That ability to look at themselves in the mirror in the morning, and the respect of others of like mindset. Those things can mean a lot to someoen like that.
So you’re saying the VC want you to do something- you’d say no, but you know for a fact after a week or so of VC style creative torture, you know you’d do it anyway. The fact that you endured a week of excruciating pain before you “broke” would give you comfort in some sort of meaningful way?
You: “You’re going to have to beat that info out of me”
VC: “Ok, fine, our pleasure.”
Isn’t that a movie cliche- torturer tells guy 'you might as well tell me what I want to know now, because after I’m through with you you’re going to tell me anyway, save yourself some abuse?"
McCain can’t raise his arms over his head to this day, the war ended the way it would have anyway, but he has his “honor”. What’s that line Marsellus Wallace said about pride? That’s my opinion too.
As for its good for other POW’s to see you resist- why? If I were the top ranking solider in a camp, I think I’d get us all in a group and say screw this honor and pride crap, let’s do whatever the hell the say to make our time here as tolerable as possible. All I see here are recycled cliches about honor and duty, but nothing as to why the human mind should value these traits in these situations.
Of course. Probably a foolish thought in this forum, but I thought I might catch someone not knowing him and dismissing that comment with, “Why was giving up his career such a big deal?” at which point I could say, yes, but he turned out to be Muhammad Ali. Sort of a drive home the point moment. And for those who did know who he was, why, the point’s already made as much as it will ever be.
As has been said before, if you don’t understand by now there is nothing we can tell you that will make you understand.
Well I’m willing to try and understand, but no one seems willing to explain, other than tired cliches and “if you don’t understand by now, you never will”. Is is that by explaining it, it will be clear its a combination of silly macho posturing, pompous military code and archaic mindsets of a bygone era?
But there is no guarantee that they won’t beat the crap out of you anyway, whether you cooperate or not. Indeed, that is pretty much how it went in Vietnam - a lot of guys never even made it to the prison camps - they were tortured and killed int he field.
You act as if the North Vietnamese were operating with a clear rulebook designed to keep order in the camp - do this and you get a beating, do this other thing and you don’t. But they weren’t operating that way - the orderly running of the prison meant little to them. Breaking the will and spirit of the American POWs was the priority.
So it was extremely likely that cooperation across the board like this would have brought just more torture - the captors would have seen this as an opening to thoroughly break the spirit of everyone. And they might have spared some guys at random, and insinuated that they were spared torture because they cooperated more. Those guys would then become unpopular, to say the least, among their buddies.
If you think, or Diogenes thinks that cowardice or traitorous behavior would spare you much pain or suffering, you’re sadly mistaken.
The Code of Conduct, referenced above, anticipates much of this and gives good guidelines for a soldier’s conduct in this situation. Live by it and you might get out of the prison alive and with your sense of self relatively intact. Go the coward’s route and you risk all of that by taking what looks at the time to be the easier way.
Like I said, you’ll never understand. It’s been explained to you for two pages now, and “its a combination of silly macho posturing, pompous military code and archaic mindsets of a bygone era” is all you have to say.
Just another cliche- I understand POW’s in Korea were studied, but where is the proof that this code works? Is it a fact that POW’s who sung from day one came out of the camps worse than those who stuck by the code? Logic would dictate the opposite to me- how can being tortured give you a better mind upon release than not being tortured, disregarding the hackneyed view that pride and honor strengthen the mind or whatever.
I also don’t think its coincidence that the military determined that the best thing for the POW personally and psychologically just so happens to be the route that is best for the military.
In the long run, we’re all going to be dead. There’s no course of action you can take that will let you live forever. So the only thing you can do is try to steer the direction your life takes while you’ve got it. Which is why some people would rather risk death than do something they would find abhorrent to their character.
Well, why don’t you call up Larry Kavanaugh and ask him about it.
Oh, wait, you can’t. He put a bullet through his brain after his release from a POW prison. And while there might be an awful lot of things that may have driven him to this act, the fact that he was shunned as a collaborator by other prisoners in the camp, plus the fact that a senior officer that served with him had introduced charges against him concerning this collaboration probably did more than anything to do so.
You want to make this a choice between bad consequences and no consequences. I’m afraid life just doesn’t work that way.
While you should do the right thing simply because it’s the right thing to do, maybe you consider that both of your actions would likely result in your being court-martialed by the military upon your release, receive dishonorable discharges and possible prison sentences, and despised as cowards and traitors for the rest of your miserable lives.
So if duty and honor mean nothing to you, perhaps the thought of future punishment might induce you to follow the Code of Conduct. (This reminds me of Kohlberg’s stages of moral development.)
