What is wrong with our colonels?

It does sound strange that she takes that position, but she does have a point. If America is unwilling to follow international law, why should Iran? American soldiers captured anywhere in the world really can't expect to be treated any better than if they were at Guantanamo or rendition victims. Of course that's still better treatment than anyone would have expected a century ago.

Where she falls flat, however, is fairly obvious - The captured soldiers are British, not American, and therefore belong to a state that has followed international law. Iran should treat them with a greater degree of law than they might do with Americans, because from all reports Britain is yet to break or ignore the Geneva Convention in this current conflict.

You can’t be serious! If America followed international law all illegal combatants once documented to be illegal are to be taken out and shot. No trial is required according to international law. They are classified as spies which also don’t need a trial to be shot. Out of uniform of a recognized nation carrying a weapon and firing on our troops is all that is needed to shot the person. Two witnesses that swear it was true and it is a clean shoot. We capture these people and feed them and treat them as if they are legal combatants under the Geneva conventions and people say we are doing them wrong. Please give me three instances where America tortured a soldier from Iraq. Give me any instances where America tortured a soldier from Iran?
Yes, people have made these claims but don’t have the facts to back them up. Did some soldier lose his discipline and break the law? I have no doubt that it has happened more than once but when it is brought to the attention of the military authorities the person or persons involved were punished publicly. The people that make the claims of torture and abuse use it as a weapon to hurt America and sow the seeds of mistrust for our government. But the can’t come up with any that have had this horrible torture they talk about.




American soldiers when captured rarely are treated as well as the people in Gitmo! Those people get three hot meals a day, clean beds to sleep in, and unless they are violent never a harsh word is used on them. Conversely when an American is captured he is tortured for days at a time, teeth pulled without pain killers. Not to get information but for fun. Mock executions are held almost daily and nobody cares, but let an American give some prisoner a dirty look and we hear about it all over the world about how mean, rotten, and cruel we are.

“Rendition victims?” Wait a minute! We capture a person on the battle field of Iraq, they person is documented to be a citizen of Saudi Arabia. After the person is interrogated and we have little or no information coming from the person we ship them back to the nation of their birth to finish out their prison sentence or if they promise not to attack America again we sent them home under the watchful eyes of there own nation. How is that bad? Let me guess, you are talking about the Canadian that was on Canada’s watch list and was captured in America. He was not an American citizen and we did not want a suspected terrorist in the states. Canada did not want him back so he was sent back to the country of his birth. What did America do wrong? Yes, the nation he was born in tortured him but not at our request. That was between Canada and the other nation we just wanted him out of our country. It was later found out that he was not a terrorist but he was not on our watch list he was on Canada’s list. Their mistake and we get the blame. There were situations where terrorist were sent to the nation of their birth and were tortured by that nation and the FBI was given access to the transcripts and in two cases was allowed to sit in on the interrogation after the torture. None of what the man told us under torture can be used against him so we only gained information that can be used on other people but not that person. He was going to be tortured anyway why not use the information if it has value.
Before you get on your high horse torture is the standard method of interrogation in that part of the world. It is expected when captured to be beaten and abused just because. It rarely works which is why we don’t do it. Shocked to find out that we don’t use torture as a routine interrogation tool? Don’t be, we have not used torture as a tool since WWII yet other nations have never stopped using it. Torture in America is best used in fiction novels and cinema and shows like 24 not in real life.




Got a little surprise for you, neither has the United States of America.

I was going to point this out but I see you have beaten me to it. The Geneva Convention rules only apply to legal uniformed military members, not terrorists or other illegal combatants (as defined by International Law).

American P.O.W.'s have never been treated no where near as well as the P.O.W.s' captured by America. To hear "SOME" americans talk about it, it is like America is the bad guy in ALL THINGS. DISGUSTING!!!!

Yes, it is great that we have freedom of speech in this country. It allows people to put an entire nation at risk just to gain political power. President Bush ordered his council to find out what we can legally do to the illegal combatants so our troops would know exactly what was legal and what was not in regards to interrogation and treatment so the rules could be incorporated into the interrogation plan. The left took this information and screamed that Bush wanted to torture people. America is bad we deserve to be punished by the terrorist. Any piss ant group of people just have to say they have reason to hate America and these idiots suck it up and parrot it as if it is true because we are the bad guys.

