The following comes from [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/20/world/20cnd-iraq.html?ex=1150948800&en=f85c20e38511be5b&ei=5087%0A|a June 20, 2006 article] at NYTimes.Com:
The American military said today that it had found the remains of what appears to be the two American soldiers captured by insurgents last week in an ambush south of the capital, and a senior Iraqi military official said the two men had been "brutally tortured."
An American military official in Baghdad, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that both bodies showed evidence of "severe trauma" and that they could not be conclusively identified. Insurgents had planted "numerous" bombs along the road leading to the bodies, and around the bodies themselves, the official said, slowing the retrieval of the Americans by 12 hours.
Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, the American military spokesman, said "the remains" of what are believed to be the two Americans were found near a power plant in the vicinity of Yusefiya, about three miles from the site were they had been captured by insurgents.
General Caldwell declined to speak in detail about the physical condition of those who had been found, but said that the cause of death could not be determined. He said the remains of the men would be sent to the United States for DNA testing to determine definitively their identities. That seemed to suggest that the two Americans had been wounded or mutilated beyond recognition.
"We couldn't identify them," the American military official in Baghdad said.
Is it as fun when it happens to Americans, Rumsfeld?
"It̢۪s because when we do it to them, they do it to US." Not to be a smart-A, but I can't think of any war where any side/sides within any war did not use some kind of torture. Seriously, I think this time the torture has a real abstract purpose, so I'll explain it in a question form. If I want my enemy to be "trigger happy" because when they are it makes good press for my side when they "F" up by shooting someone who is not in the conflict, what better way to get them to do it by using the "fear" or paranoia factor to gain my desired result. These kidnapping-torture-killings tactics are pure genius. It's a classic "Judo Political" tactic/move where you get your opponent to turn on it's own people and or the people your oppenent is protecting to gain an advantage. Classic maneuver by both the KGB and CIA to confuse, then get them to turn on their own, and divide in order to conquer. I would really like to meet the SOB who thought of it if not trained in this art practiced in politics and or war because he has got to have one heck of an abstract mind. I wonder if it was a woman though?
ReplyDeleteHeh--good point, though I doubt a woman was even consulted for this war--it's all been too impractical. ;)
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, I can see your point, but it doesn't make the moral argument go away or the part about our enemy wanting to torture us to go away either. You're right, torture has been used in every war that comes to mind--wouldn't it be nice if this war were different? It's bad enough we've got to have a war at all, but do we have to be dicks about it? :)
I just don't think "war" and "moral" go together. War being
ReplyDeletetorture/torture killings as apart of every war, and given our values systems
here in the "Euro philosophy west" are opposed to one another, so I
never try to make war a moral argument myself. There is no such thing
as a "moral war". You always have to fight it without moral judgment,
otherwise you can't win any war if you do use it. I would go insane if I
tried to fit "war" and "moral" into the same context. The bigger SOB
always comes out as the winner in any war everytime which always comes
down to who has the most effective fire on target. This being where one breaks the other side first to the point where the opponent no longer
can wage war against the other. Torture is nothing more than a small
part of the art in waging war. So that is my final spin on it from my
barbarian perspective.
I pretty much disagree with you, Bob. Wars can be moral, in my mind. Like a war with an invading force when there is no reason you are being invaded. Like, say, when the native Americans would fight back against the Europeans. Some would argue that stopping Hitler was a moral war.
ReplyDeleteThe idea is that killing can be OK if it's for the greater good. This can be a slippery slope, but if your leaders are good, moral people who honestly do care about the well being of all citizens (including the soldiers) then I think that slope can be navigated. Of course, where are you going to find a few non-sociopaths to be our leaders? Not the White House, that's for sure.
As for who "wins" the war--I disagree with you even more. You seem to define "winning the war" as "getting your way" whereas I define "winning the war" as succeeding in stopping the badguy from getting his way.
For instance, we won WWII because we stopped Hitler and Japan from reaching their Empirical goals. We can't possibly win the Iraq War by my definition since we are the invaders and there was no real badguy. Sure, Sadam was a bastard to his own people, but he was much better to them than the Saudi leaders.
Morality doesn't mean "not killing" in my mind. It means"doing the right thing in the big picture." In other words, sometimes you have to kill to stop others from being killed. Sometimes you have to die to stop someone else from dying.
It's too easy to simply write off war as a strictly amoral thing.
Sure, if we're moral and our enemy is not, we will have a harder time winning by either definition, but since America is so incredibly more powerful than any other military on Earth, can't we afford to be at least a little more moral? I think America can take it.