It’s not “simulated drowning”. It’s “near drowning”.
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As someone who’s been tortured, this throws me into rage mode. Fucking Republicans.
^^^
*heh* you’ve been tortured? That’s so gay.
Were you married?
Close. Psycho Ex. It was some not very fun Misery type shit.
I like how they call it simulated. Usually any water entering your body that you did not want entering your body is considered the first step of drowning.
How can they define “torture” as something that causes “internal organ damage”? Like, is your BRAIN and your MIND not an organ? OK, let’s beat the evr-living shit out of you, break your arms and legs, dip you in chili powder etc, etc but you know stick you in a hospital for a month when you’re done and OH LOOK, no internal organ damage, HE MUST NOT HAVE BEEN TORTURED??!?!?!? OK whut? This is the logic they follow!
P.S. I loved how stephen king said we should waterboard jenna bush to find out if it’s really torture, cause if it’s not, when who cares who gets waterboarded, right? RIGHT?
Leave it to the woe-is-me libtards to object to actions that’ll save American lives and sympathize with the terrorists. I hope the next muslim that is able to infiltrate our defenses that Bush worked so hard to put in place, but the Democrats worked so hard in lapsing (FISA, PATRIOT act, Club G’itmo, Waterboarding) suicide bombs your libtard ass.
So then we are all agreed that water-boarding is torture. But so what? Am I really to believe that some of you think the best solution when trying to get life-saving information from a suspected terrorist is to just keep asking and asking and re-asking him until we trick him into answering? Maybe we can trick him Bugs Bunny to Elmer Fudd style by dressing up a soldier like a lady and luring him into giving up the location of the bomb/hostages/terrorist cell/whatever.
Besides down in San Diego members of the military have to endure water-boarding as a part of their training, so it can’t be that damaging to the psyche.
No, I have never been water-boarded and no, I don’t want to be. It would be a pretty shitty interrogation method if people were lining up to try it.
Ban watervoarding! Might cost another one or two american soldiers per year, but who gives a damn?
You guys don’t get it. The problem with waterboarding is
A) It goes against the GENEVA convention which ban improper torture of war criminals.
B) There is no proof that we have extracted any life-saving information or that the tortured prisoners even contain life-saving information
C) The use of sensory deprivation techniques used with waterboarding show that likely any extracted information would likely be a made up answer and as result of insanity, trying to find a way to make the pain stop. (See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensory_deprivation)
Adrominik, I can assure you that it is not us that does not get it. It is you.
A) Congratulations. We’re not waterboarding Soviets who had an equal stake in civiliation as a whole, we’re waterboarding TERRORISTS who would gladly fly our own airplanes into our own buildings, KILLING THEMSELVES doing it. The rules of war do not apply to these islam monsters.
B) It’s easy to claim, sitting comfortably in your rocker in front of your computer, that there’s no proof it’s worked. I’d say that we’ve prevented every domestic terror attack since 2001, that is proof that what we’re doing is working.
C) By that matter, any intelligence whatsoever is useless as anyone could submit to doing what you suggested. It has no forbearance one way or another on waterboarding.
So, for the moral-relativists, the terrorists are ‘freedom fighters’ and that 9/11 was (as Obama says), a “massive failure of human understanding.” To anybody concerned whatsoever with the future of America, these people are pure evil, dead-set upon spreading their 12th century way of life upon the rest of the world, or otherwise condemning people who disagree with them to torturous death. There is no moral relevancy here.
Hasn’t anybody heard of honor? I mean, if your opponent stoops to a dirty trick (suicide bombs, chemical munitions, torturing P.O.W.s) does that instantly mean that we also lower ourselves to that level? No, to fight with honor means you fight on the same level no matter what the enemy does. Because otherwise THAT, would lower us…
a) No. You are torturing suspected terrorists.
b) I have a rock that keeps away tigers. It must work because there are no tigers around.
c) It only means that any intelligence that is obtained under duress is useless.
You’re the one who is being a moral-relativist, Bodero. Torture is fucking wrong. Period. Full stop. It’s one of the first things that was put in our constitution and anyone who endorses torture is advocating treason against the founding principles of our nation. It disgusting that this is a real debate.
