I'm getting a little tired of people who bring up the dropping of Little Man and Fat Boy, as if to actually compare the "war" on terror with WWII. 

And the gall to call 9/11 a "man made disaster".

If the "techniques" being revealed had been practiced on American citizens, the very people criticizing the Obama Administration would be up in arms over brave Americans being tortured.

I'm getting a little tired of lots of things around here.  Join the crowd.  Besides, I don't see any comparison between 9-11 and WWII.  That isn't the point.

Yeah Ron, we're a pretty self destructive lot all right.  It's all our fault 9-11 happened , after all, no one in the world hated us til Bush.  That bad boy.

That's a good point anti, but we HAVE been up in arms over the torture of our citizens.

If the "techniques" being revealed had been practiced on American citizens, the very people criticizing the Obama Administration would be up in arms over brave Americans being tortured.

What did Nancy Pelosi know, and when did she know it?

Obviously chopping heads off and dragging the bodies thru the streets are ok for our enemies.

If Obama was waterboarding american citizens who had plans to kill millions of americans, I would have no problem with that.  I would be the first to come to his defense. How about you??

That's a good point anti, but we HAVE been up in arms over the torture of our citizens.

We should be up in arms. It is legal for our terrorist enemies to torture our citizens.

The day we began looking east to the oilfields of the Arab peninsula was the day we began the timeline for anti-Americanism.  It was sheer coincidence that Bush was in office during the worst attack. 

Fighting terrorism with more terrorism will not solve the problem, as I've stated plenty of times previously.  Releasing these memos is not going to "open a pandora's box."  I think it's proving to the rest of the world that we freely admit that we're not always right.  Such an admission gives us an ounce of credibility, and might even open up the table for diplomacy more on our terms. 

As an aside, it's amazing how similiar sales is to foreign policy.  Both are built upon communication, rapport and knowledge; none of which were seen during the previous 8 years.

Chopping heads off is murder, not torture, Ron. And because it's legal for enemies means we should do it? Then how do you prosecute them? There is a moral high ground to be taken.

And no, if Obama were waterboarding citizens who had plans to kill millions of Americans, I wouldn't support him. For one thing, waterboarding and other methods of torture, are seldom effective, according to the experts. As a parallel, let's say I drive home drunk one time and I'm successful getting there. Is that a good strategy every time? No, of course not. By the same token, I wouldn't expect torture to be all that effective, in any way, except otherwise to make my side feel they're doing everything they can. Who's to say it won't elicit only false information that sends you off on a wild goose chase?

So what exactly is Obama planning to give away now??

I see Fred is back putting people to sleep again. Even reading his drone comments ........zzzzzzzz.

Nancy:  Nothing good came from opening Pandora's Box.  That is what is happening, in my opinion.  People are going to get hurt; we as Americans are going to be in sorrier shape than we are now as regards defending the nation.  It's a sorry mess, and this Pandora's Box should never have been opened.  Never. 

That's why a "Truth Commission " is so important. We all need to know how we got here and then move on. No jail,no fines~ just the facts. Everybody gets "outed" that way ,each side of the aisle.

Otherwise the conspiracy theorists will never shut up.

The One released the memos just to give his leftwingtinhatted base their satisfying "2 minute hate" and then declare that there would be no prosecutions and we need to "move on".  But it blew up in his ill prepared for leading face. 

Yeah.  This'll make the world love us.  Sheesh.

 Below is a commentary by Debra J. Saunders - yes a conservative, but still a good read. 

After 9/11, Americans wanted one thing from Washington: to prevent future terrorist attacks. President George W. Bush, the CIA and other hard-working officials delivered. For their trouble, a handful of those individuals now have reason to fear that they may be ruined.

My guess is that President Obama realizes it was a big mistake for his administration to release four memos written by Bush administration lawyers sanctioning enhanced interrogation techniques. Already, rage on the left has prompted Obama to go squishy on his once-insistent opposition to prosecuting any Bush administration officials. Now he says he might let his attorney general prosecute Bush lawyers.

That would be criminalizing the politics of 2002. George Tenet wrote in his book "At the Center of the Storm," "After 9/11, gripped by the same emotions and fears, Congress exhorted the intelligence community to take more risks to protect the country." Civil rights? Then-Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., noted at a 2002 Senate intelligence committee that "we are not living in times in which lawyers can say no to an operation just to play it safe." Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz defended the use of rough treatment -- "the third degree" -- in order "to elicit information from terrorists about continuing threats." The Bush administration authorized techniques that the ACLU calls torture.

