Guantánamo Bay

Uncle Sparky · November 4, 2003, 17:26

Quote:

The Department of Defence continues to hold hundreds of foreign nationals without charge or trial in the US Naval Base in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Many have been held there for more than a year in conditions the totality of which may amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. None was granted prisoner of war status or brought before a competent tribunal to determine this status as required by the Geneva Conventions. None has had access to any court or to legal counsel. Visits by family members have not been granted, thereby drawing relatives into the distress of this indefinite and unchallengeable detention regime. On 3 July 2003, it was announced that President Bush had named six detainees under the Military Order he signed in November 2001, making them eligible for trial by military commission. Any such trial would contravene international fair trial norms, and any executions carried out after such trials would violate minimum international safeguards applying to capital cases.

(from Amnesty International's web site)

I haven't seen this topic posted for a while. We all know that Team Dubbya has done all it can in the last couple of years to instigate terror world wide in the guise of fighting it. Isn't it about time that the US citizens demand their government act in a civilized way with these foreign nationals ?

The Americans have had enough time to brainwash their prisoners & beat confessions out of them : turn them over to an international court or set them free !

Arrian · November 4, 2003, 17:34

I think at this point we may be in a "loss of face" position vis-a-vis Gitmo. If we do as you ask, the US government is essentially admitting it was wrong to act as it did. The government (all governments, really) is loathe to admit fault, ever. At least during the same administration. Maybe the next one (if Bush looses) would, since it can point the finger at its predecessor.

-Arrian

Whaleboy · November 4, 2003, 18:18

Agreed. Its weird... they hold it in a piece of US territory where the US constitution does not apply... so while its not legally unconstitutional, it certainly would breach it were it held on the mainland. Theres evil deeds afoot....

There is nothing that sets these people apart from other criminals, terrorism is after all, merely a heinous crime, so why are they not allowed due legal process?

Arrian is correct, like so many things now, they can't go back and risk losing face

.

lord of the mark · November 4, 2003, 19:03

Quote:

Originally posted by Whaleboy
Agreed. Its weird... they hold it in a piece of US territory where the US constitution does not apply... so while its not legally unconstitutional, it certainly would breach it were it held on the mainland. Theres evil deeds afoot....

There is nothing that sets these people apart from other criminals, terrorism is after all, merely a heinous crime, so why are they not allowed due legal process?

Arrian is correct, like so many things now, they can't go back and risk losing face

.

the us govt, and the majority of US citizens, see the acts of 9/11 as acts of war. We are now engaged in a war with al qaeeda and its affiliates, one that by its nature have information and secrecy as key aspects. This necessitates different treatment for these people.

We currently have Zacarais Moussaui before a civilian court. The proceedings indicate the difficulties in reconciling security needs with standard civilian legal procedures.

lord of the mark · November 4, 2003, 19:05

Quote:

Originally posted by Uncle Sparky

(from Amnesty International's web site)

I haven't seen this topic posted for a while. We all know that Team Dubbya has done all it can in the last couple of years to instigate terror world wide in the guise of fighting it. Isn't it about time that the US citizens demand their government act in a civilized way with these foreign nationals ?

The Americans have had enough time to brainwash their prisoners & beat confessions out of them : turn them over to an international court or set them free !

No evidence anyone has been beaten or brainwashed. We hold them for info - and need to keep them to check when new intell comes in.

And if we were to release them why to an internatinal court? why shouldnt the ones captured in pakistan be returned there?

lord of the mark · November 4, 2003, 19:14

AP

'The U.S. Capitol Building, not the White House, was the fourth target of the Sept. 11 attackers, a German magazine reported Sunday citing results of interrogations of suspected al Qaeda leaders.

Der Spiegel said also planning for the attacks on New York and Washington in 2001 began as early as 1996, but plans hatched in 1999 to use four planes in the attacks were temporarily halted because only two pilots could then obtain U.S. visas. The operation, code-named "Porsche 911" by its perpetrators, was finalized in July 2001, the magazine said.

"The Porsche is ready to start," it cited Mohamed Atta, the Egyptian-born student who piloted one of the two hijacked planes that destroyed the World Trade Center, as saying.

Another hijacked plane hit the Pentagon (news - web sites), while a fourth crashed in Pennsylvania before it could reach its target in Washington. Around 3,000 people died in the attacks.

Spiegel magazine said its report was based on transcripts of the U.S. interrogation of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the attacks, and Ramzi bin al-Shaibah, the man suspected of coordinating them.

"The fourth plane, according to bin al-Shaibah's questioning, should have hit the Capitol, the U.S. parliament ... U.S. authorities long suspected that it should have hit the White House. Only bin al-Shaibah's statement corrected the error," the magazine reported.