Whats really disturbing is reading forums over the past couple of days and seeing how people (mostly liberals) are defending Iran's stance and basically blaming America.  Unbelievable.

I would ask our esteemed Cacto to cite chapter and verse where America is not following the Geneva Convention. I know it cant be done without lying and distorting, but I would be insterested to see the spin he tries to put on it.

Except for that guy in Germany we discussed a few weeks (months?) ago. You know the one - he's launched a court case that has led to the indictment of a number of suspected CIA members.



Okay, international law then, although I suppose hardly anyone pays attention to international law so that's totally okay.



I don't care enough about it to 'cite chapter and verse'. I'm sure you can find someone who does somewhere on this big, big intarweb.

I was only trying to point out why the colonel's response was retarded. But as usual you're only interested in picking at anything you see that's even vaguely leftist. JU is so boring these days.

No, you made an accusation. I took it as neither left nor right, just mealy mouthed talking points by those that dont have a clue what is and is not contained within the Geneva Convention.

Perhaps before casting aspersions, you should prepare to back them up.

Sorry I don't know that one could you inform me of the case?



Got anything to back that up? I don't know of any international laws broken by the United states, Do you have any I am unaware of?



The problem is that most people take that view and we never see the facts only the accusations.

That's a bit rich! Where's your facts and figures? The sole source for this article seems to be the O'Reilly Factor, which is an infotainment opinion show, and the arguments you've made against me weren't exactly supported by reputable peer-reviewed sources.

If you're going to throw stones you might want to get out of the glasshouse first.

The one arguement seems to hold a lot of water. As in where has the US violated the Geneva Convention? You are good at bobbing and weaving and dodging proof of the accusation you made. It is not up to him to prove a negative, but for you to prove your accusation. Regardless of the "source" of his article.

The problem is that most people take that view and we never see the facts only the accusations. That's a bit rich! Where's your facts and figures? The sole source for this article seems to be the O'Reilly Factor, which is an infotainment opinion show, and the arguments you've made against me weren't exactly supported by reputable peer-reviewed sources. If you're going to throw stones you might want to get out of the glasshouse first.

Yeah cacto why don't you just try to refute this one!

You can’t be serious! If America followed international law all illegal combatants once documented to be illegal are to be taken out and shot. No trial is required according to international law. They are classified as spies which also don’t need a trial to be shot. Out of uniform of a recognized nation carrying a weapon and firing on our troops is all that is needed to shot the person. Two witnesses that swear it was true and it is a clean shoot. We capture these people and feed them and treat them as if they are legal combatants under the Geneva conventions and people say we are doing them wrong. Please give me three instances where America tortured a soldier from Iraq. Give me any instances where America tortured a soldier from Iran?

The source of this article is my opinion of what I saw on the show. O'Reilly stated his points and the colonel stated her points and I took what I saw and heard and produced the article.

While opinions are based on facts as we see them they don't have to be facts. Sorry if I am talking down to you but you don't seem to know the difference between opinions and facts.

Again I say, I hear the accusations but not the story or the facts of the situation. Care to help me see things your way?

Apparently not. So far as I can tell from your rather obtuse description they're assertions that don't require evidence. Therefore take what I said as opinions rather than assertions of fact.

Satisfied?

And what parts would that be?

I agree with you. I do not recall haveing this discussion with you LW, I doubt that we would ever disagree that much.

Huh? You're really going to have to try harder to be clear. I have no idea what you mean by 'parts' here. Are you talking about words? Clauses? Parts of an assertion? Parts of an obtuse description? Parts of you? Parts of evidence?

Precision in all things is God's way of saying sorry.

You continue to avoid backing your statement up Cacto. Why? When people make statements about US forces ignoring the Geneva Convention, I am curious about specifics. you really should look up the definitions of Lawful vs unlawful combatants and then make a factual statement.

Allow me to clear up the misunderstanding for you. You said the following.



Please provide examples of the US violating US laws, UN resolutions, International laws, and or Geneva conventions with regard to our treatment of legal combatants and illegal combatants. You brought up the following but I am unaware of the situation so I asked you to give me the story.



You replied with:



I was not satisfied. So I asked again what parts you are talking about. But maybe I phrased it incorrectly. So I will ask again what of this story where we tortured some person in Germany since it is the only instance you brought up in this thread.



After reading this reply I had a hard time understaning you. Care to make your answers clear?