I’d rather “lower” (your words, not mine, as waterboarding is completely humane) myself and be alive than refuse to defend myself and die.
Reboot, as usual, you’re so far out in left field that you’ve made a mockery of yourself and shown yourself to be a laughingstock to humanity in general.
Everything you said falls upon the false premise that waterboarding is torture. No. Ripping people’s limbs off, breaking their teeth with plyers, pulling their fingernails off, that’s torture. Just ask John McCain. Waterboarding is not torture.
Funny you mention the Constitution like you know anything about it or what it stands for, or care about its existence – that you advocate the death and destruction of Western civilization by failing to allow it to defend herself nullifies the point you (failed to) make.
Torture:the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty.
Is waterboarding painful? Yes. Is it used as a mean of getting a confession or information? Yes. QED, bitch.
Then to borrow a line from the neo-cons: GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY COUNTRY. Unless you are willing risk your life to defend the inalienable human rights, you don’t deserve to be called an American. Go live in Burma or Chine where they stomp on human rights for the greater good. That shit is unacceptable here.
A good deal of evidence against torture come from the history of the German, Lowlands and French witch-hunts in the late middle ages/early modern period. Torture was used frequently, and women frequently admitted to being witches. From this we can only conclude that either:
1) There was a serious witch problem in central Europe which was ended through a campaign of torture.
2) Most people will say whatever you want them to when being tortured.
Me, I’m seriously thinking it might be 2. But hay no offence to you wiccas/republicans.
You can thank us “neo-cons” you even have a country today. You libtard pondscum would essentially turn this country into a modern day France if you had any semblance of power. Keep clamoring about “human rights,” coward, while you’re sitting free in this country able to criticize it at all.
The people we are rightfully waterboarding (causing no permanent damage to… wait, so how’s that torture again? Oh yeah, cause it happened under the Bush administration) would stop at nothing to kill you and everyone you love. But you’d try to chalk it up to “human misunderstanding” or some sort of hippie political correctness. I am ashamed that you are a resident of my country, and even more angry that a coward like you erases my vote.
At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? — Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the Ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! — All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.
At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
And here is the part that often gets left out:
I hope I am over wary; but if I am not, there is, even now, something of ill-omen, amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country; the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions, in lieu of the sober judgment of Courts
Words still true today. Think about it.
“even more angry that a coward like you erases my vote.”
No, the would be your friends at Diebold that erase votes.
“You can thank us “neo-cons†you even have a country today. You libtard pondscum would essentially turn this country into a modern day France if you had any semblance of power.”
But but… France still exists, doesn’t it? I just Google it but in light of this new information, I believe wikipedia may have once again failed me.
I’d rather be a modern day France than a 1930s Germany.
“No, the would be your friends at Diebold that erase votes.”
No, you see, they only erase votes when REPUBLICANS win. Diebold took the year off in 2006. See also: 9/11 Truthers, Moon Landing deniers, other moonbats like yourself.
“But but… France still exists, doesn’t it? ”
Thanks to the thick-skinned Americans who rescued them after the Nazis took control of their country in WWII. If only Americans had the willpower and love for their country that our Greatest Generation had.
Ooh, and Reboot throws in the first BUSH = HITLER comment. Apparently I overestimated the intelligence levels of the libtards in these threads.
Oh, you mean when Liberal Democratic President Roosevelt helped bail out France? Good point, but I believe it was the Germans and Japs who used torture in that war.
I’m still curious what you think about my ‘plague of Rheinland witches’ theory.
“you mean when Liberal Democratic President Roosevelt helped bail out France?”
The cripple socialist, or the highly effective generals we had in charge of our troops? Do you really think that Roosevelt had a map out and was planning every invasion our country did in WWII?
And as far as Rheinland, interrogating women is futile. Unless you’re interrogating them about the latest Ben Affleck or Britney Spears saga.
We will, then, assume the Commander in Chief had no role in deciding military operation in WWII. Fine, what were Eisenhower’s views on torture?
I think it’s interesting that when I brought up a point in which general right-wing rhetoric takes no position on, you are conspicuously silent and jokey. I imagine you’re desperately checking your favourite polemics books for any reference to early modern continental affairs as we seek.
*speak
Caio ftw!
