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In general, our Spec ops do wear uniforms in one way or another. And if they don't, then they have forfited thier rights under the convention.

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Special Ops don't always wear uniforms. And no one ever gives up thier right to to be treated as a human. That being said, enemy torture has being going on for centuries. Still today, in military schools for special soldiers (ie Green Berets, SEALs, Rangers) they go through 'torture school.' The soldiers have to be naked, taunted, unfed, beat, humilated pretty much (under supervised cobditions) so they "will be ready" if it happens to them. Do not think for a second that any military around the world excepts their soldiers to be treated kindly when taken prisoner. They wouldn't do it for another country.
And the most stupid thing out of the whole scandal is that the soldiers took pictures. You never take pictures of you doing something 'questionable', or just plain wrong.

Wow. The first time in my life I've agreed with marine 16. Welcome back, btw.

After how disgusted we were with the treatment of American POWs in Vietnam and the treatment of Iraqi prisoners under Saddam we should do everything we can to prevent any kind of physical or mental humiliation / harm.

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First off, I am not joking around when I say that mental torture is just is bad as physical torture. You think that enemy soldiers forcing your friend to give you a bj is not as bad as getting your arms burned? Think again. As other people, including lead psychiatrists have said, mental abuse can cause health problems and so on...And havent you heard about the physical torturings, people getting beaten, shot, punched, and elitricuted?

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My point, if you missed it from my last post, was that one, the abuses at Abu Gharib, even taking into consideration of the nature of mental abuse, were still not as severe as many other forms of torture, specifically the torture (and outright murder) that Saddam and the insurgents have shown us. And therefore it is not possible to equate the two.
Also, the prisoners were not electrocuted. Only threatened with it.

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And I dont know if you know, yet there is knowledge circualating that these torturings were comissioned by higher up leaders and generals, even as high as Donald Rumsfeld, who asked for "harsh tactics" at camps such as Abu Gharib and Guantamamo Bay.

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And I think that "Harsh tactics" are warranted and should be used in any war. Unfourtunately, at times we lose command and control and things get blurry. Abu Gharib prison had been routinely hit by mortar fire, and was one of the more dangerous posts in the country. Things screw up. It happens in every war. It still is not state sanctioned. We do not have rape sqauds, or standard torture chambers. The frequency of this type of abuse is extremely rare.
That's opposed to the other side of the conflict, where prisoner abuse/execution/mutilation is much more common.

And onto dj

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But as I have stated earlier not all the prisoners in Iraq were insurgents. Some of them are from uniformed units, in particular the Republican Guard.

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I agreed with this post, however I beleive that most of the regular army troops had been released a while ago. If I'm wrong, please point me in the right direction.

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Of course it does, never said it doesn't. But for the U.S. to come and make claims of wrong doing is hypocritical on an ethical standpoint.

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Again I don't disagree, I just want consistency from the current Presidency in its claims, in particular Rums field. The perfect example is when Iraq was showing video images of captured Americans soldiers and the current presidency condemned it (rightfully so). Yet the United States did show images of captured Iraq's. Again my main beef is inconsistency in policy.

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On the issue of images, I beleive you are refering to the first Gulf War. In this case, the Iraqis filmed POWs forced to read pro-Iraqi statements. That is directly in violation of the nature of Geneva. I'm unsure what images you're refering to the US showning, if it's the prison abuse, then it wasn't neccecarily the US Govnerment that paraded them around. In any case we were not using any images for propaganda.

In general, it's hard to expect our officials to not show outrage whenever our troops are abused (or burned mutilated and hung). It's what a public official is supposed to do, support out own side. War is not a diplomatic environment. Many times propaganda is needed. We can't expect to win if we care as much about everyone as we do ourselves. It sounds selfish and terrible, but it is the truth. Human conflict has never been clean, that is a realtiy. I would not expect to see our leaders be completely objective in a conflict that involves the intrests of thier own country and it's military.

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Agreed, for the most part. "Get over it" is a little too ambiguous for me to agree with this statement completely.

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Well yes it was a simplified statement .
It's obviously more complex than that.

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But it does require a distinguishing mark for militias, unless these are sponanteous, unorganized forces (basically, civilians that pick up guns and attack thier enemy). These insurgents are an organized force. Therefore, they must be distinguished.

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I'll agree that whether the Geneva Convention applies to the foreign insurgents is questionable. But as I have stated earlier not all the prisoners in Iraq were insurgents. Some of them are from uniformed units, in particular the Republican Guard.

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[Also, our CIA agents and other coverts can and have been captured and executed as spies. They do not fall under the protection of Geneva. In general, our Spec ops do wear uniforms in one way or another. And if they don't, then they have forfited thier rights under the convention.

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Fair enough, you my accept that but it’s more along the lines of whether Bauhaus accepts it.

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Human decency tends to go out the window in war. Very few examples of this surviving widespread combat can be found.

