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Much of the torture that occurred in Guantánamo, Afghanistan and Iraq was never explicitly authorized. But the authorization of the CIA’s techniques depended on
by sharkweek 14y ago
Much of the torture that occurred in Guantánamo, Afghanistan and Iraq was never explicitly
authorized. But the authorization of the CIA’s techniques depended on setting aside the
traditional legal rules that protected captives. And as retired Marine generals Charles Krulak
and Joseph Hoar have said, “any degree of ‘flexibility’ about torture at the top drops down the
chain of command like a stone — the rare exception fast becoming the rule.” (p12, abridged version)
What are these conversations normally like? Sort of a "Do what you can to get any information out of the suspect as I turn around and plug my ears." ?
I hate how they say this stuff isn't authorized from some high level.
"...Lawyers provided novel,
if not acrobatic interpretations to allow the mistreatment of prisoners." (p13, abridged version)
- rdtsc 14y ago> Sort of a "Do what you can to get any information out of the suspect as I turn around and plug my ears." ? I would imagine so. There has to be a non-verbal or symbolic channel of communicating that then provides official deniability. As an example take discrimination and at-will employment. Let's say the owners want to fire a gay guy. They can't fire him officially because of various discriminatory laws so they maybe invent a non-verbal or a code word 'restructuring' so they lay him off due to restructuring. In general part of operating in large bureaucratic institution is to learn: * what rules can be broken (break them if you like but don't force the management to make an official statement on it and don't ask permission on paper) * what rules should be broken ("you need to torture this guy and it is illegal so we'll just use a euphemism -- 'interrogation' you know what I mean, I know you know what I mean, but we can never write that down in an email") * what rules cannot be broken, official and un-official (some things are never tolerated what these are have to be discovered carefully as these might not all be written down, say who can disagree with the boss during a requirement meeting... it is not written down but if you are part of the wrong group, you won't fare well)
- aranazo 14y agoA frequent method of torture by US forces is to threaten to turn a captive over to allied domestic Police or Army forces. It is useful to look at the relevant UN conventions to understand what the legal definition of torture actually is.