Why Are We Going After Those Who Protected Us?

This latest outrage by ABC is too much. Two private contractors, who were hired by the CIA to develop the water boarding program have been outed by ABC-names and faces because the public and Al-Qaida have a right to know. It looks like a full court press by the Democrats in Congress, the left, and the news media to prosecute anyone connected to water boarding.

Even though President Obama seems hesitant to authorize prosecution, there is no doubt that the left is determined to see everyone from George Bush to the CIA officers who physically carried out the harsh interrogations hauled into the dock.

Last night, Keith Olbermann, who has made this a crusade, had Jonathan Alter on his show (as he usually does). Alter referred to the two men as "characters" and "bad actors" (who spoke no Arabic, no less)! So what does Alter know about the character of these two men, who now, aside from worrying about prosecution, must spend the rest of their lives hiding from terrorists?

In my opinion, this is beyond disgusting.

Instead, I feel this country owes a debt of gratitude to those from Bush down to the CIA for protecting us from further 9-11 attacks.

And they did. Three extremely high-ranking terrorists were water boarded. From them we learned about the plot to fly a plane into downtown Los Angeles and blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. But to the left, water boarding was too high a price to pay to stop those attacks. And don't forget those other horrific practices, like sleep deprivation, slapping, yelling, and placing insects in cells.

Ask yourselves why water boarding was used-after legal reviews and safeguards to prevent permanent injury or death to these monsters. Was it done to extract confessions? No. Was it done to suppress political dissent? No. Was it done to keep Bush in power? No. It was done to head off more terrorist attacks that would have killed thousands of innocent Americans.

And another outrageous aspect of this is that members of Congress were briefed on the process by the CIA-which people like Nancy Pelosi, who wants a "truth commission", conveniently forget even though she was one of those briefed.

My arguments are not solely derived from an academic point of view. In nearly 30 years spent in law enforcement (Military Police, Customs, DEA), I never engaged in anything resembling torture. It never occurred to me. Someone would have had to teach me how to do it, for crying out loud. I always regarded it as wrong. In almost all cases, it is. To torture a confession out of a criminal or for purposes of locating drugs is repugnant and clearly illegal. Yet, in 1985, had I had someone in my custody in Guadalajara who knew the location where kidnapped DEA agent Enrique Camarena was being held (and being tortured to death), would I have employed torture? I have to confess I would have.

It also seems to me that in this current war on terror we are facing, water boarding must be held as a last resort. We are fighting to save thousands of American lives against an enemy that doesn't follow any rules. Water boarding? They cut off the heads of their prisoners and were doing so before any of this water boarding was revealed. To assume that treating Al-Qaida prisoners with kid gloves will ensure humane treatment for our soldiers who are captured by these barbarians is beyond naive. It is the thinking of fools. Of course, now that we have reevealed the practice to our enemies, rest assured they are training their recruits to resist it while reminding them that they will not die and it will only last less than a minute.

The people who employed this practice did so not out of sadism, but for the best of reasons-to protect us against a barbaric enemy. They did so in good faith, believing that it had been legally authorized. And please don't come back at me with Nuremberg. They were not herding innocent men, women and children to pits to be executed or into gas chambers simply because of their religion or race. If we, as a nation, betray these people, largely as part of a political witch hunt, then shame on us a people.

As much as I hate to admit this, even at my rather advanced age (63), I may yet live to see the day that I will be ashamed to be an American.