amnesty intl. - "Waiting For The Guards is the first of 3 films commissioned by Amnesty to highlight the enhanced interrogation techniques used by the CIA in the “War on Terror”.

The Directors approached the making of the film in a way that has never been done before, choosing to show the reality of Stress Positions in as authentic a way as possible. They filmed a person being put into Stress Positions over a 6 hour period. There is no acting on the part of the “prisoner” – his pain and anguish is for real.

This powerful film shows without doubt that what the US administrations say is interrogation is in reality, torture and must be stopped.

We’ve released the film on the Internet before going to theatrical release in independent cinemas in early 2008. We believe this film is a great introduction to what the unsubscribe movement is all about, so we ask you to get the movie out there, in any way you can.

The more people see it. The more people will be compelled to unsubscribe."

..Interview with the prisoner

Might I suggest people go to the link and read up a little more about all.

Thanks for the extra info, Fedquip!

Standing on a box is torture, so is having to choose between jumping from a skyscraper or burning to death.

Torture has its place in the arsenal. I don't think anyone is happy about it, but if it saves innocent lives, it must sometimes be used.

I disagree QM.

It sucks because not too long ago everybody agreed that torture was inhumane, Now what?

When our grandfathers won WWII they came up with rules, one of them specifically was to abolish torture, we owe it to them to maintain that standard.

The CIA has always maintained that torture never produces reliable actionable intelligence.

This isn't 24 and Jack Bauer isn't real.

Quatam about your comment

"Standing on a box is torture, so is having to choose between jumping from a skyscraper or burning to death."

If this is an analogy, its apples and oranges. If you think that the attack on the WTC is good reason or a justification for the use of torture, I say youve bought into the bullshit hook, line and sinker.

I also dont understand why you think the use of torture saves lives. Is there some evidence of this? If so, Id like to see it.

QM, you assume that torture works. You also say that if it saves innocent lives, it must be used. How far would you go? Would you torture the children, friends, and acquaintances of terrorists, if there was the slightest chance that they possessed information? Where is the line to be drawn?

Torture endangers innocent lives.

It makes extremists far easier to convert knowing that Americans are a bunch of hypocritical, barbaric psychopaths.

Do you REALLY think they blow themselves up because they "Hate our freedom"?

I don't agree with QM, but I respect that he's direct and honest about his beliefs. What really bothers me are people who will not acknowledge that something as horrible as water boarding is torture.

Endlessly and disingenuously debating the status of these practices is only a distraction from the real issue. The truth is the administration and many of it's supporters believe that torture is useful and acceptable under certain conditions.

"The truth is the administration and many of it's supporters believe that torture is useful and acceptable under certain conditions."

So did... Nazis, Spanish Inquisitors, Pol Pot, Salem witch trials, etc. You get the idea. History is chalked full of people who will do anything for power even throw out their own humanity.

You get two choices in life: you can burn in hell with QM, Gonzo, Cheney and people who defend and condone torture, or you say that people need to go to jail for violating the Geneva Convention. I think in other times, or other countries, people would be marching in the streets.

Alot of administration officials and apologists of torture always put forward the ticking bomb concept, where something terrible will happen but if we torture this person we might all be safe. What they fail to mention is that the ticking bomb scenario never happened in all the annals of history.

In less then 6 years since that fateful date, the current administration has unraveled almost 250 years of judicial justice and staunch American concept of standing for right, of not succumbing to tactics used by barbaric monarchists, the Nazis and the Soviet Union.

All in the defense of the 'American Way of Life'.

As much as I think this commercial is stupid, (Oh no, don't make me stand on a box and listen to your boring cell phone conversation!) I think it's absolutely hypocritical for a nation to have a war strategy that relies upon winning the "hearts and minds" while at the same time exploiting language and legal loopholes to torture "enemy combatants".

You want to torture? Fine, but can we start carpet bombing villages with napalm? It's not like we've got the moral high ground anymore. Idiots electing idiots and we're surprised when idiotic things happen.

point is that if you torture people, then WHAT are you exactly trying to defend?

He's standing on a pair of boxes.

This "film" is just another bullet in the propaganda arsenal that is being used to bleed the hearts of the world by the "I hate America" extremists.

It's merely a dramatization. Fiction. WTC destroyed? That film was real.

HEY WHYS CAN I ONLY VOTE THIS UP? VIDEOSIFT IS CONDONING TORTURE BY ARTIFICIALLY MANIPULATING UP VOTES FOR TORTURE! I HEREBY DECLARE VIDEOSIFT IS THE GONZO OF THE INTERNETS.

