By Michael
Faulkner – July 19, 2009
When
Republican Senator and presidential candidate, Barry Goldwater, proclaimed in
1964 that “moderation in the face of tyranny is no virtue; extremism in defence
of liberty is no vice”, he provided the flimsy intellectual cover which later
enabled Reagan and Bush to prosecute their ideological wars against the “Evil
Empire” and the “Axis of Evil”. Such
a cover was unnecessary of course. The CIA had for years been engaged in a wide
range of dirty tricks involving attempted assassination of “troublesome” heads
of state, destabilisation and overthrow of elected governments deemed
“unfriendly” to U.S. interests, arming and funding of right-wing death squads,
economic sabotage and so on. Such noble endeavours in defence of the “free world”
stretched back to the 1940s. There
is no doubt that in the course of such endeavours torture played a part,
perpetrated either directly by U.S. operatives, or by proxies. Needless to say, this has always been
denied. It continued to be denied even after irrefutable evidence to the
contrary was made public following the invasion of Iraq. “We do not torture”,
claimed Bush, Cheney and Rice, even as the photographic evidence from Abu Ghraib
and the testimonies from those tortured at Guantanamo reached the eyes and ears
of the world.
The Bush
administration’s sanctioning of torture in its prosecution of the “war on
terror” relied on the usual resort to euphemism about the practices employed.
Waterboarding and prolonged sleep deprivation were not forms of torture. They
were “enhanced interrogation techniques”, rather as kidnapping of suspects and
transferring them to black hole detention centres was “extraordinary
rendition.” Employment of this
Orwellian terminology leads easily to the convenient conclusion that as long as
the “enhanced techniques” stop short of killing the sufferer, they do not
amount to torture. Or, put bluntly in the words of Johathan Fredman, former
chief counsel to the interrogators, “if the detainee dies, you’re doing it
wrong.” On the basis of this
logic, the Gestapo, no slouches at subjecting their victims to unspeakable
physical and mental torments from which death might have been a welcome
release, were not torturers but practitioners of enhanced interrogation. The perpetrators of such techniques and
their defenders do not appear too interested in engaging in moral arguments
about what they do. They prefer to talk about the efficacy of the
interrogations. They are pragmatists – like Dick Cheney.
In a recent
lecture to the American Enterprise Institute, the former Vice President opened
fire rhetorically on the Obama Administration. The new president’s declared
intention to ban the torture techniques sanctioned by his predecessor, was,
according to Cheney, making “the American people less safe.” In the style of
his mentor, Barry Goldwater, he concluded that it was ”recklessness cloaked in righteousness.” It is to be hoped
that Obama will resist pressure from this quarter, the clear intention of which
is to derail his plans to make a clean break with the Bush administration’s
practices. But one should not underestimate the determination of the
Bush-Cheney camp to undermine the new president. Cheney’s case in defence of
torture is clearly indefensible on moral grounds. But it is almost equally weak
on pragmatic grounds.
His case is
that some valuable evidence has been extracted from terror suspects
interrogated in this way. As he does not reveal what this information might be,
there is no way to substantiate his claims. It is, however, widely accepted that under torture people
are very likely to tell their interrogators what they want to hear in order to
gain relief from their torments. It is possible to imagine extreme circumstances in which torturers may
succeed in extracting valuable information through use of barbaric methods
which nevertheless do not involve inflicting physical pain. In World War Two it
is known that the Nazis managed to extract information from members of the
resistance movements who were unlikely to buckle under physical torture, by
threatening to kill their spouses, their children or other entirely innocent
people. To make such threats effective, the perpetrators would have to be
prepared to carry out their threats – and, of course, the Gestapo were
prepared to do so. Would the pragmatist Cheney be prepared to defend such
practices? Perhaps he might try to argue that such extremism, in defence of
liberty, is no vice.
It seems
clear that this is a populist bid to appeal to “the American people”. Newly
appointed director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, on hearing Cheney’s speech, is
reported in a recent New Yorker article as saying “it’s almost as if he’s
wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point.”
It certainly looks that way. But without going that far it seems clear that the
Cheney-Bush brigade are actively engaged in trying to reclaim the political
initiative. There is a possibility that another Al Qaeda attack could be
launched against the U.S. or somewhere else in the world. Should such an attack
occur it will play straight into the hands of the neo-conservatives. The
direction of their propaganda offensive is clear. The needs of “national
security” take precedence over all other considerations, including the rule of
law in the U.S. and international law. How perceived “enemies of the state” are
dealt with will come very low down the list of priorities when the security of
the whole nation is at stake. Without resorting to claims of plots and
conspiracies, it seems clear that at the very least the intention is to scare
the Obama administration into back-tracking on its commitments rigorously to enforce the rule of law and the practice
of transparency in its foreign and domestic policy. There are already signs
that some of the president’s pre-election commitments are being dropped.
One can see
how the arguments might run: We mustn’t alienate too many Republican supporters
and sections of the military. Therefore, we must be careful about releasing
compromising evidence about torture. We should not get too hung up on the past.
We do not want to appear vindictive to those who worked for the Bush
administration. Therefore we cannot prosecute those guilty of breaking the law
– after all, they were only obeying orders. And so on. One thing seems
clear. If the “national security” scaremongers are allowed to claim the
political high ground, the Obama administration will be forced onto the
defensive. That position could lead to a succession of unprincipled
compromises, none of which will be sufficient to satisfy the voracity of the
Republican right.
The Bush
administration used the 9/11 atrocity to justify the attacks on Afghanistan and
Iraq and to seriously undermine the rule of law in the United States through
the Patriot Act and other legislation. While the parallel should not be pushed too far (Bush did not destroy
democracy in the U.S.) there are certain similarities with the situation in
Germany in 1932-33. The Nazis exploited the Reichstag fire to push through an
Enabling Act which allowed Hitler to rule by decree. While this met with huge
opposition, the majority of Germans were deceived into believing that there was
an immediate threat to national security from “red terrorists”. Legislation was introduced to enable
perceived “terrorists” and other “enemies of the state” to be taken into
“protective custody”. All who
opposed such measures were labelled “anti German” and denounced as proponents
of the “Un-German” spirit. The
point about this is that it was all done in the name of national security. The
majority of Germans didn’t want to know about what happened to those detained
in concentration camps and Gestapo torture chambers. As “terrorists” and
“enemies of the state” they had it coming to them. By the time the eyes of the
majority were opened to the fact that they were living under a dictatorship, it
was too late.
Perhaps
this sounds wildly pessimistic. No-one is suggesting that such a prospect faces
the United States even if the Republicans were to re-take Congress and the
Presidency. It is to be hoped – and there are good grounds for hoping
– that the liberal tide will continue to run. Obama was elected with a
ground-swell of popular support not seen for any candidate since F.D.
Roosevelt. But it seems that what appeared to have the character of a mass- movement
last year, has faded away. Without the mass base to sustain him there is no
guarantee that Obama will be able to deliver the progressive programme that he
was elected to fulfil. Given the
enormity of the task facing him, he will need to remain resolute in his
commitment to those who have placed so much confidence in him. 