What We’re Up Against…

You’ll no doubt recall the uproar over the photos from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq showing supposed prisoner mistreatement. The Left called it “torture” and used it to vilify President Bush, Vice President Cheney, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and our troops.
I remember saying at the time that it wasn’t torture–and I took a lot of heat for it. I still believe to this day that it wasn’t torture because…well…it’s not.
This…this is torture…actual torture techniques used by terrorists who want to kill us and destroy our way of life. Be forewarned—some of the pictures are graphic in nature.
From The Smoking Gun:

MAY 24–In a recent raid on an al-Qaeda safe house in Iraq, U.S. military officials recovered an assortment of crude drawings depicting torture methods like “blowtorch to the skin” and “eye removal.” Along with the images, which you’ll find on the following pages, soldiers seized various torture implements, like meat cleavers, whips, and wire cutters. Photos of those items can be seen here. The images, which were just declassified by the Department of Defense, also include a picture of a ramshackle Baghdad safe house described as an “al-Qaeda torture chamber.” It was there, during an April 24 raid, that soldiers found a man suspended from the ceiling by a chain. According to the military, he had been abducted from his job and was being beaten daily by his captors. In a raid earlier this week, Coalition Forces freed five Iraqis who were found in a padlocked room in Karmah. The group, which included a boy, were reportedly beaten with chains, cables, and hoses. Photos showing injuries sustained by those captives can be found here.

THAT is torture. People want to complain about us water-boarding people or playing loud music? Come on. Grow the hell up, already.
This isn’t an episode of “24.” This is 100% real.
Al-Qaeda is willing to do whatever it takes, no matter how vile or reprehensible to accomplish their goal. (Which, by the way, is to kill Americans.) While I am not suggesting that we torture prisoners at all, I am saying that it’s time the Left realized that some of the methods we may use to extract information from people aren’t all that torturous.
Suddenly, water-boarding doesn’t really seem that bad in comparison, now does it?
This is what we’re up against. This is what our troops are up against.
William Smith
ConservativeBlogger.com