguments.  Of note especially is his conflation of detainees with terrorists -- we've already seen plenty of examples wherein this assumption is shown to be, at best, one needing thorough checking.

that it is unlikely that the interrogators did the things with the Quran that have been alleged?  I don't.

Also, how many of you would oppose interrogators doing it if it would save American lives?  I wouldn't.

Also, how many of you would oppose interrogators doing it if it would save American lives?

I don't see how flushing the Quran down the toilet is going to save American lives.  Is that the trump card of interogation techniques? Do interrogators say to themselves, "nothing else has worked let's start flushing the Quran down the toilet. That will get him to talk"?

I meant that as a for instance more than anything, maybe not all the prisoners are al-Qaeda, but I probably still wouldn't trust them.  

That said, I agree with redcell and trevino.

whether it would work or not...I'm not an interrogator.  But if it does work and given the fanatical nature of the religious beliefs of the enemy it would not surprise me if it did work, would you support that technique if it would save american lives?

of disorientation by means of challenging his religious convictions.  

I don't see how flushing the Quran down the toilet is going to save American lives.

I may not see it either - but I am willing to trust the opinions people on the ground to make those decisions.

Further, I will need more than the gripes of former detainees who have an axe to grind and Amnesty International on speed-dial to change my opinion on the matter.

 that no one can point to a '24' moment where torture has saved American lives. Those experienced in the field have said that torture does not produce reliable information and is not a reliable technique. All it does is harden opposition to us when it comes out, and it will come out because not everyone is into unchecked torture and lawless interrogation, no more than we favor cops doing it back home.

wouldn't be torture.  Only insulting.

Those experienced in the field have said that torture does not produce reliable information and is not a reliable technique.

Look, I know this is the new talking point among the international do-gooder community, but could someone explain to me how this is factual when it directly contradicts 5000-years of accumulated human history on the subject?

Why is it only now that we're coming to the realization that torture is "unreliable" and "ineffective"?  Don't you think enlightened ages would have figured that out long-ago?

Sorry, but I hope you will forgive me if I call this as I see it - nothing more than the latest example political correctness run amok.

But it doesn't make you right.

On the one hand, you cite antiquity.  On the other hand, your interlocutor cites data.  Upon which do we base policy?

Yes, in the unlikely event that flushing the Quran down the toilet were the only way to save American lives I would support that technique.  In fact, I would flush it myself if that were the case.

I am not an interrogator either, but I just doesn't make intuitive sense to me that the intelligence benefits of this practice would ever be worth the public relations cost.

At what point does accumulated opinion become data?

What we have is an argument between modernists who claim (perhaps from their own experiences, perhaps not) that X (torture, in this case) is not effective, and accumulated human history that says the opposite.  As such, the standard of proof for those who wish to challenge accepted history with regard to X (again, torture) is rather high and, to my mind, has not been anywhere near achieved to date.

In the end, I have no idea who is correct but I have my suspicions - as shown perhaps in the rather brisk manner with which I dismiss the current paradigm.

more research into the effectiveness of torture.  I don't think that it is something that we, as a civilized society, should condone or use (physical torture that is).  I can understand the argument that it is not effective because when you put someone in a position of extreme pain, I can see the point of view that they would say anything to stop whatever pain it is that they are experiencing.

I also don't see flushing the Quran down the toilet as torture.

Without biasing my previous comments, I have to admit that data on the effectiveness of torture may be rather hard to come by - after all, the people (public and private) who currently practice it are not likely to tell us how effective they are, right?

That said, this is is why I am left with the opinion that if it were not effective, the practice would have been ended long ago.

I'm with you entirely on the second point.

The accumulated wisdom of human history is that 1) torture is used and 2) gets results.  What results it gets generally depends upon what the torturer wants and what the tortured person thinks will end the torture.  This is also the accumulated experience of human history.  Note, please, that none of this is synonymous with "the truth."

While I do believe that there is a role for physical discomfort and even pain in interrogation, torture alone and for its own sake (both of which we know have happened in Iraq and Afghanistan) are remarkably ineffective at producing actionable intelligence in the first case.  Of course, in the second case, it's mere sadism.

