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For those of us who got passed over for this promotion to Moderator... Are we going to be offered continuation, or should we put our apps in at the airline pilot forums?

https://vimeo.com/114527403 One helluva journey my friend.

Good read here: "no good men amongst the living". It gives you a picture of the Afghan point of view prior to 9/11 to the mid 2000's when people were getting rolled up nightly. Condensed version: Afghan A wants money and goods. Afghan B wants the same. Afghan Bs only advantage is that he speaks English, so he tells the Americans that "A" is a bad guy. Afghan "A" gets rolled up for a trip to Bagrahm or Cuba. Competition eliminated. A very good book for shifting perspective.

Sorry a crappy way to put it I guess. The most successful German interrogator of WW2 was famous for not using any physical coercion. One of his prisoners later commented that he was positive he gave up info but to that day didn't know what. That's what i meant, if they don't realize they're giving up the ghost, the intel is more reliable. The Scalia argument is interesting; is there a point where our morality as a nation is less important than some critical info? It also reminds me of the joke: You: hypothetically would you have sex with a stranger for 10million dollars? Her: Yes You: What about 10? Her: What do you think I am? You: We've established that, now we're negotiating.

Fuckin A, Mr. Rogers.

My point is that mock executions are pretty widely accepted as unacceptable. I have no problem with actual shit heads getting what they deserve, but until they get something that approaches due process who's to say they are actual shit heads? Should we be able to grab a dude off a compound and water-board his ass to gain intel about who his boss talks to at dinner..... when said dude is a cook and is just doing a job to get paid. It's an extreme example I get it, but at the end of the day either the means are acceptable or they aren't. We claim we're better than them, if we want to hold that claim we need to actually be better.

THIS is why I don't pay for jack shit electronically. Cash or check, sure its old school, but its gets the job done. Not unlike BQ_Zip's mom.

Not a movie, but I binge watched the whole first season of True Detective over the weekend; pretty damn good! https://youtu.be/TXwCoNwBSkQ

Probably none, but we will never know. This discussion was not meant to suggest we actually stopped a nuke attack it was meant to stretch the limits of the argument. I don't condone or condemn the interrogation program, the report was EXTREMELY partisan and simply ignores or lies about some of the intel that was retrieved. Furthermore, it was a reflection of the time period right after 9/11 when we did not know if more attacks were coming and the majority on both sides of the aisle were in favor of doing whatever needed to be done. To suddenly judge one side based on a lack of context and a partisan report is a bit shallow. As has been pointed out above it is odd that folks object to waterboarding and sleep deprivation but are ok with jamming a Hellfire into a car full of people including American citizens. I thought the more interesting argument was what would you do if you captured the person who kidnapped your kids. I guess all you pacifists would get him some tea and discuss his mommy issues while your kids twist in the wind.

Traveling, black, and I haven't heard, but I would suspect Scientologist or Unitarian Universalist.

We've had a lot of talk here about whether we are justified in our actions based on our ideas of justice for the individuals involved or the groups they represent. Those who make the eye for an eye argument are justified in their approach; it is natural to want to harm those who have harmed us. We're military members and all believe in violence as a solution. However, are the policy implications here really about justice for these individuals at all? Should we be asking whether this is helping us achieve our political goals in regions from which these people were taken? It does seem like in extreme cases (the Scalia hypothetical) harsh treatment must be justified if it achieves the desired result. The benefits of not having a mushroom cloud over LA are far outweighed by any possible impact to credibility and perceptions of legitimacy based on the way that information was obtained. However, at some point there must be a point of diminishing returns. If our aim is to stabilize a population/region/way of thinking and establish both political structures and mindsets favorable to the long-term goals of the United States, does the impact to our ability to project soft power become so counterproductive as to negate any benefit that we may gain in short-term intelligence? "Hi, we're from (country X); we're here to help, and we haven't been in the news this week for torturing your relatives. Here's a new soccer stadium (or economy for that matter), now here's what we'd like from you" might be more dangerous in the long term than what we are preventing with short-term intelligence gathering. Let's hope we've got some pretty smart folks making the decisions; I'll be the first to admit I wouldn't have any idea how to determine the exchange rate in these transactions.

And said hypothetical terrorist says he put it in the Staples Center when it's actually in the Rose Bowl, or it really that person wasn't on the terrorist varsity squad and when he realizes the only way to end the pain and suffering is to say anything and he spits out the first location he can belieably speak about, and in either case it sends valuable resources going miles in the wrong direction wasting even more precious time. I'm not sure how familiar you are with fallacies, but here's a wikipedia page for the straw man argument that interestingly enough includes the following line that is oddly prescient "This technique has been used throughout history in polemical debate, particularly in arguments about highly charged emotional issues where a fiery, entertaining "battle" and the defeat of an "enemy" may be more valued than critical thinking or understanding both sides of the issue." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man But that straw man example is not the real situation at Gitmo, which is taking someone who may or may not know information that may or may not still be current, accurate and relevant and you intimidate them and inflict pain and suffering until they say what we want to hear. Then we send a team of who knows how many intel types to go chase down the story and see if it checks out, wasting time and money in the process. Do you realize that US citizens who are not under any physical stress resembling torture falsely confess thousands of times a year? 30% of the convicted "criminals" who were exonerated due to DNA testing made a confession, incriminating statement or pled guilty and keep in mind that's with the knowledge that they had the US justice system on their side. So I wonder what the rate is with people who are extraordinarily rendered, tortured and whisked off to black sites and left in a extralegal status indefinitely. It's safe to say that 95% of the people on this site went to SERE and they all saw first hand how telling white lies, half truths and information which only sounded right could save your bacon, give up nothing and waste enemy resources on wild goose chases. One day we'll realize that we can't beat terrorists by taking one off the battlefield and helping to create two in their place. Sadly the interrogation gurus probably created more terrorists than they locked up.

