Is this really who we are? Is this really America?
I write the following under a time pressure: The Senate Judiciary Committee is slated to vote on this confirmation tomorrow, November 6.
The Sequel - Brought to you by the gang who confirmed Alberto Gonzales as chief of Torture and Wiretapping:
For weeks now the country has been debating the nomination of Judge Michael Mukasey to succeed Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General. A month ago, it looked to be a ’slam dunk’ for this confirmation to succeed unanimously. Both Dems and Republicans seemed to agree that Mukasey would do a ‘heckuva job,’ despite a few misgivings and grunts about some radical decisions made about Presidential powers being outside the scope of law (or something equally ‘quaint’ and unimportant).
That was until his confirmation hearings last month, during which Mukasey was asked by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) if he considered waterboarding a form of torture…leading to the following dodge:
MUKASEY: If waterboarding is torture, torture is not constitutional.
SEN. WHITEHOUSE: If it’s torture. That’s a massive hedge. I mean, it either is or it isn’t. Do you have an opinion on whether waterboarding…is constitutional?
MUKASEY: If it amounts to torture, it is not constitutional.
SEN. WHITEHOUSE: I’m very disappointed in that answer. I think it is purely semantic.
MUKASEY: I’m sorry.
His refusal to categorize waterboarding as torture is downright scary, particularly for the man likely to fill the highest law enforcment slot in the land, and in addition being expected to restore the dignity and effectiveness of the Justice department.
Waterboarding has been around for centuries in various forms:
Developed during the Spanish inquisition at the same time as the Rack and Thumbscrew, for centuries it was used extensively in various European wars, and was among techniques used by organized Christianity to ‘Honor the God of Love and to convince unbelievers of the truth and beauty of the One True Faith.’ (Perhaps things haven’t changed all that much…).
In more modern times, it was used by American soldiers on Filipinos during the Philippine-American War, by the Gestapo and the Japanese in WWII, by the Khmer Rouge and used extensively in most recent conflicts in Africa. American troops were investigated for their use of waterboarding in Vietnam.
There is NO debate about whether this is torture:
While there is nothing new about these methods, there has never been a debate about whether waterboarding was torture. It Was. And IS:
—After WWII, we prosecuted Japanese officers for such crimes at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.
—The UN Convention Against Torture prohibits mock executions and the UN committee in charge of enforcing the UNCAT has reprimanded the U.S. for it’s use of waterboarding.
—The Army Field manual specifically prohibits Waterboarding and other forms of torture to be used in interrogations.
—The State Department has repeatedly reprimanded other nations for use of these techniques in it’s annual Human Rights reports.
—The American Psychological Association has written a resolution against torture, specifically condemning ‘water-boarding or any other form of simulated drowning or suffocation.’
—Allen S. Keller, M.D., director of the Bellevue Hospital Center/New York University Program for Survivors of Torture, in written testimony to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, stated:
To think that abusive methods, including the enhanced interrogation techniques [including waterboarding], are harmless psychological ploys is contradictory to well established medical knowledge and clinical experience. These methods are intended to break the prisoners down, to terrify them and cause harm to their psyche, and in so doing result in lasting harmful health consequences.
According to Keller, long term effects or waterboarding include “panic attacks, depression and PTSD [post traumatic stress disorder],” and that it poses a “real risk of death.”
—In Senate Judiciary Committee hearings in 2006 on the prosecution of terrorists, the Judge Advocate Generals from each branch of the military all unanimously and unambiguously agreed that ‘Waterboarding is inhumane and illegal and would constitute a violation of international law, including Common Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions.’
—Finally, last week a group of retired generals and admirals, also ex-Judge Advocate Generals of the military, wrote a letter to the Judiciary committee to dispel any doubt about this manufactured dispute. Excerpts include:
Waterboarding is inhumane, it is torture, and it is illegal.
This is a critically important issue - but it is not, and never has been, a complex issue, and even to suggest otherwise does a terrible disservice to this nation
Waterboarding detainees amounts to illegal torture in all circumstances. To suggest otherwise - or even to give credence to such a suggestion - represents both an affront to the law and to the core values of our nation.