Ha! someone uses phrases like ‘libtard’ thinks he has the intellectual upper hand.
I’m talking down to you, use small words and simple analogies.
You jumped the gun on your Bush=Hitler accusation, since that’s not what I said. Up until this post I haven’t even mentioned our current President. You think your talking to just another puppet like yourself and your cookie cutter talking points are valid. You’re wrong, bitch.
My simple point was that there are worse things than living in a prosperous modern European country.
There’s really nothing more for me to say, since you have refuting any of my points and your further comments have just been a show and tell of your ignorance.
Libs love to bring hypothetical and emotional stories to prove their points (like the minimum wage families, etc). But it’s irrelevant. Say we get 5 bad leads for every good lead we get when we waterboard. We’d follow-up on every one of those leads, which would make the country safer. We’re not waterboarding people into pleading guilty in the court of law. We’re extracting strategic information to provide for our country’s defenses.
” You think your talking to just another puppet like yourself and your cookie cutter talking points are valid.”
Oh no, reboot, you are SO anti-authoritarian. You completely fall outside the mold and don’t DARE to tread on any ideological side! You’re a CRITICAL thinker and thus are just SO intelligent. I aspire to be only half as smart as you someday. Clearly you have all the answers.
And can you present factual evidence that waterboarding has done just that?
Fascist’s love to bring up hypothetical stories to prove their points (like getting good leads from waterboarding). Give me ONE factual reason to believe that ANY ‘good leads’ have come from waterboarding.
So true, but I try to be modest about it.
Just read the NY Times on a daily basis and I’m sure you’ll see some of the classified leaks we’ve garnered from waterboarding.
But no. We are fighting an enemy. Why the HELL do you think our government would ruin a lead they got (and could still be working on) by publishing it to the world?
Honestly, you libs are fun to rile up like on this thread, but God help us if you ever come anywhere close to power.
Hahah Bordello. That’s at least two things you’ve completely overlooked when presented with information. I’ve got some lengthy texts on General Eisenhower right here (he’s my favourite president and General, by the by), and an ecclesiastical description of German witch trails, in the original latin, by someone who administered them.
I mean ferserious let’s have some substantial discussion of the issues here. We’re pragmatists and historians, you and me. ‘Do what works’ is my motto, so let’s crack the history books and check to see. Throw what you got at me.
So in other words, you don’t have any factual proof at all. Because I have some pretty good circumstantial evidence to suggest that it doesn’t work. That is: the US has been running around for seven years like a collective Jack Bauer, yet there is still an active insurgency in Iraq, Osama Bin Ladin is still free and worldwide terrorism has continued to increase. And the ‘stay the course’ rhetoric is exactly what a Mr. Einstein defined as insanity, continuing to do the same thing but expecting different results.
Caio is on an interesting track about Gen. Eisenhower. He had some pretty strong things to say about the preemptive wars,too.
Bodero is either a really good troll or a complete moron. Your pick.
There’s a reason that information derived under duress is not accepted in a court of law: It has been proven time and time again that such information is not reliable. If you’re not willing to sentence someone to a few hours community service for stealing a bottle of shampoo based on such “evidence” why would you risk the lives of your citizens on it?
As for the whole “if 1 out of 5 leads are turn out to be real, then it’s OK” argument, let me present you with a little analogy. Your neighbour’s house is robbed. A few hours later, the police show up and take you and your whole family down to the station and waterboard you for a few hours until they’re satisfied you didn’t rob your neighbour. You’re released, only to find your wife & daughter didn’t survive the night. You arrive home, where your neighbour tells you that the man who lives four doors down admitted to robbing the house after several hours, so he’d have more money to donate to John McCain.
Wouldn’t you just sleep so safe & righteous that night, knowing that the “1 in 5” mentality had solved another crime?
AgZed:
That’s a good example, but of course Boredo would NEVER get arrested. Upright, innocent citizens will NEEEEVER be vicitm of such a thing. Only terrorists. That’s because torture gives us leads to terrorists who then can be arrested and tortured to reveal leads to terrorists. Which…makes no sense. But the point is: Only terrorists are taken to Guantanamo, because being taken to Guantanamo proves that you are a terrorist.
