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The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

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Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#91

Post by zyxley »

blowski wrote: post #86
zyxley wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You may think it's not effective Torture factually isn't effective. https://www.cgu.edu/pdffiles/sbos/costanzo_effects_of_interr...

In a "24" like scenario, if you knew that torturing 100 people, all of whom you believe to be terrorists, was 50% likely to yield useful information would you do it? For me personally, the effectiveness of torture is irrelevant. Maybe it is for you as well, I don't know from your comment. It's something we should not do, full stop.

I believe torture is morally wrong, but it's easier to point out the practicalities of coercive interrogation (even of a nontorturous kind) producing useless bullshit most of the time.

Also, your hypothetical is absurdly biased in favor of torture, given that any real information retrieved would be a needle in the haystack of the aforementioned useless bullshit.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#92

Post by pjc50 »

ikeboy wrote: post #84
hartpuff wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The CIA is a sickening and surprisingly amateurish organisation. Their actions over the past decades have ruined the United States' international moral authority. I'm not even sure that's true. I think the perception of the CIA (perhaps due to generally positive portrayals of it on TV and in movies) is completely different to, say, the perception people have of the Stasi or KGB. And yet did those organizations, whi…

>And yet did those organizations, which people rightly consider to be bad, actually do anything worse than the CIA has been doing in the last 70 years? The average American is not personally affected by anything the CIA does. Can the same be said about the KGB?

You'd be hard pressed to find an instance where an average American civilian was affected by the KGB per se. Remember that most of the Cold War was a proxy war, fought in the middle east and South America.

The FSB their successor did assassinate a dissident in London (Litvinenko), which the UK government ignored until Russia became sufficiently persona non grata lately.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#93

Post by cmdkeen »

hartpuff wrote: post #66
spangry wrote: post #47

Interesting implication from the title of the article: that it would be 'right' to waterboard some other men. Who are they, and what justifies their torture? And before someone says it, I don't think "gathering intelligence" is a sufficiently moral or practical justification. People being tortured don't tell you valuable information; they tell you whatever they think will make the torture stop. The CIA is a sickening…

> The CIA is a sickening and surprisingly amateurish organisation. Their actions over the past decades have ruined the United States' international moral authority. I'm not even sure that's true. I think the perception of the CIA (perhaps due to generally positive portrayals of it on TV and in movies) is completely different to, say, the perception people have of the Stasi or KGB. And yet did those organizations, whi…

Yes both in terms of degree and scale. In my mind the CIA's actions are morally indefensible but still pale in comparison to what those organisations got up to. Even if you throw in the FBI in its darkest days under Hoover you don't get close to the tyranny the KGB inflicted.

It is going to take Western history a long time to get over its Communist apologists like Hobsbawm and be willing to fully accept the horrors that system spawned.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#94

Post by spangry »

ikeboy wrote: post #62
spangry wrote: post #47

Interesting implication from the title of the article: that it would be 'right' to waterboard some other men. Who are they, and what justifies their torture? And before someone says it, I don't think "gathering intelligence" is a sufficiently moral or practical justification. People being tortured don't tell you valuable information; they tell you whatever they think will make the torture stop. The CIA is a sickening…

>Who are they, and what justifies their torture? >People being tortured don't tell you valuable information; they tell you whatever they think will make the torture stop. You're already asserting your position, and disguising it as a question. Virtually everyone seriously condoning torture believe it is effective. If they were to believe it wasn't effective, they wouldn't order it to be done. You may think it's not e…

Assuming the conclusion? That would only be true if I also stated that the only possible justification someone might give for torture is intelligence gathering. I was simply addressing what I thought would be the most likely counter-argument, not asserting it's the only possible counter-argument.

By all means, feel free to argue the merits of my 'pre-emptive counter-counter argument' (boy this is getting confusing). Or if you like, feel free to argue the merits of some alternative justification for torturing people. Here, I'll start you off:

- It's a good deterrent to behaviour

- It's fun

- It hurts people we don't like

- The victim is a witch, and we need to find out who the other witches are

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#95

Post by ikeboy »

pjc50 wrote: post #92
ikeboy wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>And yet did those organizations, which people rightly consider to be bad, actually do anything worse than the CIA has been doing in the last 70 years? The average American is not personally affected by anything the CIA does. Can the same be said about the KGB?

You'd be hard pressed to find an instance where an average American civilian was affected by the KGB per se. Remember that most of the Cold War was a proxy war, fought in the middle east and South America. The FSB their successor did assassinate a dissident in London (Litvinenko), which the UK government ignored until Russia became sufficiently persona non grata lately.

