This is coolbert:
Here, from only today:
"Defense Department Won’t Say Whether U.S. Troops Still Undergo ‘Water boarding’ in Training"
"(CNSNews.com) – Though water boarding is banned as an interrogation technique for members of al Qaeda and other terror suspects, the Defense Department will not say whether U.S. military soldiers undergo water boarding in their training, as discussed in a 2002 government memo made public last week."
“'The mission [of SERE] is to train military members to survive an isolation event,' said Kathleen Jabs, spokeswoman for the U.S. Joint Forces Command, the division of the Defense Department that oversees the SERE program."
"However, she would not specify whether water boarding is still used on troops during training."
Right - - exactly!! All this brouhaha about water boarding has raised some interesting questions. IS WATER BOARDING STILL BEING USED AS PART OF THE U.S. SERE TRAINING PROGRAM!!??
Select American military personnel, airmen, Special Forces, rangers, SEALS, etc., persons who run an elevated risk of capture by the enemy, ACTUALLY ARE WATER BOARDED AS PART OF THEIR TRAINING!! Water boarding for some time, decades even, has always been included as part of the SERE course?
The question has to be asked - - well, if it is illegal to water board captured enemy terrorists, then too, is it now, OR EVEN HAS IT BEEN - - ILLEGAL ALL ALONG - - to waterboard American military service personnel - - EVEN IF ONLY AS PART OF A TRAINING PROGRAM??!!
And I am also wondering also about the other elements of SERE as well. Exposure to extremes of heat or cold, forced nakedness [a male standing naked in front of a crowd of jeering, laughing females, the latter pointing and commenting in a ribald way!!] etc.
These too all constitute torture as well? Even well meaning training has been for decades, ILLEGAL ALL ALONG!!??
Can anyone answer this question? Or should I say, is the question even being asked?
And U.S. troops/sailors/airmen from this point forward are no longer subject to mistreatment during SERE, EVEN IF BY "FRIENDLIES" AND EVEN IF IT IS JUST "TRAINING"!!
It would seem to me that water boarding as part of training, and many other aspects of SERE as well - - are now ILLEGAL, AND HAVE BEEN RENDERED NULL AND VOID!! You can talk about it in class, and maybe see historic film footage of what will occur to you, but that is about all!!
As for my self, well, you can water board me all you want, but PLEASE, no nakedness in front of a bunch of women. I could not stand the laughter!!
coolbert.
Umm, SERE Training is purely voluntary and a person can stop at any time in the process, that's kind of the point. They try to get you to sign a false confession.
ReplyDeleteAnyone who knows anything about the military or the special forces community ought to know that.
To stopping SERE would be a dis-service to those in the special forces as they would not be trained in the skills designed to prepare them to survive potential capture by the enemy.
The tragedy is not in SERE training, it is in the fact that we employed methods we feared would be used on our troops by an inhumane enemy. We became that enemy.
If they hadn't learned it from SERE they would have learned it somewhere else. SERE is not relevant to the discussion.
"SERE is voluntary." BULLSHIT.
ReplyDeleteIf you refuse to complete training, you lose your career.
While you're in SERE, it seems like great fun and a rewarding challenge, until they break out the waterboard.
When they're pouring water down your throat, it's not voluntary. You try to scream, you try to fight the straps, you panic, you can't breathe, you're drowning, and THE WATER DOESN'T STOP. You can't "opt out" once your mind snaps and your honestly believe you're going to die.