Waterboarding--as American as mom's apple pie!

'The New Yorker' has a feature 'annals of American history'. In the current issue [25 February 2008], appears Paul Kramer's instructive article on 'the water cure'. It has nothing to do with the current contraversy in the courts about America's use of waterboarding in Guantanemo or Iraq or Afghanistan or numerous black holes of prisons the CIA maintain in friendly countries. It clears away the cobwebs about a slice of America's imperialist past. And the use of the water cure or torture in the US war against Filipino guerrilla fighting for independence and against America's eagle's talon grip on the Philippines as a colony.
Kramer's story is something out of America's shameful past which is hardly ever mentioned in history texts, and never in polite company. He documents the uproar the use of the water cure on Filipinos which has a contemporary flavour to it. The arguments the government and military used back then are the same old twaddle that Herr Bush's minions use today, and the uproar of protest recycle the same old humanitarian concerns. And there it lies this sad story which is hardly resolved today. That waterboarding violates the Geneva conventions has no buyers with Herr Bush, but the brutality of the American military and the effect it has on troops and how it affects the public's psyche remain under the surface. Americans like to be loved, to be cosseted abroad, but they are increasingly disliked if not hated for the punch 'em in the face policies of a little man who shirked his duties to his country during America's war in Vietnam.
So saying this, it would do readers a good turn to buy a copy of this week's 'New York' and turn to page 38 and begin reading this sorry cut of history from America's past, which is no moment or shouldn't be of great pride. For the pattern there was set for America's war in Vietnam and Iraq.