The whole “1 out of 5 leads” blubber reminds me of Murat Kurnaz (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murat_Kurnaz). I especially like the part about why they considered him an “enemy combatant”. But, mistakes happen and he could have been the next Hitler. Who knows. So much for the “1 out of 5 leads”.
Bodero you make me so angry ( i read above) that i might actually hurt myself. seriosuly what you were sayig was so offensive on so many levels that i just gave up on humanity.
waterboarding is fucked. i cant think of any worse way to absoluty fuck your mind over. drowning is one of the most horrible horrible ways to die and for someone to simulate that takes something pretty fucked up.
you are the only one here ( i think) advocating this behavior wtf is wrong with you?
what happens when other institutions other than the military start using this torture … (remember they use it on “suspected terrorists”) what if it became so acceptable local law enforcement used it on suspects? would you still consider it humane when one of your family is mindfucked so badly and tortured? what would you think of your country then?
Maybe this will be a lightening rod for more trolls, but I just want to say that I’m glad that, even on this internet thread, most people are opposed to torture.
All that is necessary for evil to prevail is for good men to remain silent. Paul_Is_Drunk, mgear, Gilly, Adrominik, Caio, Phall3nPutz, AgZed, Goldfinger & Snow, thanks for speaking up.
I’m kinda drunk now, so good night.
Holy crap, this is what I get for playing WOW all night, it seems I missed the party.
Regarding the Geneva Convention, I believe that the no torture rules apply to conventional soldiers with uniforms and such. Someone with more go-get’em-ness than I may want to verify that.
@... Snow:
“waterboarding is fucked. i cant think of any worse way to absoluty fuck your mind over. drowning is one of the most horrible horrible ways to die and for someone to simulate that takes something pretty fucked up.”
I know what you mean, I almost drowned in a pool once when I was a kid, the lifeguard had to save me and clear the water from my lungs. I mean it was the worst thing ever. I still wake up nightly with nightmares about it. Wait a minute no I don’t, because that would be fucking stupid. You can’t think of ANY worse way to ABSOLUTELY fuck your mind over? Really? I would venture a guess that the sight of my wife getting brutally raped while my nine month old daughters was being beheaded may have a little bit more of an effect on me than THINKING I was drowning.
Once again I would like to point out that many military personal undergo water-boarding as a matter of training. Yes, I know that they know before hand that it is only simulated so maybe the mind-fuck is lessened. Here is an idea, we could pass out fliers over the middle east that explain water-boarding so that when innocent people are subjected to it, they can have the same upper-hand.
Thinking that the water-boarding of terrorists who may have useful information will one day lead to the use of water-boarding to solve home break-ins is the same kind of slippery-slope logic that makes people think that gay marriage will lead to a man fucking his goat wife in a parade at your child’s elementary school.
That reminds me of Mao Zedong, a man who really understood torture. You don’t torture people to find out information, you torture people as a test of devotion on the part of the torturer and the torturee. His systematic purges left him, by the end of the 40s, with an army so fanatically dedicated that he could take out a much larger and better equipped army.
That’s one use of torture, the other is revenge.
Not saying that’s the case with the states, in fact I know very well that it’s not. I just, as someone somewhat knowledgeable, don’t feel that there’s no other uses for torture. Far, far too many obviously untrue things (I’m a witch) have been said under torture. And the idea that waterboarding is a nice torture, or torture light, is the same kind of excuse the Catholics used historically: Do some research on the controversy surrounding torture in Northern Italy. They were supposed to be all catholic and holy, but they used torture frequently. They tried to pretty it up by explaining how humane every device was. For example, I once read a Florentine paper about how it was ok to strap someone’s arm behind their back, tie a rope around their wrists and hang them from the ceiling. He seriously claimed it was humane compared to the torture the Turks use (without specifying).
@Foinlavin
its great that your mental shields are such that you can repress terrible experiences from your childhood. But i too can think of ways which would fuck your mind over worse, but im saying waterboarding is a sensory deprevation that is practical, cheap and from the looks of it effective. try set up the situation you described in a limited amount of time.
and with the sippery slope thinking… you never know when an act will be passed allowing the disgusting practice as routine, the patriot act got passed making habeus corpus obsolete thus going against every lawfull principle i like to think i support, so you never know.
i did enjoy reading your post though entertaining stuff :).
