June 29, 2006
The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that President Bush overstepped his authority in ordering military war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees.The ruling, a rebuke to the administration and its aggressive anti-terror policies, was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, who said the proposed trials were illegal under U.S. law and international Geneva conventions.
The case focused on Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who worked as a bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden. Hamdan, 36, has spent four years in the U.S. prison in Cuba. He faces a single count of conspiring against U.S. citizens from 1996 to November 2001.
I'm familiar with a saying that goes, “if you can keep your head, while everyone around you is losing theirs, then clearly, you don't understand the situation.”
When it comes to Hamdan, that is certainly the case for me.
Quite frankly, I've never been sure about the military tribunal route for terrorism suspects captured overseas. To me it either makes sense to try them as criminals in a federal court, hold them until hostilities were over (if we deem the Geneva Conventions apply), or execute them like rabid dogs (if we deem the Geneva Conventions don't apply). The tribunal route just seemed odd to my sensibilities.
Over at Hot Air, Allah seems confused:
So if they try him, they have to take him to federal court — but they don't have to try him? What?
He also notes this from SCOTUSBlog:
As I predicted below, the Court held that Congress had, by statute, required that the commissions comply with the laws of war -- and held further that these commissions do not (for various reasons).More importantly, the Court held that Common Article 3 of Geneva aplies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. That is the HUGE part of today's ruling. The commissions are the least of it. This basically resolves the debate about interrogation techniques, because Common Article 3 provides that detained persons "shall in all circumstances be treated humanely," and that "[t]o this end," certain specified acts "are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever"—including "cruel treatment and torture," and "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." This standard, not limited to the restrictions of the due process clause, is much more restrictive than even the McCain Amendment. See my further discussion here.
This almost certainly means that the CIA's interrogation regime is unlawful, and indeed, that many techniques the Administation has been using, such as waterboarding and hypothermia (and others) violate the War Crimes Act (because violations of Common Article 3 are deemed war crimes).
If I'm right about this, it's enormously significant.
Quite frankly, if SCOTUSBlog is correct in that SCOTUS is saying the Geneva Conventions apply to non-state terrorist entities, then the court is out of it's ever-lovin' mind.
What is then to keep them from applying the Conventions to other non-state groups? Can drug cartels now claim to be protected under Geneva? How about serial killers?
The message to the soldier in the field seems clear: Take no prisoners, and collect whatever intel you can gather off the bodies.
Great job, Stevens. I think it's time you retire.
Update: Stop the ACLU has a roundup.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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