Did the UK under Churchill torture? Did Obama tell a whopper last night?
Britain did torture, as Michael Tomasky points out in the Guardian, pointing to a Guardian article about The Cage, which was “run by MI19, and specifically by a fellow called Alexander Scotland; it was of course a closely guarded secret; and — most shockingly — it operated until two or three years after the war ended, still mistreating captive Germans.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/michaeltomasky/2009/apr/30/obama-administration-torture
The original Guardian article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/nov/12/secondworldwar.world
Micheal Scherer’s post in Swampland in Time:
http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2009/04/30/obamas-mistake-britain-did-torture/
And Ben Smith in Politico:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0409/Obama_and_Churchill.html
Smith notes that Obama may be reading Andrew Sullivan. Here’s Sullivan’s original Churchill V. Cheney post:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/04/churchill-vs-cheney.html
Sullivan’s post today on the matter says that if Churchill knew, Churchill was guilty of war crimes:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/04/the-british-tortured.html
Michael Goldfarb in the Weekly Standard: “As far as I’m concerned the Guardian is no more credible than a veteran of the SS, which is to say not at all. I don’t believe Churchill ordered the torture of Germans captured on the battlefield, but these were uniformed combatants, and what could they possibly have told their captors anyway — there’s a bunch of planes headed to London tonight? When Germans or their agents were caught operating without a uniform, they were turned or shot — no trial, no habeas, no nothing.”
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/04/churchill_the_terrible.asp
Ed Morrissey asks “Does anyone in the White House actually do research?”
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/30/100-days-presser-flubbing-churchill/
Scott W. Johnson at Powerline has a post up that doesn’t involve the Guardian article, but makes other points. “What about Churchill? When the Allies first deliberated over the fate of the highest ranking members of the Nazis and German military who were ultimately tried at Nuremberg, Churchill supported their summary execution. He didn’t think they deserved their day in court as a matter of right.
Churchill was the leader ultimately responsible for the firebombing of Dresden. He was not particularly constrained by high minded liberal notions of wartime restraint, though late in the war (after Dresden) he opposed “the bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the terror.”"
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/04/023457.php
Jonah Goldberg at the Corner also has questions about using WWII Britian as an example:
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NjJkYTZjN2IzNDY1YTg4MzkwYjdlNGVlMTc4YmU3NmU=
Liberals react, too. Steve Clemons at Washington Note:
http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2009/04/the_brits_tortu/
Democratic Underground:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102×3855690
UPDATE #1: Sully has a new post up:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/04/three-mansions-in-london-ctd.html
UPDATE #2: Two more posts from Sullivan:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/05/was-the-london-cage-policy.html
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/05/churchill-vs-cheney-ctd.html
