How Poland sold itself to support CIA torture

[Metahive]

If one thinks torture is an effective tool of gathering information, then I must ask if they really think that all those people who admitted to being witches and warlocks during the witch hunts, most often under the mere threat of torture, really had magical powers. Or is it just "modern" torture that's super-effective?

[Simon_Jester]

Yes, that should illustrate the weakness of torture as a means of gathering accurate information.

On the other hand, it also shows the effect of torture as a tool of state terrorism- the witch hunts were part of a larger climate of religious fear, and of organized attempts to root out any religious views that were 'other' or 'foreign.'

[The fact that there were many different kinds of Christian sects in Europe at the time, not just one monolithic Church, tended to make things worse if anything. Many of those sects were insecure and/or actively struggling to spread in a way that the medieval Catholic Church had no real need or desire to do]

[Metahive]

I think the whole concept of "I hurt you until you do what I say"-thing was already known by cavemen. All it took to discover it was to know that people, well, don't like pain and wish to avoid it. I blame stuff like 24 for the stupid "torture is THE reliable AND manly way to gain information"-meme.

The fact that there were many different kinds of Christian sects in Europe at the time, not just one monolithic Church, tended to make things worse if anything. Many of those sects were insecure and/or actively struggling to spread in a way that the medieval Catholic Church had no real need or desire to do

Actually, after protestantism took off the RCC did struggle to regain the footholds it had lost to it. Sometimes they were successful (Poland) and sometimes they weren't (England). It was however the protestant countries who took the witch hunt more seriously.

[K. A. Pital]

Just 24 and our friend Jack? Oh no. More like most American films after 2001. They routinely depict people being threatened with torture, tortured directly or threatened with being "shipped to Gitmo" (where very bad things will happen - everyone knows how brutal those Gitmo guards are, right?)...

[Metahive]

Well, I said "stuff like 24", I know it's not just manly macho man Bauer who made it popular. I mean even before 2001 the Dark Age of Comic Books for example was full of anti-"heroes" (note the parenthesis) who did all kind of rather unheroic or downright villainous stuff to reach their goals and were potrayed as preferable over the more standard heroes because they had the all "non-nonsense solutions" and "did what had to be done".

EDIT:
I think this all boils down to the part of the human brain that prefers "intuitive" and "direct" solutions to problems, or at least those that bear the semblance of it even if they aren't such.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

But, more importantly than the prospect of being able to extract information - of whatever dubious quality and veracity - is the matter of morality. In our countries, we try and pride ourselves on being civilized, on considering 'rights' like basic autonomy and health. Torture is fundamentally incompatible with these rights. Even if it worked at one hundred percent efficacy every time, it still wouldn't be morally or ethically justifiable to inflict extraordinary pain and suffering on another person given that we view freedom from oppression and from undue suffering as essentially universal goods. So that's why it doesn't actually matter if torture works. I say this largely because I've been the one arguing it actually does work extremely well for what it's actually for (a tool of control and oppression), which is a viewpoint I'll stick to based on the material I've read - but not one I want mixed up with actually endorsing torture as somehow right or just.

But sometimes you find someone who says that torture works for gathering information, and at that point you cannot say "oh, it's immoral even if it works" because his entire position is the "if it works" bit. In those cases, you have to go with another approach: you say that torture is never as effective as other methods and await for him to disprove that. That's just debating, though; I agree that it can be used to spread terror.

Just 24 and our friend Jack? Oh no. More like most American films after 2001. They routinely depict people being threatened with torture, tortured directly or threatened with being "shipped to Gitmo" (where very bad things will happen - everyone knows how brutal those Gitmo guards are, right?)...

This (excluding Gitmo) was part of pulp and noir as well, it's nothing new. It is the old formula of Hard Men Making Hard Decisions (while hard). It is more odious today, however, as it shows that America has a torture dungeon of sorts.

[Simon_Jester]

I think the whole concept of "I hurt you until you do what I say"-thing was already known by cavemen. All it took to discover it was to know that people, well, don't like pain and wish to avoid it. I blame stuff like 24 for the stupid "torture is THE reliable AND manly way to gain information"-meme.

Yes.

The fact that there were many different kinds of Christian sects in Europe at the time, not just one monolithic Church, tended to make things worse if anything. Many of those sects were insecure and/or actively struggling to spread in a way that the medieval Catholic Church had no real need or desire to do

Actually, after protestantism took off the RCC did struggle to regain the footholds it had lost to it. Sometimes they were successful (Poland) and sometimes they weren't (England). It was however the protestant countries who took the witch hunt more seriously.