Seven years later, Obama banned those techniques, as he promised. But in releasing the memos last week, Obama unwittingly reinforced Osama bin Laden's view of America as a country of pantywaists. Now America's enemies know they have nothing to fear but bad lawyering if U.S. forces catch them.

The memos describe "enhanced" techniques used on 28 high-value detainees. Protocol called for operatives to begin with tamer methods. To wit: the "attention grasp," the "facial slap" and "dietary manipulation -- that is, "presenting detainees with a bland, unappetizing but nutritionally complete diet." Read: Ensure Plus. Really.

"Walling" involved pushing a detainee into a wall -- but a phony wall to prevent injury. The CIA was going to try to scare al-Qaida biggie Abu Zubaydah with insects, but the bugs had to be harmless and not cause an allergic reaction. I can see the al-Qaida boys chortling in their cave over the very idea that these techniques would even be controversial -- not to mention out of bounds under the Obama administration.

If the tamer methods did not work, operatives could ask CIA headquarters for permission to use more daunting techniques -- such as sleep deprivation and waterboarding. Three detainees were waterboarded before the last waterboarding in March 2003. The memos revealed that two detainees -- Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (aka KSM) -- were water boarded a total of 266 times.

Some maintain that the CIA might have learned what it needed to know without waterboarding. But as one memo reported, before the questioning got tough, "KSM resisted giving any answers to questions about future attacks, simply noting, 'Soon you will know.'"

The questioning got tougher. As the memo noted, the CIA believes that "the intelligence acquired from these interrogations has been a key reason why al Qaeda has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since 11 September 2001."

And: Once "enhanced techniques" were used on KSM, interrogations "led to the discovery of a KSM plot, the 'Second Wave,' … to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner' into a building in Los Angeles."

Do I like waterboarding? No, but it is not life threatening; in extreme cases, I can live with it. And I'll take waterboarding over a 9/11 in Los Angeles any day.

One last point: The Navy has used waterboarding in training. Obama put a stop to the "enhanced" techniques because he believes they have tarnished America's image abroad, which makes Americans less safe. People of goodwill can disagree on that point.

But when Obama opened the door for his attorney general to prosecute Bush lawyers, that flip-flop told U.S. intelligence and law enforcement operatives that Obama's assurances cannot be trusted. That can't be good for America's safety.

Former California Gov. Pete Wilson, who served on the Bush Defense Policy Board, was appalled. "If they try to prosecute that, that should spark mass resignations in the government," he told me Tuesday.

As for Obama, Wilson said, "This is a guy who was teaching law. Good God."

Nope, this should never have happened!

Sorry about the copy & paste...I just thought it was a well written piece. 

Please show me the evidence linking thwarted terorist attacks to information obtained via "advanced interrogation techniques."

The reality is that torture techniques more often produce no real credible information.

FloridaStateGrad , "The day we began looking east to the oilfields of the Arab peninsula was the day we began the timeline for anti-Americanism."

Don't you realize that the middle east didn't even know they had oil, much less know how to get it out of the ground until the British, Dutch and Americans found it and then started pumping it? They were kicked out of Iran and other parts of the middle east in the early 1970's, only AFTER they soaked a bunch of capital into developing the fields so that they would produce.

It was another 7 to 10 years before the Arabs figured out how to maintain the equipment and make it all work and produce oil. Do a little research on Standard Oil. You should be able to find a history of it. I still know people who were kicked out of those countries back then.

 Don't you realize that the middle east didn't even know they had oil, much less know how to get it out of the ground until the British, Dutch and Americans found it and then started pumping it? They were kicked out of Iran and other parts of the middle east in the early 1970's, only AFTER they soaked a bunch of capital into developing the fields so that they would produce.

It was another 7 to 10 years before the Arabs figured out how to maintain the equipment and make it all work and produce oil. Do a little research on Standard Oil. You should be able to find a history of it. I still know people who were kicked out of those countries back then.

So what?  The only reason we even sunk money into the middle east was because we had been the major supplier of oil for the Allies during WWII, and after the end of the war there was a panic that our oil resources were near extinction.  Therefore, we looked east towards an area that was still primarily under the influence of European imperialism. 

