Courtesy of Think Progress, which also supplies an explaination by Marc Jacobson, who served on the Defense Department Prisoner Policy Team from 2002-2003:
[The problem is] the perception that we tossed off [the Geneva Convention] and said, “We’re going to have nothing to do with this; we’re going to create our own set of rules,” that not only created a perception to the world that we are not going to adhere to the rule of law, but from a functional standpoint, I think it may have put our own troops in danger. You have a situation now where other nations can say: “Because of the different nature of this war, we are not going to treat U.S. troops as prisoners of war. They are enemy combatants. I’m sorry — military necessity. We’re following the precedent you’re setting.”
I'm having another one of those moments now when I really wish I could say to a Bushie: Is this really what we've come to? Really? Is this what our troops are fighting and dying for? Really?
ETA via War and Piece:
Tapped's Sam Rosenfeld points to my friend Jason Vest's important July Prospect feature story on the fight between the FBI and the CIA over who would interrogate Al-Libi, and the crappy information the CIA got when it won because it sent al-Libi to Cairo to be tortured...What's the important point that hardened field agents told Vest from literally decades of experience interrogating suspects? Torture doesn't work. It produces bad information.
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