Er... you missed what I'm saying. The Church of the witch-hunt and inquisition era (1500 and on) was not what I would call "medieval." I was comparing all Christian sects, Protestant sects and Catholic Church alike, in the era 1517-1648, and comparing them to the Catholic Church specifically from, say, 1200 AD.

The Catholics, like everyone else, participated in the complicated and intense struggle to expand their own 'territory' of believers at the expense of other sects. My argument is that the rivalry between these sects made all of them insecure, in a way that was new in European history.

Just 24 and our friend Jack? Oh no. More like most American films after 2001. They routinely depict people being threatened with torture, tortured directly or threatened with being "shipped to Gitmo" (where very bad things will happen - everyone knows how brutal those Gitmo guards are, right?)...

24 was one of the first shows to do this, so it gets a larger share of the blame.

But sometimes you find someone who says that torture works for gathering information, and at that point you cannot say "oh, it's immoral even if it works" because his entire position is the "if it works" bit. In those cases, you have to go with another approach: you say that torture is never as effective as other methods and await for him to disprove that.

Yes, if you are arguing with a soulless robot (and there are many such) who cannot grasp that it is sometimes proper to not do a bad thing, even if the bad thing would theoretically "work" in the short term.

Just 24 and our friend Jack? Oh no. More like most American films after 2001. They routinely depict people being threatened with torture, tortured directly or threatened with being "shipped to Gitmo" (where very bad things will happen - everyone knows how brutal those Gitmo guards are, right?)...

This (excluding Gitmo) was part of pulp and noir as well, it's nothing new. It is the old formula of Hard Men Making Hard Decisions (while hard). It is more odious today, however, as it shows that America has a torture dungeon of sorts.

I don't think the pulp and noir depictions of torture are entirely unique to America.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

Yes, if you are arguing with a soulless robot (and there are many such) who cannot grasp that it is sometimes proper to not do a bad thing, even if the bad thing would theoretically "work" in the short term.

Well, arguing with soulless robots is something that often happens on the Internet.

I don't think the pulp and noir depictions of torture are entirely unique to America.

Are not, and never were. It's just that today they are unavoidably tied into political debate.

[Metahive]

Er... you missed what I'm saying. The Church of the witch-hunt and inquisition era (1500 and on) was not what I would call "medieval." I was comparing all Christian sects, Protestant sects and Catholic Church alike, in the era 1517-1648, and comparing them to the Catholic Church specifically from, say, 1200 AD.

The Catholics, like everyone else, participated in the complicated and intense struggle to expand their own 'territory' of believers at the expense of other sects. My argument is that the rivalry between these sects made all of them insecure, in a way that was new in European history.

Ah sorry, I missed the "medieval" part. Then again, even the medieval church faced its fair bit of challenges and controversies. Like the split with the Eastern Orthodox Church or the struggle between Pope and Holy Roman Emperor over who's outranking who (see "Investiture Controversy") or French king Phillip IV the Fair just abducting the papacy to increase his influence on the Church (see Avignon Papacy). There's the Hussites and Cathars who also were challenging Church authority before Luther and Calvin came along. I think Protestantism was just the straw that finally broke the camel's back and forced the Church to reform itself thoroughly.

[TheHammer]

No, that's actually true. And what you say doesn't constitute "defence of torture". If anything, this is the most damning fact about torture, displaying its true goals: the only governments capable of using it in an 'efficient' manner are those that wouldn't care if dozens or thousands of innocents get captured alongside real members of the "resistance cell" (terror cell, Al-Quaeda cell etc.) - which means tyrannical governments.

So torture can be efficient to further the goals of tyranny or dictatorial indifference, where innocence or guilt doesn't matter so as long as some "guilty" parties are locked away along with innocents, making it harder to forment resistance against the government. That is, however, generally counter-productive if we're speaking about police investigations which are meant to figure out the real perpetrators and guilty parties, or if we're speaking about achieving peace in occupied territories, for example - since if you randomly punish people based on torture data, you will quickly alienate a lot of folks and face an ever-recurring resistance. Just as it happened in reality when torture was used throughout the XX century.

It's one thing to say armed robbery can get you money. It's a totally different thing to claim that armed robbery is, say, equal to police enforcement.

