Tuesday, December 9, 2014
"Obama, Bush teams battle over torture report"
"What I keep hearing out there is they portray this as a rogue operation and the agency was way out of bounds and then they lied about it," former vice president Dick Cheney told The New York Times. "I think that's all a bunch of hooey. The program was authorized. The agency did not want to proceed without authorization, and it was also reviewed legally by the Justice Department before they undertook the program."
Here is one of the Justice Department lawyers that wrote the so called "torture" memos.
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54 comments:
Enhanced interrogation was done during the Clinton administration, something Democrats like to dis-remember.
You'll never catch Hussein saying "a bunch of hooey," he surreptitiously gives his enemies the finger, much more sophisticated.
Is Feinstein punishing the voters for turning them out of power in the midterms?
Hell hath no fury...
Haz is correct. They outsourced the torture to other countries. Something that the present administration is probably doing too. Why do you think that Kerry doesn't want this story to see the light of day?
Feinstein is providing cover that will overwhelm the Gruber hearing. It'a orchestrated.
Plus, she was accused of leaking CIA info after the CIA spies on her computers. A part of this is her revenge. and she can do it while seemingly blaming Bush.
More reasons to hate politicians.
Haz, Lem and AllenS are all right. For once Feinstein is proving Obama's promise that this will be "the most transparent Government in history" to be true. You can see right thru her..
This bullshit of releasing the report the same day Gruber testifies works soooooo well on Obama's dipstick supporters. While they're all masturbating to the so-called torture report they all manage to miss the biggest story that affects their party's prospects. They're liars. Just stinking cynical sanctimonious liars, and colossally stupid besides. Die, Democrats, die. Their pain and unawareness of their impending doom gives me tremendous satisfaction.
You can actually hear the nerve induction litany running rapidly in the background behind the testimony as they dive and dodge and slither from answering directly and faintly grin when delivering an evasion.
"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing....only I will remain"
And all the craptastic liberal channels are covering the report while avoiding the testimony. BBC is spluging all over itself. None are covering Gruber testimony, and yet, it is the thing that destroys them.
I'm watching the Gruber hearings. Brutal. Trey Gowdy turned Gruber into a box of shredded wheat.
And a congresswoman just described to the head of CMS how her husband died because ObamaCare didn't cover the cost of a test he needed.
Holy crap.
Here's Gowdy. Not for the faint of heart.
During Trey Gowdy's career as a prosecutor he never lost a case. Never. Won every time.
Tough guy, big brains. Pretty hard for even an MIT PhD to get around that fact.
I recall a Asian looking guy who worked for the justice department writing a book where he said that every aspect of the enhanced interrogation techniques was approved by justice including the length of times and the number of times it could be done.
The guy was on the talk show circuit that included John Stewarts Daily Show.
For the life of me I cant remember the book nor the guys name.
John Yoo
Rabel, your link doesn't work, but it encouraged me to go out and find it... thank you.
What a drubbing by Gowdy of Gruber. And what an ass clown is Gruber, lying through his teeth, glib remarks indeed. What a coward, too. Own your damn words Mr. PhD of MIT.
I have not enough interest to read through the torture report, as imo waterboarding is not torture. Was there anything else of import?
All you need to know about all the Congressional Demos who screamed, "Torture", came from one of their own -
They were for it before they were against it.
And that was only because Dubya's approval was in the 90s.
Rabel, yes.
I was trying different iteration and kept coming up with the film maker.
Pelosi and Feinstein were well aware of these torture methods and approved of them/did nothing to stop them. Awful people, both of them.
Gruber being questioned by Gowdy looked close to tears. His little name plate at the hearing says "PhD." How insecure are you that you have to have your degree on display? Ah'm smaht, not dumb like everybody says, I'm smart and I was stepped over.
The release is political, true.
The packaging is too.
Nevertheless, this stuff is repulsive. Unworthy of our country.
President Obama could have outlawed it. I doubt the Republicans will. They will want to be able to do it, all the while saying, oh but we won't...