I would note that the last time we were at war with fanatical, religiously-motivated, suicidally-inclined zealots, Marines in the Pacific found that making friends with Japanese prisoners was the surest way of throwing them into psychological disarray and gathering actionable intel.

there is exactly zero data here.

The best you can say is that some interrogators are of the opinion that this is the case. Unless these people are willing to state that they tried torture and found it ineffective it is opinion and additionally it is an opinion formed from a particular bias.

Even if you hold all purported data from the present war to be suspect and therefore not really data at all, you've still got plenty of data from prior wars.  There's no need to suspend disbelief here pending information that won't be public for decades -- unless you plan to argue that the present conflict exists outside of history and human nature.

Josh, these are all fair points - they are not dispositive of my point of view, however.

To your points:  Torture for the sake of torture is stupid, sadistic and unhelpful.  Last I heard, outside of despotic regimes (such as Saddam's), the only people who practice that sort of behavior is the mafia (who use it simply to intimidate people).  I am not aware that anyone has advocated such a practice at Gitmo - I have certainly not done so intentionally.

If I thought for an instant that "making friends" with our current enemy consisting of fanatical, religiously-motivated, suicidally-inclined zealots would work, I would sign-on in an instant.  However, I don't believe this is possible - which is why I think we need to destroy the fanatical, religiously-motivated, suicidally-inclined zealots and try to keep the remaining population from becoming same.

My premise is that any truthful information that we can get from the zealots in our custody is likely to help save lives - American and otherwise - which can only help in our goal to "make friends" with those who are receptive.  Thus, I am willing to allow my government to use any means at their disposal to obtain that information, trusting that they will do so within bounds that I can live with.

Much of this is beyond the scope of our current narrow discussion, however - and I apologize for the diversion.

Regards.

There is nothing from any war at any time that could purport to be data under even the loosest use of the term. To state otherwise is just wrong.

Now you are entitled to your own opinions on the morality of torture, but to state that it is ineffective in producing intelligence in general or actionable intelligence in particular is just contrafactual.

Or stated another way, the Army does not believe that to be the case. In SERE training you are told, unequivocably, that everybody talks. Second, you are told to set a goal of holding out 24-hours. Third, you are told not to lie.

While I know of no instances at Guantanamo, I do know that we have tortured to death at least one person at Bagram -- apparently, from the statements of US personnel, for its own sake.

I should qualify "making friends" as a term meant to  encompass calculated positive influence on a prisoner rather than an actual unfeigned friendly empathizing with that prisoner.  The point is that they think we're friendly.

Where we agree is that the test here needs to be a utilitarian one -- what is effective?  My argument is that torture is a limited tool indeed and can probably be mostly discarded.

Finally, no need to apologize for anything.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/172852_interogate12.html?searchpagefr
om=1&searchdiff=6

No sadist should ever be an interrogator. Their need gets in the way. Nor should anyone who enjoys the exercise of raw power over others.

of something relevant here. I'm just not sure what. Quite honestly, I think that statement would work for any profession.

a similar enemy in the pacific theater of WWII.

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze6kt7j/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/aami
tcsm.pdf

Torture (or at least, physical discomfort of the type that your average Democrat congress-critter or NY Times editorialist would consider so) has a limited role in our intel gathering procedures.

Torture for the heck of it should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the UCMJ.

FWIW: I agree with both of these.

How effective is "effective" is a discussion that will continue well beyond any of us, and I gathered your meaning w.r.t. "friendly" - but thanks for the clarification.

Oh, and thanks also for the chat.

As an interrogation technique, if it was actually proven to work, I wouldn't be all that opposed.  

It is offensive, but it isn't torture, nor does it actually do any real harm to the person being interrogated.

I just don't see it as being all that a valid interrogation technique.

Demonstrate to me that our prisoners are under a similar compulsion to not lie, and you might have a valid parallel there.  Everybody does indeed talk -- but to end the torture.  This does not correlate with a telling of the truth outside of SERE training.

As for your dismissal of all the lessons of all of prior history -- because they do not constitute "data" -- I cannot believe that you seriously hold to that position, except as an argumentative tactic here.

 an example of useful, timely intelligence data that was acquired via torture in United States history.