While torture can certainly be used as a means of intimidation, one has to wonder why it is used as a means for "enhanced interrogation" by government agencies, which would be the primary goal of the CIA. Certainly an organization such as the CIA knows that historically, information obtained under torture is unreliable. It almost makes me wonder if its only half the story as far as interrogation is concerned - that its phase 1 to soften up a "hard case", and phase 2 involves other more conventional means, probably applied by a different interrogator, as an extreme version of good cop/bad cop.

"Look, I find all of this barbaric. I believe we can come to some sort of understanding here. Agent Smith is waiting outside and he wants to tear out your fingernails, but I really don't want it to come to that. I think my methods are more effective, but you've got to give me something I can work with. I need to show them something substantial, or my boss is gonna let Agent Smith do his thing. Can I get you some water? Anything to eat?".

[Siege]

Or, and I find this far more likely, whoever's in charge actually bought into their own BS and thought that what they were doing wasn't actually torture, it's enhanced interrogation. We're not pulling fingernails here, good lord we're professionals! We only don't let them sleep for a few days, or in the worst case we simulate drowning - but not for more than 40 seconds at a time! That's not torture, right? We're not leaving any physical marks, right? Torture is something uncivilized people do with, like, hot pokers. That's not what we do, we just refuse to mollycoddle the bad guys. We have manuals and procedures and protocols -- that means it's not torture. Right? Right, guys?

[TheHammer]

Or, and I find this far more likely, whoever's in charge actually bought into their own BS and thought that what they were doing wasn't actually torture, it's enhanced interrogation. We're not pulling fingernails here, good lord we're professionals! We only don't let them sleep for a few days, or in the worst case we simulate drowning - but not for more than 40 seconds at a time! That's not torture, right? We're not leaving any physical marks, right? Torture is something uncivilized people do with, like, hot pokers. That's not what we do, we just refuse to mollycoddle the bad guys. We have manuals and procedures and protocols -- that means it's not torture. Right? Right, guys?

Regardless of how they want to justify it in their minds, I'd think the over-riding aspect would be whether or not it was effective. I don't think they particularly give a shit about a moral justification, but if these techniques were counter-productive, you have to wonder why they would continue to use them. That's why I'm guessing that they aren't used in a vacuum, rather they are used in combination of other techniques to yield results. Maybe you start with Agent Jones who does the more traditional techniques, he fails to yield information, then the a fore mentioned agent Smith is brought in to soften him up, before Agent Jones (or other "good cop") follows up with traditional techniques.

Granted, this is pure speculation, but the idea that they are ignorant to the studies on the usefulness of information acquired via torture, that they are stupid, and or that its all done purely for sadistic/revenge reasons seems more far fetched to me than the idea that its part of a system.

[bilateralrope]

but if these techniques were counter-productive, you have to wonder why they would continue to use them.

Because agencies involved in secrecy often develop disconnects from reality.

MI5 has a history of going off the rails.

The NSA's bulk collection of data doesn't look like it gathers any actionable intel and the NSA as a whole looks like it does more to harm US national security than it does to protect it.

I think this is because of the secrecy surrounding such agencies. The higher ups within the agency become convinced that something is a good idea. Office politics silence anyone below them who disagrees, and anyone with the authority to tell them to stop doesn't get the full picture of what is happening because it's all kept secret.

[Metahive]

Hämmermän is the total opposite of a Freemarket Fetishist Libertarian. He believes the government would never willingly engage in useless or counter-productive measures. Pick one, the Holocaust, the Great Leap Forward, the War on Drugs etc. etc., all things that wasted resources and had either not the intended effect (massacring Jews did not make Germany more secure) or backfired spectacularly (the great leap was more of a backwards somersault). Do you ever go outside or pick up a book?

[Simon_Jester]

Ah sorry, I missed the "medieval" part. Then again, even the medieval church faced its fair bit of challenges and controversies. Like the split with the Eastern Orthodox Church or the struggle between Pope and Holy Roman Emperor over who's outranking who (see "Investiture Controversy") or French king Phillip IV the Fair just abducting the papacy to increase his influence on the Church (see Avignon Papacy). There's the Hussites and Cathars who also were challenging Church authority before Luther and Calvin came along. I think Protestantism was just the straw that finally broke the camel's back and forced the Church to reform itself thoroughly.

Yes, and in doing so they basically broke the Church's complacency about the idea that they were the spiritual hegemon of Western Europe. They had rivals and struggles prior to that, but no peer competitors on soil they had once considered 'theirs,' unless you go clear back to ancient Rome.

