COMMENT: IMHO, incredibly irresponsible behavior by UK judicial system. However, I really wonder whether USG will really degrade the special relationship because I suspect it would be cutting our nose off to spite our face. While I think we have clear dominance in some intelligence disciplines and coverages, I also think the UK dances rings around us in others. Marcus
Intelligence ties between UK and US in jeopardy
By DAVID STRINGER The Associated Press
Thursday, February 11, 2010; 7:32 PM
LONDON — Intelligence ties between London and Washington have been jeopardized by a British court's disclosure that a terrorism suspect was beaten and shackled in U.S. custody, diplomats and security officials said Wednesday.
. . . . . . .
“This is more serious than the Cambridge spy ring, this is more serious than Robert Hanssen,” said Bob Ayers, a London-based former U.S. intelligence officer. “This has the potential to be far more damaging.”
Phi Beta Iota: The US threats–largely bluster–are old news. What is new is the quote by Bob Ayers, a much-admired colleague, that the UK disclosure of US torture of a UK person is vastly worse than the Cambridge spy ring. We stand with Col Stuart Herrington, USA (Ret), one of our many heros, with respect to the moral and practical fact that torture is not effective–and it is an atrocity with strategic moral negatives that neophytes and wanna-be macho contractors simply cannot comprehend. In combination, torture the crime against humanity; bluster with allies over revealing our immorality; and the obsessive focus on terrorism to the detriment of the larger high-level threats to humanity, is strike three and the epitaph on failed 20th Century “too big to fail” top down elite governance.