XRay, That's interesting about the failed link. It doesn't work for me either now. It did earlier. I always check by opening a link in a new tab when I preview a comment. It takes me to my Blogger page now.
I cleared my cache between the time I posted and your reply. Maybe that mucked it up. I may have learned something.
And just checking one more time, now it takes me to an "about.blank" blank page. I suspect the NSA.
And checking again, an earlier link in the MH's "Last Christmas" post still works. Definitely NSA.
You can find the Gowdy video by googling "gowdy gruber hearing" and selecting video. The whole hearing pops up, as well as the vid of Gowdy.
At some point, possibly on this blog, there was a big discussion about Dianne Feinstein and how she's got depth and background in government and intelligence (more so than Boxer though that's not saying much) and is basically good even and despite the occasional shady self-serving financial deals and leftish lurching. She still occasionally calls out Obama so she's okay was the argument. I took the position that at the end of the day she, like all other lefty politicians, serves herself and/or her party first and America second/third if at all.
I win.
We all lose, of course, from this.
These Dems are throwing America under the bus for political cover.
Whores!
The same Feinstein lecturing from on high called the House committee on Benghazi "a hunting mission for a lynch mob."
Fr. Martin,
I respect that opinion when it comes from a man of the cloth much more than when it comes from an out-of-power-at-the-time opposition politician.
And I agree that EIT's are repulsive.
But let me ask (and I'm sure you're familiar with the "ticking time bomb" scenario), in your mind is there ever a situation in which their use would be justified?
If the answer is no, then are you willing to accept a share of the responsibility for the lives lost when the bomb goes off if we had the planners in custody and did not use all legally justifiable means to stop it?
I support what the CIA did not because of the limited information we did obtain, but because of the information that we didn't obtain - because it didn't exist. That being information about another major terrorist attack. There wasn't one under development, but we did not know that at the time and could not preclude the possibility, so we water boarded and stressed the men we held who would have known.
That last paragraph is poorly written, but if you can understand my question, I would like to hear your answer.
With all the important issues facing this country and what do we get?
Non-stop discussions about local police abuse in Ferguson and NYC, the torture of a few terrorists years ago, and a college gang rape that never occurred.
Its almost as if the MSM doesn't want to discuss the real issues.
Rabel:
Torture is always wrong, as is murder, rape and all other evil. Absolutely nothing can ever justify it.
If you argue that *some* circumstance justifies torture, then my counter is, where do you draw the line? Will you say some circumstances justify rape? What about extorting confessions by harming children? (One of the CIA tactics.) do you defend those as possible tactics, if the circumstances call for it?
How about medical experimentation on prisoners? Where do you draw the line?
Do you really need me to epxlain why this consequentialism is wrong and perilous?
Will y'all do me a big favor? Please go to my blog. Link on the sidebar. I'm having trouble accessing it, and I wonder how big a problem this is. Thanks.
John Yoo is good with Richard Epstein every couple of weeks over at Law Talk. 67 episodes archived and there's a new one.
I can't help noticing that all the responses, so far, to the torture report have been to:
> Point out how political it is (true);
> Explain how reckless it is about national security (likely true);
> Deny that the tactics were in violation of existing law;
> Point to "context."
All of which skirts the essential question: were the alleged acts of torture -- oops, I mean enhanced interrogation techniques -- TRUE?
Is it true that our folks threatened to rape someone's mother, and kill someone's children, in order to get information?
Is it true that they essentially raped -- er, "rectally rehydrated" -- prisoners?
Inquiring minds want to know.
If you say that these techniques are always wrong, then you put the comfort of the killers and your own moral comfort above the lives of the innocent who will die in extreme discomfort, in great numbers and at your command when you could easily force the the immoral murderers to suffer instead. And. it's very important to remember that these evil people will not really be harmed with any lasting physical injury. Their victims on the other hand will be dead, burnt, broken, maimed, and more. Again at your discretion. I find that the far more offensive choice that is unworthy of our country, or anyone who takes protecting the innocent as a duty.
We bomb innocents all the time to protect our own. Is that off limits, or does our sensibility only apply to causing fear and humiliation to evil people. It seems backwards to me.
