Waterboarding Drew Critics During U.S.-Philippine War

The “water cure,” as it was then known, was widely used in the 12-year war in the Philippines that began in 1898, says historian William Loren Katz. William Howard Taft, then the U.S. governor of the islands, made the technique front-page news when he told Congress it had been used to extract information in the conflict. Meanwhile, a soldier’s letter boasting of giving 160 people the “water cure,” of whom only 26 survived, was made public. [ More ]

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