The magazine did not say where it had obtained the material but said parts of the transcripts dealing with Germany had been passed to German authorities.

According to Spiegel, Sheikh Mohammed first suggested in 1996 an attack on the headquarters of the CIA using a chartered jet but this was rejected by al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden as not being spectacular enough. Sheikh Mohammed later suggested a 10-plane attack, it added.

Bin al-Shaibah was arrested in Pakistan in September 2002. Pakistan announced it had also arrested Sheikh Mohammed in March 2003. Both men are currently being held by the United States at an unknown foreign location. '

Thats what we've got in gitmo. Hope we're squeezing them for every bit of info theyve got.

Sandman · November 4, 2003, 19:35

The US has muddied the waters of international law by inventing a politically convenient new type of prisoner. It will certainly come back to haunt them, for example, if the next country they attack decides to claim that stealth bomber pilots are ununiformed combatants, or American journalists are legitimate targets.

reds4ever · November 4, 2003, 20:13

Quote:

Originally posted by lord of the mark

the us govt, and the majority of US citizens, see the acts of 9/11 as acts of war.

how about treating them as POW's then?

Lefty Scaevola · November 4, 2003, 20:37

Quote:

Originally posted by reds4ever
how about treating them as POW's then?

Because they have violated the rules of warfare, including thoses necessary to be laeful combatants are recieve all protetions of the 1947 Geneva conventions. They have warcrimed themsevles into a legal limbo, where they can be held as combatants (legal or not) for the duration of the conflict (which is a problematic dertermination in an opened ended war, not anticipated by the conventions drafters) but having fils 1 or more of the requirement to be accord "POW" status. The issue of US contitutional rights is a separate matter touched on above. Its all up in the air what the final legal results will be, and such result are more likely to come first from political proseeses, than from legal ones.

MichaeltheGreat · November 4, 2003, 20:44

Quote:

Originally posted by Uncle Sparky

(from Amnesty International's web site)

I haven't seen this topic posted for a while. We all know that Team Dubbya has done all it can in the last couple of years to instigate terror world wide in the guise of fighting it. Isn't it about time that the US citizens demand their government act in a civilized way with these foreign nationals ?

The Americans have had enough time to brainwash their prisoners & beat confessions out of them : turn them over to an international court or set them free !

We have no obligation to turn over unlawful combatants taken prisoner in combat operations to any international authority. I agree we should do something about them, since we've now had enough time to vette them and determine we don't have anyone by mistake.

A quick tribunal under provisions of the UCMJ and MCM, and a quick trip to Allah will solve the whole thing.

Nubclear · November 4, 2003, 20:46

Quote:

why shouldnt the ones captured in pakistan be returned there?

This really has to be a joke.

Lefty Scaevola · November 4, 2003, 20:46

The most interesting legal question presented with the Guantanomo prisoners, to shed a little light on you laymen making fools of yourself in athe legal arena, is the procedure, mostly undifined in the 1947 conventions, for dertermining who is an unlawful combatant. Tjis is where the USA position appear to have a serious weakness.

MOBIUS · November 4, 2003, 20:47

The other thing that they are quietly doing behind the scenes is bullying countries into promising that they guarantee immunity for its citizens from any prosecution from the new International Criminal Court (ICC)- on pain of sanctions! This includes countries that helped them against Iraq!

MichaeltheGreat · November 4, 2003, 20:52

Quote:

Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola
The most interesting legal question presented with the Guantanomo prisoners, to shed a little light on you laymen making fools of yourself in athe legal arena, is the procedure, mostly undifined in the 1947 conventions, for dertermining who is an unlawful combatant. Tjis is where the USA position appear to have a serious weakness.

IIRC, it simply requires a competent tribunal, competent referring of course to one having jurisdiction, and no further definition being given.

IIRC, the US position taken is that the SecDef has the authority to make that determination, and did in fact act as a tribunal in reviewing whether prisoners were to be detained locally, or transferred to Camp Xray.

Lefty Scaevola · November 5, 2003, 01:39

That is the official position, but one not very statisfying to many lawyers outside the Goverment. However, i do not see an effective method to challenge it. As noted, the law on the subject is VERY vague, although I very much doubt that any covention delegates, or bodies that ratified it, ever imagined that a single political appointee, rather than a group of judicial officers, would be the tribunal.

Kuciwalker · November 5, 2003, 01:53

I would NOT advise debating MtG on the fine points of law

Lefty Scaevola · November 5, 2003, 02:01

The problem with this question is that it is not fine points. A few sentences to broadly cover what needed a few pages to define. A big broad ultra wide blunt point of law. and it is not as if thoses who wrote it were unable to anticipate that goverment would try to drive a mechanized brigade through loopholes of this size.

