U.S. COURTS FIND WATERBOARDING "TORTURE"

Evan Wallach writes in today's The Washington Post on waterboarding. This is a must read article. Wallach is a judge on the U.S. Court of International Trade and a former JAG in the Nevada National Guard.

Wallach writes on the history of waterboarding as practiced on and by U.S. troops and the judgment of U.S. courts on those who practiced it. Writes Wallach:

"Here's the testimony of two Americans imprisoned by the Japanese:

""They would lash me to a stretcher then prop me up against a table with my head down. They would then pour about two gallons of water from a pitcher into my nose and mouth until I lost consciousness.

"And from the second prisoner:

""They laid me out on a stretcher and strapped me on. The stretcher was then stood on end with my head almost touching the floor and my feet in the air. . . . They then began pouring water over my face and at times it was almost impossible for me to breathe without sucking in water.

"As a result of such accounts, a number of Japanese prison-camp officers and guards were convicted of torture that clearly violated the laws of war. They were not the only defendants convicted in such cases. As far back as the U.S. occupation of the Philippines after the 1898 Spanish-American War, U.S. soldiers were court-martialed for using the "water cure" to question Filipino guerrillas."

Concludes Wallach:

"We know that U.S. military tribunals and U.S. judges have examined certain types of water-based interrogation and found that they constituted torture. That's a lesson worth learning. The study of law is, after all, largely the study of history. The law of war is no different. This history should be of value to those who seek to understand what the law is -- as well as what it ought to be."