# Children being held at Camp X-Ray! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 23, 2003, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511 "2003-04-23T03:32:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2003, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/21 "2003-04-23T20:45:27Z")
You DO know that minors can & have been tried as adults in the USA, right? Like they said- we don’t know their ages. If you have some way of accurately determining their ages outside the scientific Pathological tests they are using, I suggest you call the Marines. Or how about this: “Every terrorist under 18, please step forward, we’ll send you home now- hey, Abdul, don’t you have a lot of grey hair to be 14?”. :rolleyes: You know, the USA lets minors join the Armed services, and if captured, they are treated as POW’s- no matter their age. ---
**Author:** ![sezyou](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b77776/32.png) [@sezyou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sezyou)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2003, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/22 "2003-04-23T20:49:19Z")
I you read the article, it is the spokesman for the US that agreed that children under the age of sixteen being held. It was not an assertion made by “Abdul”. ---
**Author:** ![CTB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9a140/32.png) [@CTB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CTB)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/23 "2003-04-24T00:23:57Z")
Folks, let’s get at least one set of facts straight for the sake of this thread, kids or no kids. 1. These people are not POWs. They have been declared “enemy combatants”, a term that has no legal meaning whatsoever, and as such they have no legal rights under any law, American or International or otherwise. 2. These people have no legal representation, and no manner of proving their guilt or innocence. 3. These folks represent members of either the Taliban or Al Queda. Thus, by any reasonable view, they are due treatment as either POWs or accused criminals. 4. No one in recorded American history has been treated in this way by the United States: Not Nazis, not Viet Cong, not Geoffrey Dahmer not even that sack of sh\_t McVeigh. When you bring children into it: 1. We don’t even allow people under sixteen to drive, vote, drink, join the military, nor even have consensual sex, and yet we feel justified ripping these kids out of their country, away from their families, with no knowledge of what the future holds. Anyone who holds forth the idea that we are justified in holding anyone under these conditions, let alone children, needs to take a deep deep look inside themselves and really think about what they are condoning. ---
**Author:** ![Monster104](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Monster104](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monster104)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/24 "2003-04-24T00:54:03Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. No one in recorded American history has been treated in this way by the United States: Not Nazis, not Viet Cong, not Geoffrey Dahmer not even that sack of sh\_t McVeigh. Try the Japanese internment camps during WW2. > [@](#): > > 1. These folks represent members of either the Taliban or Al Queda. Thus, by any reasonable view, they are due treatment as either POWs or accused criminals. If they do not fit the definition of a POW, then they are not POWs. And if they were terrorist fighting against US armed forces, they are not simply “accused criminals”, they are enemy combatants. ---
**Author:** ![milroyj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@milroyj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/milroyj)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/25 "2003-04-24T01:12:28Z")
Isn’t it a war crime to use children as combatants in the first place? The blame lies with Al-Queda and the Taliban. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/26 "2003-04-24T05:41:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Monster104 \* > \*\*Try the Japanese internment camps during WW2. > \*\* Okay then, the last time this happened is _one of the most embarresing moments of US history_. Does that make things better? ---
**Author:** ![MrVisible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@MrVisible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrVisible)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/27 "2003-04-24T06:09:52Z")
According to [CNN](http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/americas/04/23/guantanamo.detainees/index.html), there are three “enemy combatants” between the ages of 13 and 15 being held. Among the 660 or other prisoners. Proud to be an American. Woo-hoo. ---
**Author:** ![Monster104](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Monster104](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monster104)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/28 "2003-04-24T06:41:22Z")
> [@](#): > > Okay then, the last time this happened is one of the most embarresing moments of US history. Does that make things better? I wouldn’t simply call it one of the most embarrassing moments of US history, myself. That whole time period was one of the most “embarrassing”, so to speak, for the entire world. In hindsight we know that it was wrong, but hindsight tends to have 20/20 vision. In any case, I merely brought that up in response to the claim that something similar has never happened. There are huge differences between the Japanese camps and the enemy combatants, and that’s what makes the prison camp ok in my book, and the Japanese camps not. ---
**Author:** ![Spiny\_Norman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Spiny\_Norman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiny_Norman)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 8:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/29 "2003-04-24T08:06:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SuaSponte \* > \*\*Nor is capturing and detaining those who fought for the other army in a war. > > One does not charge or try POWs. IIRC, that violates the Geneva Convention. > > Sua \*\* The detainees at Guantanamo has carefully been _denied_ POW status - POWs have rights, see ? ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/30 "2003-04-24T09:48:20Z")
This article says they were brought to Guantanamo on suspicion of terrrorism > [@](#): > > [here](http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,942310,00.html) > Three boys aged between 13 and 15 are among about 660 inmates at the controversial camp, a US military official told the Guardian, on condition of anonymity. The official would not disclose their nationalities but said they had been brought from Afghanistan this year on suspicion of terrorism. they mention a Canadian national (15) at the bottom of the article as being involved in a fight. > [@](#): > > But the children would still be held indefinitely and would not be granted access to lawyers, he said, because the US continues to view them as “enemy combatants” - a term it has used to argue that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to the inmates, who have not been charged with any crimes. > > That would be the case “until we ensure that they’re no longer a threat to the United States, that there’s no pending law enforcement against them, that they’re no longer of intelligence value,” Lt Cpl Johnson said. so what makes them no longer a threat? One thing is for certain. Even if these are the most dangerous kids in the world and deserve to be locked up a large part of the world will have further confirmation of how fucked up this present US regime is. How can a 15 year old with a AK47 threaten the US? My country couldn’t threaten the US for fuck sake. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/31 "2003-04-24T10:33:50Z")
