The Spin on Torture

(This is an oped piece I had written for the Cap Times. It was going to be used, but the woman I knew there got promoted to Managing Editor that same day. So this article was forgotten. That's fine with me, but I felt like posting it today since the issue is still important.)

The Spin on Torture
By Debra Miller

As a young adult, I remember learning of the barbaric tactics used by the Japanese military on prisoners of war during World War II. I was, of course, horrified, and I was so thankful to be an American where we didn’t behave like “those people.” When we captured soldiers, we treated them with basic respect and dignity because we were Americans – the nation with true character.

Today I am reading the “Alleged Secret Detentions and Unlawful Inter-state Transfers Involving Council of Europe Member States” by Mr. Dick Marty of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly. The report contains details of certain men who have been detained by our government for months and sometimes years, tortured, forced to endure barbaric conditions, and then – in some cases – released because there was no evidence of guilt in the first place. Some of these men are still in custody in Guantanamo, just because they knew someone who knew someone who was part of a terrorist organization. The following is a description of an American prison in Kabul called the “Dark Prison,” sometimes used as a detention post: there is “loud music round the clock, a total absence of light, rotten food, no possibility to wash or use a toilet, uncomfortable handcuffing and leg shackling, cold cell, inadequate clothing, prisoners frequently beaten and trampled on.”

There is the testimony of Binyam Mohamed al Habashi, a resident of the United Kingdom, who has been held in Guantanamo for five years. He has kept a diary of these years and the various abuses he has suffered at the hands of American CIA agents and government officials of other nations that have been involved in the rendition program. The abuses are several and severe, at the least humiliating and at the worst close to murder. It could just be one man’s testimony, except that many others who have been under our custody due to the war on terror have said the same thing. They have been subject to beatings, cutting of private parts and then having pictures taken of them, hanging them in shackles, knocking of heads against the wall, and being chained to the floor with their arms suspended above their head. These are just a few of the things that we are supposed to accept as “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

According to an AP report of November, 2005, over 83,000 people have been detained in the “war on terror.” About 14,500 are still in custody. Of the 112 who have died in US custody, 26 are being investigated as criminal homicides. What has happened to our character as a nation? William Bennet wrote a book entitled, Moral Outrage, in regard to the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal. Where is Bennet’s book about the moral outrage regarding the use of torture by the Bush administration? Where is the evangelical Christian response to such obvious disregard for human dignity?

Our behavior is extremely hypocritical in light of trying to build a democracy in Iraq. It is also hypocritical in light of our president’s religious beliefs. The examples of torture in the Bible are many – Jeremiah, Daniel, Shadrach, Meshah, Abed-nego, Peter, Paul, Silas, and the one who endured the most torture – Jesus – all victims of political power gone bad. Torture, by definition, is done by a government to a person in its custody. Imprisoned people are vulnerable and cannot fight back. That is why we could point fingers at the Japanese and Germans and decry their injustice and lack of humanity. Now we need to get the log out of our eye and demand change from our administration.

Richard J. Neuhaus has said, “We dare not trust ourselves to torture.” It may work for Jack Bauer, but, as Senator John McCain has said, “24” makes great TV but rotten reality. David P. Gushee, Graves Professor of Moral Philosophy at Union University, in his “Christianity Today” article “Against Torture,” states,

Just because U.S. government officials say that we can be trusted to act
‘in keeping with our values’ - without due process, accountability, and
transparency - does not make it so. No government is so virtuous as to
be able to overturn the too often verifed laws of human nature, or to be
beyond the need for democratic checks and balances.”

Gushee has identified five reasons that torture must not be allowed. First, it violates the intrinsic dignity of the human being, made in the image of God. Second, it mistreats the vulnerable and thus violates the demands of public justice. Third, authorizing any form of torture trusts government too much. Fourth, torture invites the dehumanization of the torturer. (I have never been proud of my German heritage for this reason.) And fifth, torture erodes the character of the nation that tortures.

The fifth reason contains the most irony. This administration, which prides itself on representing the evangelical Christians of our nation and holds the allegiance of so many of those Christians, is condoning behavior that is so anti-Christian as well as being un-American. They are using political spin to justify sin. And where there is sin, there is need of repentance. The Declaration of Independence states that “all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” If these rights are God-given, then they are extended to all of mankind and not just Americans. God is just, and the guilty will not go unpunished, but we must always remember that that goes for us as well as the “bad guys.”

The United States Supreme Court, in a June 2004 judgment, stated, “For if this Nation is to remain true to the ideals symbolized by its flag, it must not wield the tools of tyrants even to resist an assault by the forces of tyranny.” Our nation is founded on the belief of the dignity of each person, and many who have gone before us have built a reputation for this nation that is worthy of our pride and patriotism. But when our behavior gets out of hand it is up to us to speak out and call for accountability. As Proverbs 14:34 says, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.”

Pat Buchanan is my Hero - Today

I just finished listening to Joy Cardin's interview with Pat Buchanan on WPR. He is calling a spade a spade as far as the war in Iraq is concerned, and the potential for war with Iran. He has declared that our reasons for going into Iraq were wrong, many have died needlessly, and that we as Americans are full of ourselves if we think it's our job to save the world. If Bush continues to push toward war with Iran, and the American people don't stop him, then we will face the judgment we deserve. You don't go to war based on a perceived threat, you go to war to avenge acts of wickedness. George W. Bush, unless he repents, will have the blood of many Americans and many more Iraqis on his hands. So will Congress.

Guliani has the neocons behind him - to put him in the White House would be foolishness indeed.

And how has this affected Iraqi Christians? Brother Andrew says that conditions for Christians there are worse than they have ever been, and they are so dangerous that he can't go into detail lest they be persecuted even further. Samaritan's Purse claims that the number of Christians in Iraq have decreased by over 150,000. You would think that a Christian administration would be more careful about guarding what little Light was in the nation of Iraq. Who is the Light of the World anyway? It is Jesus, not American democracy. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. We have terribly squandered what could have been a history-changing eight years by caving into hubris and humanism. Proverbs 24:6 speaks of there being victory in the multitude of counsel. This verse is referring to war, and the United States has failed to humbly seek out needed counsel. "Victory" will not follow.