ONLY QUANTUMMUSHROOM APPEARS TO BE AGAINST TORTURE BY DOWNVOTING. HURRAH FOR THIS BRAVE SOUL.

I salute Arvana for posting this. He is sincere in his beliefs, just like the Mulleted-One.

"Standing on a box is torture, so is having to choose between jumping from a skyscraper or burning to death."

If this is an analogy, its apples and oranges. If you think that the attack on the WTC is good reason or a justification for the use of torture, I say youve bought into the bullshit hook, line and sinker.

I disagree. Because if those who were supposed to be protecting out country had caught one of the would-be 9-11 hikackers in advance and needed to torture him to find out the rest of the plan, then very, very few reading these words would not at least accept we would try to extract the critical intel from the captive by any means necessary.

From the time osama hatched the 9-11 plot, it became a perfect example of a real 'ticking time bomb'. Clintonian dereliction of duty regarding national defense was why we never had our aforementioned theoretical hijacker in custody: the walking penis was too busy "erecting" walls between American law enforcement agencies in order to hide his own crimes.

As for whether torture is effective, studies lean toward concluding intel gleaned from it isn't necessarily reliable (e.g. McCain), however if you're not willing to defend your own country by any means necessary, you're going to lose everything.

I'd rather go too far than not far enough, especially with terrorists who are not "enemy combatants". Threats of hell-burning aside, I question the sanity and loyalty of those trying to secure Constitutional rights for these vermin.

Waterboarding? I'd be more interested in whether or not it WORKS rather than if it's torture. Our Special Forces soldiers are all schooled in how to survive torture by our "civilized" enemies, and they too, get a taste of waterboarding.

No one likes torture, but it still deserves its place in the arsenal. No one's being waterboarded for not returning library books.

The usage of torture is a strategic failure in the process of information gathering from the enemy.

First of all it assumes that the terrorist organization is a top down informational entity with operational strategy going down to all it's entities. Thus if we capture one combatant in Iraq, we might derive actionable intelligence. That is of course wrong, terrorist organizations operate in cell structures, one cell does not know the existence of a sister cell, this is the viewpoint of the intelligence community post 9/11. This is problematic because it allows the enemy to remain always at large in the political process in Washington, that is why the enemy definition keeps changing, its Osama first, then insurgent forces, then the very broad term of 'Islamic extremism'.

The cell structure thus allows for unrelated parties to assume the guise of representing a greater whole, separate actors can suddenly be part of a larger nebulous whole even though in reality they are not related. This is how Bush in his simplistic assessment of the threats can say there is terrorism from Morocco to Indonesia. In Iraq the US labeled Zarqwi as being an operative member of al-Qaeda, this is beneficial for both sides Osama can claim larger operation status while the US can state that its fighting al-Qaeda terrorists in Iraq. However Zarqwi for example did not possess intelligence on operations in Afghanistan, they were not related, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Funny how Osama Bin Laden was called the mastermind of 9/11, in mere hours after the event, what happened to such intelligence gathering clairvoyance?

Looking back at the myriad of enemy combatants captured so far in both Iraq and Afghanistan - we have yet to see any proof of progress with regards to any actionable intelligence being gathered from those sources, because the actors caught were obliviously small fish.

Second it drives away actual informants who would want to switch sides, by creating the 'US against Them' cornerstone the Bush Administration has actually rallied support for terrorist organizations. Operatives who would gain from switching sides would not want to, knowing that they face torture and long term imprisonment. This is how after all these years of war, and "Mission Accomplished", turning the corner, defeating the terrorists: The Taliban control half of Afghanistan and al-Qaeda is reconstituted its strength in Pakistan and Southern Afghanistan.

Third it assumes from the operative viewpoint that ALL enemy combatants would provide under duress reliable actionable intelligence without actually knowing what that could be i.e. we are torturing to find out something we don't even know might exist, the Rumsfled's known unknowns and unknown unknowns - that is of course a logically fallacy. How can you derive intelligence when you don't know what you are trying to get at? This of course translates into increased torture methods against detainees, eventually breaking them to a point where they will tell you anything to get you to stop. Khalid Sheik Mohammad was tortured to the point that he confessed to a whole swell of terrorist plots and acts, intelligence operatives rolled their eyes because it was simply inconceivable that it could be true as it would mean he was in 5 or 6 places at once, there was no concrete evidence to prove it, he was simply saying things to make them stop.

This is dangerous, as its a self feeding cycle, if you torture enemy combatants without a contextual means to an end you would receive all kinds of rubbish, that feeds into paranoia that it's actually real and you then torture even more. Actionable intelligence has a finite time frame, usually less then 6 months, after which the operative in custody is tapped out, the organization would nullify any plans and change their tactics and plans.