DinoDoc · November 5, 2003, 02:08

There is obviously nothing new under the sun considering the fact this must be the fourth time this topic has come up.

MichaeltheGreat · November 5, 2003, 02:22

Quote:

Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola
That is the official position, but one not very statisfying to many lawyers outside the Goverment. However, i do not see an effective method to challenge it. As noted, the law on the subject is VERY vague, although I very much doubt that any covention delegates, or bodies that ratified it, ever imagined that a single political appointee, rather than a group of judicial officers, would be the tribunal.

I think the technical details are that the initial recommendation of status was made by officers in charge of the interrogation and initial processing of these prisoners, and then it got kicked up to Rummy for rubberstamping, so he's not the sole approval.

I don't find it to be a satisfying solution in general, but I can't get too worked up in these cases - we have people clearly not part of a regular force or organized militia, members of two groups who did not openly carry arms, wear distinguishing markings visible at a distance, and which did not and do not adhere to the laws and customs of war.

Treating Afghan members of the Taleban in their normal uniforms (black turbans) and the large body of Pakistani volunteers who were also "uniformed" Taleban as unlawful combatants on a wholesale basis would be unacceptable, IMO. But irregular and foreign Taleban who engaged in guerilla operations, and members of al Qaeda conducted themselves so far out of the norms of lawful combatants that I don't have a problem with the results so far.

In WW2, Skorzeny's Einheits Stielau prisoners captured by the US were treated to very quick trials before tribunals of three officers, one of which had to be in field grade - the standard that applied at the time. They were taken in US uniform as infiltrators, there really was no defense, and they had trials one day and executions a few days later. No wasted energy or BS. The Genevan Convention for POWs grew out of the military law context that applied in the field in WW2, so I don't see that it would be exceptionally tough to implement something similar.

I think procedural treatment should follow the Manual for Courts Martial and criminal law (and penalties) should follow the UCMJ for these people - I really don't get what Rumsfeld and Ashcroft think they have to gain by talking about (but taking no real action) on creating special tribunals with special one-off procedural rules.

And you're right - it's not fine points at all. I'd have to suspect, absent any other explanation, that the language as to what constitutes a proper tribunal for status and other purposes deliberately did not impose any specific requirement so as to get the greatest number of governments, including many non-savory governments, to ratify the convention.

MichaeltheGreat · November 5, 2003, 02:23

Quote:

Originally posted by DinoDoc
There is obviously nothing new under the sun considering the fact this must be the fourth time this topic has come up.

There's never anything new under the sun.

Alexander's Horse · November 5, 2003, 02:44

It's illegal, it's immoral, it's shameful, it's counter productive and one day a future President is probably going to have to apologise about it.

MichaeltheGreat · November 5, 2003, 03:02

Quote:

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
It's illegal, it's immoral, it's shameful, it's counter productive and one day a future President is probably going to have to apologise about it.

It might be the fourth thing, but then I'm all for trying and shooting them.

DinoDoc · November 5, 2003, 03:04

Quote:

it's immoral,

Your point is?

Alexander's Horse · November 5, 2003, 03:07

oh yeah I forgot to mention - it's just plain dumb.

Ned · November 5, 2003, 03:21

I think this question ought to be put to Dean, Clark, et al., to find out what they would do.

oedo · November 5, 2003, 04:13

at least they could set the innocents free, before.....

oedo · November 5, 2003, 04:14

....oh, and the children of course, as well.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2978661.stm

MichaeltheGreat · November 5, 2003, 04:17

You mean by "children" the younger *******s carrying weapons and fighting in an unlawful combatant organization?

The ones that wouldn't think twice about pulling the trigger on their Kalashnikovs and sending your infidel asses to meet your Maker? These weren't exactly your average schoolkids.

MichaeltheGreat · November 5, 2003, 04:18

Quote:

Originally posted by Ned
I think this question ought to be put to Dean, Clark, et al., to find out what they would do.

I agree, but I think Dean already spoke on this between his retirement and his announcing as a candidate. IIRC, basic blurb about applying standard military law and procedures.

oedo · November 5, 2003, 04:21

Quote:

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat
You mean by "children" the younger *******s carrying weapons and fighting in an unlawful combatant organization?

The ones that wouldn't think twice about pulling the trigger on their Kalashnikovs and sending your infidel asses to meet your Maker? These weren't exactly your average schoolkids.

everyone has to be considered as an innocent as long his guilt hasn´t been proven. I thought you know that, MtG. these children (and all the other inmates as well) haven´t been even accused, yet.