If your actions led to other POWs being mistreated or killed, or if (God forbid), you assisted in mistreating other POWs, you could even be executed.
Also realize that should you cooperate with the enemy in any manner, even after torture, your actions and the extent of your alleged mistreatment will be scrutinized upon your release.
Others have said this repeatedly. The Code of Conduct is for the POW’s benefit. If you walk out after years in a POW prison knowing that you resisted to the utmost, your mental health will be far better than the miserable wretch who capitulated immediately and sold out his country and his fellow POWs.
Yes, it would.
It would mean that I did my best to follow the orders I agreed to follow. I don’t pretend that I’d have some superhuman tolerance; perhaps I’d break and start babbling the first day. I have no idea; God willing, I’ll never be placed in a position to know.
Why should the human mind value the trait of being able to go into combat at all? Rude hairy strangers are shooting at you and trying to kill you. Best you find the first possible moment and sneak away, so as to not get shot – right?
When a person goes into combat for the military, they are placing their lives on the line not for self-preservation, or even for their own family’s preservation. They are risking their skin for their country. This is an abstraction you may not accept at all, or you may accept it only for a war in which you agree with the end result. You may hold that the soldier slogging along with Patton towards Palermo was doing something noble, but the soldier slogging through the Mekong Delta was a tool.
If you don’t accept the idea of sacrifice for a country at all, then you are willing to trade on those exact kinds of sacrifices that others have made on your behalf, with no intention of returning the favor – which is fine – and no admiration for it, which is truly low. Alas, it’s perfectly legal for you to live safely and securely, in a country where you have a right to figuratively spit upon the men who suffered to give you the opportunity to do so. It’s just low and craven.
If you do accept the idea of sacrifice for your country, but believe that Vietnam, specifically, was evil, the only thing I can say is that say is that as a soldier, you’re not permitted to vote on what actions to take on behalf of your country. You can “vote” by casting a ballot in elections; you can “vote” by refusing an order to deploy – knowing that there will be consequences. But the armed forces aren’t a camping trip where the group gets to vote on each day’s activities. Your agreement to serve means you agree to follow the lawful orders of your lawful superiors, up to and including the civilian leadership. You can’t decide to bail out at the first whiff of trouble.
If you cooperate with your captors, or if you are seen as capitulating without having been tortured, you will be despised by your fellow POWs. Your captors already despise you. It can’t be good for a POW’s mental health to also be despised by his fellow prisoners–and there’s got to be some self-loathing that will arise for having capitulated.
Is this a guy who did what he had to survive, or a guy who decided to turn sides and fight with the VC? Because if it was a guy who just did what he felt he had to do to survive, like give info voluntarily, and the twisted military code caused others to heap guilt on him for not being as torture proof as they were, well just more ammo for the argument that the military POW code is crap, isn’t it? I’m a pariah and a criminal simply because I can’t take physical torture? Screw that.
Yes but if not for the “code” many POW’s who despise you wouldn’t, and you wouldn’t have that added burden to deal with.
The prisoners in these camps organized themselves to take care of each other and keep morale high - they placed the senior officer imprisoned in charge. From what I’m reading, these guys who collaborated rejected the authority of their chain-of-command and were removed to other parts of the prison, where they were given all kinds of goodies to try to break the spirit of the remaining men. They weren’t tortured anymore, and were given vegetable gardens, aquariums and books. Their comrades-in-arms got rotten food and more torture.
At any time, they could have rejected the gifts of their captors and the chain-of-command would welcome them back - and many men did this, finding it impossible to live this way. Others didn’t, and some of these guys remain despised individuals to this day. One sought elected office in California in the 1970s, under the tutelage of Tom Hayden and Jane Fonda. He was made a political pariah by fellow Democrats, who couldn’t see running a man who had been censured by the Navy for collaboration.
It isn’t a question of not being able to take torture. It is a question of aiding the enemy and screwing over your buddies - and that won’t fly very well.
Really? What code would you replace it with? “Every man for himself”?
Do you think this would help prisoner discipline and mental health better than the Code of Conduct as it is presently promulgated? If so demonstrate please how that can happen.
I don’t see what’s with everyone saying “let’s all do whatever or captors say”. Everyone knows the actions and comments of POW’s is not to be believed- you see a POW even in Iraq reading an anti-American statement, you don’t believe he means it right? So why take abuse to avoid doing something meaningless? If everyone has the option of decent food and recreation if the comply, don’t get mad at me because I went for it- you had the choice to do the same, be mad at yourself for holding to your silly code while you get beaten daily and are fed maggot ridden rice.
I’d be mad at you for not keeping your word.