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RedditOn Friday, President Bush lied to the American people, as he has many times before, telling us that "this government does not torture people." But the metastasizing record shows that Bush and a compliant Justice Department have repeatedly authorized harsh CIA interrogation techniques, such as head slapping, frigid temperatures and simulated drowning. Such techniques have been condemned by many decent and reasonable people in these last years. But the critics who gathered this past weekend to denounce these methods made for an unusual group. Meeting for the first time since the 1940s, World War II veterans who had been charged with top-secret interrogations of Nazi prisoners of war lamented "the chasm between the way they conducted interrogation during the war and the harsh measures used today in questioning terrorism suspects." [See the Washington Post's cover story, "Fort Hunt's Quiet Men Break Silence on WWII," by Petula Dvorak} John Gunther Dean, 81, who became a foreign service and ambassador to Denmark, told the Washington Post, " We did it with a certain amount of respect and justice." Another World War II veteran--one of the few who interrogated the early 4000 prisoners of war, most of them German scientists and submariners, who were brought in to Fort Hunt, Virginia for questioning for days and weeks--spoke of how "during the many interrogations, I never laid hands on anyone. We extracted information in a battle of the wits." He added that he was proud that he "never compromised my humanity." Henry Kolm, 90, an MIT physicist, told the Post, " We got more information out of a German general with a game of chess or ping pong than they do today, with their torture." Several of the veterans used the occasion, upon receiving honors from the Army's Freedom Team Salute, to state their oppositon to the war in Iraq and methods used at Guantanamo Bay. Peter Weiss, a longtime friend of The Nation, a fearless champion of nuclear sanity, international law and human rights, spoke movingly. " I am deeply honored to be here, but I want to make it clear that my presence here is not in support of the current war." Another veteran, Arno Mayer, a professor emeritus of European history at Princeton University and a longtime contributor to the Nation, refused the award out of concern that he and the others were being used by the military today to justify their acts. "We did spooky stuff then, so it's okay to do it now." But what the Veterans' revealed so strikingly was the disgust these former interrogators-- in a war that posed a greater threat to America's survival than the so-called "war on terror"--have for the cruel, inhuman, degrading and illegal techniques called for --and condoned-- by the Bush Administration.
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bless those noble old warriors. they are a national treasure to be cherished...
salute...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 12:08am
But these guys are so...Daddy's war, so pre 9/11...
(overlooking the fact that they won, too)
Posted by skeletonman at 10/08/2007 @ 02:13am
one more piece of the puzzle speaks out.
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/08/2007 @ 02:18am
"this government does not torture people."
"I am not a crook,"
Posted by hsuBfools at 10/08/2007 @ 02:22am
Did the Nation editorialize on those revelations when they came to the surface in November 2005?
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 04:54am
Try to keep up with CURRENT events; we are talking about what the US Government has done vs. what it is likely doing now and dissenbling about.
Posted by skeletonman at 10/08/2007 @ 06:45am
I understand why the hamsters don't have the wits to outsmart ossama's boys in a game of chess. Conservatives are stupid. But come on, the hamsters don't even have what it takes to beat al qaeda at a game of ping pong.
Posted by Will C. at 10/08/2007 @ 08:54am
now that's really fucking stupid
Posted by Will C. at 10/08/2007 @ 08:54am
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 04:36am
Have you and your WWII witnesses no shame? Only last year the British govt released official papers attesting to a torture center run by the British during WWII.
To top it off, the Labor govt, after the war, kept that center at full throttle, torturing communists.
And what shame, pray tell, are Katrina and the Ft. Hunt veterans supposed to have about this? They were not working for the British Government during or after WWII and had nothing to do with these actions by that government. So why bring it up here? The whole point of Katrina's article is that we, the United States of America managed to interrogate thousands of high-value Nazi prisoners without torturing them and still got the intel we needed to win. What other governments and interrogators may have done (and apparently did do) is irrelevant to that observation.
Posted by Stwriley at 10/08/2007 @ 09:00am
and didn't we, the people who don't torture, have to pull the asses of those who did out of the fire back then.
Torture is an act of desperation. That is the level to which hamsterland has reduced this great country
Posted by Will C. at 10/08/2007 @ 09:04am
The guy that "wrote the book" on interrogation for the US Army has came out against Chimpy long ago. Anybody that is not a scared sheep knows that harsh techniques are counterproductive. They produce more false information than good info. But, torture makes the Christian Taliban feel tough and resolute.
whattsa matter, MARKY, can't determine the difference between Britain in 1945 and the US in 2007? Is it the English that got you?
Listening to, reading the frightened sheep, I am having a hard time telling the difference between them and the Islamic terrorists.
Lets see:
"god is on "our" side
Dead civilians are just part of the game
Who cares where the money comes from
Torture is fine, as long as it makes us feel safe
We need wmd's to feel safe
Working with dictators is cool, fun, and good for business.
Posted by crabwalk at 10/08/2007 @ 09:17am
Support "the troops".
Listen to them.
ahhh, off to the DMV tomorrow. I am packing a lunch. MAASCH, I'll let you know how it went....
