The only value captured terrorists hold is in the information they can provide -- information which has prevented terrorist attacks and led to the capture of still more terrorists. Information gained from Abu Zubadayah, for instance, led to the capture of Ramzi bin al-Shib, which in turn led to the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, as well as preventing an al-Qaeda attack in the United States. Yet due to a weakness of will, and a desire for the approval of Europe, we are on the verge of abandoning any useful means by which to extract such information. Most Americans probably don't feel so delicately about the treatment of captured terrorists. I'd bet that we could probably eliminate the National Debt by selling lottery tickets, with the prize being ten minutes alone with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and a lead pipe. Should Osama bin Laden be captured tomorrow, interrogators would be prevented from even shouting "boo!" at him.
The Left has driven this debate by claiming that any method used by Americans to gain information from captured enemies that makes them feel uncomfortable is "torture," while ignoring the fact that American soldiers and civilians are routinely kidnapped, tortured and beheaded by terrorists. Liberals, Democrats and their mainstream media partners have repeatedly accused the United States of using torture during interrogations. In fact, there is no evidence that torture has been used on the detainees at Guantanamo Bay or anywhere else.
Real torture usually results in lost or damaged body parts. Real torture involves inflicting pain of such intensity and duration that the subject would do anything at all rather than face it again. But coercive interrogations, such as the CIA was permitted to use against Abu Zubadayah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, are simply not torture. Loud music, threats, rooms that are too hot or too cold, lack of sleep and interrogators using good cop/bad cop routines are not torture. As much as one may dislike it, playing the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica and other loud music barely rises above the level of "annoying." Otherwise, the parents of every teenager in America would be calling Human Rights Watch.
On the contrary, Gitmo detainees are guaranteed a full night's sleep, which cannot be broken for interrogations. They eat at least as well as the soldiers who guard them, hearty meals of "culturally acceptable" food. They also get plenty of outdoor recreation, and all the religious perks they could want. Guards are even forbidden to touch the personal Qur'ans each detainee is issued. They receive health care courtesy of the US taxpayer, and their biggest medical problem is that they're gaining weight. The detainees are allowed to send and receive letters, which cannot be opened and read, and pass each other messages by giving them to lawyers. The detainees often cooperate to stage attacks on the guards, sharing resources and strategies. Yet the Left continues to cry that the terrorists aren't being treated gently enough under the terms of the Geneva Conventions.
The Geneva Conventions were adopted after WWII to encourage nations at war to treat captured enemies in a humane fashion. Those who do not adhere to the rules are unable to demand such consideration for their own troops, who would (it was supposed) refuse to fight, or trade information for humane treatment if captured. Until now, nations have not adhered to the Geneva Conventions and the laws of war because they feel an overwhelming need to be nice to their enemies, but because they want their own captured soldiers treated well. Terrorists, besides not fighting on behalf of any nation, flout the Conventions and all rules of warfare by deliberately targeting the innocent and torturing those whom they capture. Yet the Supreme Court forced President Bush to extend Geneva Conventions protections to those who had been deliberately excluded from them by the Conventions themselves, thereby rendering them utterly meaningless. Not only the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, but the "high value" detainees held by the CIA were deemed worthy of protection by the Geneva Conventions.
It's easy enough for the Supreme Court to decide that captured foreign terrorists should have most of the legal rights of American citizens, plus the protections due signatories of the Geneva Conventions. But with all that protection, how are we to gather the information needed to stop future attacks? The confusion stems from Article 3, Part 1 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, which prohibits "Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment." What, precisely, does that mean? By whose standards are "outrages upon personal dignity" to be judged? No one knows what methods of interrogation are still legal and which can no longer be used. Every attempt to clarify the meaning of this ambiguous phrase has been mischaracterised as an attempt to change or abolish it.
Even former Secretary of State Colin Powell and certain Republican Senators such as John McCain (AZ), John Warner (VA), Lindsey Graham (SC) and Susan Collins (ME) have -- by accident or design -- misunderstood the attempts to distinguish between legal and illegal interrogation methods. The four Senators have joined the Democrats in pushing a bill that would deliberately leave the language as vague as possible, hamstringing those trying to save lives. The bill would also force the government to give secret information to terrorists preparing for their trials. McCain railed against "weakening the Geneva protections" and said President Bush's request "puts our military personnel and others directly at risk." Powell declared his support for the wishy-washy Republicans, saying he was worried that the "world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism." Powell's letter also declared, "To redefine Common Article 3 would add to those doubts...Furthermore, it would put our own troops at risk."
Who do these people think we're fighting? Since when have captured American soldiers been protected by the Geneva Conventions? We have, in fact, never fought an enemy to whom they meant more than a way to tie our hands. It's impossible to see how either our troops or our civilian population could be put at greater risk by using coercive methods to discover details of enemy plots and personnel. More to the point, abandoning interrogation methods that have already protected civilians from terrorist plots in order to lessen the threat to our troops seems like an obscene role reversal. I have to wonder how members of our military would react to being made safer -- if that were even true -- by increasing the risk to those they have put their lives on the line to protect.
Capturing our enemies no longer helps the war effort. In fact, detainees may become a serious liability. As it is, we cannot interrogate them effectively. The Left is using their very existence to undermine support for the war at home and abroad. Guantanamo Bay is little more than a US taxpayer-funded terrorist resort and training camp. If the Democrats (and certain Republicans) have their way, detainees will be handed secret information that they can send to their fellow terrorists in letters which the guards are forbidden to open.
If the McCain bill becomes law, there's only one way our troops can prevent captured enemies from using our own system to become an even greater threat. Don't capture any.
Joe Mariani is a computer consultant born and raised in New Jersey. He now lives in Pennsylvania, where the gun laws are less restrictive and taxes are lower. Joe always thought of himself as politically neutral until he saw how far left the left had really gone after 9/11. His essays and links to articles are available at http://www.guardianwatchblog.com/