The Torture Debate in America, Essay Example

Danchev analyzes and discusses the role that Britain plays in abusing suspected terrorists. Analyze the accuracy of Danchev’s revelations that detainees are abused and tortured.

According to Danchev the torture of suspected terrorists involved corporal ingenuity and instruction, considered to have been perpetrated by the “alliance of values” in Tony Blair’s words. However, the primary goal of the punishment was humiliation, which took a canine form. During the torture, the Schmidt Report (n.d.) reports that detainees were reminded that no one remembered, cared or loved them; being considered less than human and that animals were more loved and freer than them. When the detainee refused the waster he had been offered, he was reminded that a dog was held in high esteem compared to him because a dog differentiated wrong from right and protected its territory. The detainees were hence taught lessons how to bark, come, stay in order to match his status to that of a dog (Eliot, 2006).

What role does the United States play in this situation?

The culture of impunity is evidenced by the US failing to attach responsibility despite evidence of torture by the commanders and policy-makers. Instead the highest powers of the country should stop adding insult to injury by holding the responsible persons to account. Surprisingly, officers commission inquiries such as the Schlesinger Report and reject the findings when the evidence point fingers on commanders known to them (Greenberg, 2005).

And what can the US do to prevent it?

Prevention of the torture of suspected terrorists can be achieved by the implementation of the Geneva Conventions (Four Conventions) that provide protection for persons that fall into enemy hands. Although it does not separate non- from combatants, it refers to “wounded and ailing combatants” from civilian persons, by cutting on the laborious tasks accorded to them. Additionally the conventions state that persons who did not participate in hostilities or have laid down their arms should be treated humanely.

References

Eliot W. (5 January 2006).  “What I heard about Iraq in 2005”, London Review of Books.

Greenberg, K. J. (2005). The torture debate in America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Schmidt Report (n.d.). p. 13; Working Group Report, Torture Papers. p. 357.