Posted by crabwalk at 10/08/2007 @ 09:18am
Posted by SKELETONMAN 10/08/2007 @ 06:45am Posted by STWRILEY 10/08/2007 @ 09:00am
SKELE, STW....'fraid you guys aren't quite familiar with our newest poster MARKKRISTALLNACHT....allow me to introduce you...from "Prison Reformers Finally Set Free" by Matthew Blake...
"You ask: WTF are you implying? "It's all the jews fault"? Correct this presumption, (created by reading you post), if you can/ desire to.
I'm not implying nothing, I'm saying it straight out you dolt. ----Posted by MARKCANYON 10/07/2007 @ 11:10am
MARKY seems to have a problem with Jewish folks...not just AIPAC, not just Israel, not just Zionists. He's the real deal anti-Semite.
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 09:20am
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 04:36am
it's the "cosi fan tutti" defense, again.
Posted by johannesrolf at 10/08/2007 @ 09:21am
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 09:20am
But the Israelis are exxccellleeenntt at torturing people. Marky Mark should be proud of them, doing what needs to be done so he can feel safe, tough and superior.
Posted by crabwalk at 10/08/2007 @ 09:23am
Posted by JOHANNESROLF 10/08/2007 @ 09:21am
you never cease to amaze me. Again in a good way. We need more like you, fewer cowardly neo-cons.
Peace all. Wish me luck at the center of all evil, the DMV, hopefully I will not encounter any teachers or dirty bombers.
Posted by crabwalk at 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am
CRAB, here's MARKNUREMBURG's view of Nazi Germany, btw...
BLOG | Posted 10/05/2007 @ 5:23pm Prison Reformers Finally Set Free by Matthew Blake
"For one bright moment that came to view well enough in Europe when there were no people of color to confuse the picture. Then the right people, for once, were locked up, and put on Death Row, and sent to gas chamber. For a short moment the picture was clear and honest folks knew what to do.
That gave the crooks a fright. That was when they hollered like stuck pigs and forced America into war, and bombed Europe to rubble. ----Posted by MARKCANYON 10/06/2007 @ 1:15pm
(my bolds)
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am
Katrina's article is just another example of how our generation just doesn't hold a candle to the Greatest Generation. They went through economic & political crisis that make ours pale by comparison, and STILL they managed to do it right. We can even keep our bridges up.
Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 10/08/2007 @ 09:29am
Peace all. Wish me luck at the center of all evil, the DMV, hopefully I will not encounter any teachers or dirty bombers.
Posted by CRABWALK 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am | ignore this person
most amusing.
if and when we get our country back, I'm not sure we will still know what to do with it.
Posted by johannesrolf at 10/08/2007 @ 09:42am
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am
Cripes!!
I logged back on to do a quick weather check. Almost sorry I did. That's some sick stuff. I never did check back to see Marky Marks list of Waxman's corrupt cronies. Could be like Ponti's witch hunt list.
didn't I start my career here citing Rev Niemoller?
could be time for a refresher course in basic humanity for the neo-cons.
Posted by crabwalk at 10/08/2007 @ 09:58am
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am |
its a credit to kvh that the guy is allowed to post. think he appreciates?
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 10:09am
Posted by IBBLEBLIBBLE 10/08/2007 @ 10:09am
Probably not. But I did read his response to me back on the other thread. He is, believe it or not, an anti-Semitic SOCIALIST! Claimed that Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia were "working" because they kicked out (or killed) the Jews.
Weird, but again, not worth it. Put him on Ignore.
Now what's FUNNY is...JOHANNESROLF. He read MARK and demanded "Where's the outrage?". Yet, he's got so many of us on Ignore himself (for the unmentionable sin of disagreeing with him) that HE CAN'T SEE that we WERE outraged!
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 10:20am
MARKCANYON, I'm still waiting for an answer from the previous thread regarding what you'd do to the Jews and Leftists if you had the chance. No answer? I am neither, although I'm thinking you must consider it an honor to embrace a philosophy that millions of Brits, Americans, Russians and French fought and died to crush unequivocally. NAZI's ARE LIKE THAT.
Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 10/08/2007 @ 10:29am
George Bush and his Authoritarian Conservative Republicans are pro-torture, because they want to train monsters who will follow any order. Torture turns the people who carry it out into monsters, useless to a peaceful society, you see - US Soldiers would not shoot into crowds of Americans. BlackWater, would.
Blackwater has been involved in operations primarily aimed at training them, to use what they learn against patriotic Americans someday. Many of them are former military, which means they have been trained to be patriotic. By training them to torture and massacre with impunity in Iraq, Bush is getting together a force that he thinks will stand up to the well regulated militias of patriotic Americans. Bush is wrong, BlackWater is wrong. We will cut off your supply lines, we will have training as good as yours, you will be in our territory, nothing but bandits in the woods. Patriotic Americans will hunt down your BlackWater militias, and you just wait and see, you will be utterly destroyed: surrender now.
Posted by conshame at 10/08/2007 @ 11:03am
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 10:20am
i think it might be JR's alter ego sock puppet...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 11:33am
Any true freedom loving, decent American should hang his/her head in abject shame. Torture and all the other authoritarian bs is disgusting.