So I hope we're in agreement. I'm saying that the increased friction between different, mutually belligerent religions in dynamic tension tended to increase the pressure on all religions to act aggressively, and to use shows of force against heretics and dissenters, be they real or imagined. Thus, pursuant to the 'control the people' aspect of torture, witch trials and the auto-da-fé served to reassert that the local sect (any sect) still had power over the soul, and had the ability to punish 'evil' enemies.

Or, and I find this far more likely, whoever's in charge actually bought into their own BS and thought that what they were doing wasn't actually torture, it's enhanced interrogation. We're not pulling fingernails here, good lord we're professionals! We only don't let them sleep for a few days, or in the worst case we simulate drowning - but not for more than 40 seconds at a time! That's not torture, right? We're not leaving any physical marks, right? Torture is something uncivilized people do with, like, hot pokers. That's not what we do, we just refuse to mollycoddle the bad guys. We have manuals and procedures and protocols -- that means it's not torture. Right? Right, guys?

True.

Also, in some cases there is a fine line between fairly normal interrogation tactics and torture. Nobody thinks it's all that far out of line if the police interrogate someone for twelve hours at a stretch until they're psychologically beaten into a jelly by repeated questionings and people pointing out every minor contradiction in their story. But keep the same person awake for twenty hours asking such questions and it edges over into torture by sleep deprivation too...

And once you've gotten used to doing that for twenty hours, it doesn't seem that unreasonable to just leave the guy in a room to stew for a few more hours after the interrogation before you ask him some more questions. And then a few more, and a few more.

So yes, I think this idea that people are actually rationalizing their torture as 'enhanced interrogation,' just a normal interrogation with a few minor modifications to give the prisoner more incentive to cooperate... yeah. I bet there are people who actually think like that- or who use that to rationalize what their subconscious wants to do for nastier reasons (sadism, or at least as often just the desire to see enemies punished, which is a very common human trait even among people who wouldn't enjoy seeing a stranger suffer).

but if these techniques were counter-productive, you have to wonder why they would continue to use them.

Because agencies involved in secrecy often develop disconnects from reality.

MI5 has a history of going off the rails.

The NSA's bulk collection of data doesn't look like it gathers any actionable intel and the NSA as a whole looks like it does more to harm US national security than it does to protect it.

I think this is because of the secrecy surrounding such agencies. The higher ups within the agency become convinced that something is a good idea. Office politics silence anyone below them who disagrees, and anyone with the authority to tell them to stop doesn't get the full picture of what is happening because it's all kept secret.

This.

NEVER assume the CIA or any other intelligence agency actually knows what the hell they're doing in the absence of oversight. Intelligence and security organs going off the rails and inventing hairbrained schemes or chasing imaginary plots is so routine that it's practically an entire subgenre built around subverting the traditional image of the spy story.

The belief that the spies and secret-ish police actually know what they're doing is one of the cornerstones of support for authoritarianism. Big Brother is watching, such people assume, because he's strong and will keep you safe, NOT because he's a lunatic peeping Tom. Unfortunately, the "lunatic peeping Tom" explanation tends to be more accurate.

[Thanas]

Just 24 and our friend Jack? Oh no. More like most American films after 2001. They routinely depict people being threatened with torture, tortured directly or threatened with being "shipped to Gitmo" (where very bad things will happen - everyone knows how brutal those Gitmo guards are, right?)...

Us mass media is full of stuff condoning or even outright defending or endorsing questionable tactics, most often by the police.

See for example Hawaii 5-0, Blue Bloods (probably the two worst offenders) and NCIS.

They also happen to be widely popular shows.

[Thanas]

I may use the term a bit liberal, but three points:
-They delivered information to the US services that was used to kill targets. That is a direct contradiction of publicly stated policy, and worse, in direct opposition to article #1 of the constitution which puts human dignity above all. Yes, they got their piece of paper that says it won't be used, be everyone knew that.
-They helped and covered US officials to capture a traveller on Frankfurt airport. Germany is a sovereign country, only German officials are allowed to use physical force. Otherwise we can our sovereignty down the toilet.
-They covered the abduction of a German citizen, Khaled al-Masri. German officials are supposed to protect the rights and lives of German citizens, not serve the requests of US secret services.

We definitely need less Kotzebues in our secret services and more Karl Sands.

With regards to the first, I disagree with the interpretation. Of course we are going to deliver information in a war to our allies and especially target information. Heck, our KSK has been fighting in Afghanistan. Article 1 does cover things in Germany, it does not hold in other nations (which is why we are not allowed to have the military fire on jets in Germany but can bomb targets in Afghanistan or in Kosovo).

