Posted by
Bradford on Friday, May 11, 2007 7:25:42 PM
It's a depressing fact of life that many so-called "patriots" and "freedom-lovers" on the right see nothing wrong with torture, so long as we're the ones doing it. Such a willingness to abandon the principles of civilized behavior suggests that, for many of these would-be authoritarians, talk of freedom and liberty is just that. Talk.
Now Army General David H. Petraeus, top U.S. commander in Iraq, has publicly repudiated those who would support torture and other "expedient methods" in the war in Iraq. A recent Army survey found many U.S
military personnel willing to tolerate some torture of
suspects and unwilling to report abuse by comrades prompting Petraeus to write:
"I was concerned by the results of a recently released
survey conducted last fall in Iraq that revealed an apparent
unwillingness on the part of some US personnel to report illegal
actions taken by fellow members of their units. The study also
indicated that a small percentage of those surveyed may have mistreated
noncombatants. This survey should spur reflection on our conduct in
combat . . . Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. They would be wrong. Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they also are frequently neither useful nor necessary."
Kudos to General Petraeus.