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America’s CIA And The Use Of Torture:
Janam da Firangee,
Sikhi Main Mangee

FATEHPAL SINGH TARNEY

 

 

 




An ‘enhanced interrogation technique’ is a euphemism that I find offensive.

Torture is torture. 

This topic is a particularly sensitive and personal one for me given my experience in the Vietnam War as an American soldier. I had extensive training in the Vietnamese language and my time in the country improved my language skills exponentially as I was keenly interested in the local people and their culture. 

My initial job was as an interpreter for a program giving medical aid to local villagers, especially children. This was like being in the Peace Corps, rather than the Marine Corps.

Then, I was transferred to a reconnaissance unit where I was called upon to do prisoner-of-war interrogation.

First of all, becoming a perpetrator of brutality gives one a lifelong burden of guilt and remorse. 

In my case, the transition from a humanitarian role to cruel interrogator, I believe, accounts for most of my PTSD -- post-traumatic stress disorder -- issues, continuing long after my military service. 

Even in my small way, I appreciated, long before the ‘war on terrorism‘, the contradiction between malicious behavior perceived as “necessary” and the American values I was taught at home, church, and school.

The inhumane treatment of detainees is bad enough, but if, in fact, the CIA did impede congressional and White House oversight, the problem is that much worse.


December 10, 2014


 

Conversation about this article

1: Peter Haskill (New York, USA), December 10, 2014, 12:33 PM.

George W Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld -- they're the main criminals behind all of this inhuman and un-American outrage. I do not accept Bush's excuse that he did not know about it. First of all, he's a proven liar. Second, if he asked his goons to do 'whatever's necessary' without telling him about it, how does that absolve him? In law, it's called 'wanton disregard' and is culpable! Thirdly, what happened to the age old rule: "The buck stops here"? Each of them deserves to be charged, tried ... and if found guilty, hanged. In Texas. Saddam-Hussein-like, because they're all of the same ilk.

2: Harmeet Singh (USA), December 13, 2014, 12:05 PM.

S. Fatehpal Singh ji: Thanks for sharing. Would you like to elaborate on how a person like you changed his role from a humanitarian worker to an interrogator?

3: Fatehpal Singh Tarney (Boca Raton, Florida, USA), December 16, 2014, 6:54 PM.

Piare Harmeet Singh ji: Language skills in the military have many applications that are, in terms of the internal logic of the military, complementary. Outside of the military, of course, health care and POW interrogation may appear contradictory. Medical programs are designed to win hearts and minds. The purpose of interrogation is to gain information. Both are employed to advance the overall war effort. One follows orders and in my particular case, as a lowly enlisted man involved in health care, I was resented by fellow enlisted men because I spent most of my time working with medical doctors who were officers. Interrogating P.O.W.s substantially reduced the harassment I received from my peers. Helping deliver medical care to Vietnamese villagers, especially children was rewarding, but the harassment I received got so bad that I wrote my father asking him to appeal to our local congressman in New York for help.

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Janam da Firangee,
Sikhi Main Mangee"









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