Torture versus collateral damage; the bigger evil?

[davidbfpo]

I am sure SWC readers, many of them in the USA, have seen the media flurry over the US Senate report on the CIA's use of torture. There are many arguments over the report's contents, whether it should have been released and what has been / is the impact.

I shall link only one UK press report:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...t-summary.html and one desscriptive piece on the abuses:http://www.vox.com/2014/12/9/7360823...orture-roundup

I did find the remarks of John McCain worth reading in full; his stance on torture is well known and he does ask questions the USA should get answers to:http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/...1-a58f984db996

Instead of citing Ali Soufan, the ex-FBI Agent, I have chosen an ex-British Army interrogator. His short piece ends with:

I personally think that one of the key weapons which will defeat Islamic fundamentalism is the moral superiority of the plurality of those who oppose it, whether Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, secular or whatever, and what the Senate Intelligence Committee has told us today suggests that, for a time, the CIA gave up that superiority. How can we now claim that we are better than they are?

Link:http://adrianweale.com/2014/12/09/in...n-and-torture/

(Added later) A detailed riposte by:

....former CIA Directors George J. Tenet, Porter J. Goss and Michael V. Hayden (a retired Air Force general), and former CIA Deputy Directors John E. McLaughlin, Albert M. Calland (a retired Navy vice admiral) and Stephen R. Kappes.

Link to WSJ article:http://www.wsj.com/articles/cia-inte...ves-1418142644