..being raised Muslim, I just cringe at the thought of the Qu'ran getting flushed.

So um, yes, it would work.

I can't support it though because I'm just imaging lightening bolts coming and striking me down just for that thought.

...It's just that I don't think we should make our interrogation techniques about religion, ever. It doesn't matter that the terrorists are making this about religion; this isn't a war against Islam per se, only terrorists who are Muslim.

Yes, I do think it is unlikely that they have done this. I was in the Marine Corps for six years, in military intelligence.

I absolutely find the idea of interrogators "flushing" the Quran to be hard to credit. Not that I would be opposed to it. I say throw pig blood on them while you're at it.

But the command structure doesn't work that way. Contrary to the mounds of liberal propaganda ever since Vietnam, the modern military isn't nearly as cold, calculating, or hard-core as you may think. It's full of beauracrats afraid of their shadow, beholden to the Mothers of America. I remember being reprimanded at jump school for calling one of the Army privates a knuckle head when he wasn't following my orders.

When I was in, we believed we had a lot of leeway with physical "interrogation", but nobody would have dared use religiously motivated interrogation techniques. Hell, nobody would even dare to refuse access to chaplains or mail (even as far back as boot camp we were taught how critical it was that prisoners get their mail)

Now, granted, this was all early nineties so, it's possible they've stiffened things up a bit. But I doubt they have done so by enough that people would expect to get away with flushing the Quran.

Hey, just my opinion, just my experiences, but to answer your question, yes I do doubt it.

And no, I wouldn't object if they were doing it. I just don't think they are.

Scharff was an interrogator of WWII allied airmen.  He was the most successful interogator on the other side during WWII, and his methods had nothing to do with torture.  In fact, some of the POW's that he interrogated actually sponsored his entry into the US so he could obtain American citizenship.  

UPI article about Shraff

The article quotes an American interrogator who says:

In his book, "Stalking the Vietcong," Herrington, a member of the Phoenix program in Vietnam, said: "One of the keys to securing cooperation of a source was to disarm him psychologically by decent treatment." In an interview this week with United Press International, he added: "Nothing else works as well."

He said in addition: "There is basic human decency involved. The prisoner in front of you is a father, a brother or a son. He's the same as you are, and I always asked myself, if I were in his place, how would I like to be treated."

The article or anything else I have read about Schraff doesn't say torture doesn't work, but that it doesn't work as well as humane treatment.

You are the one dismissing history and insinuating some thinly sourced anecdotal statement about Marines being nice to Japanese to get them to talk. You are the one who dismissed docj's to rely on the unproven and unprovable statement of some anonymous interrogator.

My mistake for engaging on the issue. I'll move on.

I'm seeing a pattern.

Anyway, if you want specifics, do ask.  I believe Blue Neponset has provided some above.

of why the left is crowing.  The Newsweek report was that the Pentagon was going to include the flushing allegations in a report.  The Pentagon denied not only that it was going to be in a report but that they could find any documents with such allegations.  Now it turns out that there were FBI documents with such allegations.  I'm sure the Pentagon will stutter and say, "we meant there were no DoD documents containing allegations of flushing the Koran".  But still its pretty weak.  Looks like the Pentagon is caught in yet another lie.

Yeah, they have done a bang up job so far with those decisions. Things are smooth as silk.

-JP2

that the the interrogation techniques used against allied airmen will work against al-Qaeda, then be my guest and make the case.

If you're trying to make the case that there are ways beyond torture that can be used to extract information than prisoners, I think you'll find that point as having been conceded (implicitly, at least) some time ago.

Finally, if you're going to use our experiences in Vietnam - arguably the only war we've to date lost - to make a point about the gathering of intel from prisoners, may I respectfully suggest that said argument may not be nearly as convincing as you think it is.

Nobody seems to want to apply any logic to this whole question.  So I'll offer to turn the lights on for some folks right here and now.  Consider this:

First off, I doubt that any American in their right mind is going to attempt to flush a book down a toilet.

