As the means of mass destruction get ever-smaller and more accessible to individuals via vials and backpacks, blowback becomes an even more important issue. It only takes one person from the countless lives that have been damaged or destroyed during the long occupation of two countries. Factor in a culture that puts a premium on honor and grudges and revenge and generally takes a long view of history, and we might not find out for many years exactly how much danger we've put ourselves in.
Torture blowback
Wednesday April 29, 2009
Categories: Torture
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About Crunchy Con
Rod Dreher is an editorial columnist for the Dallas Morning News, and author of "Crunchy Cons" (Crown Forum), a nonfiction book about conservatives, most of them religious, whose faith and political convictions sometimes put them at odds with mainstream conservatives. The views expressed in this blog are his own.
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Typical Internet toughtalk:
Men sooner forget the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony”—Niccolo Machiavelli
What creates insurgents isn't our behavior, but our very presence in foreign countries, period. The torture may add a bit of spice to that resentment, but it's not the underlying fuel. We could be perfect gentlemen in our treatment of prisoners and still see the same result. If you don't want to deal foreign threats minimize your meddling in foreign affairs. It's really that simple.
I'm with Derek. That's why we need to shift to negitiation rather than force; everybody has relatives in some other country, and no amount of force will get all of them. The days in which you could exterminate or terrorize all your enemies are long gone, if they ever existed.
"Cunning Realist says that if he had had a family member tortured by the US, nothing would stop him from seeking revenge."
As a "thought experiment" let's suppose that "Cunning Realist" had a family member who was killed in the U.S. on 9/11 at either the WTC or the Pentagon. What would "Cunning Realist" be thinking or feeling then? Would anything be stopping him from seeking revenge? Or, perhaps even, keeping an open mind on the efficacy or morality of waterboarding?
@Reganite:
Cunning Realist never said that that impulse was civilized, legal, or a good idea.
The individuals most affected by crimes and monstrosities are not the best ones to decide what is done about them. This is why we have a legal system: to replace the blind and furious impulse to revenge with some rationality, and some balance.
The people who ordered and approved waterboarding, who carried it out, did not lose relatives on 9/11. Or if they did, their uninvolved colleagues should have restrained them.
But on one thing we do agree: torture is as morally repugnant as terrorism. I do think you're standing on the wrong side of the line there.
It's something that I have thought privately, namely: what would I do if something like what happened to Maher Arar or Khalid El-Masri happened to me or a family member.
You bet I would seek payback. It would be nasty, effective and lethal. . . . Blood is thicker then water, as they say, and I would not let such an affront to the autonomy of myself or family go unanswered.
But what if the "family member" being tortured had just murdered your children?
What if the agent of the state that did the torturing was your own husband?
What if you had other family members relying on your provision instead of rotting in prison or swinging from the gallows?
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