Compassionate Conservative Tortures Logic

I once spent two weeks attending the Army Interrogation School. There was no good reason for me to go there. I was in the Air Force Reserve and training to be a debriefer for Operation Homecoming, the hoped for return of American PW’s from North Vietnam. Our PWs were being interrogated and tortured in Hanoi. The military had a school for interrogators. That was the only connection. I didn’t need to learn interrogation techniques to debrief a returnee.  They sent me anyway. It wasn’t a very exciting school and it was held in Baltimore, not an exciting city in 1971. The curriculum was typically dry and lifeless. But right from the start we learned that we didn’t torture people. Torture didn’t work. Army policy, US policy was we didn’t torture people. The whole idea of interrogation was to establish rapport, develop a relationship and to outsmart the prisoner using various tried and true techniques most of which you’ve seen Andy Cipowicz and the other cops use on NYPD Blue:"Good cop; bad cop,” “We know all,” ect.. However, what the Army taught me has been very helpful. First, I’ve made it a rule never to torture anyone. Irritate, perhaps, but never torture. Second, the Army taught me how to ask questions. The key is to never ask a question that can be answered “yes” or “no.” You pose your question in such a way that an essay type answer is required. Instead of, “Did you charge $372 on the Visa?” you ask “What did you get for $372?” Obviously, a wily subject may refuse to answer or counter with a question of their own. (It’s easier to get answers to your questions when your subject is, in fact, your prisoner). American pilots were tortured by the NVA. They were tortured quite brutally. Men like Senator McCain had their arms tied behind them with a rope tightly strapping their elbows together. The arms were in the same position as the yoga stretch where you grasp your hands behind your back and straighten your arms as high as you can. From here another rope was looped around the rope holding the elbows and tossed over a rafter. The arms were pulled up until the pilot’s feet were off the ground. This put terrible stress on the shoulders and ribs were popped loose from the sternum. This torture didn’t elicit any important intelligence but McCain and many others have lifelong disabilities from this and other torture techniques. Our country was angry as we learned our airmen were being treated this way. It will be inconceivable if Senator McCain compromises in any way in the protection of the Geneva Convention on treatment of prisoners. It is also inconceivable that an American President is arguing for the legal right to torture when it has been long established that torture has no value.

Comments

[sarah]

so, what DID linda get for $372???

[ann]

Cheating Is, is not Unacceptable!