Comments on: Outsourcing torture to Uzbekistan

By: David All

David All — Mon, 02 May 2005 23:00:18 +0000

“Either we detain them forever since the war on terrorism has no end … .”
Seem to recall Orwell and others writing about the dangers of unending war being used to justify permanment tyrannery.

By: B. Kallikak Moran

B. Kallikak Moran — Mon, 02 May 2005 22:34:15 +0000

rd- “…the two options are inseparably connected.”
Only when you accept the absurd notion that all this human suffering – rendition, Abu Ghraib, Diego Garcia, Guantanamo Bay etc. – is centered around an actual, intentional, and honestly waged “War on Terror”.
That that “war” is itself not central to what all this human suffering is centered around is still pretty much a taboo subject in the US/UK public fora. But it’s getting a mite obvious. “War with Terror” might be a better name for it. It has nothing to do with the stated aims you accept, and tacitly demand we all accept.
“We” aren’t locking people up and degrading them and shipping them off to Uzbekistan to protect “our” children, not if by “us” you mean the American public.
But then I don’t think you do mean that, I think your real definition of “us” in that context is much narrower; and that when the time comes you’ll have no trouble at all shipping off the same children whose slit throats you now attempt to use as a goad for acceptance of these inhuman “contractual” atrocities.
In plainer English, you’re trying to establish a commonality that you don’t even feel, that doesn’t really exist. “We’re all in this together!”
Sure we are, only some of us are more “in this together” than others.

By: rd

rd — Mon, 02 May 2005 16:34:40 +0000

OK, stephen judd, lets say we “treat them as soldiers,” and grant POW status to suspected terrorists who serve no state and follow no rules of war. Either we detain them forever, since the war on terrorism has no end, or, following the Geneva protocols, we return them to their torture-happy home country at some hypothetical end point in the future, which amounts to rendition, just like we returned Iraqi soldiers to the hell of Iraq after the first Gulf War. Treating them “as soldiers” does nothing to resolve the indefinite detainment/rendition bind. Now, as to my supposed willingness to electrify testicles, if you’ll actually read my post you’ll see I support indefinite detainment as an alternative to rendition, but the entire point
is that the two options are inseparably connected.
While people often denounce as two unrelated horrible things the US is doing, in any realistic scenario doing less of one automatically means doing more of the other.

By: goesh

goesh — Mon, 02 May 2005 13:28:15 +0000

School of the Americas, anyone?? The threat of confinement in a US prison with its controlled environment to maximize personal comfort,total medical and dental care, a nicely furnished library with educational opportunities, free legal representation, a decent rec facility, adequate food, conjugal visits and a mosque should in and of itself put the fear of God into these cheeky fanatics who believe that slitting the throats of our children gains them paradise. Onward American Jurisprudence!!

By: idiot/Savant

idiot/Savant — Mon, 02 May 2005 12:09:32 +0000

troutsky: the problem is the anti-interrogation training US special forces, spies and pilots get encourage them to think that it is going to happen to them anyway – meaning that they have no incentive not to torture people.

By: Donald Johnson

Donald Johnson — Mon, 02 May 2005 11:07:46 +0000

MIght be bad strategy, y81, but all the Presidents in your lifetime and mine have supported horrific human rights violators when they haven’t engaged in their own human rights violations. That goes for Carter, who sold weapons to Indonesia while they were busy committing genocide on East Timor. Whether this makes them war criminals in a strict legal sense is something I’d leave to legal experts.

If Americans don’t want to hear the unpleasant truth about themselves, and most people don’t, then telling unpleasant truths is bad strategy. Thanks for the reminder.

By: stephen judd

stephen judd — Mon, 02 May 2005 09:07:33 +0000

“1. Eventually send them back to Uzbekistan… #1 is denounced as tantamount to torture.”

I think I must point out that this is NOT the same as what we are discussing here, which is handing people over to the Uzbek government having asked “you won’t torture them, will you?”

Nudge nudge, wink wink.

