TJP

Cheney’s Motivation: Pure Self-Interest

By Byron A. Ellis – May 22, 2009

Since the time of Adam, language has been used as a deceptive and polarizing tool. According to the Bible, Satan used it to deceived Adam and Eve and as a wedge between them and God. The serpent, which represents Satan, told Eve that if she ate from the tree of knowledge she would be like God.

Today, advocates of torture have relabeled it as enhanced interrogation. Thus, they are attempting to use language to change public perception. These are the same stock of people that claimed Native Americans were valueless and could be exterminated for their land and that Africans were not human and, therefore could be exploited for profit.

The contemporaneous claim is that waterboarding is not torture. Such claim, however, is posited and pure self-interest.

Waterboarding is the practice of strapping down a prisoner, placing a cloth over his face and dousing him with water to simulate the sensation of drowning. The technique was first used by the Spanish Inquisition and has been the subject of war-crimes trials dating back a century.

According to Article 3 of the Geneva Convention: “In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions: 1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, color, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria. To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons: (a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; (b) Taking of hostages; (c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment; (d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.”

Recently, the Daily Beast reported that two intelligence officers confirmed that Vice President’s Cheney’s office suggested waterboarding an Iraqi prisoner.

McCain, to his credit, noted, “Japanese were tried and convicted and hung for war crimes committed against American POWs. Among those charges for which they were convicted was waterboarding.”

Even Bush’s Bush's attorney general, Mukasey, has called waterboarding personally "repugnant."

And National Public Radio (NPR) reported “The interrogation method was used by the Japanese in World War II, by U.S. troops in the Philippines and by the French in Algeria. In Cambodia, the Khmer Rogue used waterboarding against its own people. The British used it against both Arabs and Jews in occupied Palestine in the 1930s. In the 1970s, it was widely used in Latin America, particularly under the military dictatorships in Chile and Argentina (where it was known as "Asian torture.").”

It is clear why some members of the former administration wants to use language to make torture more palatable to the American public; they do not want to go to jail.

Additionally, the claim that waterboarding was effective, requires a redefinition of effectiveness, since prisoners were waterboarded more than eighty times. If an interrogation technique is effective, the first time it is used it is should produce the desired effect.

Apparently, the argument espoused by the former administration is that enemies should be sacrificed to maintain America safe. Such philosophy, however, is contrary to the mandate of Jesus Christ, so it is anti-Christ.

Jesus admonishes to love our enemies (Luke 6:27-36), because it is through love and understanding that divides are bridged. 

The philosophy of hating and not seeking to understand our adversaries’ grievances makes us less safe.

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