Originally written Feb. 9, 2006

by Christine Gates

Torture & Intimidation?

I will tell you about Intimidation!

The U.S. military and CIA are repeatedly accused of torture, intimidating the Iraqi people, and other alleged war-crimes by the main-stream media (MSM).  I’ll tell you about intimidation of people.

 
If what some call torture at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were really torture, then we would beat them within an inch of their lives, get the information, and then kill them.  We don’t!  Some say our torture tactics are intimidating the Muslim world, especially the Iraqi people, which is a human rights violation.  Hog-wash!

 
If what some call intimidation of the Iraqi people were really what I would call intimidation, here is what I would do.

I would be beat them so severely that many or most of the bones in their bodies were fractured, whip them, cut off their arms and legs, and leave them on the streets in Baghdad to die like dogs.  I would make sure the torture victim was able to live long enough to tell everyone - like the other terrorists - how brutal the Americans were and to plead with everyone to give up.  The “victim” would be in such excruciating pain and agony that the tales of torture would be accompanied by the gurglings of death. 

 
That would make everyone in Iraq intimidated by U.S. practices.

 
It is sure to intimidate most, and by the way, the above scenario is how Westerners are treated when they are captured by terrorists in Iraq, with the only exception being when they are beheaded so they can’t talk.  It is all video taped for the world to see.  Al-Jezeera broadcasts the images and then they are archived on the internet.  The images show innocent men pleading for their lives as their heads are slowly sawed off with a small saw, not a sharp blade.  The radical-Muslims decapitate little girls on their way to school, principals who teach girls, and numerous aid-workers who have no political affiliation in places like Afghanistan and Indonesia.  That is our enemy in this war.  They torture; we do not.

 
What we are doing is nothing compared to such things as described above.  I would hope that my government would never do such heinous things against another human being.  We, the American military, are not doing such things.  Here is what we do:  We play loud rap music.  We keep them awake for long periods of time.  We flush books down toilets (proven untrue, but still thrown around as fact).  We feed them according to their Islamic food laws.  We allow prayer five times a day (as prescribed by their religion).  We give them prayer mats and Holy books.  Recently, we have been intravenously feeding some of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay so they won’t die while they are on a hunger strike.  We have allowed attack dogs to bark close to prisoners.  How exactly are we violating human rights? 

 
Maybe some are disturbed by my fantasy, as they should, but think about the reality of American methods and the methods of others in history.  We are not “torturing” our enemy.

 
China, to begin another topic, is engaged in the practice of selling the body parts of executed political prisoners.  They sell vital organs for transplantation and adult stem cells for research.  They sell aborted fetus parts for medical research and to cosmetics companies.  Those seems to be bigger human rights violations than one of our soldiers letting his dog bark too close to a terrorist prisoner or putting underwear on the heads of naked prisoners.  I don’t hear great out cry from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch about China’s practices.  Why not?

 
Everything needs to be kept in its context and not blown completely out of proportion.  War is inherently ugly, unfair and harsh – we need to remember that.