Pictured: the terrorists and the terrible.
The New York Times reported Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the confessed architect of the 9/11/01 attacks on the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon was waterboarded 183 times, and according to a 2005 Justice Department memo as part of the CIA’s overseas detention program Abu Zubaydah, the first major accomplice captured was subjected to the procedure 83 times.
It’s time somebody says this, thank you President Bush and to his men who worked so diligently to get to the bottom of how the 9/11 attacks happened. In such a complex operation planned largely overseas, they were able to identify the prime suspects, seize them, and get to the bottom of their plans in quick order. As such, our intelligence and defense operations got right to the heart of Bin Ladin’s wicked Al Qaeda operation to identify what they were doing and then were able to insulate the United States for the remainder of his administration against a single attack against private United States citizens, our military, or our interests either in the United States or overseas.
What’s really disgusting about this whole matter is not that the most worthless scum the world has to offer, is that our efforts to deal the most conspicuously evil, murderous thugs to walk the earth at least since Hitler’s Nazis exterminated millions of Jews is shown in any way as a bad thing not the heroic and justified action it truly was. There is no question that waterboarding is a miserable experience for someone to endure. However, it is a procedure some of our special ops men have been subjected to as part of their training and toughening. News reporters have voluntarily submitted to the procedure to report on just how effective a method it is.
Let’s be clear on two things. Waterboarding causes no lasting physical damage whatsoever to its subjects. The procedure was used under careful supervision and with layers of permission on only the most dangerous high value detainees in the war on terror. Most importantly, it worked. The United States got the key intelligence it needed to break the back of Al Qaeda rendering them, at least up to now, incapable of further attacks on our republic.
Those responsible, whose confidentiality can be revealed, should be applauded as heroes. The American people owe them a debt of gratitude for their persistence and determination to accomplish goal number one, securing our safety against the worst single day attack on domestic United States targets where close to 3000 of our fellow citizens were killed for no other reason than reporting to work as most responsible Americans do almost every day of their adult lives.
Those who attacked us were more than criminals. They were enemy combatants. Their actions were not simply crimes. They were acts of genocide. Their tactics, hijacking four airliners and using them as weapons to kill as many Americans as possible exceeds all known definitions of aggressive warfare which we can only best describe as terrorism. This was not the action of a rogue or tyrannical state against another nation. It was the action of an organized, well-financed and meticulously managed operation grounded in the most insidious perversion of the Muslim religion as justification to destroy as many of our fellow citizens as possible because our values and interests, that we stand for freedom, self-expression, free enterprise, the integrity of women and people of all faiths, and democracy stand as the absolute opposite of their vision of society which has only been seen on a grand scale when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan where, for starters, women were forced to hide behind clothing that best resembled burlap fertilizer bags while being denied the most basic necessities of civilized life including education and who could be beaten or killed for any action that displeased the males of Taliban society. Even the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein or radicalized Iran would be seen as too permissive by these evil thugs.
Because we are a civilization where the rights and integrity of the individual matters, we are very careful to resort to behavior where simply resorting to those actions where the ends justify the means is an acceptable response to even the most barbaric acts against us, but all philosophies have their limits.
While the radical left, the news media, and many politicians express their outrage against the “enhanced interrogation” methods employed by the Bush administration, we must put what was done in proper perspective. As the Obama administration could obviously care less at what is at stake revealing confidential matters of things done to assure our safety, the actions those who would ridicule President Bush’s decisions, the information reveals the layers of permission needed, the precautions taken, and the careful deliberation taken before any actions that go beyond regular passive means of imprisonment were taken. At no time was indiscriminate torture employed and every action taken was as a final measure when more passive measures failed.
What is never considered by figures in the media and most disturbingly the current administration is any sense of perspective. President Bush had to deal with the awesome task of having 3000 Americans killed on his watch and had to take every action conceivable to prevent any further threats to our people. Extreme situations demand extreme measures and let’s be real, when the whole story of how these interrogation episodes were handled with so much scrutiny and followed carefully scripted procedures. It’s not like our officials were just whaling away on these lowest scum of scum.
What rationale against “enhanced interrogation” stands up when the whole situation, who the detainees were, what we stood to gain from them, and how the whole scenario was conducted are considered. There’s been some mumbo-jumbo about if we act in such harsh ways against our adversaries, what are they going to do to us? Let’s see, how were our servicemen treated at Fallouja? What did the Islamic thugs do to American journalist, Daniel Pearl?