BTW, my mother used to rectally hydrate me as a child. It's called an enema, and the torture device is available at your local pharmacy. Is my mom a war criminal?
Fr. Martin,
We obviously disagree on what constitutes torture.
This is why I used the phrase "legally justifiable". The DOJ provided that justification and rules on the means.
In my mind rape is not justifiable, nor harming children. Did those things happen or are threats being reported as actions?
Medical experimentation - no. Did that happen or are definitions being expanded for the sake of winning an argument?
But I'm OK (for known members of foreign terrorist organizations who we have reason to believe may possess information about pending acts of mass terror or the location and identity of past perpetrators) with coercive interrogations and stress inducement if there is no lasting physical harm to the detainee. Likewise water boarding and forced feeding or hydration if conducted within previously debated and approved guidelines with medical supervision.
The context and the threat we faced at the time justified these "tortures".
But I must go back to the question of responsibility. Had there been another 9/11 plot in process and we held men who knew the details, would the people railing against "torture" be willing to accept responsibility for the consequences of our failure to extract this information by using legally justifiable means, unpalatable as they may be?
How many innocent lives would you be willing to sacrifice to keep your conscience clear?
I'll add one more thought - I think it's a good thing that a Priest takes the position that you do. A politician entrusted with providing for the safety of the public, not so much.
By the way, your website kicked me out on my first click then let me in on the second.
BagOh said:
If you say that these techniques are always wrong, then you put the comfort of the killers and your own moral comfort above the lives of the innocent who will die in extreme discomfort, in great numbers and at your command when you could easily force the the immoral murderers to suffer instead.
Sorry, but that's not very coherent. Do you believe anything is always wrong? If so, doesn't this fall back on you, when you draw your lines?
Or, do you seriously consider ANY tactic acceptable in war? Please expand on this. You would, for example, torture infants, if it would work?
Either you draw a line -- as I do -- or you don't. Which is it?
And it's very important to remember that these evil people...
Does that "evil people" include those who were released because of mistaken identity? How about the mentally challenged individual who was held, not for anything he did, but as leverage on someone else (not in captivity? Is he "evil people" too?
... will not really be harmed with any lasting physical injury.
So the rule is, "no lasting physical injury"? I'm thinking pouring hot wax over various parts of their body won't do "lasting physical injury." Same with rape, carefully conducted. There are lots of heinous things that involve no lasting physical injury. Even cigarette burns will heal. You're OK with those as possible tactics then?
Their victims on the other hand will be dead, burnt, broken, maimed, and more. Again at your discretion. I find that the far more offensive choice that is unworthy of our country, or anyone who takes protecting the innocent as a duty.
So, again, you will justify any evil, because of evil done? You have NO lines, is that it? To be clear?
We bomb innocents all the time -- deliberately? If so, that's wrong too. Since when does one wrong justify another? We used to enslave people -- since we used to do it, by your logic, it's still OK.
This is not logic, this is fury.
BTW, my mother used to rectally hydrate me as a child. It's called an enema, and the torture device is available at your local pharmacy. Is my mom a war criminal?
Seriously?
Let's try this another way. A man has sex with his wife -- she doesn't consider that rape.
So whenever he has sex with any other woman, it can't ever be rape...right?
Or maybe the issue of consent and intention make a difference?
Rabel:
We obviously disagree on what constitutes torture. This is why I used the phrase "legally justifiable". The DOJ provided that justification and rules on the means.
Is your argument that torture is whatever the government says it is? Do I really have to explain the problem with that approach?
In my mind rape is not justifiable, nor harming children. Did those things happen or are threats being reported as actions?
Jamming something up a man's rectum, against his will, for no medical reason, where that person can give consent, is usually called rape. What would you call it? And, yes, they do this, according to the report.
And yes, they did threaten to rape one person's mother, and to kill someone's child. One hopes they were bluffing; but an obvious bluff has no value as a threat, right?
Medical experimentation - no. Did that happen or are definitions being expanded for the sake of winning an argument?