Most everyone raised in the United States who is older than about 4 has had enough experience with flush toilets to know that it won't work.

Secondly, even assuming you were dumb enough to try, someone's going to have to fish the flipping thing out of there.  Are you going diving for it, or are you going to have to call in the plumber?

And how much jacking around would bringing in the plumber be, in a maximum security facility?  More than it'd be worth, I suspect.

Any suggestions of anyone flushing a book would thus appear to me to have been made up by some stone age types who don't have enough experience with indoor plumbing to know how rediculous the statement is on it's face.

Trust those people!

Yes, I do.

I wanted to post some evidence that backed up the argument that using torture as an interogation tecnique is not such a good idea.

If you're trying to make the case that the the interrogation techniques used against allied airmen will work against al-Qaeda, then be my guest and make the case.

Two interogators were quoted in the story, one interogated allied airmen and the other Vietnamese.

Finally, if you're going to use our experiences in Vietnam - arguably the only war we've to date lost - to make a point about the gathering of intel from prisoners, may I respectfully suggest that said argument may not be nearly as convincing as you think it is.

Frankly, this point is ridiculous. The man quoted above deserves more respect than you have given him.  

"Secondly, even assuming you were dumb enough to try, someone's going to have to fish the flipping thing out of there.  Are you going diving for it, or are you going to have to call in the plumber?"

I would hardly put anything into my toilet that I knew I was likely going to have to fish out later, and I know how clean my toilet is.

I would actually believe the flushing story better, if it involved the soldiers tearing the pages of the Koran and flushing those.  But the only reports along those lines were of the Muslim prisoners doing that themselves.

I can't imagine piling people in a pyramid or hanging them from the ceiling, when everyone know you're just going to have to pull them apart or unchain them eventually.  What a hassle.  

If you're arguing that the use of coercive techniques to extract information from terror suspects has no place in our dealings with al-Qaeda and the like, then we have an irreconcilable disagreement and there is not point in arguing it further.

If you're arguing that there are other techniques that could (and perhaps even should) be used, then that point has long since been conceded.

FWIW, I meant no disrespect to Herrington.  The fact is however that Vietnam was hardly a high-point for our military on any level or in any area - including the acquisition of intel, and I suggest that perhaps this "new age" approach to intel gathering was part of the problem.

if the book got stuck I doubt it would be the interogator doing the fishing.  

This post, and this article aren't about whether torture happened, whether flushing the Koran is torture, whether torture is good - none of that. It's about the difference between the headline and the story and the lack of proof. Good grief.

I don't think that it necessarily has to be a proper and tidy flush for the intended effect.  I am sure that if someone were sufficiently religious to be offended by something like this, tossing a copy of Quran in a toilet and pulling the lever would have an effect.  

So, we're supposed to comment on the actual meat-and-potatoes of the story and not fly-off wildly in 64 different directions?

When did y'all decide to make that part of the posting guidelines?

:)

In all seriousness, point taken - and I for one plead guilty to the charge of helping (with my fellow co-conspirators who shall remain nameless but know darn well who they are) to hijack this thread and taking it where the distinguished author had no intention of it ever going.  Leaving now - thanks.

I don't see the comparison here.

Or are you arguing that the flushing of a Koran amounts to this type of abuse?

If so, I am not with on it.  Flushing  Koran is offensive, and I certainly wouldn't encourage it or excuse it, but it isn't anywhere near the same.

Didn't The White House (the Press Secretary Scott McClellan) say the story was damaging and inaccurate.  Who knows if the aligations are true, but the press was attached for releasing a story that there is evidence for.  That seems like a problem to me.  

would be acceptable proof in your eyes of these things happening?  If these things are happening, and the government and the interrogators are keeping it quiet, then the only two sources left are the prisoners or "unnamed sources".  Should the media stop pursuing this just because they can't get the possible perpetrators to confess to it?  

Asserts that torture by itself is sufficient; but when added to other means of intelligence-gathering, you'd have a hard time saying it's not useful. The sum of human experience points to the contrary conclusion.

how many of you would oppose interrogators doing it if it would save American lives

Sounds a lot like it is OK to torture to get information.  Regardless of the suspect information that arises out of that kind of behavior, how do you determine that a person has information/is valuable before the interrogator starts the exploitation?  Do you care?