How much more must these rogues do before the Dems will fulfill the Constitutional duty and impeach the bastards?
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/08/2007 @ 11:33am
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 10:20am | ignore this person
bet he's not a sarah silverman fan...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 11:37am
I sure do miss arguing about blowjobs.
Posted by Dr Decibels at 10/08/2007 @ 12:04pm
I sure do miss arguing about blowjobs.
Posted by DR DECIBELS
Yeah, where is all that outrage?
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/08/2007 @ 12:19pm
surrender now.
Posted by CONSHAME 10/08/2007 @ 11:03am
CS flying her broom over Moyock City, NC, smoke-writing "SURRENDER ERIK!" to the crowd below!
heheh
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 12:49pm
bet he's not a sarah silverman fan...---Posted by IBBLEBLIBBLE 10/08/2007 @ 11:37am
MARKMENGELE probably was with a Jewish girl, but discovered their evilness "during the physical act of love...Yes, a profound sense of fatigue, a feeling of emptiness followed. Luckily he was able to interpret these feelings correctly. Loss of essence...
He can assure you it has not recurred, Mandrake. Women, er, women sense my power, and they seek the life essence. He does not avoid women, Mandrake...but I do deny them my essence."
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 12:53pm
Peace all. Wish me luck at the center of all evil, the DMV, hopefully I will not encounter any teachers or dirty bombers.
Posted by CRABWALK 10/08/2007 @ 09:26am
No bombers, but you will find all "working" there, shuffling papers, collecting your fee(tax), were all educated by those teachers in public school...and they have "peaked" in their careers, (good thing there is no competition,eh?), as the likes of EMPTY, WILLC(for sure Will,)and SHAFTINGALL AND CONSHAMEDAGAIN have, anxiously awaiting their next newly found right...from the treasury.
Posted by john maasch at 10/08/2007 @ 1:00pm
"But the two Guardian reports I linked to show that Germans were tortured horribly in London cellars. Theheroic interrogators TheNation cites know it. KVH knows it. The people here knew it who read the papers. You all certainly know it now. But none of you give a damn. You let the vanden Heuvels and Navaskys lead you by the nose." Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 1:23pm | ignore this person
Now Mark, isn't it possible the the noble Americans didn't know what the British were doing. Isn't it also possible that under Clinton no one knew that the policy of rendition would lead to torture. Give us Americans credit for being innocent bystanders. We thought they were all sitting around with pizza and beer playing a friendly game of ping pong.
Posted by RAGGEDSTEP at 10/08/2007 @ 1:36pm
If you havn't seen the post how do you know I'm blind?
In any event, I've seen enough of yours to know that any debate between you and anyone on here would be the intellectual equivilant of The Battle of the Alamo (you being the Texans)
Sieg Heil!
Chip
Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 10/08/2007 @ 2:09pm
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 1:23pm
Jesus, dude, blow it out your ass already.
Posted by Dr Decibels at 10/08/2007 @ 2:26pm
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 1:23pm | ignore this person
Jesus, dude, blow it out your ass already.
Posted by DR DECIBELS 10/08/2007 @ 2:26pm
i believe that's what he's been doing since he arrived
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/08/2007 @ 2:29pm
Don't these pukes have somewhere else to play?
Freeperville.com all full up?
Posted by Dr Decibels at 10/08/2007 @ 2:30pm
MASK
MARKMENGLE!!!??
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! FREAKIN GREAT!!
Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 10/08/2007 @ 2:47pm
Sorry, Mengele (hehe)
Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 10/08/2007 @ 2:48pm
No bombers, but you will find all "working" there, shuffling papers, collecting your fee(tax), were all educated by those teachers in public school...and they have "peaked" in their careers, (good thing there is no competition,eh?), as the likes of EMPTY, WILLC(for sure Will,)and SHAFTINGALL AND CONSHAMEDAGAIN have, anxiously awaiting their next newly found right...from the treasury.
Posted by JOHN MAASCH
Don't you have some child labor in India to exploit, you old fool?
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/08/2007 @ 3:17pm
Posted by FROSTY ZOOM 10/08/2007 @ 2:29pm
Well, I gotta say, I'm debating taking MARKEICHMANN off Ignore.
Subtle anti-Semites are no fun, since they might be taken seriously (METTEYA for one)...but an honest-to-gosh, no "Godwin's Law"...NAZI SYMPATHISIZER on the TN blog would be a hoot.
Plus all his "poor, poor Nazis" stuff puts one of a mind of JOHANNESROLF and his endless "Germans were the real victims of WW-2" stuff.
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 3:58pm
If it was right to bomb flat Germany and kill millions of their civilians, and martyr tens of thousands of German Nazis why not Jewish Nazis? Why was exterminating them 65 years ago the good war, but exterminating the same people today, unacceptable?
Posted by MARKCANYON
Prior to Adolf's unsanctioned recovery of German territory he was an ally of the West, a "bulwark" against communism. Many in Western Europe and the US admired the Nazi state.