@Caio
disturbing yet intriguing
Conservatives used to actually care about Liberty, and the “American Way,” and rights. But now they’re all complete pussies. Bodero is a great example. “I’d rather lower myself and be alive than refuse to defend myself and die,” he says.
But that’s because he’s a big crybaby drippy vagina. “OOOOoohh, no, they flew teh airplanes into buildings, I’m so scared, ZOMG let’s start eliminating civil rights and torturing people, anything so I can feel saaaaafe!”
Listen here, dickless. I would gladly die with my liberties and my civil rights intact, than start giving them up so I can pretend to be safer. I never thought I’d live in a country where we’d ever have a debate about whether or not it’s OK to torture.
I want you, and the rest of the cunts that think like you–all you motherfuckers that are scared of the evil brown people who don’t love Jebus enough–who are happy to allow torture, wiretapping, illegal searches, intrusive omnipresent security, and won’t be happy until there’s a jackbooted thug on every corner going, “Papers, please,” to kindly get the fuck out of my country. We’re tired of your fearmongering bullshit. Get the fuck out now. You aren’t real Americans, and you don’t deserve to live here. And take your goddamn Homeland Security Threat Advisory color board with you and don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out.
Fuck you.
@Howie:
“Give me convenience or give me death?” 😉
or
I Agree. Although I’m not American. But seeing that the same shit starts to happen here in Germany, I totally agree. One would think at least Germany would have learned it’s lesson.
btw: In Germany, we already had a huge discussion about whether it is right to use torture on criminals. A little boy was kidnapped and the Chief of Police of Frankfurt threatened the kidnapper to torture him if he wouldn’t tell them where the kid was. And there were lots of people who wanted to reward that sick bastard cop for that!
At least they could have been so honest to admit that all they wanted was revenge. Because that’s the only thing it was about.
I don’t think I want to live in a society of people that only give a fuck about human rights if it affects themselves.
@... caio and snow
Good points.
@... Goldfinger
I am a bit confused. The kidnapped kid with time running out scenario is the ultimate example used by those who support certain uses for torture. Yet, here you are using it in the opposite context. I remember one of the first episodes of “The Shield” there was situation where a child molester had kidnapped a little girl and put her in a place where she was running out of air/food/something. In the interrogation room the man would not cooperate. So against his better judgment the Captain allowed Vinnie Mac to go to town on the guy with a phone book (as in hitting him with not reading from). The man divulged the location and the little girl was saved. As I watched it I thought surely even the most passive aggressive, peace loving person in the world would agree that the necessary thing had been done. Well, apparently not everyone.
At this point I am not sure where to go. Are you, Goldfinger, and I even the same species? I don’t mean that as an insult, and maybe you don’t have kids, but in a similar situation where my child was in jeopardy and the the person who could stop it was uncooperative, I shudder to think the extent of evil I would perpetrate against that person to right that wrong. I say evil because I understand that I may never be the same after that. I might never overcome the horrible things I had done and live in the darkness of my deeds. But my child would live on. Don’t I owe my son or daughter that?
Maybe on a national scale a policy of any form of torture may be wrong. I’ll concede that. Perhaps local law enforcement is also the wrong place for it. However, I cannot believe that you could not search your imagination and come up with a scenario where you might abandon your righteous beliefs and do what it takes to survive. Can you be that globally minded?
Oh and while I am here:
PCs are better than Macs
Christianity is not a bad thing
Natalie Portman is Hot
So is the cheerleader from Heroes
But maybe a little young.
Well. The kid I was talking about was already dead.
I think it was a very good example because it extremely stresses our moral principles.
Of course I would have done the same if it had been my child. Child murderers deserve nothing better. BUT: I would have done it myself and called it revenge. And, as with all things I do, I would have been ready to bear the consequences. But torture has to keep out of the law enforcement. There are laws against torture, the police defends the law and thus is never allowed to use it.
If we want to defend the standards of our civilisation, we have to keep up these standards ourselves. We must not uphold the law by breaking it time and time again.