There are numerous decisions we made from a foreign policy standpoint that have a direct cause-and-effect relationship to Islamic Terrorism, and they begin post WWII.  As noted above, oil is one, but the second most important was to stave the spread of communism via Russia.  Our support of Israel is the third main reason, but I personally think that it hasn't been nearly as influential as the first two.

I'll glady to research on Standard Oil, if you'll do research into our relationship with the Shah of Iran post WWII and how it eventually led to the Iranian Revolution; or on our contradictory relationship with Saudi Arabia (even though the Saudi's support the most unpure and cruel version of Islam - Wahhabism), etc.

Your argument that we're helping the Arabs pump their oil is weak at best, because it doesn't have anything to do with our actual foreign policy.  We couldn't care less what happens to the Arabs or Persians.

I can actually remember the deal with the Shah and everything that happened with that. It wasn't WWII that made oil exploration over there a priority. It was Korea.

The single biggest thing we, as a nation did to promote terrorism was to support, train and arm the mujaheddin when they were fighting Russia. This is a perfect example of biting the hand that fed you. Since the Russians killed off all of the educated, civilized people in Afghanistan before the CIA even got involved, there were only the primitive left to fight. I was in the Navy when a lot of this was going on. I made several trips to Karachi carrying weapons and ordinance in the early 1980's. At the time, we weren't told much about why. Many years later, I figured it out. We also flew other missions around the area for reasons of insertions and extractions back then. Again, they weren't telling us much back then, but later, the pieces all came together.

 It wasn't WWII that made oil exploration over there a priority. It was Korea.

If that's true, then why is it that FDR had discussions with the Saudi's regarding oil right before his death?

The single biggest thing we, as a nation did to promote terrorism was to support, train and arm the mujaheddin when they were fighting Russia.

I disagree - it was operation Ajax which gave us the appearance of another imperialistic nation, thereby creating tension and distrust throughout the Arab/Persian world; which predates the Russian invasion of Afghanistan by a few decades.  Heck, we didn't even begin our support of the Mujaheddin until a few years later, after the hostage situation in Tehran.

Talks with FDR only led to exploration efforts. They still didn't know what would be found, if anything.

Ajax didn't train and arm anybody In the tactics of terrorism or gorilla warfare. It was going on in the mid/late 1950's. That was during Korea, but was conducted by the CIA. They did most of the work themselves.

The Russians invaded Afghanistan in 1977 or 1978 if I remember right. That was 4 or 5 years after the Americans, English and Dutch were kicked out of the Oil Fields that they built and developed.

Love Vintage: "Below is a commentary by Debra J. Saunders - yes a conservative, but still a good read. 

After 9/11, Americans wanted one thing from Washington: to prevent future terrorist attacks. President George W. Bush, the CIA and other hard-working officials delivered. For their trouble, a handful of those individuals now have reason to fear that they may be ruined."

What did they "deliver"? We weren't attacked, but to chalk that up to our use of torture is not only incorrect, it is insulting to the actual hard work of soldiers, not to mention the strategies of those who would do us harm. Bin Laden is as responsible for there being no further attacks as Bush is. Should we praise him for that? And to call torture "trouble" is insulting, not just to the concept of justice, but to the very core of this country as a moral example for the world to follow.

"My guess is that President Obama realizes it was a big mistake for his administration to release four memos written by Bush administration lawyers sanctioning enhanced interrogation techniques. Already, rage on the left has prompted Obama to go squishy on his once-insistent opposition to prosecuting any Bush administration officials. Now he says he might let his attorney general prosecute Bush lawyers."

Yes, I think Obama realizes his mistake of first saying he would not allow prosecution of those who tortured, or those who ordered the torture. I don't think it's "squishy" though, I think that's called "morality".

"That would be criminalizing the politics of 2002. George Tenet wrote in his book "At the Center of the Storm," "After 9/11, gripped by the same emotions and fears, Congress exhorted the intelligence community to take more risks to protect the country." Civil rights? Then-Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., noted at a 2002 Senate intelligence committee that "we are not living in times in which lawyers can say no to an operation just to play it safe." Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz defended the use of rough treatment -- "the third degree" -- in order "to elicit information from terrorists about continuing threats." The Bush administration authorized techniques that the ACLU calls torture."