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/08/2007 @ 4:30pm
Speaking of Professor ROLF....do anybody REALLY think we could get this lucky?
BLOG | Posted 10/05/2007 @ 10:50am What Democracy Looks Like in Costa Rica by John Nichols
OK kids here it is, I'm outta here.this will be my last post.
Posted by JOHANNESROLF 10/08/2007 @ 10:04am
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 4:33pm
Posted by MTSPENCE05 10/08/2007 @ 4:30pm
Empty, ol' pal....do you realize who you're talking to?
"For one bright moment that came to view well enough in Europe when there were no people of color to confuse the picture. Then the right people, for once, were locked up, and put on Death Row, and sent to gas chamber. For a short moment the picture was clear and honest folks knew what to do.
That gave the crooks a fright. That was when they hollered like stuck pigs and forced America into war, and bombed Europe to rubble.....Working people must come to their senses. We must defend the innocent against the true enemy. We need a prisoner exchange: Blacks out, Jews in."-----Posted by MARKCANYON 10/06/2007 @ 1:15pm
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 4:36pm
I was a POW interrogator in VN. Never once did I resort to torture even after witnessing inhuman treatment inflicted on my fellow Marines. It is well proven that torture does not produce good intelligence. Period.
Posted by James Large at 10/08/2007 @ 4:36pm
Posted by MASK
I'm not commenting on his posts. I merely pointed out that reprehensible regimes are often US allies.
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/08/2007 @ 4:56pm
Excerpts from John Kerry's congressional testimony in 1971
I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command....
They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.
Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/08/2007 @ 5:09pm
Well, I gotta say, I'm debating taking MARKEICHMANN off Ignore.
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 3:58pm
no way dude.
i play soccer.
i play football.
i play tennis.
i play frisbee.
i don't play rascistdiatribeball.
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/08/2007 @ 5:21pm
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 12:53pm
i find her hot and repulsive at the same time...
this nazi guy seems to be enjoying the attention. what do you think? 16?
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 6:26pm
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 3:58pm |
yeah...he IS honest and up front...no meely-mouthing, thats for sure...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 6:30pm
2008 Presidential Election Weekly Poll
www.votenic.com
Results posted Tuesday evening
Posted by votenic at 10/08/2007 @ 7:23pm
Posted by MTSPENCE05 10/08/2007 @ 4:56pm
Odd, if that was your point, that you forgot to mention Stalin?
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 7:33pm
Posted by IBBLEBLIBBLE 10/08/2007 @ 6:26pm
Silverman? Yeah, but I suspect it's mostly act. Kind of like a hot Jewish "Dice Man". Sheen will be off it in 1-2 years as she can't keep "topping herself". Then she marries Kimmel, gets preggers, and goes all "mommy" in her humor.
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 7:35pm
BTW, wanna bet MARKHIMMLER would drool all over himself if somebody like Yasmine Bleeth even talked to him (despite her "racial impurity")?
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 7:38pm
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 7:38pm
I'd prefer not to imagine, what a personality like that would want to do with/to a woman.
Posted by Malcontent at 10/08/2007 @ 7:46pm
Posted by MALCONTENT 10/08/2007 @ 7:46pm
Oh, I figure MARKPOGROM would quote "Danny Vermin" from "Johnny Dangerously"....
"Dames are put on this earth to weaken us, drain our energy, laugh at us when they see us naked."
Posted by Mask at 10/08/2007 @ 7:51pm
Posted by MASK 10/08/2007 @ 7:38pm | i
looks like little goering is gone.
yeah, silverman cracks me up...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 7:52pm
During my tenure in VN, we gleaned a great deal of actionable tactical intelligence by demonstrating that we, the US Marines, were human and humane. We really did try to win the hearts and mines of enemy. Our approach was hugely successful. We were able to convince many Viet Cong to change sides and cooperate with us.
Unfortunately, like the current fiasco, our "win the hearts and minds" program came way to late in the war to really have any widespread effect on the war. What a shame!
We used tried and true interrogation methods on those who would not cooperate. The methods we used were designed and perfected by those honorable men at Fr. Hunt even before I was born.
Those methods did not include ANY physical abuse. None.
Two examples:
(1)While interrogating a recently captured Viet Cong, I strutted back and forth delivering questions rapid fire and did not allow the POW to answer. He was sitting on the floor in his underware and I towered above him. Several fellow interrogators were in the next room watching him behind a one way mirror. As I turned to strut back in front of him, I inadvertantly stuck MY hand in a rapidly rotating fan that had no grill. It hurt like hell, but to salvage the interrogation, I just continued walking out a door with no expression on my face. Once, outside I bent over in pain. My fellow Marines in the next room began howling in amusement. They also noticed the POW's wide eyed fearful expression.
I regained my composure reentered the room and renewed the interrogation. The POW soon began cooperating and signed a Chu Hoi "line crosser" affidavit in which he swore alligence to the South Vietnamese government. His status changed immediately and he began helping us. During a subsequent conversation, he told me that when he saw and heard me sticking my hand in the fan, he thought that since I was so hard core that pain didn't bother me, he would have no choice but to cooperate. He also expressed his wild surprise that we had not tortured and abused him.