...get much closer to the interrogator community than I am, and I wouldn't trust most of them to successfully negotiate an exercise interrogation, let alone the real thing.

As in any profession there are vastly experienced, prudent and creative practitioners of the craft, and there are mediocre to disastrously incompetent ones, just itching to cock-up an operation so violently that it undermines the entire theater-wide mission.

For rationality's sake, do not EVER trust someone's judgement just because they wear a military uniform or bear a particular rank or MOS designation. Military people don't, after all.

...you said that you trusted the opinion of working interrogators. I have found no exception to this consensus against torture among experienced, vetted interrogators. So, looks like you're out of ammo.

If a person has been released to the point where they can hire a lawyer to press charges, then it's a good bet they weren't Al-Qaeda members or even guilty of much.

...

I'm not so sure about this one. If memory serves a number of the detainees release are nationals of "friendly", or at least cooperative, governments. I suspect that no small number of them were released not soley for lack of evidence but more for expedience.

policy makers - not necesarily the guys doing the actual dirty work.  If I was unclear, then my bad.

FYI, as a long-retired 21B I can attest with great certainty to your principal (and well made) point (few things are more terrifying than being in close proximity to a nervous 2LT with C4 in one hand and a blasting-cap in the other).

Regards.

There is no "if".  Stuck it would be, or else float it would.  Going down the pipe it would not be.

So there you go.  And how are you going to make this now totally offended prisoner fish it out?  You aren't.  Which means, if you aren't doing it yourself, you are going to bring in the plumber to do it.  Particularly if it's stuck halfway in the hole.

And getting a plumber in there is going to entail a lot more monkey motion than anyone is going to want to go through.  This is a secure area, so you are going to have to move the prisoner, then get the plumbing fixed, the move the prisoner back.  Probably take half a day to accomplish, and everyone and their dog who has to go out of their way over it (staff, not the inmates) is going to be more than a little bit peeved.

So if it'd happened, it'd be easy to prove.  Get the maintenance reports from civil engineering.  They'd have had to check someone in to fix it, right?  They don't just let people wander in there.  "Hi.  I'm the plumber, and these are my toolboxes.  I'll go into the prison area now and fix some stopped up toilets."

HeHe.  I'll bet!

Like I said before.  Whoever made that one up doesn't know plumbing from shinola.

The FBI documents contains 'reports of allegations.' I does not contain 'reports of desecration', it does not report that 'US soldiers or civilian interrogators did thus and so.' And if you read the much heralded story put out by the ACLU the FBI report identifies the source of the allegations as detainees.

So where does this corroborate the Newsweek story? Where does this catch the Pentagon in 'yet another lie'?

the remaining population from becoming same".

There's a lot of meat wrapped up in that little addendum.  

do you only use positive reinforcement during an interrogation?  It's been years since college elective courses but I'm still operating under the delusion that reinforcement(negative included) elicits reward/escape responses.  If I'm wrong I'm sure a whole slew of psychology students should be alerted to their misteachings.

 

point to the use of "latrines" and "urine buckets", which was likely the case when the detentions commenced.  It wasn't until late 2002 - early 2003 that the modified shipping containers were in place and used.  Additionally, those are described as having "knee-high sinks" to facilitate foot washing before prayers, so I would guess that the toilets are likely floor pad Asian toilets, not Western flush type.  

Any of the above would allow for throwing in a book, depending on size.

flushing a book down the toilet is a far cry from torture.

if they are latrines, then why they "flushing" reports.

If it is a latrine, and doesn't flush, then we would have "tossed the Koran into the toilet" reports.

Granted something may have been lost along the way in translation, but when I use a portapotty, I don't generally say that I flushed anything in it, I would most likely say I "dropped" stuff into it.

issue very informative.  She has a lot of updates, and links, but the one thing she encourages is that rather than reading MSM reports of the FBI report, why not go to the FBI reports themselves.  

http://michellemalkin.com/archives/002566.htm

There generally is a flush handle on the wall, or a tank higher up with a pull chain.  Flush water flows down the center of the toilet to the hole, which is about 4" in diameter in the types that I have seen.