Remember that all the so called reliable actionable intelligence for Iraq possessing and developing WMDs came from a single informant. Look where that lead to.

Fourth it loses the sight of how to attain trust, operatives from past conflicts always state that to derive information you must make the actor rely on you, trust in you and eventually befriend you. Interrogators of Nazi war criminals often state how they derived more information in a simple chess game then through torture methods.

Torture is a annihilation of the human spirit, it drives people insane through sleep deprivation, humiliation and water boarding. It nullifies the human psyche into delirium, psychosis and eventual madness, yet we are led to believe that somehow that would prevent another 9/11.

Finally all warfare is tactics, for all of America's military might they were close to defeat by an insurgence that has lapsed back into guerrilla warfare, the tactics shifted. The application of torture would mean the tactics will shift once more.

The question remains - "Is this strategy benefiting our objectives?"

The US administration would of course say "Yes", why wouldn't they. The appointment of Mukasey as Attorney General for the first time showed how abortions and other issues of the previous Justice Department appointments became insignificant, the question was only "Do you believe water boarding is torture?" - It was asked not because it was important as AG but because there are people in the administration who know they have gone too far and are vehemently trying to cover their asses from prosecution. The scandal of Abu Graibh was called as being "a few bad apples", that is of course not true, operational orders came from the top down. The definition of torture rewritten by John Yoo and David Addington. Torture was stricken through Congress, yet it continues through the special signing letters of the President. The public is basically being lied to.

Now American politicians are too scared to stand against it because they lack a backbone and are more worried they might be wrong, fear penetrates the Democratic party while the Republican party is lost after a presidency of fiscal irresponsibility, looming recession, and the 2 never ending wars.

Its not about constitutional rights for terrorists, its about constitutional rights for US Citizens that is under threat. You could find yourself supporting means to an end that will lead into police state.

I remember when Americans were the good guys.

As alway on such topics Farhad provides very interesting background info, thanks.

"if we had 'caught one of the =would-be= 9-11 hikackers in advance and needed to torture him to find out the rest of the plan, ' "

I'm truly surprised you don't recognize this classic case in flawed logic.

You're arguing that the end justifies the means.

If the suspect doesn't crack, how far are you willing to go to get the info?
Maybe his family knows something. Maybe his neighbors.

Maybe you.

quantumushroom said:
Torture has its place in the arsenal. I don't think anyone is happy about it, but if it saves innocent lives, it must sometimes be used.


that's a huge sacrifice for an "IF".
recall that one of the founding principles of American Law is "Innocent until proven guilty". Torture assumes guilt from the start. Torture destroys innocent lives. How many convictions arose from Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp
Since the beginning of the War in Afghanistan, 775 detainees have been brought to Guantanamo, approximately 420 of which have been released. As of August 09, 2007, approximately 355 detainees remain. More than a fifth are cleared for release but may have to wait months or years because U.S. officials are finding it increasingly difficult to line up places to send them, according to Bush administration officials and defense lawyers. Of the roughly 355 still incarcerated, U.S. officials said they intend to eventually put 60 to 80 on trial and free the rest.



that's nearly 90% confirmed innocent, and 10% potentially guilty. That's a revolting, and unconscionable rate.

It is absolutely impossible to force a person to tell the truth. Some people may say anything to avoid being tortured, but it's probably whatever bullshit their captors want to hear. This country has regressed to the level of the Salem Witch Trials.

Those who disagree with me bring up some very good points. For those worried about a loss of rights/freedom, it's our duty to always be vigilant wehether at war or not.

This particular enemy has already made his decision about how to wage war, and it is that all life is worthless, including his own. Muslims kill more Muslims than American soldiers. They torture their own not for intel but for the glory of Allah, Muslim women are virtual slaves, young girls are treated like cattle.

The "rights" of a terrorist without a country, willing to blow himself up (a painless vaporization) aren't worth worrying about, he's already made his choice. These fanatics can't be bribed, coerced or made to fear consequences. They cannot be "understood" to the point they stop, and they certainly can't be reasoned with. So, they should pray they're never captured and hope for a quick erasure instead.

9-11 proved how far the enemy is willing to go, and it's all the way. They deserve no less from us.

Torture methods probably won't be used as much as you think, whether or not condoned. There's more important things to be concerned with.

Torture methods probably won't be used as much as you think, whether or not condoned. There's more important things to be concerned with.