Seriously? You guys have never heard of this joke? https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100317194351AAomYoj https://www.answers.com/Q/Has_anyone_ever_been_so_far_as_to_even_look_more_like Probably NSFW - Link 1 Definitely NSFW - Link 2

Dude are you having a stroke?

I agree with Mark1, there's a huge difference between getting a limited exposure to these things in SERE and actually having to face them with no end in site. However, I think there's a misunderstanding with what water-boarding really does. From what I've read and watched (there's all sorts of idiots on youtube trying it) it basically makes it feel like you're drowning. That said, having been a lifeguard in high school (great job) no matter how good a swimmer a person is, eventually that feeling trips a natural drowning response similar to a fight or flight type thing. The result is the "classic" drowning person flailing arms, ineffective kicking and head tilted back, eyes rolled back sheer panic look. They'll crawl on top of their rescuer trying to get out of the water. Water-boarding is more than a mock execution, it's a simulated execution that despite knowing going into it that you won't die the procedure will access a primal level of your brain you can't control to make you experience the level of fear that you are in fact dying.

Mother of God...

It looks like the general feeling of the other posters can best be expressed in the following image: Congratulations on reaching that next level.

Champ Kind!?! How far we've fallen. Welcome aboard.

Can you put the job on a 1206 for community involvement?

Park it on the lemon lot for 20% over market value. Should still be there in 4-5 months...

Not gonna lie... When I clicked on this thread, I was expecting more sentiments along the lines of "fuck 'em" than the "evil/immoral" comments I'm seeing.

I don't doubt that is true, but it would be even more disgusting than just trying to claim that the 'enhanced interrogation' wasn't torture. For all the congressmen arguing that the information garnered from the program saved lives: I take that to mean that you believe torture is acceptable when it's convenient for us. Go ###### yourselves. Whether it works or not (it doesn't) isn't even a conversation we should be having.

the issue here is that: 1. we are stooping to their level and when we do that we lose sight of what ideals we are fighting for 2. this program has been run by people who are in fact their own oversight and in turn have produced misleading information as to the efficacy of these programs. and finally 3. the fact that non of the supposed cases where they said torturing led to information that stop terrorism actually did that. in fact none of the torture led to any information that stopped terrorism and that is what most people have a problem with.

Here are three truths: 1) Physical abuse is inhumane and unlawful. It destroys our principles of justice and equity. 2) Torture creates false confessions, with the tortured person willing to say anything, regardless of their original actions or convictions. 3) We strongly desire to torture suspects because we are angry and afraid. However, torture does not make us more secure. We need the truth to fight and win our wars. Because torture is secretive, it denies the American public of justice. Sen McCain Floor Statement on 9 Dec 2014 https://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=1a15e343-66b0-473f-b0c1-a58f984db996 Sen McCain was tortured as a POW for five and a half years in North Vietnam from Oct 1967 to March 1973. David Frost's interview of Director of Central Intelligence, Richard Helms in 1978 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol44no4/html/v44i4a07p_0023.htm The KGB operative Yuri Nosenko defected from the USSR in Apr 1964, six months after the JFK assassination in Nov 1963. "The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy" (AKA "The Warren Commission") was completed in Sep 1964. Though the KGB temporarily considered Lee Harvey Oswald for inclusion in espionage activity, but he was quickly determined unfit and refused admittance to any USSR programs. The Committee conclusively determined there was no reason to suspect that the KGB or Nosenko had actually aided or orchestrated the killing of JFK by Lee Harvey Oswald. Despite these facts, the CIA still interrogated Nosenko for another four and a half years, until March 1969. Instead of a desire to follow the law, the extended and illegal detention of Nosenko was primarily due to the CIA's fear of reprisal if they were wrong, and from disinformation from the KGB saboteur "Fedora," who had infiltrated the UN. Confessions https://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/507/transcript Anatomy Of A Bad Confessionhttps://www.wbur.org/2011/12/07/worcester-coerced-confession-i Proof that even harsh verbal interrogation without physical torture frequently results in false confessions, particularly when the interrogators are impassioned. Finally, the US Supreme Court unanimously ruled in Brown v. Mississippi way back in 1936 that convictions based on confessions under duress are unlawful. Torture is morally wrong, it is illegal, and it fails in its’ goals. The new “The Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency's Detention and Interrogation Program” (aka the “CIA Torture Report”) again supports these truths. Why do we continue to pursue torture?

We are better than them. Waterboarding is better than beheading. Rectal feeding is better than mass murder on 9/11.