I went back and looked at the dates on some of the statements that are referenced in the FBI reports, and it appears that they were indeed made in summer 2002, which would have been before the new facility was on-line, so my guess is that they were talking latrines, buckets, etc., when those particular statments were made.

The left is saying that the allegations were true. I don't see them crowing over Newsweek's triumphant proof that they had an incorrect source. They are crowing that the Quran has been flushed down a toilet. Let's be real here. If the only thing in question about the Newsweek story was the source of the information no one would be interested. Everyone is trying to find out if the sources were real in order to find out if the information is real.

In other words, the lefty websites throwing parties right now aren't really interested in how credible Newsweek is. They are only interested in being able to suggest that the U.S. has desecrated the Quran.

Military people being 'blasphemous' is lefty gold. They're very interested in respecting any non-christian faith.

last week:

"Newsweek's story about Koran desecration is demonstrably false, and there have thus far been no credible allegations of willful Koran desecration, and Newsweek has produced no such evidence," Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said today in response to media queries. (emphasis mine)

Now, I don't know what "demonstrably false" means to you, but to me it means that not only is the accusation false but the Pentagon can prove that the content of the story is completely wrong.  That is quite a high hurdle to overcome and quite a bold statement, especially in light of the recently released FBI documents.  Apparently the FBI thought the allegations credible enough to include them in their reports.

link

if you read the reports, the FBI states that the allegations could not be verified and weren't all that credible, which is exactly what the Pentagon said-there were "no credible allegations . . ."

Try again.

While you are at it, Michelle Malkin has a link and actually posts portions of the FBI reports.

at getting the subject to say what the torturer wants them to say.

http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/trainingmanual.htm

YOu should read #18 all about how detainees and prisoners should act while in prison.

... Apparently the FBI thought the allegations credible enough to include them in their reports.

It doesn't take much to get something included in an FBI field report --- the person being interviewed says something and the FBI agent writes it down. If you have an FBI file for some reason you'd probably be shocked to see some of the things that people have said about you. This is one of the reasons why the FBI background reports are confidential, they contain just about everything that anyone has ever said about anyone at any time.

was that I trusted the opinion of policy-makers to decide what is and is not acceptable with regard to interrogation techniques - and that I assumed many of those people were "on the ground" when making those decisions.

I was not aware that individual interrogators could decide "Hey, let's throw their holy book in the crapper and see if that gets them to talk," leaving aside for the time being that why someone would think that could work is beyond me.

So, if this is the consensus "among experienced, vetted interrogators", it remains a bit of a mystery to me why so many regimes and organizations (mafia, and the like) rely on it.

Then again, you could be replying to someone besides me - in either case, Good Night.

is only one of torture's uses.

I don't think that it is too much of a stretch to say that the use of this technique by other regimes and organizations use it.

Undoubtedly effective uses of torture are:

1. Getting the subject to say what you want them to say.  (think Spanish Inquisition)
   
   
2. Intimidating the subject and others into complying with your demands.
   
   
3. Satisfying the impulses and desires of the torturer.

Just because this technique has a long and rich history does not in any way imply that it is effective at getting good, actionable intelligence.

Do you seriously believe that the issue has been one merely of crediblity, and that the mea culpa the left wing blogs are seeking is for the government to say "well newsweek had a good faith basis for making these allegations which we still say are demonstrably false"?

The left wing websites are prepared to accept only one answer. "yes, the koran was flushed down the toilet".

After newsweek retracted the story, did the worldwide protestors come out and say "nevermind"? Do you think those who took to the streets were satisfied by the retraction? That they believed the incident did not occur?

Now apply that same thinking to the left wing blogs. Of particular note, reactionary radical blogs like Americablog. Do you think that what they are now seeking is the government merely to say that they were too harsh with Newsweek?

Pardon me for saying, but PUH LEEZE. This new evidence means one thing and one thing only to them. That the CONTENT of the story was true.

