Can We All Agree Waterboarding is TORTURE?

Question

Daniel Levin, then acting assistant attorney general, went to a military base near Washington and underwent the procedure to inform his analysis of different interrogation techniques.
After the experience, Levin told White House officials that even though he knew he wouldn't die, he found the experience terrifying and thought that it clearly simulated drowning.

http://abcnews.go.com/WN/DOJ/story?id=3814076&page=1

WASHINGTON - A former interrogation instructor for the Navy said the words Thursday that congressional Democrats wanted to hear from Attorney General-designate Michael Mukasey: "Waterboarding is torture, period."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071108/ap_on_go_co/congress_torture_6

As Keith Olbermann said, "..There are rules. And even if we just make up these rules, this country observes them anyway because we're Americans, sir. And we're better than that and we're better than you..."

http://youtube.com/watch?v=arWJ358tZgU

Answer 1

It is torture! Any of you who have said it isn't ever come close to drowning? I have, it is one of the most frightening things in the world! At the time it is happening, you have time to think of what is happening to you! You know that you can't breath because you will take in water & if you take in water you will have to try I cough & if you cough you will only take in more water! You try to hold your breath, but you can only do it so long, especially if you are unprepared! It is sheer torture & if you don't believe it, let someone do it to you & you will find out quickly how terrifying it truely is to be subject to this form of non-torture! I am well aware of how these people we are fighting do things to our troops, but aren't we better than that, no, it won't stop what they do to our people but, we don't have to stoop to their level!

Answer 2

YES

Amrit Singh, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, testifified how harsh interrogation techniques -- including waterboarding -- are both illegal and ineffective for gaining reliable intelligence.

Congress has enacted four statutes and ratified two treaties that prohibit torture of all kinds. By any reasonable reading of the statutes, waterboarding is a crime. Waterboarding is also considered illegal under both Senate-ratified treaties.

The applicable laws are:

The federal Anti-Torture Act; the federal War Crimes Act which, even as amended by the Military Commissions Act, bans acts such as waterboarding; federal criminal assault laws, which, under the PATRIOT Act, apply to all assaults by or against Americans on or in overseas facilities designated for the use of the federal government; the McCain Amendment in the Detainee Treatment Act; the Senate-ratified Convention Against Torture; and the Senate-ratified Geneva Conventions (particularly Common Article 3, which prohibits torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees).

"While we support legislation to put the entire government, rather that just the Defense Department, under the Army Field Manual on Interrogations, waterboarding has long been a crime," said Christopher Anders, senior legislative counsel for the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. "Other than administering electric shocks or using the rack, it is hard to find a more clear-cut form of torture than waterboarding."

Answer 3

Waterboarding is a useful tool if it saves lives as it did when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 1993 WTC bombing and 9/11, gave up the names of 60 fellow terrorists.

Why don't you ask the families of the 3,000 9/11 victims what they think of waterboarding if it would prevent another 9/11 from happening?

As for torture, Saddam Hussein and his two crazy sons knew what torture was and how to apply it on Iraqi citizens who displeased them.

http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/silenced/torture.htm

Waterboarding is "simulated drowning". If it were real, then the prisoner could die, and if the prisoner dies, then the prisoner cannot give up information.

Torture under Saddam was permanent damage to whatever part of your body was being mutilated.

Answer 4

Yes, waterboarding is torture.

Answer 5

Yea well pulling out a big knife and sawing someones head off is quite a bit harsher than water boarding or flying a plane into a building and killing thousands. This is what you call a necessary evil, one that I have no problem with I would go as far to say that give them to me and I would have them singing like a bird.

Answer 6

apparently a lot of ignorant answerers here seem to think it's only torture if arabs do it.

much like they condone murder of innocent civilians with no recourse.

and they are convinced we are the good guys. these kind of people are seriously mentally ill.

Answer 7

I do not care if it is torture or not, until the insurgents put on a uniform and declare a themselves a country we do not HAVE to abide by the Geneva convention with them. I am sure every Lib here would want that procedure done to their childs captor to find their child.

Answer 8

Yes. I agree. Now, SO WHAT? If you injure anyone in my family, I guarantee you an education into medieval and modern torture techniques that could last WEEKS!
Geneva rules do not apply in Iraq.

Answer 9

No, hacking off body parts is torture. Of course what the enemy likes to do doesn't get the coverage, either that or a bunch of libs find a way to justify it.

Answer 10

No it doesnt even remotely compare to what has been and will be done to US soldiers

Ever been in a fight? Did you observe rules that a boxer in the ring would have to observe or did you street fight? Are you less of a person because you kicked your assailant in the nads or are you still the better person?