Buffalo News columnist Douglas Turner’s recent, deeply disturbing defense of torture (Buffalo News, 4/27) represents a mindset that seems to be permeating the right wing, undermines the rule of law, and mirrors rationalizations used by the Fascists before World War II to torture Jews, Gypsies, and Slavs.

His critique of President Obama’s release of interrogation documents is based on the false presumption that no one knew we were torturing detainee at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and numerous other interrogation sites. Mr. Turner, we and the world already knew about what you and your ilk want to cover up. Americans do have the right to know when their government violates American and international law. Remember that is part of what democracy means; the people’s right to know.

I wonder how this will help radical Muslims, since they already know about our torture? Maybe, if we try to correct our mistakes, it will show the world what we should stand for, a society that values individual rights and the rule of law.

Your personal justification that some of Bill Donavan’s cohorts may have used harsh techniques during World War II hardly justifies torture today. Most American’s didn’t know about these violations of the Geneva Convention then, and would have been appalled that our people were acting just like the Fascists we so reviled.

Remember the war crimes tribunals after World War II, run primarily at the insistence of the US? We prosecuted and executed Japanese and German officers for ordeing the torture of Allied GIs because they were considered crimes against the rules of war and humanity.

These trials of fascist war criminals were just the start of a series of international and American laws that outlawed torture. It was done not primarily on moral grounds but for the simple reason that we didn’t want our troops to be subjected to torture. US law clearly outlaws torture. (Check the US Army regulations on the subject.) Which brings me to what you and you friends didn’t say but implied: that we should not prosecute high-ranking officers in the government and military for ordering and condoning torture.

First let me digress on what America should stand for. Newt Gendrich put it well many years ago when he explained to a high-ranking Chinese communist about the rule of law. He said that America is unique because all Americans are subject to the rule of law from the president on down. This is the way we create a fair society.

You know what I find strange? I have asked several of my friends who are Second Amendment advocates or leaning right what makes America so unique in the world. Most of them could not answer that question. I found this strange because you would think super-patriots would have some idea of what we are fundamentally about.

What do you think is so unique about America? Could it be that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution have anything to do with it? I would suggest that they do and they establish the principle that all people are created equal, and that we cherish the rights of the individual above all else under the rule of law. The rule of law is what protects both our democracy and our individual rights. Yet you are so willing to ignore serious violations of American law.

Are you willing to let enlisted men and woman be prosecuted for war crimes and let the real culprits at higher levels skate? Numerous GIs and Marines have been convicted of crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, as they should be. That is the rule of law. If Cheney, Rumsfeld and others ordered torture, which violated American and international law, why shouldn’t they be brought to justice?

I know you think the end justifies the means even if it violated our laws, but what evidence is there that any reliable information was obtained by torture that couldn’t have been obtained elsewhere?

Just because Bill Donavan and the Gestapo sanctioned torture in the distant past doesn’t justify it today.

Richard J. Rosche, Esq.

Captain, US Army, Retired
Buffalo

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