(2) I was called to a MASH hospital in Da Nang to interrogate a seemingly high ranking enemy officer POW. The POW was severely wounded. I put on rank insignias showing a rank similar to the rank we though he held. The doctors and nurses were attending him while we spoke. He was on a bed in the same ward that housed many wounded US Marines and soldiers. One of his wounds was a bullet wound that entered and exited in the meaty portion of his right thigh. The doctors and nurses were quite irritated that I wanted to immediately speak with their patient and hindered me at every opportunity. Finally, I explained that the man more that likely had information that could save American lives. They relented. It was necessary to clean the bullet wound by passing a rod tipped with an antiseptic solution though it. It was obviously a painful process for the POW. I tried to leverage the pain he would have had to endure regardless if I was present or not. He immediately took notice of my machinations and told me his name rank and unit in almost perfect and unaccented American english. He also told me that he had nothing else to say to me. He died minutes later without ever speaking another word.
I learned a number of lessons from this man. One of those lessons was the meaning of the word respect. Another was that I could accomplish my military mission while, at the same time, perserving my own personal integrity and humanity.
I walked away from the war in VN with my integrity and humanity intact.
As I see it, the difference between the men at Ft, Hunt, me and my fellow Marines and the cowards at AG are very clear.
We had great training. We had great leadership. We had personal honor and integrity, The Marine Corps held us accountable for our actions and we held each other accountable.
The AG cowards had no training, no leadership, and no honor or integrity. The reason is that their entire chain of command right up to and including Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld let them down. Those son of a bitches need to be held accountable. When my generation and my father's generation said, "We don't torture." We meant it.
Impeachment, conviction, and removal from office is the only way to hold them accountable. Unfortunately, that is "off the table."
Posted by James Large at 10/08/2007 @ 8:41pm
Posted by JAMES LARGE 10/08/2007 @ 8:41pm
thanks for your service. really...
Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/08/2007 @ 11:35pm
Unfortunately, that is "off the table."
Posted by JAMES LARGE 10/08/2007 @ 8:41pm
well, they need SOMEWHERE to count the money.
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/08/2007 @ 11:49pm
Tragically, that is "off the table."
Posted by Malcontent at 10/08/2007 @ 11:52pm
Your are very welcome ibb, and yes malcontent it is very tragic.
Posted by James Large at 10/09/2007 @ 02:26am
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/08/2007 @ 2:52pm
Alright, I put this off knowing it was a thankless task, but I'll wade into the logical quagmire now and show Mark the error of his ways (at least as a commenter.)
Mark, If you're going to post here and not end up ignored by everyone (and I do mean everyone; right, left and center) then you'd better learn that this kind of rampantly illogical argument does not fly. I don't doubt that you wowed them with this nonsense wherever it is you came from, but here at The Nation we tend to be a bit harder to impress and less than fond of a pile of logical fallacies dropped on us like a "gift" from the birds. So, as a public service, I'm going to tackle this pile and show you why no one here will take your posts seriously until you change your ways.
KVH and those Ft. Hunt investigators who are so indignant over interrogations in Iraq know what went on in WWII, but they pretend that was the good war.
Of course, it doesn't help that you start off with a glaring logical fallacy in your first sentence. Indeed, this is a compound fallacy, since you manage both to start with a classic ad hominem fallacy to impugn the character of KVH and the Ft. Hunt team and then move on to blatantly begging the question by implying that they are ignoring evidence that contradicts their position. That might actually be a legitimate line of argument in itself if there were, in fact, any sign of such evidence in the lines that followed this one (or indeed in any other source) but there is not. Thus you beg the question by trying to set up such an idea as factual when it has no basis.
They know what the British did, and they know what the Americans did. They know that at Dachau, GIs hacked to death with entrenching tools Nazis who had surrendered. They know the US let thousands of malnourished Waffen SS prisoners die of disease and exposure in POW camps after the war by keeping them on low rations and denying them heat in the bitter cold winters of 1945 46. That was the good war. That brutality and murder were justified because those were Nazis. But it is is not justified against Islamists. Why not?
This paragraph is, alas, what passes for evidence in this little screed. The entire thing is an exercise in false analogy (your third logical fallacy, if someone's keeping score) since none of these cited cases has anything to do with torture performed by Americans, or indeed with torture at all, which is the subject of Katrina's article. So you've already failed utterly in your purpose at that point.
Beyond that, you present much of this as though it's equivalent, which it is not. Your first incident (the Dachau Massacre) is well documented and old public knowledge, since that Army released the full report back in 1991. While this was clearly covering up a war crime (summary execution of prisoners) it was both understandable (they had just liberated Dachau) and irrelevant to the current torture debate, which is about systematic policy, not a singular incident (and one that isn't even torture.)
Your second example is just as irrelevant and only speculative at best in any case. There is no evidence whatsoever that any systematic or purposeful attempt was made to starve or kill off SS prisoners after the war. Privation in the camps does not prove this, and Army records indicate rather that it was supply problems that made rations short over the 1945-46 winter (they were largely being trucked in, since German production was almost nonexistent.)