With regards to the second and third I agree though with the caveat that the Masri situation was not of Merkels doing but actually done by Schröder.

The difference being Merkel is actually supposedly in power, not a bribed puppet (I can link you recent quotes from the prime minister and president from that time claiming neither knew what the special services were doing, oblivious how lying and/or incompetent it makes them look). Unless you postulate Merkel is bribed US puppet, which wouldn't be surprising given some of her moves.

DIfference is those guys are still representing their country. If they are idiots, then that only reflects on the populace which elects them.

Ah, yes. So, if Kiejkuty was just US base (which it was in all but paper status), we could do equal shrug and say it wasn't our problem? So convenient.

Yes. The paper status is actually damn important. If it is a sovereign territory then you are not allowed to do anything about it. If it is your own territory then you not only can, but also have a duty to do something about it.

So, either BND actually breaks German law for free or is just better at hiding the deals, seeing they had 60 years, not 6, to establish secret channels. Why would be either of the above better?

It depends on what you define as breaking the law. If the worst you can come up with is data sharing vs active torture on your own territory with full collusion of the security agencies in question in return for a payoff....well.

[Metahive]

See for example Hawaii 5-0, Blue Bloods (probably the two worst offenders) and NCIS.

Don't forget JAG. One episode had a soldier killing wounded Iraqi insurgents. Turns out all those eeeeevil insurgents were all reaching for their guns/ hidden IED detonators. [300]NO PRISONERS! AHOOOO! NO MERCY AHOOOO![/300] Another one had the chinese impound a US jet that had emergency landed on one of their airbases. A pilot defies direct orders, goes rogue and destroys the jet. Acquited because FUCK YOU, SLANT-EYED CHICOMS! Maverick for the win! Basically every time a case had US interests vs foreign interests the latter was not only always at the losing end but also portrayed as subtly or unsubtly sinister. Because the world is really all black and white.

I'm still ashamed I used to watch that show religiously.

Yes, and in doing so they basically broke the Church's complacency about the idea that they were the spiritual hegemon of Western Europe. They had rivals and struggles prior to that, but no peer competitors on soil they had once considered 'theirs,' unless you go clear back to ancient Rome.

This is actually still simplifying things. I did mention the Cathars and Hussites. Those pretty much were peer-competitors in that they were rival christian sects which were poaching for believers in catholic lands. The catholic solution to both of them was to go for outright murder, although the Hussites later managed to get a truce in place after they had disposed of their more radical faction.
Even earlier than that you had Arianism which also had the Church undertake some serious effort to overcome. Believe me, protestantism was neither the first nor the last major spiritual challenge to catholic hegemony, just the one most popularly known to people today.

[K. A. Pital]

Don't forget JAG. One episode had a soldier killing wounded Iraqi insurgents.

What. The. Hell. Executing wounded in cold blood is like, a classy warcrime right there. But I guess when you commit real war crimes, the real task of the media is not even denying them; with so much power at your disposal you can glamorize them. Kind of like when the bandits were coming to power in Russia, it was flooded by films that actively glamorized the mafia. Of course, mafia money was involved in making them.

[Thanas]

See for example Hawaii 5-0, Blue Bloods (probably the two worst offenders) and NCIS.

Don't forget JAG. One episode had a soldier killing wounded Iraqi insurgents. Turns out all those eeeeevil insurgents were all reaching for their guns/ hidden IED detonators. [300]NO PRISONERS! AHOOOO! NO MERCY AHOOOO![/300] Another one had the chinese impound a US jet that had emergency landed on one of their airbases. A pilot defies direct orders, goes rogue and destroys the jet. Acquited because FUCK YOU, SLANT-EYED CHICOMS! Maverick for the win! Basically every time a case had US interests vs foreign interests the latter was not only always at the losing end but also portrayed as subtly or unsubtly sinister. Because the world is really all black and white.

JAG always was kind of schizophrenic about politics and some episodes swing wildly in one direction and one in others. Which is why I didn't list them there. Anyway, I don't recall them ever worshipping torture like NCIS or the others do.

It is kinda crazy that the military worship show does not make the list of worst offenders there.

I'm still ashamed I used to watch that show religiously.

Catherine Bell is reason enough.

[Simon_Jester]

Yes, and in doing so they basically broke the Church's complacency about the idea that they were the spiritual hegemon of Western Europe. They had rivals and struggles prior to that, but no peer competitors on soil they had once considered 'theirs,' unless you go clear back to ancient Rome.