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Of course it does, never said it doesn't. But for the U.S. to come and make claims of wrong doing is hypocritical on an ethical standpoint.

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For the large part, however, we DO show a great deal of decency to our POWs. Middle Easterners have been a different case than POWs in, say, WW II. They have demonstrated a lack of respect for us, and this lessens the odds of us being able to tolerate respect for them.

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Again I don't disagree, I just want consistency from the current Presidency in its claims, in particular Rums field. The perfect example is when Iraq was showing video images of captured Americans soldiers and the current presidency condemned it (rightfully so). Yet the United States did show images of captured Iraq's. Again my main beef is inconsistency in policy.

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We cannot claim failure because of a mistake.

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The prisoner abuse is not the reason I claim failure Iraq, there are other reasons I believe that stick out, but this is already getting off the subject at hand.

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The only thing we can do with a mistake is fix it, get over it, and get along with the job.

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Agreed, for the most part. "Get over it" is a little too ambiguous for me to agree with this statement completely.

First off, I am not joking around when I say that mental torture is just is bad as physical torture. You think that enemy soldiers forcing your friend to give you a bj is not as bad as getting your arms burned? Think again. As other people, including lead psychiatrists have said, mental abuse can cause health problems and so on. That whole "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" saying is so dumb. Psycological abuse, especially sexual, is terrible and lingers with for the rest of your life, causing constant pain, as does the realization you have no arm after getting it slowy burned off.
And havent you heard about the physical torturings, people getting beaten, shot, punched, and elitricuted?

And I dont know if you know, yet there is knowledge circualating that these torturings were comissioned by higher up leaders and generals, even as high as Donald Rumsfeld, who asked for "harsh tactics" at camps such as Abu Gharib and Guantamamo Bay.

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It's sick and it will make the Iraqis hate us more, if that's possible.

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Not just the Iraqis, the whole rest of the world.
Yea the Iraqis beheaded our soldiers and blew up our civilians, but it is never right to stoop to their level. Actually I think we went lower. America has a lot to clean up. I know that it was just some of our soldiers doing it, but they came from our country. That is bad representation. The whole world is hating on us.

To address the specific points that dj brought up:

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Not all of them are. The Geneva Convention does not require that they have to be in an official standard military garb because not all countries can afford uniforms. What the hell do you think our intelligence and Special Forces (in particular resistance movement trainers) do, run around in standard U.S issued uniforms.

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But it does require a distinguishing mark for militias, unless these are sponanteous, unorganized forces (basically, civilians that pick up guns and attack thier enemy). These insurgents are an organized force. Therefore, they must be distinguished.
The insurgents are not doing this. Also, they have violated the "rules and customs of war".

Also, our CIA agents and other coverts can and have been captured and executed as spies. They do not fall under the protection of Geneva. In general, our Spec ops do wear uniforms in one way or another. And if they don't, then they have forfited thier rights under the convention.

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Furthermore even if it was illegal, whatever happened to the concept of human decency.

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Human decency tends to go out the window in war. Very few examples of this surviving widespread combat can be found.

For the large part, however, we DO show a great deal of decency to our POWs. Middle Easterners have been a different case than POWs in, say, WW II. They have demonstrated a lack of respect for us, and this lessens the odds of us being able to tolerate respect for them.


To again clarify. I am not saying that the prisoner abuse was "ok". What I am saying is that it is in no way the norm. We cannot claim failure because of a mistake. The only thing we can do with a mistake is fix it, get over it, and get along with the job.

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And second of all, stop this different levels of torture garabage. Torture is torture. There are no levels of it and you dont know what the Iraqi prisoners felt, so you cant judge if the mental pain was just is bad as the physical pain of getting your arm burned off.

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Ok then. I suppose that every fraternaty on my campus should be charged with war crimes for doing nearly everything that appeared in those photos and more.

Secondly, OF COURSE there are levels to it. There are levels to everything. You cannot tell me that humiliation is equal to GOVERNMENT SANCTIONED execution and mutilation.

Equating mental anguish to losing your arm... You can't be serious.

Hasn't anyone on this site known pain or hardship? Can't you see the difference between what a group of our soilders did AGAINST our overal orders and STATE SANCTIONED murder? Think about it. Would you rather be arranged in embarrassing positions, or have your lower extremeties dipped in a vat of acid?

And onto the Geneva Convention:

Article 4, Section 2 of the 1950 Geneva Convention on the Treatment of POWs.

"Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions:

(a) That of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates;

(b) That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;

(c) That of carrying arms openly;

(d) That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war."

And Section 6:

"Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war."

So, in Section 2 we see these men
of at least c, probably d, and in all liklyhood b.

We also see the repeated theme of "the rules and customs of war". Violations thus far by the insurgents include hiding among civilians, targeting civilians specifically, and not wearing any "fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance".

So it appears that these prisoners have violated the Geneva Convention, and therefore do not fall under it's protection. It is for this very reason, discouraging armies from hiding among civilians, and thus drastically increasing civilian casualties, that this concept was included.