No, that would be criminalizing criminal behavior. You are half correct, though; torture was a political tool, not a security tool. Prisoners were tortured to provide a link between al-Queda and Iraq where none existed. The "ticking time-bomb" scenario was completely fabricated, and Congress was lied to by the Administration about false links and false leads. It was well established before 2002 that waterboarding was torture. Go back to 1898 when US soldiers were found guilty of using the "water treatment" during the Spanish-American War. Japanese soldiers were found guilty of using it on US soldiers during WWII, and US soldiers were one again found guilty of it during Vietnam.

"Seven years later, Obama banned those techniques, as he promised. But in releasing the memos last week, Obama unwittingly reinforced Osama bin Laden's view of America as a country of pantywaists. Now America's enemies know they have nothing to fear but bad lawyering if U.S. forces catch them."

You really have no idea about interrogation techniques, or information gathered from terrorists not using them, or the fact that our torture, and the use of places like abu ghraib, have been bin Laden's wet-dream of recruitment. If you think that's bin Laden's view of America, you really need to learn about things like reverse psychology. You'll find yourself fooled by 12 year olds less often the sooner you do.....

"The memos describe "enhanced" techniques used on 28 high-value detainees. Protocol called for operatives to begin with tamer methods. To wit: the "attention grasp," the "facial slap" and "dietary manipulation -- that is, "presenting detainees with a bland, unappetizing but nutritionally complete diet." Read: Ensure Plus. Really."

...to quickly move onto....

""Walling" involved pushing a detainee into a wall -- but a phony wall to prevent injury. The CIA was going to try to scare al-Qaida biggie Abu Zubaydah with insects, but the bugs had to be harmless and not cause an allergic reaction. I can see the al-Qaida boys chortling in their cave over the very idea that these techniques would even be controversial -- not to mention out of bounds under the Obama administration."

No, "walling" is slamming someone's head into the wall while preventing neck injury. They're no good to you if you kill them by snapping their necks. Of course, killing someone by poisoning them with insects, or killing them through anaphylactic shock leads to the same useless corpse result....

"If the tamer methods did not work, operatives could ask CIA headquarters for permission to use more daunting techniques -- such as sleep deprivation and waterboarding. Three detainees were waterboarded before the last waterboarding in March 2003. The memos revealed that two detainees -- Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (aka KSM) -- were water boarded a total of 266 times."

Which means several things: that the first 265 times didn't work? It also assumes that we got useful information when we did this. Torture will make anyone say whatever you want. Which is why the Spanish Inquisition invented waterboarding. It'll convert anyone to Christianity.

"Some maintain that the CIA might have learned what it needed to know without waterboarding. But as one memo reported, before the questioning got tough, "KSM resisted giving any answers to questions about future attacks, simply noting, 'Soon you will know.'""

That "some" includes every single person who has interrogated terrorists since 9/11.

"The questioning got tougher. As the memo noted, the CIA believes that "the intelligence acquired from these interrogations has been a key reason why al Qaeda has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since 11 September 2001.""

...or it could be due to the fact that bin Laden hasn't needed another attack to have the US create every single recruitment opportunity for al-Queda. Why run the risk of condemnation from moderates in the Middle East by another attack, when the US continues to play the "evil empire" and give al-Queda everything it wants?

"And: Once "enhanced techniques" were used on KSM, interrogations "led to the discovery of a KSM plot, the 'Second Wave,' … to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner' into a building in Los Angeles.""

...except that if you look at the dates, the LA plot was uncovered months before KSM was captured. But facts always have a liberal bias, so I didn't expect you to mention that.....

"Do I like waterboarding? No, but it is not life threatening; in extreme cases, I can live with it. And I'll take waterboarding over a 9/11 in Los Angeles any day."

Wrong. Waterboarding is "drowning with simulated death". It is illegal, and has been in this country for over a century. It has been illegal according to international law for the past 60+ years. And your moral justification for torture is disgusting beyond the pale. Jack Bauer is a fictional character. There has never been a "ticking time-bomb" scenario. And even if there was, that is no reason to make waterboarding legal. If an LA 9/11 was avoided through torture, then let's go ahead and prosecute those responsible, and let them enter that as mitigating evidence during their sentencing. If they truly prevented another 9/11, they should be proud they broke the law. Instead, we have chickenhawks like Cheney and Rumsfeld sitting silently and idly by while US soldiers were sentenced to years in prison for practicing the very acts they approved and called for. Where were those cowards then? Why not step forward and say that those who practiced torture were true Americans, and call for their pardoning? They were cowardly for their (in)action, and you are cowardly for supporting it.

