It is widely known that torture can have horrifying psychological effects on its victims, but in an Op-Ed for the Washington Post, former Army interrogator Eric Fair relates his own hardship coping with what he did to Iraqi detainees in the name of freedom.
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MY EDITORIAL:
Dear Former Army Interrogator,
First, thank you for serving. I am forever in debt to you for that.
Thank you also for speaking up and speaking your mind. I admire that.
But, ask yourself why your story is news in the first place? Because it is common or because it is uncommon. Is this a story about the one truck that did catch on fire on the interstate or the rare story about the thousands that did not? You made it to the Post because there is a hunger for anything that puts the US in a bad light.(the one truck that did)
Was the good that was done by the gathered intel edited out of your story? Because how could you in good conscience leave out the fact that sometimes that hard to get intel saved lives and was productive. How could you leave out the context and perspective of the enemy we are up against and how their training manuals detail it being the prisoners duty to lie and to always say he was tortured and abused.(Manchester Manual) Or the context of how the enemy treats its prisoners! Or the context and perspective of how our very own soldiers go through much worse at SERE school than the acts of "torture" you outlined.
Having said all of this I do agree with your overall premise about torture and its usefulness. I also think it emboldens the enemy. We should lead first as country by example. I also think that you saying it is systematic goes against everything I have heard first hand from those "down range" and those who just got back from Intel school at Fort Huachuca, freshly trained.
Thank you again for serving.
Kind Regards,
--
Benjamin Parrish Cook
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