Pentagon to Give Guantánamo Detainees Geneva Rights

The Bush administration finally caved in to decency and decided that the Pentagon will treat all detainees at Guantánamo in accordance with the Geneva Convention. This change of heart wasn’t a Pauline conversion en route to Damascus, but rather it comes directly from a 5-3 Supreme Court decision that blocked military tribunals for detainees. Tony Snow, White House spokesman, said of the reversal of policy, “It’s not really a reversal of policy.”

The truth, whether the White House admits it or not, is that the detainees were neither according the rights of prisoners of war (which this journal maintains they always have been) nor the rights of civilians under federal arrest. There is no middle ground, regardless of the desire to create a third class of “illegal enemy combatant.” Congressman Duncan Hunter (R-CA) has said, “We need to have a body of law directed at this new battlefield,” and will help the White House get appropriate legislation passed. While new legislation is unnecessary, passing something will provide some mechanism for protecting the innocents who may be accused of terrorism while ensuring the detention of the guilty.

Senator Bill Frist (R-TN) said the Senate probably won’t take up any new legislation on this matter until after the August recess. This may prove to be a huge miscalculation by the Republican leader. The only card the GOP really has to play is the “tough on terror” card (by the way, anyone seen Usama bin Laden?), and passing a “terrorist rights act” will backfire just as surely as the president’s guest worker plan for immigrants did. A June poll by ABC News and the Washington Post showed 57% of the American people supported holding the Guantánamo detainees without trial. Only 37% understood what America is about and opposed it.

Over in the House, Congressman Arlen Specter (R-PA) has already introduced legislation, which would authorize the military tribunals that the president created by fiat, but the bill would force the Defense Department to provide certain protections for the accused. He will hold hearings later this week on the matter. He assured the world, “We’re not going to give the Department of Defense a blank check.” He probably shouldn’t linger on the blankness of the checks the DoD has had since September 11, 2001.

Despite their best intentions, the guys in Washington are trying to achieve something using the wrong tool. When Alberto Gonzalez labeled the Geneva Conventions “quaint,” and went on to recommend America ignore them, he missed a huge opportunity. The rules of war are very clear that no prisoner of war need be released from custody until the war has ended or until the power holding the individual chooses to free the prisoner. The war in Afghanistan continues as does the war in Iraq. Given this situation, all the White House has to do to lock the Guantánamo guys up and throw away the key is declare them POWs and let the Red Cross check up on them. And who would argue that they are not?

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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