"One last point: The Navy has used waterboarding in training. Obama put a stop to the "enhanced" techniques because he believes they have tarnished America's image abroad, which makes Americans less safe. People of goodwill can disagree on that point."

Alright, I've heard the "torture makes America more safe" -argument, I've never heard the "torturing improves America's image abroad" -argument. Care to let the rest of us in on the secret?

"But when Obama opened the door for his attorney general to prosecute Bush lawyers, that flip-flop told U.S. intelligence and law enforcement operatives that Obama's assurances cannot be trusted. That can't be good for America's safety."

Oh, so because Obama wants to enforce the law, he's making America less safe? Are you mental? Wait, don't answer that.

"Former California Gov. Pete Wilson, who served on the Bush Defense Policy Board, was appalled. "If they try to prosecute that, that should spark mass resignations in the government," he told me Tuesday."

Asking people to resign because they broke the law? That would only cause mass resignations by those hired over the past 8 years.....

"As for Obama, Wilson said, "This is a guy who was teaching law. Good God.""

Oh. My. God. A lawyer wanting to hold people responsible for breaking the law. Who'da thunk it? I'm just appalled it's taken him this long to start holding people responsible.....

PS: When you're done defending torture, why stop there? Might I suggest moving into the field of pro-child rape? Or perhaps pro-Holocost?

I'm going to pull one out of the old Bush playbook...

Barack Obama is the President.  He receives the most classified information in the country.  Fred Thompson does not.  Why should we believe Fred Thompson?

PS: When you're done defending torture, why stop there? Might I suggest moving into the field of pro-child rape? Or perhaps pro-Holocost?

How true.  We all know that breaking the speed limit leads directly to a person wanting to commit  mass murder.

I never would have agreed to the formulation of the Central Intelligence Agency back in forty-seven, if I had known it would become the American Gestapo.

 Harry S Truman, 1961

The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a bit longer.

 Henry Kissinger, 1975

Mattlock says:  

You really have no idea about interrogation techniques, or information gathered from terrorists not using them, or the fact that our torture, and the use of places like abu ghraib, have been bin Laden's wet-dream of recruitment. If you think that's bin Laden's view of America, you really need to learn about things like reverse psychology. You'll find yourself fooled by 12 year olds less often the sooner you do.....

I'm sitting here with a friend of mine who does have an idea about being waterboarded, as he went through S.E.R.E. training and was "boarded" .  He says you have no idea what you're talking about.  Until you have been waterboarded, you have no right to suggest to anyone whether it is right or wrong.  He saw many others in S.E.R.E. training also get "boarded" and saw no long lasting effects from their experience.  Is it fun?...NO!, he says.  He does believe that it can gather useful information with its practice.  He does want to know if you believe that giving them a slap on the hand and withholding dessert will gather useful information?!!!  To consider waterboarding an insult to our hardworking troops suggests to him you've never been in the military and you have no idea or concept of war or the fight against terrorism.

One more point: Again, you do not know what you are talking about when you say it's simulated death by drowning, because he's been there as well.  He'll plead the 5th on which he thought was worse, the "board," or drowning. 

Going to S.E.R.E. is not an accurate comparison for the simple reason that you volunteer to go and can quit.  You go into with the knowledge that you aren't going to die. The same rules don't apply to detainees.   Being waterboarded for training (or charity) is just not the same.

lovevintage: thanks to your friend for his service and congratulations on finishing S.E.R.E. training.

As to his opinions on whether or not it is torture: he knew he was not going to die and that the doctor present was there to save his life and his tormentors were 'friendlies'. There is no way that experience can be equated with  the real thing. He knows the physical sensation, not the psychological.

As an example of what I mean: a friend's Dad once hit his thumb with a hammer and it swelled up painfully underneath the thumbnail, turning a rainbow of colors. His solution: take his power drill and ease the pressure with a small hole drilled right through the swollen nail.

Was that torture? Absolutely not.

But what if someone else did it to the old guy in order to get his ATM Pin number? Do you think the public would be outraged?

OK, he's hi-jacked my screen name, you've got my friend going now...

QUIT? You clown.  Yet another person who has never been in the military.  You don't QUIT S.E.R.E. training.  At least not when I was in. 

Is it really necessary to re post what other people have posted to repond to it?