No, it didn't happen. I brought that up to ask, in effect, where do you draw the line; and you said no to it. Now my question is this: why is your line-drawing better than mine? Why are the techniques you defend OK, but medical research, not OK? Because you've defended your position on utility; and I would argue, pointless pain has less utility than medical experimentation. So why one, and not the other?
But I'm OK (for known members of foreign terrorist organizations who we have reason to believe may possess information about pending acts of mass terror or the location and identity of past perpetrators) with coercive interrogations and stress inducement if there is no lasting physical harm to the detainee.
So, emotional or psychological harm is OK? Why is that more acceptable than physical harm? Which would you rather lose -- your mind or your pinkie toe? Under your line-drawing, cutting off a toe is forbidden, but not causing emotional wreckage.
The context and the threat we faced at the time justified these "tortures".
So, at what point would the "context and threat" justify things you have so far ruled out?
How many innocent lives would you be willing to sacrifice to keep your conscience clear?
It's not me "sacrificing" them. I'm not God, and neither are you. Thinking we are, and doing what belongs only to him, is generally a bad idea.
On my blog, I posed a hypothetical: the President is told New York will be vaporized unless he imposes martial law, converts to Islam, and then through the government, imposes Islam on America. Under your reasoning, if you were President, there is only one choice: submit and impose martial law. You'd save lives.
This kind of consequentialism leads to very ugly places. Just because you say, oh, I'd never go there, doesn't mean you won't end up there.
Fr. Martin,
Your emotional response to the Feinstein report has led you to the use of hyperbolic argumentation and a misrepresentation of the views of those of us who chose to engage with you on the subject.
That's understandable and, up to a point, admirable, but doesn't contribute to a useful discussion on the issue.
You seem to be a good man who does good work, but your vision on this matter is clouded by what appear to be pacifistic views on the conduct of national security.
I'm willing to give your viewpoint due consideration, but you must make honest and accurate arguments for that to happen.
Father,
You ask me where my lines are, but every line you draw still leaves innocent people, possibly women and children, terribly hurt, maimed and dead. Unless my actions to stop that produce even more harm, how can I justify letting those innocents die just to get myself into heaven.
Many more Germans civilians were killed than Allied in WWII, so should we have let them win instead. In this debate of Enhanced Interrogation we are only talking about things that are a world of difference less vicious than what we all know is necessary to assure that good wins over evil. I believe we are blessed by having these less vicious techniques available. The alternative is to let us be killed or resort to something far worse.
I have said before that if it didn't already exist, waterboarding would be a dream invention we would be searching for, because of the much worse things it would allow us to avoid doing.
Soldiers often come back from combat broken by what they had to do, but I think most of them and us know they did the right thing if the enemy is truly evil intentioned, and I don't think there is any question about this enemy.
We use Enhanced Interrogation techniques specifically because we ARE more decent than our enemies. Otherwise we would use the techniques they use. If we stop using E.I., it will be temporary until we have paid enough of a price in death and destruction to make us rethink just how bad they are by comparison. That may seem a noble sacrifice, but the lives lost will be an unnecessary and thus immoral sacrifice paid to serve our vanity.
BagOh:
Many more Germans civilians were killed than Allied in WWII, so should we have let them win instead.
No one is advocating that. That's a red herring. But my question is, if we decide to become more like our enemies out of the notion that this is what we "must" do in order to win, then why, precisely ought WE to win?
Why do we deserve to win? If we choose to do evil ourselves?
In this debate of Enhanced Interrogation we are only talking about things that are a world of difference less vicious than what we all know is necessary to assure that good wins over evil.
Good? But your whole argument is that good is negotiable; we can -- and in fact must -- trade away our goodness, for the sake of winning.
First, I don't accept the premise that we must do that. That is an unproven assertion. If you choose to make the assertion that victory for our side cannot be obtained, but at the price of sacrificing our own virtue, then I respectfully challenge you to prove that assertion.
We use Enhanced Interrogation techniques specifically because we ARE more decent than our enemies. Otherwise we would use the techniques they use. If we stop using E.I., it will be temporary until we have paid enough of a price in death and destruction to make us rethink just how bad they are by comparison. That may seem a noble sacrifice, but the lives lost will be an unnecessary and thus immoral sacrifice paid to serve our vanity.
