Discovering How the US Became a "Torturing Democracy"

Related Post: Fox News Anchor: "We Do Not F****** Torture!"

By coincidence, as the latest furour over torture escalated, I was writing chapers on the early months of the Bush Administration. That, in part, is why I have been unsettled by the spin, diversions, and outright lies of former Bush officials: the evidence offers no gray area in which to hide. The Bush Administration authorised torture, under the label "enhanced interrogation", and persisted in that authorisation even though there was no evidence of its effectiveness, let alone its legality or morality.

One of the sources I have been using is the website for the documentary Torturing Democracy. It is invaluable for its interviews, documents, and commentary (and the full documentary is on-line). A few of many notable examples:

Richard Armitage, former special forces officer, Deputy Secretary of State in the Bush Administration: "There is no question in my mind -- there's no question in any reasonable human being, there shouldn't be, that [waterboarding] is torture."

Moazzam Begg, detainee in Camp Bagram in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay:

The CIA, the military intelligence, and the FBI had decided in May 2002 to begin my interrogation in earnest, which included during that period me being tied, "hogtied" as I call it, also as they call it in America, with my hands tied behind my back to my ankles and being left like that for hours on end at various points....They brought photographs of my family, which they'd taken off my laptop computer, which they'd seized in Pakistan, which include pictures of my children that they waved in front of me and asked me, "Where do you think they are? Do you think they're safe? What do you think happened to them? Do you think you're going to see them again?" And during this period hearing the sounds of a woman screaming. The implication of which was it was my wife being tortured next door; they didn't say as much, but they didn't have to.

Martin Lederman, Department of Justice Legal Adviser:

The purpose of the torture memo [of August 2002] was to give the CIA absolute assurance that no matter what it did, in terms of interrogation, that it would never be subject to any criminal culpability. None of its agents would ever be exposed to criminal culpability under domestic law, putting aside foreign tribunals.

Michael Gelles, Chief Psychologist, Naval Criminal Investigative Service:

We know that people who are tortured provide information. We just don't believe that in most cases that information is accurate and reliable. Because people will provide information to stop the discomfort.

Bush-Cheney Official Armitage on Torture: "Maybe I Should Have Quit"

Richard Armitage is neither a lefty nor a softie. He has served in the CIA, military special forces, and Department of Defense, and in the Bush White House, he was Deputy Secretary of State to Colin Powell. On the day after 9-11, he personally laid out the seven-point ultimatum to the head of the Pakistani intelligence services: comply with our campaign or the US is coming after your country.

So when Armitage tells Al Jazeera that he should have resigned over the Bush Administration's treatment of prisoners of war, this is not the regret of an official who was opposed to the campaign against Al Qa'eda and international terrorism. And when he says for the record that, yes, detainees were tortured by waterboarding, this is a statement for the record rather than party-politics criticism.

This short clip is another sad far-from-footnote in the record of how a US Government tore up international law such as the Geneva Conventions and any meaningful ethical standards in the name of a "War on Terror". Armitage and Powell were out-manoeuvred by a Vice President's office and Department of Defense intent on claiming an unchallenged Executive authority beyond law or public accountability. (What Armitage does not mention in this clip is the awful irony that those same officials would walk away from the battle with Al Qa'eda to pursue war in Iraq.)

Yet, lest anyone make out Richard Armitage to be a valiant hero in a sordid saga, it should be noted that he is eager to avoid any culpability in torture --- as he did not know about waterboarding --- and equally happy to throw blame on members of Congress.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hEvvUBkYDk[/youtube]