US Supreme Court rules that Gitmo detainees can challenge their detentions in civilian court
The decision was close. Of course, the leftosphere is celebrating.
I have a feeling no one will be celebrating in the future. This might work for the current war, but what happens the next time we are in a major conflict?
We took hundreds of thousands of German prisoners during WWII. Should we have allowed every single one of them to hire a lawyer and challenge their captivity in US courts?
Does that have any precedent, and is it in any way realistic?
4 comments:
What kind of prisoners do you mean that the US took in Germany? Soldiers from a nation that you were enganged in war with would mean that they were PoWs and that status is exactly what the US denied the prisoners in Gitmo. If you talking about German nationals arrested in the US during the war similarly to the Japanese - that is a different story. This isn't really about leftist or right wing or whatever, It's about Due Process as it is stated in the Constitution. Or are you saying that you'll chose how you plan to apply that as you see fit? That the Constitution is only for American Citizens? could be a really slippery slope.
Anyway - spooky America
To Ruthie: I'm not an attorney, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but if I read correctly, the prisoners' status as POWs or unlawful combatants was not an issue in this ruling. In other words, that didn't matter. The next time the US is in a major conflict, we might find ourselves swamped with habeus corpus requests from attorneys hired by every single prisoner.
Also, your country (Germany) is currently serving in Afghanistan. If you agree with this ruling, why aren't you likewise protesting for the right of Afghan prisoners to hire attorneys and challenge their detentions in German courts?
What other major conflicts might that be? Aren't you getting a little ahead of yourself? And by the way, several high profile German war criminals challenged their verdict in the supreme court because the military tribunals had no appeal and that is unconstitutional. The supreme Court ruled it wasn't responsible for war crime trials, but it did put pressure on the military Government in Germany and they revised alot of verdicts and converted most to life sentences or less. It isn't exactly a new thing.
And Germany doesn't run prison camps in Aghanistan where people get locked without being charged with anything, denied access to a lawyer, no trial and no contact to the outside. If we did you can bet your ass that there would be a huge scandal and outcry and the Government would likely have to resign.
Oh and you can avoid getting samped with habeas corpus appeals - just don't lock prisoners up without a trial, access to a lawyer and contact to their families. Or you can declare them PoWs and guarantee them the rights of the geneva convention. You shouldn't have any problems then. It's basically what the rest of the world that considers itself civilized does.. but you can always also act like some african dictator, but then the leftosphere is correct if they are concerned.
I've quoted you and linked to you here: http://consul-at-arms.blogspot.com/2008/06/re-us-supreme-court-rules-that-gitmo.html
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