I rather like the US. It is a mighty fine place. There is some stuff I do not like about it, but such is the case with all things in life.
To tell the truth, after seeing the research and results, I do not support torture. Not for any moral reason, as much as the tactical value of what we gained, does not appear to outweigh the damage done to our national prestige.
As to speaking to people who have been tortured, you are correct. She was too far gone to say anything. Apparently after they beat her (to the point of a compound fracture), they set her on fire, then wrapped her in some sort of synthetic blanket, and tossed her on the roadside. I imagine they thought she was dead. Her family found her and brought her to us for medical treatment. We couldn't treat her, so we had her evacuated elsewhere. From talking to the medics though, it is certain she later expired of wounds given the nature of her injuries. We never got a good answer on what she'd done. It couldn't have been working for us, as we'd never seen her before. I mean, not that we'd have recognized her, but the ID card didn't ring up as belonging to a source or someone we bought goods from. Our local partnered unit didn't have anything to do with her either.
I did talk to the man who had been sent to blow up Americans in suicide attack with the threat they'd rape and murder his wife if he did not conduct the attack though.
The world is not some stupid debate club meeting in which the "moral" position will result in the correct action. You live in a manner in which you are free of the consequences of your actions. If you supported torture, or condemn it, there is no big difference, you would just feel self righteous for hurting them bad people, or for being an ivory pillar of righteousness.
The American government, and its security apparatus is charged with protecting its millions of people at large, from very, very bad people who would like to hurt us in all sorts of fun and fascinating ways. There are very real repercussions when collectively, it makes choices. At some point, when confronted with a very horrifying new view of the world (in the burning embers of what had been the great stretch of prosperity that had been the Clinton years), they made a choice to do something that was very bad for a select group of people, to try to protect a larger group of people from great harm.
Was it worth it? Likely not. From my brushes with the local justice system, roughing someone up appears to work on low level jokers, but not as well on the higher ups. Then again that's pretty far outside my job field, I shouldn't conjecture too much.
But the point remains, you bear no burden save for your own. Your moral judgments affect only one man, and that is you. Your screeching every time something doesn't jive with your personal worldview has gotten tiresome. We live in a big scary horrible world in which bad men want to hurt us. Dealing with those two facts more often than not involves compromises, sometimes for the greater good, sometimes in great error.
To believe otherwise is to be naive to the point of being a small child. So with that breath, I must ask if your mother knows where you are EJ, and if it isn't time for your nap yet?
I live with the consequences of my actions. Choices I make can, and do have serious outcomes that affect other people. I would say that takes a maturity you lack with your "na-na, everything amrikkkan is torture and bad! boo" posts.
So with that, bip-bip, cheerio, I have a job to get to.