As for hacking ones head off not being torture.  Apparently what you're saying is that if you die it's not  torture.  You have to live after they hack around on your neck for it to be classified as torture.

And I suppose IF you die, it's just psychological torture for your family, no big deal as long as no one was waterboarded.

Well, I've only been in for 11 years. Silly me what do I know. 

+They just made bout 1000 Pvts go to SERE for the hell of it.+

Is there anyone that has something negative to say that knows what they are talking about?  BELIEVE me, you get a great dose of the psychological.  I was 1 of 3 Marines who was chosen to go through S.E.R.E., the rest were pilots.  At the end of your training, you go through a de-brief.  This was in the mid 70's and our de-briefing officer was a POW for 7 years.  One of the pilots asked why they picked on the Marines so much.  I'll just say he responded by saying "we love to give the Marines an extra heavy dose of training."  So believe me when I say, I got a great dose of the psychological.  S.E.R.E.'s is an introduction to what it's like being a POW and the techniques they use to extract information, which btw, were childs play compared to what the North Vietnamese did to our people.  I went into it thinking I was a pretty "bad" arse marine, you come out the other side finding out you're not as "bad" a** as you think you are.  In the realm of "torture" waterboarding is really a pretty lightweight "torture." 

Now I ask you, what are your suggestions for getting information from prisoners?  I'm thinking right now you're going to give me a good laugh with your answer.

Unless someone here is a professional interrogator, they are not speaking with experience. Not to say that S.E.R.E. training isn't horrible, but you do know how long it lasts and when you get to go home. You knew it was a training exercise. I'm also pretty sure you weren't waterboarded 6 times a day, then shoved into a dark box with bugs to crawl all over you until it's time for your next waterboarding for a month straight. To compare the 2 is completely ignoring exactly what the Bush administration did with their harsh interrogation techniques. 

The whole point of the Geneva Conventions and the fact that the United States of America has had a policy that we would not torture ever since the Revolutionary War is because we as a nation must take the moral high ground. If we torture, we have no reason to demand or even expect that our soldiers wouldn't be subjected to the same treatment. Our soldiers were tortured in Vietnam. Did we torture them right back as a matter of policy? No. Why is that?

I will never understand why anyone that has been in the military would attempt to justify war crimes or torture. It goes against everything you were trained not to do. Seeing an American get their head cut off on the internet doesn't change that.

I said I would get a good laugh.  I also asked for someone to respond that knew what they were talking about.  Progressive failed miserably in his attempt.  S.E.R.E. instructors are very good at what they do.  I would go so far as to say they enjoy it.  I could classify anyone that can get information from someone as a very good interrogator.  I like how you say "as a matter of policy," this shows your ignorance of the Vietnam War.  Everything that I was trained not to do?  I was trained to kill people.  I thought they trained me very well for it.  But I'm sure you'll find something wrong with that too, right?!!!  Again, I present the question, how would you get any information from the bad guys, without some form of "torture?" 

Nancy, I didn't say it wasn't necessarily a painless death, but a beheading is murder. It goes way beyond torture. It may in fact be torture, as well. But to compare a beheading to the euphemistic "enhanced interrogation techniques" is disingenuous. One is murder. The other one isn't.

Nancy, I'd like to play devil's advocate.  My comment was so lengthy, however, that I have turned it into a blog.  Anybody interested in seeing the way in which I play devil's advocate will just have to read my blog.  I hope it's finished tonight.  Where I am, it's 9:05 p.m.

Progressive is right, Love,  If you are a professional interrogator, you have  better idea of what works and what doesn't.  Just because you came out of training unscathed doesn't qualify you to say it's an okay technique to use on detainees.  Some information that was given during the waterboarding is good and some of it is bad.  I spoke with General (Ret.) Sullivan, the former Army Chief of Staff, about this just last thursday.  He may not have the qualifications though,  He wasn't  Marine, after all.

LV: "Again, I present the question, how would you get any information from the bad guys, without some form of "torture?""

What did they do during WWII?

"We got more information out of a German general with a game of chess or Ping-Pong than they do today, with their torture," said Henry Kolm, 90, an MIT physicist who had been assigned to play chess in Germany with Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess.

More importantly, how do you justify the breaking of national and international laws by torture? Would you be willing to break the law if it meant defusing a "ticking time bomb" -scenario? Would you be willing to be charged with the crime if you stopped a terrorist attack?