I meant to ask whether the average Russian was affected by the KGB.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#96

Post by pigpaws »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #75
pigpaws wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah, isn't democracy grand? Its' a microcosm of the MSM.... and you thought this was a republic? Outrage-on-demand. EVERY opinion is protected, unless it doesn't agree with the "masses"...

You have freedom of speech, but that doesn't mean everyone should agree or respect your opinion.

Agree, no; Respect, yes (that I have an opinion). Its called being civil. I've been dinged for "not being civil" based on someone's subjective opinion (BS), but the way HN does things, its "Mob Rules". Down-vote all you want, but people who do without stating why are cowards.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#97

Post by ikeboy »

spangry wrote: post #94
ikeboy wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Who are they, and what justifies their torture? >People being tortured don't tell you valuable information; they tell you whatever they think will make the torture stop. You're already asserting your position, and disguising it as a question. Virtually everyone seriously condoning torture believe it is effective. If they were to believe it wasn't effective, they wouldn't order it to be done. You may think it's not e…

Assuming the conclusion? That would only be true if I also stated that the only possible justification someone might give for torture is intelligence gathering. I was simply addressing what I thought would be the most likely counter-argument, not asserting it's the only possible counter-argument. By all means, feel free to argue the merits of my 'pre-emptive counter-counter argument' (boy this is getting confusing).…

I think you should have left out the question altogether, or phrased it as an assertion: "nothing justifies torture".

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#98

Post by blowski »

zyxley wrote: post #91
blowski wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a "24" like scenario, if you knew that torturing 100 people, all of whom you believe to be terrorists, was 50% likely to yield useful information would you do it? For me personally, the effectiveness of torture is irrelevant. Maybe it is for you as well, I don't know from your comment. It's something we should not do, full stop.

I believe torture is morally wrong, but it's easier to point out the practicalities of coercive interrogation (even of a nontorturous kind) producing useless bullshit most of the time. Also, your hypothetical is absurdly biased in favor of torture, given that any real information retrieved would be a needle in the haystack of the aforementioned useless bullshit.

The problem with debating it on a practical level is that it sounds like you're haggling over what kind of ends are required to justify the means.

Even if it were 100% effective - every person tortured did exactly what the torturer wanted - it would still be unjustifiable because it is so morally repugnant.

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#99

Post by CocaKoala »

overcast wrote: post #69
CocaKoala wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it takes you more than 83 separate instances of waterboarding somebody to decide that they don't have useful information to share with you, then waterboarding is not an efficient way to get reliable information. If waterboarding is not an efficient way to get reliable information, then I'd be very curious to hear about what definition of "work" you're using where waterboarding might satisfy, but fail in this parti…

For all the times it didn't work, how many times did it work for others? One person, with no information, doesn't mean anything.

Your question is poorly formed because the basis of my comment was asking how you defined "work" in the context of waterboarding. You didn't provide any sort of definition, you just said "Well, maybe it worked for other people".

But if it doesn't work reliably, for whatever "work" means, then it doesn't matter if it's successful sometimes and unsuccessful other times because if you don't have a way to distinguish the success from the failure, it's impossible to measure.

That's why I asked you to clarify what you mean when you say it might "work".

Re: The Al-Qaeda Leader Who Wasn’t: The Shameful Ordeal of Abu Zubaydah

#100

Post by rm_-rf_slash »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #73
hartpuff wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The CIA is a sickening and surprisingly amateurish organisation. Their actions over the past decades have ruined the United States' international moral authority. I'm not even sure that's true. I think the perception of the CIA (perhaps due to generally positive portrayals of it on TV and in movies) is completely different to, say, the perception people have of the Stasi or KGB. And yet did those organizations, whi…

Behold, the effects of propaganda. I'd really like to see some solid research in how much the CIA or US government funds TV shows and movies to portray those organizations as the good guys, or whether it's more due to patriotism or whatever it is that makes a movie-maker portray organizations like that as good or bad.

Hah, good luck with that. One of the reasons the CIA is so effective is that it essentially self-funds the activities it doesn't want the public prying into. The agency makes its own investments and uses the profits as needed.

We usually think of this as a drugs-for-arms Iran-Contra-type of affair, but for most spy agencies, real estate is the way to go: it's easy to obfuscate ownership, the value tends to hold or rise, and nobody's gonna steal your condominium when you're not looking.

Sarasota FL has an interestingly high concentration of expensive property and people with clandestine connections. (It also has one of the highest rates of climate change denial, a thought for another time) "He works in real estate" is a common implication.

So to answer your question, how much propaganda does the CIA fund:

You will never, ever know.

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