Neither of these examples bears on the question in hand at all, so the rest of your question too is irrelevant. Indeed, it is a form of post hoc fallacy to make this argument at all, since you are essentially arguing that because bad things (in general) have been done in the past during wars that this somehow justifies doing these things now against different people. That is not only logically fallacious, but morally reprehensible.
Why is no one indignant about the torture inflicted on German socialists and communists by British Labor party socialists?
Well, actually people are indignant about the allegations, as you pointed out in your original post, but that still doesn't make what the British did during and after WWII relevant to Katrina's article, which was about what the U.S. did in terms of interrogation during WWII as opposed to now. That makes this another false analogy, I'm afraid.
If it was right to bomb flat Germany and kill millions of their civilians, and martyr tens of thousands of German Nazis why not Jewish Nazis? Why was exterminating them 65 years ago the good war, but exterminating the same people today, unacceptable?
And for your final logical fallacy of the day, may I present the complex question fallacy wound up with with a false analogy, a strong shot of ad hominem and just a hint begging the question. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we have four logical fallacies in the same paragraph.
You must have thought this a wonder of logical entrapment, Mark, but I'm afraid that you'll find this kind of trap only captures your own foot. You wind up so many unsupported assertions into this thing that no one is going to answer because they can't logically accept all the unproven premises. It's a junk question that means essentially nothing because it has no reference to empirical reality.
So much for this wade through the swamps of illogic. I hope you'll take this to heart, Mark, and not go the way of RESE or Plunger, but I doubt it.
Posted by Stwriley at 10/09/2007 @ 07:20am
Odd, if that was your point, that you forgot to mention Stalin?
Posted by MASK
Actually it was Britain's aversion to the Soviet regime that allowed Hitler to get away with so much.
The Soviets were not US allies until the Nazi invasion in June 1941. The raison d'etre for the partnership ended with the defeat of Nazi Germany. In all the years following the Soviets were viewed as the enemy.
The usual apples and oranges bs from the little bitch, attempting to twist, distort, confuse.
Posted by mtspence05 at 10/09/2007 @ 10:22am
....a thankless task,...
Posted by STWRILEY 10/09/2007 @ 07:20am
Not true, thanks, that took a bit of work.....and even more work to understand :-)))!
Posted by Happy at 10/09/2007 @ 11:15am
Posted by STWRILEY 10/09/2007 @ 07:20am
As happy said, not a thankless task. Thanks.
But a pointless one. The poster in question has not misinterpreted facts, to reach an erronious conclusion, which could, potentially be corrected.
He has started from his desired (for whatever twisted reason) conclusion and is frantically scraping up any idea or "fact" which he can use, misinterperet or selectively reference, to support his delusions.
He is lost and hoping someone will follow him, so he won't feel so alone in this big, bad world of mean ol' jews. Don't think he made many new friends here, either. Poor little fascist.
I'd save your considerable ability to shred poor logic, for those who were at least attempting to be logical.
But, either way, thanks again.
Eric
Posted by Malcontent at 10/09/2007 @ 11:55am
Posted by JAMES LARGE 10/08/2007 @ 8:41pm
James,
Thanks much for this story and your service, both are invaluable. I hope that you have/will set down your experiences during your service, it's something we need more of in history. If people really understood war from the soldiers perspective, there'd be a lot less support for war except as a last resort.
Happy and Eric,
Thanks guys, I do feel that an occasional troll slaying is the price of posting ;-)
Posted by Stwriley at 10/09/2007 @ 12:20pm
I enjoyed the dressing-down a great deal.
Thank you, STW, for the effort.
Posted by drhammer at 10/09/2007 @ 12:33pm
By the way, in her book "Shock Doctrine", Naomi Klein explains how everyone knows that torture produces unreliable intelligence. It is used as a terror tool, to suppress dissent by setting a horrific example for the rest of the populace during the implementation of authoritarian policy.
I am currently about halfway through her book, but I am prepared to recommend it to all of you already. It is at least eye-opening, if not somewhat disconcerting.
Posted by drhammer at 10/09/2007 @ 12:41pm
Posted by STWRILEY 10/09/2007 @ 07:20am
wow.
well done.
i just said he was an idiot and put him on ignore.
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/09/2007 @ 10:36pm
"...specialists in sailing around in the air all day farting putrid rubbish."
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/10/2007 @ 10:12am
Self-analysis?
Posted by Malcontent at 10/10/2007 @ 6:50pm
You are hard to ignore. Like a 4 year old, standing in the middle of a room full of adults....screaming inanities at the top of you wittle wungs.
Posted by Malcontent at 10/10/2007 @ 6:53pm
Posted by MARKCANYON 10/10/2007 @ 10:12am
You could not be more wrong. Rampant and illogical arguments are what fly best around here. Because most of you, and you are a prime example, are empty headed windbags, presumptuous and pretentious puffs. You and your buddies are specialists in sailing around in the air all day farting putrid rubbish.