So when conservative web sites are saying what a bunch of hot air the left wingers are blowing out their you know where's about this development, it isn't some kind of stonewall against an apology to newsweek for being too mean or judgemental to them. No, it is our justified ridiculing of their insistence on presenting this as some kind of evidence that the incident actually occured.

If you seriously, honestly think this is about giving Newsweek some props, by all means consider them propped.

For that matter, Kathleen Parker at Townhall.com was way ahead of ya on that anyway.

The left wing blogs are using this development as some kind of false proof that the incident actually occured. In my opinion, it is that conclusion that conservatives are sneering at.

I was trying to say the notion of rationalizing extreme measures to get information sounds a lot like rationalizing the use of torture.  I was not attempting to say anything about the specific acts.

The outrage about the Newsweek story was apparently the riots the story caused (the allegations of Koran desecration were nothing new, although that they would be acknowledged in a Pentagon report was).

But now this particular line is looking more and more ridiculous:

After newsweek retracted the story, did the worldwide protestors come out and say "nevermind"? Do you think those who took to the streets were satisfied by the retraction? That they believed the incident did not occur?

Of course Gen Meyer, before the administration jumped on the "bash Newsweek" bandwagon, said the riots had little to do with the story.  And Hamid Karzai in his press conference with President Bush earlier this week said that the Newsweek story had absolutely nothing to do with the riots, they were all about internal politics.  Even Scott McClellan is trying to back off his earlier statements.

The protestors were nothing but my example. An analogy. I chose it as it was on point, but the issue you were discussing that I was taking issue with was not the protestors, it was the leftwing websites. Don't you see?. The point was do you think that a retraction is satisfactory? IN the case of the liberal websites. Or didn't my lengthy post get across the point that the left is in fits of spastic glee claiming the events occured, and NOT about Newsweek being vindicated.

took spastic glee spreading the line, pushed by the White House and the Pentagon, that Newsweek's article caused the riots and was responsible for the deaths.  That is, at best, a vast oversimplification, and, at worst, simply not true.

So who looks better in this whole fiasco?

I'm sure the Pentagon will stutter and say, "we meant there were no DoD documents containing allegations of flushing the Koran".  But still its pretty weak.

Scandalous! Shameful! Incompetent! How dare the Pentagon only investigate its own documents? If they had competent leadership, they would have sent Delta Force to seize the records of the FBI, the Agriculture Department, and the ACLU, to see if there existed any documents...with allegations! Man, it's a good thing we have the Left looking out for us.

...from your statement that "I am willing to trust the opinions people on the ground to make those decisions," which I took to mean in-theater operators rather than policymakers.

While individual interrogators are certainly not allowed to decide on the rules governing a particular interrogation, that doesn't seem to stop them from doing so rather often, as in any profession.

Is not worth it.

This is hardly a Summer of Love inspired consensus on interrogation practices. There are two types of reasons to eschew "torture" in interrogations: the pragmatic and the moral. The moral reasons don't require too much justification, I assume.

Torturing people to elicit information carries a high-risk of obtaining misinformation, either from a prisoner who knows nothing and is "innocent" but is capitulating to end the torture, or from someone who is not innocent but who does not possess the information you are after, or someone who is aware but who provides misinformation under torture and you leap on it because you are relying too heavily on a technique that is distasteful to you (or not) and which may be blinding you to other subtleties that would betray the intentions of your subject.

The proof is in the actual purposes of interrogations under torture throughout history: to acquire false confessions, to implicate the innocent, and to intimidate and terrorize a populace. Never to actually arrive at some dire truth.

Note: interrogations, and all intelligence-gathering activities are guided by top-down intelligence requirements, which can reinforce tunnel-vision and monomania in pursuing those pieces of information.

On the flip side of the pragmatic reasons for forbidding torture: the soft-power consequences for revelations of inhumane conduct are real. If they threaten your mission, they are to be avoided. It might not be worth it to capture a handful of ragtag fighters if the consequence is that your civil reconstruction mission is thereby sabotaged.

Dunking a Qu'Ran in a toilet hardly constitutes torture, but I would consider imprudent given the balance of consequences over gains.