Lost in all the moralizing over the methodology of interrogation is the key issue: what measures are being taken by our government to destroy worldwide terrorist movements. While the United States turns inwards against itself, who is the next Khalid Sheik Mohammed? Where is he hiding? What does he know? What is he planning?
This citizen is thankful for the single-mindedness and resolve shown by our last President to keep our nation safe. It’s a very difficult job with many tough questions to answer and decisions to be made. When considering the big picture, how could there be any compassion against thugs like Khalid Sheik Mohammed?
Meanwhile, look how far our efforts have fallen in less than 100 days. Between President Barack Obama and Homeland Security Chief, Janet Napolitano removing concepts like “war on terror,” “terrorist,” and “enemy combatant” from their official vocabulary and seeking to deal with terrorists as ordinary criminals with all the protections afforded regular American citizens during peace time, clearly they do not understand the severity of the situation, just how wicked and determined our adversaries are, and just how much carefully focused efforts are required to succeed.
Instead, they are more worried about what potential threats might exist among those who are most likely to have political and moral values that don’t agree with theirs wasting precious time and resources on their shameful confidential report to law enforcement where even the servicemen who surrendered their personal freedom, put their lives on the line, and fought overseas to secure our freedom are seen as a pool of possible recruits for ultra-conservative domestic terrorist operations. They don’t mind throwing around concepts like terror when talking about our own people including committed Christians whose moral standards pit them against abortion and embryonic stem cell research, gun owners, listeners to talk radio, citizens dealing with the consequences of the failing economy, or are concerned about the effects of illegal immigration,
Their wild goose chase against our own citizens prefaces its key findings with the following rationale:
The DHS/Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) has no specific
information that domestic rightwing* terrorists are currently planning acts of violence,
but rightwing extremists may be gaining new recruits by playing on their fears about
several emergent issues. The economic downturn and the election of the first
African American president present unique drivers for rightwing radicalization and
recruitment.
Then the balance of the report goes on to define those they see as possible threats, threats with no specific information, our own citizens all engaged in lawful pursuits whose greatest threat is that when push comes to shove, their core values, lifestyle, or current situation might encourage values contrary to the orthodoxy of Obama administration dogma.
All of these perceived threats are spoken of in terms of terrorism with an entire section of the report dedicated “Disgruntled Military Veterans.” That the second most extreme act of terrorism in the United States was committed by a psychopathic former Gulf War soldier, Timothy McVeigh appears to have created a waive of paranoia enveloping the judgment and thinking of Ms. Napolitano.
While the administration is chasing windmills worried about what we, normal citizens, who are appalled at how his administration is behaving and is anxious to reveal every confidential action the Bush administration took that does not agree with them, what are they doing to protect us from our most dangerous threat, radical Islam. They won’t even call the threat by what it is. How can any of us feel safe in that context?
Who knows what revelations lie ahead or to what extent the Obama maniacs will go to discredit the previous administration who accepted the awesome challenge of putting our safety first? Clearly, the Obama administration is more concerned about its political standing and threats against its ability to saturate the public with its radical policies without dissent.
What is a greater abuse of power; making an Al Qaeda leader very uncomfortable streaming water in his nose to obtain much needed intelligence or developing a report which concedes having no “specific information” targeted against normal American citizens whose values and lifestyles put them at odds with how the Obama administration would want them to behave?
The conclusions are obvious. How could our enemies not feel profoundly embolden when they realize their threat is no longer taken seriously when our government is more concerned with scolding itself for how it dealt with those at the heart of the terrorist movement while at the same time showing extreme paranoia against the very citizens they are charged with protecting?
With the whole situation presented in its full context, we admire President Bush and his chain of command for exercising such remarkable restraint and considering their actions so carefully while doing what was necessary to obtain the most precious intelligence of all in the war on terror. Given all the crimes against humanity Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah were guilty of exploiting, that these examples of the absolute worst of human scum could be handled in such a purposeful, professional manner aimed solely at the goal of obtaining information and not pounding away on them for retribution shows the highest kind of moral behavior in the heat of warfare imaginable.
How these simple facts and principles can be so hard to understand is difficult to comprehend. These are the factors the news media should be presenting the American people not the constant Chicken Little ‘the sky is falling’ hysteria that our officials had to act very assertively against the absolute most wicked villains on the face of the earth.
This citizen thanks President Bush and prays that my fellow Americans will eventually appreciate his wisdom. If the news media won’t tell us the truth, how are we to know any better?
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