>From fwd `budge at el pleasant' aka Joe Noonan(?):
``....Unfortunately, no momentum has developed for another solution: trial before a special international court such as those established to deal with former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Indeed Harold Koh, who labels such a court a "more benign approach than President Bush's military tribunals," nevertheless rejects it as "slow and expensive."...Koh is no doubt right that international trials would be costly and cumbersome; but it is not clear that those disadvantages outweigh the value of proceeding in a manner that has a better chance to gain broad international acceptance than entirely American courts, especially a military court set up in Guantánamo or some other military base. Deferring to such an international court could strongly advance American interests. Despite the slow pace with which they have proceeded, the worldwide credibility achieved by the tribunals for ex-Yugoslavia and Rwanda is very high. For the US, achieving such credibility is second in importance only to convicting the guilty...''
[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15122]
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One nice thing about the US actually becoming a lawful combatant of international terrorism by adopting the necessary protocols and resolutions that would make it party to the international court systems, would be if the US did apprend OLB and others and bring them before the court---that lawful process would virtually guarantee indefinite detention for suspects as these bodies took their deliberative sweet time pursuing justice.
Of course the US would have to give up carpet bombing as its preferred tool of international law enforcement. Bummer.
I had this great argument at work today with my work buddies. It went something like this.
So, Larry, how can you claim some group is a lawful target of military force, not civilian while you're killing them, and then if you get them alive, turn around and say, hey they was unlawfully resisting by shooting back?
Larry (Vietnam vet) launched into a typical scenario where the innocent US solder is picked off by the Viet Cong granny-lady. So, I said, okay, fine, but you are not supposed to call in a B-52 strike on grandma's whole province.
That more or less ended the discussion in with a cynical laugh---since that was pretty much exactly what we used to do. Loi (Vietnamese) was a lunch. This kind of light banter about that war is too disrespectful of his personal experiences to be carried on in front of him.
The above quoted essay was good until the very end:
``...What then is to be done about the military tribunals? A first step is to narrow the range of those who may be tried before them. A judicial process should be available to distinguish prisoners of war from unlawful combatants. The authority of the tribunals to try permanent residents of the United States should be eliminated. The trials should be required to observe standards of due process that include, at least, rights to a public trial; to counsel of the defendant's choice; to call and cross-examine witnesses; to be convicted only upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt; to appeal to an independent and impartial court; and, in the case of aliens arrested in the United States, to have an opportunity to challenge the jurisdiction of such tribunals by habeas corpus.
Finally, human rights groups should be provided the opportunity to establish a presence in Guantánamo or wherever else the trials are held, and to monitor all proceedings and to circulate their findings. Whatever the facilities provided to such groups, they will, of course, study the trials as best they can. Their conclusions about the tribunals are likely to matter to the United States, and to other countries, almost as much as the verdicts of the tribunals about the defendants who appear before them.''
Let's keep it clear that the US can not have it both ways, ie. lawful combatants for the purpose of killing en mass by military force, but unlawful combatants for the purpose of detention, trial, imprisonment, or execution.
It's one or the other. And with some more legally sophisticated argument, I think you could trap the US government in a legal no exit. Either we are war criminals for using military force against civilians, or we are war criminals for our treatment of prisoners of war.
In any case, human rights groups should not acquiesce on the use of military tribunals in any form for any reason, outside the current lawful US practice and those given in the Geneva Conventions. In other words, military tribunals are used for military personnel and prisoners of war who, after internment have committed offenses against the military codes of justice. That's the purpose of such tribunals, that's how they are empowered now, and their scope should not be extended.
I can't help but suspect that some higher ranking US military, really do not savor the idea of having the military system of justice abused and corroded by extending it to cover civilians. It has got to be giving at least some of them, real qualms. This whole business is very much like the kind of abusive expedience of the military, that destroyed its credibility and morale during Vietnam.
Chuck Grimes