So…What exactly is Waterboarding?:
The media is enabling this debate by muddying up exactly what Waterboarding is. It is not simply pouring a bucket of water on a detainees head. It is not a quick dunking like you see at the county fair (as Dick Cheney would have you believe).
It is a mock execution playing on one of the strongest human primal fears: the fear of drowning. But according to one expert, it is not a mock drowning - it IS a drowning, from which one may or not be rescued at the brink of death.
From a soldier (and terrorism expert) who has experienced waterboarding firsthand as a victim and a witness:
(I urge you to read this disturbing first hand description in it’s entirety)
Waterboarding is not a simulation.
Unless you have been strapped down to the board, have endured the agonizing feeling of the water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel your throat open and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs, you will not know the meaning of the word.
Waterboarding is a controlled drowning that, in the American model, occurs under the watch of a doctor, a psychologist, an interrogator and a trained strap-in/strap-out team. It does not simulate drowning, as the lungs are actually filling with water. There is no way to simulate that. The victim is drowning. How much the victim is to drown depends on the desired result (in the form of answers to questions shouted into the victim’s face) and the obstinacy of the subject. A team doctor watches the quantity of water that is ingested and for the physiological signs which show when the drowning effect goes from painful psychological experience, to horrific suffocating punishment to the final death spiral.
Waterboarding is slow motion suffocation with enough time to contemplate the inevitability of black out and expiration –usually the person goes into hysterics on the board. For the uninitiated, it is horrifying to watch and if it goes wrong, it can lead straight to terminal hypoxia. When done right it is controlled death. Its lack of physical scarring allows the victim to recover and be threaten with its use again and again.
Call it “Chinese Water Torture,” “the Barrel,” or “the Waterfall,” it is all the same. Whether the victim is allowed to comply or not is usually left up to the interrogator. Many waterboard team members, even in training, enjoy the sadistic power of making the victim suffer and often ask questions as an after thought. These people are dangerous and predictable and when left unshackled, unsupervised or undetected they bring us the murderous abuses seen at Abu Ghraieb, Baghram and Guantanamo.
The Administration Knows this is torture:
ABC News last week revealed that in 2004 a high ranking Justice Department Official tasked with reviewing the administration’s legal position on torture was so concerned with the technique of waterboarding that he went to a military base to experience it himself.
Daniel Levin was at the time acting Assistant Attorney General, having replaced another official who himself had quit the department after 9 months because of disagreements over torture and interrogation tactics. Levin was asked to write a memo on these tactics to replace a controversial one removed by his predecessor.
Levin’s new memo began: ‘Torture is abhorrent both to American law and values’ and went on to say that waterboarding could be illegal torture unless performed in a highly limited way and with close supervision…and that he believed the Bush Administration had failed to offer clear guidelines for its use.
After being waterboarded, he 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.
So Where are we now?
One would think that a refusal to call waterboarding torture would be reason to refuse Mukasey’s confirmation accross the board.
But two important committee members late last week (Schumer and Feinstein) came out saying that they will reluctantly vote ‘yes’ to such a confirmation.
As far as I can tell, their reasons are spineless as always (they are Democrats, after all).
Something to the effect that ‘this is the best nominee we will get from George Bush’ or the other standard response ‘We just want to move forward.’
So give these wet noodles a call and shake them up. This is truly important. Tell them we all know that waterboarding is torture; and that as torture it is illegal under US and international law; and that anyone running Justice should be able to own up to this fact. There is no debate:
Charles Schumer (D-NY):
Washington Office: 202-224-6542
N.Y. Office: 212-486-4430
Web Email: http://schumer.senate.gov/SchumerWebsite/contact/webform.cfm
Dianne Fienstein (D-CA)
Washington Office: 202-224-3841
San Francisco Office: 415-393-0707
Web Email: http://feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContactUs.EmailMe