The problem with your calculation is rather plain. Pardon, I don't mean this to be personal -- but it's quite narcissistic. Of course we're going to claim we're more virtuous, even as we cross one line after the other, always justifying it by the ends.
Do you really suppose that people who engage in that sort of negotiation -- it's only a little sin, it's only a small crime -- can really trust themselves to say, OK now, I've really gone too far this time!
Society is littered with people who were and in some ways still are very decent, and yet -- they wake up one day and realize they've followed a terrible trail of mounting corruption. It always starts small, with very tiny compromises, "only one more," and lots of good intentions.
BagOh:
It occurs to me that there is a terrible conceit in what you're saying. You seem to think it lies in your power, or mine, to assure that innocent people don't get hurt.
Where did you get this notion?
Of course we all want to protect the innocent. But you're saying something different: that morality and virtue must be sacrificed, so long as any innocent people are unprotected. And the justification you seem to offer is, that we'll protect more; and as long as some remain unprotected, then more moral baggage must be tossed overboard.
But under this seems to be the assumption that someone (you? the government? God Almighty?) has given you this omnipotent responsibility. Or, given it to the U.S. military.
And, as I say, the unstated assumption seems to be that this is actually an attainable goal.
I dispute all these assumptions.
After all, if I'm right, you might give up every bit of morality, bit by bit, all in pursuit of protecting the innocent; and when you've nothing left to sacrifice, and there are still innocents unprotected, what then?
And if you really mean this -- that the line must move as long as there remain innocents to protect, then my question remains entirely fair: what evil won't you allow, for the sake of saving some remaining "innocent"?
It seems to me, that calculation has to mean, in the end, sacrificing someone a little less innocent, for the sake of someone, a little more innocent.
Isn't that sort of the rationale being used by those who shrug off the harms done by false or reckless rape accusations? Because, after all, a climate that tolerates more false accusations is a climate that is better for the more worthy victims, those who are raped. This is almost exactly what Lena Dunham and the Rolling Stone apologists are arguing.
Why doesn't your line of reasoning end up there?
Rabel:
I admit I argued rather sharply earlier, and I regretted that later; but I don't believe I argued inaccurately. That was not my intent.
As far as being a pacifist, you misread me. Not at all. But I believe that justice and morality are even more needed in times of war and crisis, precisely because that's when, under the press of "crisis," we tend to shed them under duress.
Example: we brutally and sinfully bombed the hell out of Dresden. It was wrong. And it was not necessary. And yet we did it, supposedly because, well, it's war and if you don't bomb Dresden cruelly, then what kind of person are you? Such was, and always is, the sort of war-fury that drives a nation in those times.
This is such an ancient problem. It fascinates me that in AD 2014, many people argue that our circumstances are unique -- unlike any other -- and therefore, we are exempt from the moral laws that always prevailed before.
We're not unique; it's our conceit to think we are.
(As an aside, I would argue that while the peril we face is not to be dismissed, it's hardly "the worst ever." The Cold War has a better case, with a truly global struggle, a hidden enemy with vastly more resources, and the unique peril and moral dilemmas arising from missiles heading toward you that will arrive in less than 30 minutes, and wipe out everything. The moral dilemmas the President now faces, in confronting terrorists, don't hold a patch to that.)
Thanks for the response.
We're not all that far apart. It's a matter of where we draw the line and our ability to hold to that line in times of crisis. My line is farther to the cruel side than yours and I think that we can stay within certain boundaries.
Your example of Dresden is a good one. It was a close call and not a clear cut right or wrong. There was resistance (primarily from the U.S. side) in the military, but, had I been there, I don't know that I would have made the decision, but I would have supported it.
It's especially tough to win a war without a good bit of that "war-fury" for motivation.
"The problem with your calculation is rather plain. Pardon, I don't mean this to be personal -- but it's quite narcissistic. Of course we're going to claim we're more virtuous, even as we cross one line after the other, always justifying it by the ends. "
No, these techniques are clearly and demonstrably less viscous than what our enemies use, or even what we would have used in the past, or what we will use once we have to save ourselves from more serious people.
