Tuesday, Sep. 08, 2009

No need for Obama to look back

I almost did not write this piece because it is undoubtedly controversial, but like a moth to a flame I just cannot let it go.

I am very concerned that some of our national leaders do not understand the war we are fighting and the impact of their actions. This decision to investigate CIA interrogation methods really bothers me. President Barack Obama said he was looking forward and not back, but this is looking back.

A group of career lawyers in the Justice Department already reviewed the report years ago and concluded that the CIA had disciplined the people who needed it. The current administration and frankly none of us in regular America (including most people reading this and me) were not sitting in the hot seat on Sept. 12, 2001, trying to figure out how we were so surprised the day before as well as how to prevent a repeat.

We lack the experience to re-judge a case already judged. Frankly it really angers me to listen to people who never had the courage to lay their lives on the line for this country to then saddle up and decide it’s time to nail the people who were tough enough to confront the devil and keep the rest of us safe. It particularly bothers me when images of Abu Ghraib are flashed around when that was investigated and the guilty punished. That’s old news.

Too many people in this country want to whine about the hard decisions and terrible aspects of war. No, I’m not defending torture, but I’ve been around the block enough to know that defining torture depends on your political persuasion and whether you’re a lawyer. I think some of the things we get squeamish about are pretty awful, and I would not want them done to me.

Yet I think about the desperation felt in this land on Sept. 12, 2001, and I see how that determination to save the rest of us could easily drive people to extremes in order to prevent another catastrophe from taking nearly 3,000 lives.

When I wrestle with myself over the right and wrong of enhanced interrogation techniques I cannot help but conclude that if given an option of being very bad to someone or allowing one of my children to die, I would probably do something that a civil libertarian would deplore —until his or his family member’s life was on the line that is.

Maybe I’m morally bankrupt, but I know that my ability to draw that line between right and wrong when interrogating a terrorist is not clear. I also know that I do not trust the current administration to be willing to place themselves in that morally ambiguous situation when passing judgment on someone.

Therefore, I think President Obama’s original promise to look ahead was a wise one, and the decision to look over his shoulder now is not a wise one.

His job is to keep us safe. He and his administration should be focused on that. This investigation is sure to encourage the CIA to be less aggressive, and I fear will influence our military leaders’ actions.

John M. House is a retired Army colonel who lives in Midland. His e-mail is housearmylife@aol.com.