"And as I end the refrain, thrust home!" (with a h/t to Edmund Rostand [gutenberg.org])
It seems I struck a tender spot, but Mark remains unedified. So I shall draw my rhetorical sword once more, to dispose of the wounded, though I fear at this point (having been reduced to alliterative aspersions) Mark is more like the "Black Knight" of Holy Grail fame than even the most inept of Cyrano's foes. So, on with the rhetorical version of "I'll have your legs next."
As to the ignore button, that is not a threat. You can tear out your eyeballs and slash your eardrums for all I care. Actually, I prefer not to have your backtalk, it is invariably ignorant or idiotic, when it is not hypocritical or dishonest.
Ha,ha,ha,ha,ha! Unwarranted arrogance is always an amusing sight, especially when coupled with the inability to actually understand the terms you're using Mark. When exactly, for instance, have I shown the slightest tendency toward hypocrisy (leaving aside the aspersions cast by your other labels, equally without merit)? Could you even define a hypocritical statement or do you simply throw the word out because you know it to be insulting without bothering to see if it's applicable? Really, this sinks even lower than the rampant illogic of your last post. Still, we may as well see what you've shot back with below and whether you can identify logical fallacies any better than you can define "hypocrisy."
Your excursion into logical fallacies is an example. You begin by confusing an ad hominem with an execration or an insult. Hyperbole and even venom as expressions of disgust or anger, do not validate or invalidate a subsequent argument, any more than does a joke or a rendition of Dixie.
When I contradict KVH and the Ft. Hunt investigator's boast of their subtle and non-violent WWII interrogations, by showing WWII torture houses in London, that is anything but a circular argument. You merely prove, you don't know what a circular argument is.
And the answer is found right off the bat: no, you cannot identify logical fallacies with any more facility than you showed on your first attempt. Let's review for clarity, shall we? I said that this was first an ad hominem for the simple and correct reason that its purpose was to impugn the current testimony of Katrina and the Ft. Hunt team by referring to knowledge and situations that did not pertain to the argument they are making (i.e., that the U.S. did not torture prisoners for information during WWII as a matter of policy, based on their experience as men who applied the actual policy.) That makes this a classic ad hominem by definition rather than a use of invective or hyperbole, which may only serve to express emotional states or attitudes in debate, not to seek to undermine the opponent's credibility based on irrelevant reference.
Then of course you go on to compound your logical misidentifications by misconstruing the fallacy that I referred to, a shabby and low rhetorical technique if there ever was one, a debased form of straw man (you're adding in new fallacies to supplement your old ones, but who's counting, right?) I accused you of begging the question, not of making a circular argument at all, a very different and quite accurate characterization. By using the British actions you imply that this is equivalent to the U.S. having done this themselves at the time and thus that the Ft. Hunt men's testimony is impugned. Your statement here reiterates that as the basis for this attack on their testimony (the ad hominem above) and proves that you are attempting to assume the truth of your conclusion by reference to irrelevant data. That is a form of begging the question, and one of the subtler applications too, I'll grant you, but still a fallacy and the one that I first identified.
You have found a site listing logical fallacies but as you are hanging by your fingernails off the brittle chalk of your dementia that site only helps show your crumbling faculties.
Ah, once again the mark has been struck (and yes, I meant it...) I may be a bit older than the average commenter here (though probably not) but I'm still a bit away from dementia yet. Nor do I rely on anything but my own command of logic and its formal expression when I wade into your little screeds. I do keep a website on the list for my students, however, which I'll pass along here, as you could obviously use the reference yourself: Stephen's Guide to the Logical Fallacies [onegoodmove.org].
Now, let's move on with this little exercise and get to the heart of the matter; your "evidence" and the entire reason I termed this line of argument irrelevant and a false analogy.
Of course the Dachau incident is known, otherwise I could not cite it and you could not google it. But that is the point. Were the many Allied war crimes not widely known then KVHs claims of a good war sixty years ago, in contrast to today's dirty war would be justifiable. But, as you suggest, everyone who googles the issue for ten minutes knows otherwise.
And here we get to the heart of the problem. You insist on this erroneous straw man of "the good war" which appears nowhere in Katrina's argument. Indeed, she and the Ft. Hunt team make only reference to the U.S. use of torture now and lack of it then, not to the war in general at all (except at the end where Katrina implies that WWII "posed a greater threat to America's survival than the so-called 'war on terror'", which still does not claim it as a "good war", only as a more important one.) All of your evidence, from the use of torture by the British MI19 (first revealed publicly by the Guardian in 2005 in this article and this article) to the post-war incidents at Dachau and in POW camps is essentially to support the point that this was not, in your estimation, a "good war". But that is not relevant to the point Katrina is making, nor is her argument coutered by your evidence. Indeed, your own argument on the "good war" front acts as a support to Katrina's position, since if WWII was not a "good war" in the sense that we did some bad things during it, then the fact that we chose not to use torture on prisoners stands in even starker contrast to what we are doing now than if we had never done anything during WWII that might be morally dubious (and there were certainly cases of dubious moral behavior by the U.S., both as individual citizens and as policy, like the use of civilian bombing campaigns). To quote a bit of Shakespeare: "Besides, there is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if it come to the arbitrement of swords, can try it out with all unspotted soldiers." [ Henry V, Act 4 Scene I]
Evidence of war crimes (like the Dachau incident), covered up or not, are not evidence of official policies to commit such actions nor of torture (as official policy or not) and the actions of allies, then unknown to the U.S. (indeed not known to anyone outside of a handful of foreign office and MI personnel in Britain until 2005, as the Guardian articles make clear) do not contradict the fact that the U.S., by policy and practice, did not torture prisoners (even high value ones) for information, which was Katrina's point and no other. So the whole basis of your argument is fallacious from the beginning and then compounds this problem by rampant illogic even when making that irrelevant argument.
