Detaining people without lawyers or trials seems unusual.

If denying rights to someone who was trying to kill Americans, will save other Americans, I am all for it.

If denying rights to someone who was trying to kill Americans, will save other Americans, I am all for it.

The Gitmo captives have no rights. It's amusing to read the assumption by the posters on this thread that you can acquire the constitutional rights of an American citizen by killing Americans overseas. It's a perverse assumption.

The fact is that the Gitmo captives are being treated in accordance with the Geneva convention and international law. First, the Taliban government of Afghanistan was not considered the legal government of Afghanistan by the UN, having deposed the previous government by force. The UN recognized the Northern Alliance as the legitimate government. Furthermore, the Taliban Islamic theocracy was not a party to the Geneva Convention nor made any effort to become so. In their view, all laws but Koranic law are illegitimate.

However, let's ignore all that and assume that the Taliban is covered by the Geneva Convention. For the provisions of the GC to apply, the combatants must identify themselves as combatants with easily seen badges or insignia. Of course, the Taliban combatants did no such thing, preferring to dress as civilians and pose as civilians when it was to their benefit. They have no rights as combatants.

However, let's ignore all that and assume that they identified themselves as combatants. The idea that POWs deserve lawyers is nonsense. Domestic US law does not apply to prisoners of war. That's why there is a Geneva Convention and international laws of warfare. POWs are outside the domain of the law that applies to US citizens. If you might recall, our soldiers captured by the Germans in WWII had no right to a lawyer to argue their case. There is no such law.

Likewise, the idea that there is some set term of imprisonment for these captives is wrong. According to the Geneva Convention, the POWs will be freed when their leadership declares an end to hostilities. Unfortunately for the captives, the leadership of Al Qaeda declares there should be no end to their religious war against America until the black flag of Islam flies over Washington. It is in accordance with international law that they spend the rest of their days in prison.

The United States is springing some Gitmo captives which it deems to be no threat. That's a generous policy it is under no obligation to do. Those who remain a threat should be imprisoned until they are too old to harm America.

To illustrate the kind of captives at Gitmo, consider the case of Half Dead Bob. Half Dead Bob was a Taliban fighter who weighed under 100 pounds when captured. He was sick and near death. He was fed at Gitmo and treated by doctors. He put on weight and recovered his health. He told an American general who was interrogating him that he had been treated well, that he knew that the general was a good man, but that if he was released that he would kill him because he was not a Muslim.

That's the reality of Gitmo. We should never release these murderous religious zealots to do harm to Americans again. The law does not compel us to spring them. We should not let them go.

Tantor
Editor For Life
Conservative Propaganda
www conpro blogspot com

If one is held on US soil (as a military installation technically is) one is entitled to the rights one would have living in the US.

The Geneva convention does not require all members of a conflict to be signatories for it to be in effect. The US is a signatory, therefore ignoring the provisions is a crime under international law.

Indeed, one could argue that they are civilians held illegally as hostages by the US.

True, but they (Gitmo captives) are not classified as POWs, and therefore exist tenuously outside if the realm of POW law, as stated in the Geneva Conventions.

Again, your argument is specious, since they are being held illegally, not as POWs, but to humour you, the government of the country where they were captured, the Taliban, collapsed, and is therefore no longer engaged in hostilities. This should lead, by your reasoning, to the prisoners' release.

Oh, just for your information, most Islamic flags are green. Green is sacred to Islamic theology.

Imprisoning someone because of ideology is about as far from the ideals this nation was founded on as one can get. You really aren't much of a patriot, are you?

Tantors argument conveniently left out the half dozen or so teenages that are being held at "Gitmo". Although I understand the Army was intending to provide video games.

Nice try. Guantanamo is not US soil. It's Cuban. We have an agreement to lease it from Cuba for 99 years.

However, I am always amused to see lefty civilians who never got closer to the military than watching reruns of Gomer Pyle trying to explain technical details of the military. It's something like watching a chimp smoke a cigar or a bear ride a bicycle. It's not that they do it well, it's just amazing that they're doing it at all.

Rejecting treates like the Geneva Convention certainly does demonstrate that the Taliban had no intentions of abiding by it. However, we have complied with the Geneva Convention perfectly. I challenge you to cite an instance where we have not.

However, let's ignore all that and assume that the Taliban is covered by the Geneva Convention. For the provisions of the GC to apply, the combatants must identify themselves as combatants with easily seen badges or insignia. Of course, the Taliban combatants did no such thing, preferring to dress as civilians and pose as civilians when it was to their benefit. They have no rights as combatants

What a dishonest argument. The Taliban dress as civilians, shoot at our guys, declare war on our guys, but you think they should be considered as civilian noncombatants. You are really showing desperation here.

You're catching on. They have placed themselves outside the domain of the Geneva Convention and they are also outside the domain of domestic US law. You fallaciously imply that being outside the domain of the Geneva Convention places you in the domain of domestic US law. That's a foolish argument.

There is no law regarding the captivity of terrorists on foreign soil who have attacked American forces. Therefore, since there is no law covering their captivity, such captivity can not violate any law. I challenge you to cite the law that covers them.

The Taliban never surrendered, still exist, are regrouping to make new attacks, and in fact making attacks on various civilian contractors and NGO workers in Afghanistan. Our special forces are still sporadically engaged with them, mostly in the mountainous region bordering Pakistan. You need to read the newspaper and bone up on current events.

Very few of the Gitmo captives are Afghan. They are mostly Al Qaeda combatants from a couple dozen foreign countries, mostly Saudi Arabia. They are not Talib but Al Qaeda, which vows eternal war against infidels.

In the literature of and press releases from Al Qaeda and related Islamist fundamentalist groups, they boast of raising the "black flag" of Islam over Washington. I am quoting them verbatim. You could educate yourself on this topic by reading their literature so you don't make foolish "corrections" like this.

Nice try at trying to obfuscate the issue. Half Dead Bob is not in Gitmo because our forces picked him off the street corner for having anti-American feelings. He's in Gitmo because he was a combatant in Afghanistan trying to kill Americans. His virulent statement of implacable hostility demonstrates that if released he would return to attacking America. Why do you make excuses to release him?


Tantor
Editor For Life
Conservative Propaganda
www conpro blogspot com