It makes me feel that we shouldn’t have done everything we could to make that happen. And that we shouldn’t have done everything we could to make the rest of the world at most disinterested in stopping such a thing. By, among other things, torturing people.
And given the way were are acting, it’s questionable if that would be “murdered”, or “killed in an act of war”; given that we don’t seem to consider slaughtering large numbers of innocent people murder when WE do it. We are in no moral position to call someone else destroying an American city murder, unless and until we admit that it’s murder when we do it.
And if we act no better than them, or worse, as we have, how can you condemn them ? And we are NOT fighting Al Qaeda to any great degree. We are fighting people who are fighting back against our war of agression, our unmitigated act of conquest.
Garbage. They don’t have the power to do more than irritate our civilization. We are not torturing people because in danger of being destroyed, but because we as a nation are evil. We torture them because we want to, because we get off on it, not because we need to or even because it’s useful; it’s neither.
Why ? And cutting off someones head with a knife is BETTER than the way we behave.
Yes we are, and yes we have.
We are talking about torturing anyone who falls into our grasp.
Yes. It makes us monsters. It makes our culture something that should be destroyed.
And why should I believe that ? What motive does Al Qaeda have to attack us when we are doing exactly what they want ?
So your argument is that knowing definitively that we have an enemy with the means and desire to kill thousands of civilians in one fell swoop, on our mainland, should not have ANY impact at all on how we think about interrogation? None at all? That’s what “no more” means.
I just want to make sure I am understanding what you’re saying here.
And, most importantly, since we have used tactics you consider torture, I assume you are saying our culture should be destroyed? If so, don’t bother replying to my previous email, because you are most certainly not worth my time.
During the Cold War the danger of nuclear incineration was far greater than it is now, yet we managed to fight the evil of international Communism without resorting to such tactics.
The danger that Islamic fundamentalism currently poses to the United States is minor compared to some of the threats we’ve faced in the past. Yet the nervous nellies run around shrieking as though the Soviet warheads were already incoming over the ice cap. Our fathers were made of sterner stuff.
Out of curiosity, do you have any values at all that you hold more precious than your life and property? Or is keeping yourself alive your highest aspiration?
But you are not willing to risk your life to preserve the ideals of the United States? You would prefer that men be tortured to purchase a tiny increase in your own safety?
Thank God our fathers and grandfathers did not make such a bargain.
And believing that torture will make us safer is silly. There are few better ways to make us more hated, and to make actions against us look more justified.
You’re making an unwarranted assumption – I’ve never said I would not. Yes, there are many of “the ideals of the United States” (depending on how that term is defined) that I would be willing to die for.
Again – a completely unwarranted assumption, as I have never said I would prefer that.
Does this board actually engage in constructive dialogue, or is it all just mudslinging without any attempt to address one another’s actual points?
And that in a nutshell, is why our military has maintained the tradition of no torture. We want to take the higher ground. We want to wear the white hats. When we sink to torture and the torture is supported all the way to the top of our government, we have made a mockery of America and the millions of brave servicemen that have and still do serve her as honorably and bravely as they can.
Jim (Nice to be in agreement with you on a political / military issue for a change Der Trihs)
Be sure to get absolutely no closer to any personal insults in this thread (or in this Forum), they are not permitted. (Sarcasm, ad hominem arguments, casual dismissals, leading questions, and such, unfortunately are, but insults are prohibited.)
Okay, here’s a specific point. Do you believe that the danger posed to the United States by Islamic fundamentalism is greater than the danger that was posed by Soviet Communism? Remember that the Soviet Union was a sovereign nation with thousands of warheads targeted at American cities and American military bases. At any moment the leaders of the Soviet Union could have vaporized millions of our citizens. Nikita Krushchev was quite blunt about it: “We will bury you.”
And yet, during the entire Cold War we never adopted a policy of torture.
Are you seriously arguing that we should now change that policy because of a handful of religious nuts living in some caves in Afghanistan?