Quote Originally Posted by Raistlin
Stress positions are pretty bad, I guess. I really have no idea what this is all about. If it's possible not to do that, then we shouldn't, but I'm not sure that we can get intelligence from them without it. And unless we get the intelligence, Americans will die.
To quote some Law & Order judge: it's not about being right...it's about doing right. The "greater good" is NOT a valid reason under any circumstance, and is not an excuse for any infringement on individual rights.
It's not simply that it the greater good. The way it is is that the US is essentially in a street-fight with these Al-Qaida members, and the international rules are being applied to one side of the fight without a single thought to whether it makes it more dangerous for that "honorable" person to defend himself. Especially when the other guy is not only breaking the "honorable" rules, but is possibly carrying a knife or a gun. You wouldn't do such a thing in a street fight, and war, as much as people would want to pretend otherwise, is nothing more than a giant street fight with cluster bombs. Sure if you know you're going to survive without getting massively hurt you should try to not injure the other guy too badly. The goal is to stop the fight, not to kill the other guy. But if you're defending youself and the only way to stop the fight is to break the guy's nose so he can't fight, then you have to do that. If you don't you're probably going to get seriously hurt, as well as anybody standing there. Prolonging the fight is actually worse for everybody.

As far as "not pissing off other countries", the other countries are already pissed. I don't think Iran or Pakistan is going to see that we've turned Guantanamo into a 5-star hotel and start loving us. Osama is already so pissed at us that he's already attacked us. Who exactly are we gonna convince at this point?