"It seems to me, that calculation has to mean, in the end, sacrificing someone a little less innocent, for the sake of someone, a little more innocent."
That is an artificial situation that does not exist in the world we are struggling in. So in the real world, are you really happy with presenting that degree of difference between innocent victims of terrorism and people who behead aid workers?
You are trying too hard to justify the pacifism of watching people be killed in service of your self-image of a benevolent champion who need not get his hands dirty.
I just don't think the option is really available. Nor do I find the techniques we use so terrible in a war situation we did not create, nor that we wish to fight, but that we find ourselves duty bound to win. And we just don't need to win, but prevent the death of innocent people.
You take my point to the extreme in order to find it's limits. That's worthwhile, so lets do it with yours. Would you use these methods on the ISIS beheader to prevent the nuking of an American city? Where is the line?
I said:
"The problem with your calculation is rather plain. Pardon, I don't mean this to be personal -- but it's quite narcissistic. Of course we're going to claim we're more virtuous, even as we cross one line after the other, always justifying it by the ends. "
BagOh said:
No, these techniques are clearly and demonstrably less viscous than what our enemies use, or even what we would have used in the past, or what we will use once we have to save ourselves from more serious people.
Well, there seem to be several clear inferences from this statement, do you really mean them?
For example, do you really mean to say that the measure of our "goodness," our virtue, is being less vicious than our enemies?
Second, you assert that our virtuous-because-less-vicious tactics are less vicious "than we would have used in the past"...
I'm not sure what you mean here. Who is "we"? Which past? Without knowing these, I'm not sure your statement is accurate. But so what? Again, is your definition of virtuous, "less vicious than the worst of our forebears"? Same problem as the first inference.
"... or what we will use once we have to save ourselves from more serious people."
What do you mean here? What sorts of even more vicious things are you allowing for, if necessary? Back to my same question: how far will you go?
I said:
"It seems to me, that calculation has to mean, in the end, sacrificing someone a little less innocent, for the sake of someone, a little more innocent."
BagOh said:
That is an artificial situation that does not exist in the world we are struggling in.
Not at all. It's precisely what happened with CIA interrogations, if the reports are accurate. A mentally challenged man was held, not because of anything he did, but because his imprisonment could be leverage on some baddies to whom he was related.
Further, some of the CIA's captives were misidentified. They may well have been innocent; but they were clearly less innocent, so...guess what happened to them?
So in the real world, are you really happy with presenting that degree of difference between innocent victims of terrorism and people who behead aid workers?
No, I think my point is clear. Once you start saying -- as you are -- that some greater good justifies sacrificing moral principles, I fail to see how you don't arrive at sacrificing the less-innocent for the more-innocent. But if you can explain to me just how you keep a hard back-stop against that, I'd like to know. We're discussing your own moral decision-making; I'm trying to understand it, and I can't do that without more help from you.
You are trying too hard to justify the pacifism of watching people be killed in service of your self-image of a benevolent champion who need not get his hands dirty.
I am not a pacifist -- unless by "pacifist" someone who won't rule out any measure of moral sacrifice and depravity, in order to win. I'm pretty confident General Eisenhower was not prepared to do anything to win -- would you call him a pacifist?
You take my point to the extreme in order to find it's limits. That's worthwhile, so lets do it with yours. Would you use these methods on the ISIS beheader to prevent the nuking of an American city? Where is the line?
No, I would never use these torture methods. Never means never. Some things are always wrong. Always means always.
If you believe that, then at some point, you too will say, "No, I will not do that in order to win."
So far, you have given every indication that there is, in extremis, absolutely nothing you would not do, no moral principle you would not sacrifice. Now, I actually think that's not true -- that you do have your limits. But I keep asking you to tell me what line you would absolutely never cross, and you keep remaining silent on that one.
I can't help wondering if you won't concede your own no-go lines, precisely because then you know, I will pose the same question to you about a city being nuked.