Ahem. Will you feel the same way when Hillary Clinton is president?

delete

quantumushroom said:
This particular enemy has already made his decision about how to wage war, and it is that all life is worthless, including his own. Muslims kill more Muslims than American soldiers. They torture their own not for intel but for the glory of Allah, Muslim women are virtual slaves, young girls are treated like cattle.

These are all utter straw-men, and you know it.
The arabic world consists of 23 countries, and about 325 million people. does your statement apply to all 325 million of them? how do we know which might hold information, and which don't?

Americans kill more Americans than terrorists do.
Automobiles kill more Americans in one month than "terrorists" have.

Nearly every conflict the US has entered into since WWII has been to overthrow a foreign government so that American (and now mostly multi-national) mega-businesses can sustain exploitive profits. The United Fruit company has a few of these under it's belt. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_fruit_company
The US military overthrew a democratically elected leader in the 1950s at the behest of a British Oil company and installed a dictator. That dictator was later overthrown by Islamic revolutionaries, and as such, we have modern Iran.

"The Enemy"is not some unified movement. These are mainly cells, operating along similar principles as the US "Militia Movement" did in the 90s - Independent cells with similar aims. In both cases (US militia, and Islamic terrorists), the groups believe that the US government is repressing them. For Every arab who dies because of the US invasion, there are countless brothers, mothers, father, uncles, cousins, etc. who now have reason to hate the US. Some of them may feel inspired to attack this meddling foreign occupation.
Imagine if China were to liberate the very Blue-State people of California from the Red Bush regime... Do you really think it would take long before Californians started attacking their liberators, regardless of how benevolent the occupation was?






but most importantly, and regardless of justifications, the simple fact is that torture does not work. it is highly ineffective at gaining real information. We have many hundreds of years of history that prove this over and over and over.
Here is a test case: "terrorists" have kidnapped you. They torture you, asking for the whereabouts of your closest friends and family, whom they want to kill. They say they will let you go once they have killed your family. Would you believe that they would let you go? would you tell them where your friends and family are? now, after having thought about that for a while, tell me, do you still think torture is useful?

I'm glad that we all agree that current tactics are torture, not "enhanced interrogation". But they are illegal. For citizens and people detained in the U.S., it is prohibited by the Constitution, and for enemy combatants captured in other places, it is prohibited by the Geneva Conventions. If we say that torture should be used in certain circumstances, we are saying that it is okay to break the highest laws in the land. When the rule of law is so casually ignored, something is definitely wrong.

The President of the United States swears to protect and defend the Constitution. Everything else comes afterward.

Stop downvoting comments you disagree with. The button is there for flagging inappropriate comments. If you do it, I'm going to rip out your mouse-clicking fingernail, slowly.

Now, let's see how effective torture really is...

Were this real footage and the guy in the video had something to do with 9/11, it would warm my heart to watch this.

"All major religious traditions carry basically the same message, that is love, compassion and forgiveness; the important thing is they should be part of our daily lives."

damn that clinton! i knew it was all his fault!! thanks for the info QM!

*shakehead *lookatfloor

if you have to construct some kind of ticking bomb scenario to justify torture without examining the years of oppression by the US and UK against the people of that region, your argument is *weak.

These fanatics can't be bribed, coerced or made to fear consequences.

If you're talking about actual terrorists, you're right, they can't. So why are we torturing suspected terrorists again? Oh right because they might know something. Even though you've already pointed out that if they are actually with knowledge that might be meaningful, they aren't the type of person to crack under torture. Honestly, look at the tragic irony of what you're saying.

what happened to the video?

Quantum I am on the same page with you my friend. There is an old analogy that I think applies here and it is that there are three types of people in the world (as pertains to this discussion).

-There are Sheep, there are Sheepdogs, and there are Wolves.
-Wolves want to kill Sheep at all costs.
-Sheep don't want to get killed.
-Sheepdogs do whatever is necessary to stop Wolves from killing Sheep.

and sadly...
-Sheep despise Sheepdogs when there are no Wolves around.
-Sheepdogs continue to guard Sheep knowing full-well that they are reviled.

The direction that our society is heading is to villify the Sheepdog and to sympathize with the Wolves. Problem is, if it continues, there will be no Sheep or Sheepdogs left.

Erimus:
there's also a little saying about letting a fox guard the henhouse...

Tags for this video have been changed from 'amnesty international, cia, torture' to 'amnesty international, cia, torture, waiuardsting for the g' - edited by kronosposeidon

Tags for this video have been changed from 'amnesty international, cia, torture, waiuardsting for the g' to 'amnesty international, cia, torture, waiting for the guards' - edited by kronosposeidon