As far as my expertise on this matter, I first read of the Dachau incident when the documents were released back in 1991, in my early days as an historian. I am a military historian by training, though I specialize in early modern strategy. My mentor at that time, however, was a well known WWII military scholar so this would hardly have passed him or his students by unnoticed. I do know how to use Google well, though, and I've found most of the sites you probably get your info from (all seriously right-wing and/or neo-nazi, with a conspicuous lack of citations or real sources) though I'll not increase their traffic by posting them here. What I see from you, and from the sites that makes claims like yours, is a serious lack of any supporting evidence for your interpretations of events. Your excursion into the murky waters of post-war German deprivation below is a fine example; you push an interpretation that misrepresents the actual evidence available and weave around it (in much the same way as this article [rense.com] does) a conspiracy to kill German POWs that has no basis in the facts as we know them.
As to the deaths of thousands of German POWs, especially in the special stockades for Waffen SS prisoners, that you think that is irrelevant proves my point. Nor is it unsubstantiated speculation. Books have been written about the tens of thousands who perished, after the war, because they were not strong enough, and not fed enough to resist the severities of those living conditions. There were even attempts to bring Eisenhower to trial on signed documents that he specifically ordered those privations and sought those deaths.
Here we find you combining that same repugnent rhetorical trick (misrepresenting my argument by claiming that I consider the deaths of POWs irrelevant when it was readily apparent from the context that I meant the evidence this provided was irrelevant to the argument you were trying to counter) with this twisted conspiracy-based view of history. The history of the post-war military government of German is a mature topic in history, having been worked over well by a host of scholars. The actions of Eisenhower, as military governor have been scrutinized for at least 55 years and there has never been a shred of evidence that he deliberately sought the deaths of German POWs, nor of any German once VE-Day arrived (except through the legal means of the court systems then in place.) The attempt to "try" Eisenhower was a farce, based on the documents he signed to change most POWs status to "Disarmed Enemy Combatants" (thus allowing them to be given the civilian food ration rather than the POW one under Geneva rules, and also allowing them to be released for labor, as many were) and never had any chance of success for the simple reason that it was groundless.
For a solid and factual discussion of the post-war system see this article [hnn.us] at History News Network and this article [globalsecurity.org] at GlobalSecurity.org. As I said before, all the evidence available points to nothing more than the general shortage of food across Europe (and especially in Germany) and the decisions that had to be made by Eisenhower and many others on how best to distribute what was available. It was neither purposeful starvation nor was it some sinister scheme to kill off German soldiers or SS, it was a simple matter of a nasty post-war clean-up that was inevitable from the moment Hitler led Germany into war in 1939. With a wreaked economy and widespread dislocation (and a poor 1945 planting season) shortage was inevitable in Germany, and the U.S. was powerless to prevent this (indeed, to do so would have been beyond the capacity of even U.S. shipping even then.)
So, not only is your interpretation of these events utterly incompatible with the facts, but it still has the same nasty logical flaw at its base that I identified the first time: it's still a false analogy in the context of the original argument. Conspiracy or not, this has nothing to do with the point Katrina was making about the use of torture, which this was not (technically what you're claiming it is, is "genocide") and is thus not applicable to the argument. This does not minimize or under-rate the death of any actual person who may have died in those POW camps, but that is not what our current debate is about, it is about the use of torture, as policy, to extract information from prisoners; the topic of Katrina's article.
If you want examples of illogic and crass stupidity, it is in your insistence that none of that bears on vanden Heuvels meanderings. Her point is that the US govt nowadays is behaving in an unprecedentedly cruel and illegal manner as against America's correct and honorable behavior in the past.
And once again, I reiterate: Katrina's argument is that in WWII, in much more dire circumstances, we did not resort to torturing prisoners for information, and now in less dire circumstances we do, as a matter of policy. Your attempt to expand this beyond that scope (to this generalized "good war" motif) is a straw man of the first order. I can only suppose you resort to it because you know that you'll have no leg left to stand on if you try countering Katrina's (or my) actual arguments. And with that, I swing my rhetorical sword for the final thrust home...and take off those legs.
P.s.
Now do me a favor and put me on ignore. I don't have time for pathetic poseurs and twaddlers.
Oh no, not now that you've made me treat you like a recalcitrant student. I'm going to have to stick around and oversee your education.
Posted by Stwriley at 10/12/2007 @ 4:45pm