By: stephen judd

stephen judd — Mon, 02 May 2005 08:55:43 +0000

rd, my point, which you seem to have missed, is that either you treat them like soldiers (military), or you treat them like spies and conspirators (civilians), but no matter what, you accept the consequence of your constitutional principles.

Your constitution, you should consider, was framed by people with direct experience of a revolutionary war, who were all too conscious of the potential for meddling from foreign powers. Apparently they didn’t feel that torture was required.

Perhaps it may help you to know that I’m not an American – I’m a New Zealander – but frankly, if you yourself can’t see why this is wrong, why should I care more for you than the Uzbeks, who also don’t see why it’s wrong? They don’t give a shit about torture, and evidently, neither do you.

rd, would you, personally, electrify someone’s nuts? Would you be less culpable if you merely handed them over to a known nut-electrifier? What is your minimum criterion for doing so? If there is such a thing as enough evidence to persuade you to torture, why isn’t that enough evidence to convict in a court?

Can you imagine how profoundly disgusting it is to even have this conversation?

There is such a thing as rough justice, but the rougher it gets, the less justice there is. At some point, enough justice has leaked away that what you do is itself a crime.

I used to root for you guys. Now I don’t. This is why.

(Apologies for infuriated typos, but there’s no preview button).

By: wbb

wbb — Mon, 02 May 2005 07:07:17 +0000

Given that it is unrealistic to hope to end the use of torture by the US government at these offshore posts, I propose you lower your sights and campaign to have boiling people alive made illegal.

Compromise is the hallmark of succesful negotiation. Let Washington keep the fingernail routine.

By: Troutsky

Troutsky — Mon, 02 May 2005 05:59:56 +0000

The best reason not to engage in torture ( or sub contract it out),other than the obvious moral one,is that your own soldiers may end up on the recieving end and they will know why. And they’ll be pissed.

By: rd

rd — Mon, 02 May 2005 05:32:47 +0000

My only point was just to say that “no rendition” means in any realistic scenario “more indefinite Guantanamo-style detainment.” I think that’s OK, but people need to realize the two options are inversely related: a decline in one leads to an increase in the other.

As for Stephen Judd’s suggestion that we not detain foreign nationals when we don’t have the type of evidence that would lead with reasonable certainty to a US criminal conviction, I think the realistic view is that would place almost impossible burdens on our military forces and on our criminal justice system. Running down Pashtun chieftains willing to come and testify in the US is a little tricky, for example.

By: Jim Harrison

Jim Harrison — Mon, 02 May 2005 04:58:15 +0000

Maybe Bush is telling the truth. Maybe the Poles began WWII by attacking a German radio station. Who knows? I guess we’ll have to wait for a full investigation.

By: Mario

Mario — Mon, 02 May 2005 03:18:32 +0000

I wouldn’t jump the gun so fast, Henry. While there is evidence about rendition and torture in Egypt, no evidence was presented in the NY Times article that the US is letting the prisoners be tortured. President Bush told the press that the US seeks assurances that no detainees sent to Uzbekistan will be tortured. He may be lying, he may not be. If he is lying, then damn him. Either way, it is not the case that “no other conclusion” is possible.

By: y81

y81 — Mon, 02 May 2005 03:01:07 +0000

I realize that voices from outside the cocoon aren’t particularly welcome at CT, and the point of the blog is to vent and abuse, not to persuade, but if you ever do want to persuade the majority of Americans who voted for this Administration to your point of view, describing the elected government as group of war criminals is a bad strategy. It’s especially unpersuasive because the left has described every administration in my adult life—except maybe Jimmy Carter’s—as war criminals. Remember the boy who cried wolf?

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Sun, 01 May 2005 22:37:57 +0000

rd, given the options you describe, the US government has no morally acceptable option but to apply maximum pressure (withdrawal of aid, sanctions etc) to the Uzbekistan government to abandon the use of torture, and to send no-one back there until this pressure is successful.

Was that your point?