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rulemylife -> RE: Right Wing Radio Host Water-boarded.."it`s absolutely torture" (5/24/2009 9:03:05 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: CruelNUnsual
Incorrect. that was the Japanese water cure, not waterboarding. It starts out the same, but they fill the stomach with water till its painfully distended and then jump on it.
The terms water cure, water treatment, and water torture were often used synonymously. Water cure is usually referred to as what you said. It was a technique used as far back as the Middle Ages. It is the forced ingestion of water which causes a painful distention of the internal organs made even more painful by beating or jumping on the victim. In many cases, before the water was expelled, internal organs were damaged that led to severe illness and many times death.
But the term water cure was also used for other water tortures, including what has only recently been referred to as waterboarding.
It is not the same form of torture. What was used on our POW's, and what those Japanese soldiers were convicted of war crimes for, was identical to what we call waterboarding but was referred to as the water cure or water treatment at the time.
Annals of American History: The Water Cure: Reporting & Essays
A letter by A. F. Miller, of the 32nd Volunteer Infantry Regiment, published in the Omaha World-Herald in May, 1900, told of how Miller’s unit uncovered hidden weapons by subjecting a prisoner to what he and others called the “water cure.” “Now, this is the way we give them the water cure,” he explained. “Lay them on their backs, a man standing on each hand and each foot, then put a round stick in the mouth and pour a pail of water in the mouth and nose, and if they don’t give up pour in another pail. They swell up like toads. I’ll tell you it is a terrible torture.”
......................As early as April 16, 1902, the New York World described the “American Public” sitting down to eat its breakfast with a newspaper full of Philippine atrocities:
It sips its coffee and reads of its soldiers administering the “water cure” to rebels; of how water with handfuls of salt thrown in to make it more efficacious, is forced down the throats of the patients until their bodies become distended to the point of bursting; of how our soldiers then jump on the distended bodies to force the water out quickly so that the “treatment” can begin all over again. The American Public takes another sip of its coffee and remarks, “How very unpleasant!”
Background Information on Waterboarding Outcome of Case Past“Drop By Drop: Forgetting The History of Water Torture In U.S. Courts,” The Columbia Journal of Transnational Law,. 2007
World War II (Sep. 1, 1939 – Sep. 2, 1945):
The United States, acting alone before domestic courts, commissions and courts- martial, and as a participant in the international community, condemned and prosecuted the use of waterboarding by the Japanese against Unites States troops. In US military commissions, and as a participant in the International Tribunal for the Far East (based upon Nuremburg procedures), a number of Japanese troops and officials were convicted of torture for the use of waterbording.
One witness, Captain Nielsen, described waterboarding as follows: “I was put on my back on the floor with my arms and legs stretched out, one guard holding each limb. The towel was wrapped around my face and put across my face and water poured on. They poured water on this towel until I was almost unconscious… I felt more or less like I was drowning, just gasping between life and death.” The specific quote is from United States v. Sawada.
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