Gonzaga Debate Institute 2010

Credibility Adv. – I/L – Torture Bad – US Credibility

Torture hurts the US image abroad, risks any opportunity to develop a relationship with the Arab world, and is the most repugnant act imaginable

Schell 5 (Jonathan, http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0120-25.htm, date accessed: 6/25/2010) AJK

The senators' language regarding torture reflected, with exceptions, the horror of the matter as dimly as their flowery praise of one another. None, it is true, went as far as to suggest that restrictions on the abuse of prisoners were "unilateral disarmament," as a recent Wall Street Journal editorial did. Most of the senatorial defenders of Gonzales's record concentrated on denying his responsibility for one or another of the damning memos. More striking were the arguments against torture by those skeptical of the nomination. Two dominated. One was that torture hurts the image of the United States in the world. In the words of Senator Lindsey Graham, "I can tell you that it is a club that our enemies use, and we need to take that club out of their hand." Or in the words of Senator Herb Kohl, "winning the hearts and minds of the Arab world is vital to our success in the war on terror," and "Photographs that have come out of Abu Ghraib have undoubtedly hurt those efforts." The second argument was that enemy forces would torture U.S. forces in retaliation. In Biden's words, "This is about the safety and security of American forces." Even Gonzales, who declined at every opportunity to repudiate the policies that had led to the torture, was ready to agree that Abu Ghraib had harmed the image of the United States. But are these the fundamental reasons that torture is unacceptable? Can this nation now understand pain only if it is experienced by Americans or, through some chain of consequences, it rebounds upon the United States? Have all the people in the world but Americans become invisible to Americans? Torture is not wrong because someone else thinks it is wrong or because others, in retaliation for torture by Americans, may torture Americans. It is the torture that is wrong. Torture is wrong because it inflicts unspeakable pain upon the body of a fellow human being who is entirely at our mercy. The tortured person is bound and helpless. The torturer stands over him with his instruments. There is no question of "unilateral disarmament," because the victim bears no arms, lacking even the use of the two arms he was born with. The inequality is total. To abuse or kill a person in such a circumstance is as radical a denial of common humanity as is possible. It is repugnant to learn that one's country's military forces are engaging in torture. It is worse to learn that the torture is widespread. It is worse still to learn that the torture was rationalized and sanctioned in long memorandums written by people at the highest level of the government. But worst of all would be ratification of this record by a vote to confirm one of its chief authors to the highest legal office in the executive branch of the government. Torture destroys the soul of the torturer even as it destroys the body of his victim. The boundary between humane treatment of prisoners and torture is perhaps the clearest boundary in existence between civilization and barbarism. Whether the elected representatives of the people of the United States are now ready to cross that line is the deepest question before the Senate as it votes on the nomination of Alberto Gonzales.
PMCs send the signal that the US condones torture

HRF 10 (Human Rights First, http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/media/usls/2010/alert/617/index.htm, date accessed: 6/26/2010) AJK

"The torture and abuse visited on detainees at Abu Ghraib was a violation of fundamental human rights and humanitarian law principles," noted the group in its Amici brief. "The decision by the D.C. Circuit to immunize the tortious conduct of private military contractors on the ground that such contractors were 'integrated into combatant activities over which the military retains command authority' is incompatible with principles of international law to which the United States has subscribed." The group notes that the decision is incompatible with international law in two ways. First, it leaves the detainees without a civil remedy for the violations of their human rights. Second, it ignores that individuals taken and detained in the course of combat are owed a duty of care under the Geneva Conventions and that civil liability arises from the violation of that duty. Human Rights First notes that the D.C. Circuit ruling in this case cannot be reconciled with those fundamental principles. The brief filed today notes that, unlike some military personnel involved in the Abu Ghraib abuses, the private military contractors who participated in torturing detainees have not been criminally prosecuted. The organization notes, "Immunizing government contractors for the acts alleged would create the appearance that the United States condones torture by proxy or is even willing to invite abuses by outsourcing certain military functions to private actors for whose conduct the government need not answer. The problem is not a small one, as there are more contractors than soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan." The case at hand stems from a federal lawsuit filed by more than 250 former Iraqi detainees held in various Iraqi detention facilities, including Abu Ghraib. The prisoners allege that private contractors from CACI and L-3 Services tortured and seriously abused them during interrogations. In 2007, U.S. District Court Judge James Robertson denied CACI's motion for summary judgment, but ordered a jury trial in the case. CACI appealed that ruling to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. In a separate ruling, Robertson granted L-3 Services' motion for summary judgment and dismissed the case against the company. Two years later, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled 2-1 to uphold the dismissal of all claims against L-3 Services and, reversing the lower court's decision, dismissed all charges against CACI. The defendants are now seeking relief from the Supreme Court.