http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html en-gb 30 Thu 31 Dec 2009 00:51:07 GMT+1 A feed of user comments from the page found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html?page=16#comment4 Legalism is not justice.A military court is not a civil court.Practically, field conditions differ from higher echelon conditions.Torture is a form of terror.Has anyone read the transcripts from Guantanamo?One fellow was a completely honest man- he said he had fought the Russians when they occupied his country and then he fought the Americans when they did the same. He said he had not been tortured.But, he added, "most of these prisoners have nothing at all to dowith any of this and you ought to set them free." Mon 19 May 2008 01:53:28 GMT+1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html?page=12#comment3 Quite simply, the Americans reacted to 911, rather than responded to it. Their 'war on terrorism' was too quick off the mark and lacked long term focus. They threw away the good-will created by the awful events of that day and they discarded the post second world war lessons and ethos that millions, rather than 3,000, died for. A man that can sit in a kindergarten school and fail to react to an attack on the World Trade Centre when it had years before been attacked, is a man without history and a man without judgment. Because of that president's poor judgment, America is now a lost soul watching from the side-lines as China, Europe and Islam begin to assert moral authority in this world. The question is whether America can learn from its failure to understand the needs of a world badly in need of stability and work with them. Fri 16 May 2008 03:22:13 GMT+1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html?page=8#comment2 Debates on the legality and effectiveness of torture all rest on the assumption that torture is about obtaining information. I'm not sure that this is always the case - in fact I suspect that it rarely is. As Noam Chomsky says, torture usually has more to do with "maintaining credibility" - *sending* a message - than gathering intelligence. Those who torture are broadcasting a coded message to enemies and potential enemies (and even dissenting friends): I will get my way, by fair means or foul, so don't cross me. With respect to American torture, the message seems crystal clear. Lest we forget, might is right. Thu 01 May 2008 02:57:41 GMT+1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html?page=4#comment1 A key principle in the arguments regarding the USA's treatment of those detained in "The War on Terror" is that the US does not extend to them the protection of the Geneva Conventions. In that, the USA is correct. The terrorists are irregular combatants. The Geneva Concentions do not afford protection to such. The Provisional IRA, INLA and Loyalist Paramilitaries were not treated under the Geneva Conventions but under Criminal Law.The Geneva Conventions do not require that regular soldiers be treated according to the Conventions in perpetuity. For example, if a soldier misuses the white flag, eg entices the enemy to believe he/she is surrendering and then opens fire, then the soldier(s) who acted in this way are no longer protected by the Geneva Conventions. Render fear to those who deserve fear and honour those to whom honour is due. Sat 26 Apr 2008 20:22:08 GMT+1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2008/04/torture_team_by_philippe_sands.html?page=0#comment0 TORTUREIf you have stomach for realising how little grip mankind has on "civilised" behaviour, read Zimbardo's "The Lucifer Effect". The problem is that basic bloke is nasty and sophisticated bloke happy to let him be. It is a hell of a long road from here to a gentle world; we are rushing along it - the wrong way - but Gordon's Moral Compass is demagnetised and Dubya's only points to Victory. One can only assume that Mugabe's Compass points right up his . . . Fri 25 Apr 2008 18:42:49 GMT+1