Rabel:
I'm not trying to be tiresome, I am trying to drill in on something important.
About Dresden. You say,
It was a close call and not a clear cut right or wrong. There was resistance (primarily from the U.S. side) in the military, but, had I been there, I don't know that I would have made the decision, but I would have supported it.
If you mean, the destruction of the city was -- as a military necessity -- a "close call," I'd like to see more proof for that contention.
My understanding is that was not the justification offered for doing it. It was offered as a means both of retribution, and as demoralizing the civilian population (as was other bombing; Dresden -- and Tokyo -- were just particularly horrific).
And my point is that Dresden only becomes no longer "clear cut right or wrong" precisely because of the decision to say, moral values are luxuries we sacrifice during war. It's a conceit to think, oh, I can compromise my capacity for moral decision making this time and this time -- but it will still work just fine when I get to that point, seemingly so far away.
All human history tells against this. When we make these compromises, it's our very capacity to see what's right or wrong that we are corrupting.
Rabel:
I'm not trying to be tiresome, I am trying to drill in on something important.
About Dresden. You say,
It was a close call and not a clear cut right or wrong. There was resistance (primarily from the U.S. side) in the military, but, had I been there, I don't know that I would have made the decision, but I would have supported it.
If you mean, the destruction of the city was -- as a military necessity -- a "close call," I'd like to see more proof for that contention.
My understanding is that was not the justification offered for doing it. It was offered as a means both of retribution, and as demoralizing the civilian population (as was other bombing; Dresden -- and Tokyo -- were just particularly horrific).
And my point is that Dresden only becomes no longer "clear cut right or wrong" precisely because of the decision to say, moral values are luxuries we sacrifice during war. It's a conceit to think, oh, I can compromise my capacity for moral decision making this time and this time -- but it will still work just fine when I get to that point, seemingly so far away.
All human history tells against this. When we make these compromises, it's our very capacity to see what's right or wrong that we are corrupting.
Father,
You state that my position is "...some greater good justifies sacrificing moral principles,"
But that's not my position. I'm saying that saving innocent life is my top moral principle. My other principles of avoiding humiliating someone,or making them uncomfortable or scared is just not equal- especially, but not exclusively - if they are a known terrorist.
Your position, as I understand it, is the reverse. You are willing to sacrifice innocent life to avoid scaring, humiliating or making someone uncomfortable, even if that person is a known murderer who wants to kill more, or even thousands more.
I simply can't imagine justifying that to the people who I would be dooming, or their surviving loved ones, but as unpleasant as it might be, I can justify to people, and to my God, and I could live with myself after saving those lives through these enhanced interrogation techniques.
You just have to imagine actually having that choice to make, and having to face the real outcomes. I would sacrifice a lot of my other principles to save innocent life. That's what nearly every soldier in combat is asked to do. Nobody wants to kill a man, or drop bombs on a city, but there are degrees of bad, and I guess our lines are just different.
I thank you for the discussion here. I respect you, and maybe we can have at it again sometime.
BagOh said:
Your position, as I understand it, is the reverse. You are willing to sacrifice innocent life to avoid scaring, humiliating or making someone uncomfortable, even if that person is a known murderer who wants to kill more, or even thousands more.
That is not my position. But if I understood your last reply correctly, you are interested in drawing this to a close, so I will simply let it lay there.
Fr. Martin,
Wikipedia has an excellent article on the bombing of Dresden. It presents both sides of the argument.
Contrary to your statement, the justification at the time was military, but as I said, it was a close call.
I'll pull this quote from "Bomber" Harris, "I do not personally regard the whole of the remaining cities of Germany as worth the bones of one British Grenadier." and say that if I were in the shoes of that British Grenadier then - bombs away.
Rabel:
I won't argue the point further about Dresden being a legit military target, without doing more work on my own.
But this wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_bombing_during_World_War_II
Addresses the broader point, which is the decision the allies made to use bombing not for destroying military targets, but for terrorizing the civilian population. I had included Dresden in that project, and Tokyo as well. I think my earlier arguments still apply to this broader example, if not Dresden.
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