You were beaten to that conclusion by plenty of right wing websites. My blog never took spastic glee in attacking newsweek. At Kos, I didn't take spastic glee in attacking Newsweek. And you still aren't addressing my question.

I'm asking if you genuinely believe that the left wing sites are interested in some kind of vindication for newsweek or rather are they using this story to try and prove that the Koran/Quran was in fact flushed?

And I was not only asking that, I was pointing out that it is this conclusion that most people here are arguing with.

If the people here were so interested in proving newsweek guilty, what possible difference would the physics of flushing a book make? None. The debate would be about using anonymous sources, not flushing books.

You simply cannot miss it. The debate is about the allegations themselves.

Here's some interesting commentary you may be interested in rotwang: The indepundit is angry.

I think what we (the "vast anti-American left-wing blogosphere") is an truly independent accounting  (with the ability to subpeana and take testimony from anyone) of what is going on in our detention centers all over the globe.  Not Pentagon-conducted investigations that inevitably come to the conclusion that the abuses were isolated incidents solely the blame of rogue low-ranking individuals.  We want the White House and the Pentagon to implement review procedures that satisfy the Supreme Court and not continue to stall (Joseph Padilla still hasn't gotten his day in court).   A clear and consistent statement from the White House on exactly what constitutes torture and what interrogation techniques are out-of-bounds would be helpful, too.  

The problem is the Pentagon's and the Administration's credibility is so low that when they say there is no "credible" evidence that accusations of Koran flushing are true is simply not credible.  

It is good that you demand these investigations. It helps me to defeat you electorally. I am able to position you and the rest of the vast anti-American left-wing blogosphere as America-hating moonbats, and you are defenseless against this because your behavior is that of America-hating moonbats.

It may well be a "known fact" in the moonbat echo-chamber that the Administration's and the Pentagon's credibility are so low that the notion that books went down toilets is more believeable than anything they say. But outside the moonbat echo-chamber, that stuff sounds like the ravings of loons.

The notion that the military is fundamentally evil, and that the Pentagon is where they cover that up, sounds absolutely crazy to people who have been in the military... or to people who have friends and family in it. Which is a lot of people.

It is so many people that I can rely on the fact that a huge majority of Americans will dismiss you all as looneytoons for even suggesting it.

This is why the Newsweek debacle was as big a story as it was. "Moonbats found in newsroom! Film at 11!" We're just not used to seeing supposedly sane reporters and editors giving credence to stories about books going down toilets. When it happens, we all look to see what went wrong. "Oh. Leftist moonbats in a newsroom. Didn't that just happen at CBS?"

It is definitely in my interest as a political partisan that you guys continue to pump each other up inside your echo chamber, and jump out from time to time to tell the rest of us what you're thinking in there. Because it's nuts, and it helps me defeat you at the polls. So do continue.

Somehow, for thousands of years, humans missed the cute and cuddly approach to intel gathering?

Look, like I said, it's a stupid caricature to say that anyone is saying that torture is the summit of intel gathering technique groups. A reasonable statement is this:

Torture works.

More specifically, torture, when used with other sources, works.

Does hugging and calling someone chum work? I'd guess at times yes, it does -- but, and I know this will shock everyone, folks sometimes lie not only in the presence of pain, but in its absence. When I was twenty, I was once asked in a friendly way by my mother if I'd eaten a whole plate of brownies. I had. I lied. No acetylene torch to my feet. True story.

I am deliberately putting the moral aspect of this to the side, because I think it's dispositive, and aiming instead at efficacy. I torture twenty captured soldiers independently of each other, cross check the results, inform them it gets worse if they tell me what they think I want to hear instead of the truth, cross check against other source of info, and go from there. Heck, maybe I play snuggle bear with six of them. Whatever. A smart interrogator doesn't limit his toolkit.

But thousands of years of human experience indicate that torture, used as a dispassionate tool rather than a cheap way to get a sadism jones, can be stunningly effective. Mixed wih Care Bear stares and other intel sources, I'd submit it's deadly.

I think a lot of folks are so intent on not committing what is, after all, an incredbly grave sin, that they want to totally discredit the practice on utilitarian grounds, too. Seems like a good way to discredit the moral argument by association, to me.