It may be questionable whether or not these prisoners fall under Geneva's protection. But is is certainly NOT bullsh1t to say that they have violated (and thus forfeit the protection of) the Geneva convention.

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How so? these people arent even an army, they shouldnt expect to be treated the same way.

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What are you talking about, a good amount of the soldiers from the Iraq army are in these prisons, therefore ARE part of a army and then therefore as a occupier and signers of the Geneva Convention we are obligated to uphold all agreements from the Geneva Convention

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These are people who dress in normal clothes and blow people up.

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Not all of them are. The Geneva Convention does not require that they have to be in an official standard military garb because not all countries can afford uniforms. What the hell do you think our intelligence and Special Forces (in particular resistance movement trainers) do, run around in standard U.S issued uniforms. As for the part of "blowing people up" what the hell do you think the United States does in war, blows people up. You might want to be a little more specific with what you mean by "people" because right now as it stands the statement is ambiguous. Perhaps you mean Civilians?

The is a prime example of inconsistency on policy.
Furthermore even if it was illegal, whatever happened to the concept of human decency.
Also to deal with anybody who says something along the lines of “like the human decency they showed us,” with these actions we therefore justify any actions “they” have taken and therefore leave no grounds to criticize there acts as in-humain or wrong.

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That has to be the biggest bunch of bull**** I have ever freaking heard.

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How so? these people arent even an army, they shouldnt expect to be treated the same way. These are people who dress in normal clothes and blow people up. How are we suppose to stop people like that?

It's sick and it will make the Iraqis hate us more, if that's possible.

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040522/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/prisoner_abuse_justice&cid=542&ncid=716

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That has to be the biggest bunch of bull**** I have ever freaking heard.

The torture was not illegal.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040522/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/prisoner_abuse_justice&cid=542&ncid=716

Dr. S, to start off, here is my verification:

The photos, check em all out.

And second of all, stop this different levels of torture garabage. Torture is torture. There are no levels of it and you dont know what the Iraqi prisoners felt, so you cant judge if the mental pain was just is bad as the physical pain of getting your arm burned off.

Oh and one last thing, we cant pull out of Iraq now, but it would've been nice if we never went in.

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Let's focus on the fact that it was WRONG,

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Wow, we're agreeing on something.

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that we ARE no better than Saddam, just more perverted,

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That's just ******* unadultered bullsh1t. Saddam had state sanctioned touture, mass graves, abuctions, arrests without warrants in a STABLE GOVERNMENT.

The abuses you've seen commited by American troops are illegal and are being treated as such. Our governemnt never set out to do these things for the simple fact that it would be extremely detrimental to our cause and went against our principles. People commited a crime. Do not judge the American government upon the actions of a few rouges.

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We have to get out of Iraq. We are just doing more and more damage.

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You have no idea what damage will happen to that country, and eventually to ours, if we pull out now. We have made a promise to the Iraqi people and we must keep it. If people would stop calling us monsters and attacking us for non-policy mistakes we'd be getting along a lot better.

Let's forget whether it was torture or not, Dr. Strangelove (though I believe it was). Let's focus on the fact that it was WRONG, that America CANNOT continue to take the moral high ground, that we ARE no better than Saddam, just more perverted, and that Colin Powell's bul sh** statement about America not staying in countries where it isn't wanted is just that: bull sh**.

We have to get out of Iraq. We are just doing more and more damage.

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mas·och·ism (ms-kzm)
n.
The deriving of sexual gratification, or the tendency to derive sexual gratification, from being physically or emotionally abused.

The deriving of pleasure, or the tendency to derive pleasure, from being humiliated or mistreated, either by another or by oneself.

A willingness or tendency to subject oneself to unpleasant or trying experiences.

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Note the focus on you getting pleasure from abusing yourself, or having another do it to you.

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sa·dism (sdzm, sdz-)
n.
The deriving of sexual gratification or the tendency to derive sexual gratification from inflicting pain or emotional abuse on others.

The deriving of pleasure, or the tendency to derive pleasure, from cruelty.

Extreme cruelty.

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Making the prison guards sadists, not masochists.
Unless you've got some weird, out of context, psychobable definition.

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Having a Freudian view on the matter, I believe that the soldiers resorted to violence to fulfill their sexual desires.

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I'd like to see the full logic behind that, given that everyone knows minimal information surrounding the actual causes. And yes I have read Lord of the Flies. However, that again has to do more with the savage, sadistic nature of man.

No, I meant masochists. Having a Freudian view on the matter, I believe that the soldiers resorted to violence to fulfill their sexual desires. Have you ever read The Lord of the Flies?

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Those soldiers were masochists.

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You mean sadists I think, right?

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You're contradicting yourself there. Even if it's a low form of torture, it's still torture.

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It's like the difference between between manslaughter and murder, in terms of severety at least. Manslaughter is still killing, but it's not murder. Get my point?