This is actually still simplifying things. I did mention the Cathars and Hussites. Those pretty much were peer-competitors in that they were rival christian sects which were poaching for believers in catholic lands. The catholic solution to both of them was to go for outright murder, although the Hussites later managed to get a truce in place after they had disposed of their more radical faction.
Even earlier than that you had Arianism which also had the Church undertake some serious effort to overcome. Believe me, protestantism was neither the first nor the last major spiritual challenge to catholic hegemony, just the one most popularly known to people today.

Arianism is taking things back to ancient Rome; see my previous post. Arianism didn't disappear until after the fall of Rome, granted. But it is still part of the Roman era of Christianity and was pretty much gone as a religious force by, say, the time of Charlemagne- which was quite early in the medieval period.

The Cathars, Hussites, and other pre-Reformation breakaway sects... let me try to explain what I was getting at. They existed, they occupied territory and caused enough trouble for the church in Rome that the Vatican was willing to launch major military campaigns to be rid of them. But they did not cause the seemingly permanent loss of, say, half of Western Europe. The Catholic church was large enough compared to the 'heretic' in each case that there was a definite imbalance of power in the Catholics' favor, large enough that the existence of the 'heresy' didn't automatically guarantee religious tension throughout Europe.

In this regard, the Protestant sects were something new and different, because their attempt to split off succeeded on a very large scale, such that the Catholic spiritual hegemony lost its supremacy.

[Grumman]

Don't forget JAG. One episode had a soldier killing wounded Iraqi insurgents.

What. The. Hell. Executing wounded in cold blood is like, a classy warcrime right there.

According to the part of Metahive's post you cropped, the soldier didn't murder them in cold blood. If an enemy soldier is wounded but still fighting (and if they're reaching for a weapon, that qualifies), they're still a combatant and still a legitimate target. Playing possum, on the other hand, is a war crime.

[Metahive]

Arianism is taking things back to ancient Rome; see my previous post. Arianism didn't disappear until after the fall of Rome, granted. But it is still part of the Roman era of Christianity and was pretty much gone as a religious force by, say, the time of Charlemagne- which was quite early in the medieval period.

Small correction, while Arianism arose when there was still a Western Roman Empire, it only became a major challenge to the Church after it had fallen, because many of the newly converted germannic kingdoms which had risen in its wake took a liking to it. It took about 300 years for the Church to fully defeat it. Charlemagne BTW was crowned emperor because the papacy knew it needed strong secular allies against its challengers.

The Cathars, Hussites, and other pre-Reformation breakaway sects... let me try to explain what I was getting at. They existed, they occupied territory and caused enough trouble for the church in Rome that the Vatican was willing to launch major military campaigns to be rid of them. But they did not cause the seemingly permanent loss of, say, half of Western Europe. The Catholic church was large enough compared to the 'heretic' in each case that there was a definite imbalance of power in the Catholics' favor, large enough that the existence of the 'heresy' didn't automatically guarantee religious tension throughout Europe.

And what I'm getting at is the Protestantism was just the culmination of a long string of struggles that the Church endured since its inception. And, uh, the schism with Eastern Rome did cost them quite a lot of territory, and that territory eventually fell to the Muslims who were at that time considered christian heretics.

Anyway, I don't recall them ever worshipping torture like NCIS or the others do.

That might be because the show ended just as the torture debate took off. Wasn't that around 2005/2006?

Catherine Bell is reason enough.

I'm even more ashamed to admit that I didn't watch JAG for the eye candy but because I was a blind US fanboy.

[Metahive]

According to the part of Metahive's post you cropped, the soldier didn't murder them in cold blood. If an enemy soldier is wounded but still fighting (and if they're reaching for a weapon, that qualifies), they're still a combatant and still a legitimate target. Playing possum, on the other hand, is a war crime.

I think that's what Stas was getting at when he said "glamorized", by portraying a warcrime as fully justified and necessary. BTW, the insurgent in question wasn't playing possum, but he was reaching for an IED detonator. Of course, it's not quite clear the soldier who shot him actually knew of that beforehand and it didn't matter in the end. US:1, evil, defiant Furriner:0.

BTW, contrast that with the scene in Red Dawn where one of the girls booby-traps herself with a hand grenade in the end and blows up a bunch of commies who come investigating her. Remember, it's only evil if the enemy's doing it.

[Thanas]

That might be because the show ended just as the torture debate took off. Wasn't that around 2005/2006?

No I remember the show having a few really boring episodes about the military trials long after the debate had already started.