Another question would be: When would torture be appropriate and when not. If we do a bad thing for a good reason, how long does it take to do them for a not so good reason? What if the suspect is not guilty at all? How do we know? Is it okay to use it on someone who has direct contact with Osama bin Ladin? Is it okay to do it on someone who has been planning a terrorist attack? Is it okay to do it on someone who we only SUSPECT to do so?
What I want to say: If we want to stay what we are and if we want uphold the moral principles of our civilization, it is the wrong way if we go around saying: “Well, human rights only apply to Americans/Germans/Christians/whites/tax payers/employed people/people who are not suspected of crimes.” If we want to be like that we could have saved all the millennia it took as to develop from cavemen to homo sapiens sapiens.
We’ve missed most of that story in Europe, so lemme get this straight… Waterboarding is not supposed to be torture, because it “causes no permanent damage”?
0_O
Seems that Neocons are just as fluent in Clintonese as the next guy.
Torture: Is it moral? No. Is it useful? In some ways it can be. Is the information gathered through it’s use reliable? Almost never. Torture, especially done the way it is, is not effective or reliable. As such it should not be used. I think that to progress we need to constantly better ourselves. That can’t happen if we stoop this low every time the shit hits the fan. 2 steps backward are not worth one step forward.
Foinlavin: Was that “The Shield”? The phonebook treatment sounds like something Andy Sipowicz would have done on NYPD Blue. Vic would be more the shove-a-flashlight-in-the-perp’s-rectum guy. Heh heh.
The thing about torture is, that when people talk about these “ticking timebomb” scenarios where the terrorist has the code to the bomb, or knows where the dying kid is–of course you’re going to do whatever it takes to get the info. If you’re the cop, you’re going to beat the information out of the guy, and then suffer the punishement later. The problem with our waterboarding policy in Guanatamo is that we’re doing it lots of folks, without regard to immediacy. Torture, as a way to get general information, is immoral and ineffective.
When I heard about waterboarding I thought it was some new sport.
Looks like I was right. To the extreme.
mAgnUS … make my children
Holy shit guys. I need to get my home computer working, cause missing this thing until I got to work sucks.
Anyways, lots of good arguments in here (though Bordero pissed me off with 90% of what he said). Since he’s been thoroughly flamed off this thread, I can safely congratulate you, and award you with one internet (collectively). I can really agree with a lot of what you guys said (especially the wrong but necessary occasionally angle, I’ve always wondered about that).
well done.
Two facts:
1. Torture doesn’t work.
2. Torture is wrong.
@... Howie Feltersnatch
It was “the shield”, but early in the first season, I guess they had not established how crazy the character was going to be on a regular basis.
OK, so the consensuses can safely be said to be that torture as a matter of policy is a bad idea but torture may be an option in an extreme situation with a ticking time bomb and an orphanage and the water supply and a impending assassination with a imminent chemical attack.
@Foinlavin
but that’s just the problem. torture will never and has never worked in a “ticking time bomb” situation. Not that there’s ever even remotely been anything that would prove this (really? ticking time bombs?) but logically if a terrorist knew when the ticking would end, and the blowing up began, why not just hold out till then? Shit, why wait till then? Tell them your entire story, all James Bond style!
thinkprogress.org/2008/02/25/former-fbi-agent-ticking-bomb-scenario-is-a-red-herring/
former FBI interrogator on the subject
Watched the video.
If the U.S.’s position is that we have only water-boarded three detainees ever, then one of three things is going on.
1. It doesn’t work, so we stopped.
2. It does work so we keep doing it but do not tell everyone because it makes fine upstanding citizens like yourself upset.
3. It does not work but we keep doing it for sport.
thehill.com/byron-york/when-waterboarding-works-2007-12-13.html
In a information complete, logical world, those would be the three conclusions. But you haven’t considered scenario’s that are information incomplete (that is, you don’t have a way of confirming the information is true even after investigation).
Suppose the interrogator asks “who are the other members of your terrorist cell?”. The detainee, who is not a terrorist, is tortured until he names 3 random people. Those three people are each tortured until they name three random people. Since you are in Iraq, one of those people might actually be a terrorist, just by chance. And when they go to his house and find a bunch of bombs and guns, they conclude that the operation was a success, even though its nothing but random chance.