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June 03, 2005

My apologies...

We've been doing some belated spring cleaning, the garage and years of accumulated ... er... stuff. Piling it into keep, toss or sell mounds.

Lord, we've already filled a dumpster and if the weather holds nice tomorrow I hope most of the rest gets sold.

Sorry if the posting is light.

I really want to write extensively on Gitmo and the Geneva Conventions. I just do not agree with those of you who believe that Gitmo is somesort of horrible violation of international law or even of US law. Is the subject controversial? Yes. Are there reasoned differences of opinion? Again, yes. But that doesn't translate into the Bu$Hitler is turned the US into a Xtian/Zionist fascist theocracy stylings I keep encountering on leftist sites, let alone the facile sophistry of Amnesty International's "Gulag" Khan who has stated her boredom with the run-of-the-mill torture/murder in non-Western climes and is utterly besotted with the idea of "hidden" or "secret" torture in the West. Yum Yum.

A link to all the actual articles of all four Conventions can be found here.

If you've missed it before, I have a copy of the American Bar Association Task Force on Terrorism and the Law, Report and Recommendations, dated January 4, 2002, link here. Fine primer on American law, including discussion of Ex Parte Quirin.

You might also be interested in what Alberto R. Gonzales, Counsel to the President, said before the ABA Standing Committee on Law and National Security on 2/24/2004, link here

To suggest that an al Qaeda member must be tried in a civilian court because he happens to be an American citizen or to suggest that hundreds of individuals captured in battle in Afghanistan should be extradited, given lawyers, and tried in civilian courts is to apply the wrong legal paradigm. The law applicable in this context is the law of war those conventions and customs that govern armed conflicts.

Under these rules, captured enemy combatants, whether soldiers or saboteurs, may be detained for the duration of hostilities. They need not be guilty of anything; they are detained simply by virtue of their status as enemy combatants in war. This detention is not an act of punishment but one of security and military necessity. It serves the important purpose of preventing enemy combatants from continuing their attacks. Thus, the terminology that many in the press use to describe the situation of these combatants is routinely filled with misplaced concepts. To state repeatedly that detainees are being held without charge mistakenly assumes that charges are somehow necessary or appropriate. But nothing in the law of war has ever required a country to charge enemy combatants with crimes, provide them access to counsel, or allow them to challenge their detention in court and states in prior wars have generally not done so.

And, last but not least, my thoughts had run to posting about the German "werewolves", a post WWII "insurgency" little discussed in contemporary history. Lo and behold but that the History Channel TODAY is running a program on this subject, Nazi Guerillas.

More later.

Posted by Darleen at June 3, 2005 04:15 PM

Comments

I've been reading your comments at Wizbang (including your entry in the caption contest). Well done. I'm stumped by this week's contest because it's too obvious. This frameone person (guy, I presume), who's commenting away at Wizbang, left a 200 word comment at my site. At least he was polite. Does anyone know who he is?
Keep up the good work. I have a book about the werewolves but I haven't read it.

Roger

Posted by: Roger Fraley at June 4, 2005 02:12 PM