In case nobody noticed MrVisible’s link to the [CNN.com](http://CNN.com) story, they are not using the hot-button word “children” but have substituted the more accurate “teens”. They also note: > [@](#): > > U.S. authorities were not aware they were teenagers until after medical examinations, according to Army Lt. Col. Barry Johnson. The teens are being held in a separate facility for their own security, Johnson said. > > They also are undergoing special mental health counseling, U.S. officials said. As with other detainees at Guantanamo Bay, the teenagers’ home countries and the International Committee of the Red Cross have been notified, officials said. The names of the nations are being withheld. ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/32 "2003-04-24T10:45:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Duck Duck Goose \* > They were shooting at American soldiers. We know this to be fact ? No. Truth is, it seems, we know nothing except what some career officer has been told to say about the children. And that may, or may not, have been based on political expediency or the hearsay of some scared 18-year old US grunt in Kabul. It don’t amount to a whole heap of much, especially as they’ve lost over a year of their lives on the extra-judicial whim of … who exactly ? Hell of a way to breed the next generation of terrorists. Don’t you have kids around that age, **Goosey**? ---
**Author:** ![lander2k2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ea924/32.png) [@lander2k2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lander2k2)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/33 "2003-04-24T10:58:03Z")
Regarding the Japanese internment camps of WWII…. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Monster104 \* > \*\*In hindsight we know that it was wrong, but hindsight tends to have 20/20 vision. \*\* That’s why the subject of history is so valuable. You can compare historical events to what is happening today and heed the warnings of yesteryear. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/34 "2003-04-24T11:01:01Z")
The fact is the USA has said it abides by no rules and will do whatever it wants. The prisoners are not afforded any legal protection whatsoever. They are not afforded the protections of the Geneva convention or of the Constitution. To me, the whole thing is quite shameful and the fact that some of them may be juveniles is just another drop in the bucket but not the central issue. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/35 "2003-04-24T11:46:19Z")
Regarding the legal status of the X-ray detainees (which appear to have disappeared into a legal black hole), there are surely only two possibilities: 1. The were captured as members of a voluntary armed force during combat and are therefore Prisoners of War. 2. They are civilian foreign nationals sought as criminals by a nation state. If 1) is not the case, legal procedure for 2) requires extradition proceedings to take place between the two national governments. If the national government of the state in which the criminals reside is in no fit condition to do so, then surely a unilateral decree by the other state equates to **simple imperial hegemony** , especially if the _reason_ the government is not functioning is because _they have been labelled the “criminals”?_ For the record, the term “enemy combatant” is a little misleading since it gives no clear indication of their legal status. The term “illegal combatant” perhaps says more about the current justification (!) for their treatment _vis a vis_ the [Geneva Convention](http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/91.htm). Paragraph 2 of article 4 states that “voluntary forces fighting on behalf of a party to the conflict” **are** to be afforded Prisoner of War status. However, the current administration argues that paragraph 2b strips them of this status since they wear no uniform or” fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance”. No international lawyer I, but I cannot see how this situation is different to thousands like it in the history of international law. They must have had _some_ way of distinguishing the enemy (the Northern Alliance _et al_. seemed identically dressed to me - were they outside the GC too?). Under this interpretation, is it also true that US/UK/AUS Special Forces should expect Camp X-Ray status if captured? It seems that “unlawful combatant” is something any state can shout in order to avoid messy extradition proceedings. Regarding the fact that these invasion-repelling self-defenders (for that is what they consider themselves) are children, then one cannot defend a clear breach of international law by an entreaty to consider their welfare unless, say, underprivileged Americans could be kidnapped and given a new and fulfilling life in a Madras without a stir. Every effort should be made to return these boys to Afghanistan or formally extradite them in order to charge them with a felony. Now that they are in a country which still _executes_ children this is perhaps unlikely. ---
**Author:** ![elfje](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19b73/32.png) [@elfje](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfje)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/36 "2003-04-24T12:12:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SentientMeat \* > \*\*Regarding the legal status of the X-ray detainees (which appear to have disappeared into a legal black hole), there are surely only two possibilities: > > 1. The were captured as members of a voluntary armed force during combat and are therefore Prisoners of War. > > 2. They are civilian foreign nationals sought as criminals by a nation state. > > If 1) is not the case, legal procedure for 2) requires extradition proceedings to take place between the two national governments. If the national government of the state in which the criminals reside is in no fit condition to do so, then surely a unilateral decree by the other state equates to **simple imperial hegemony** , especially if the _reason_ the government is not functioning is because _they have been labelled the “criminals”?_ > \*\* good point. So the “democracy” the US is so keen on promoting, is not even a democracy in the true sense of the word, in the US itself. Imperial is indeed more like it. How else do you describe a nation that pushes for the implementation of their own agenda, invades countries willy-nilly because it’s “in their interest to do so”, and is publicly advocating for their nation to become the Global Leader, this century? Imperial, indeed. They’ve had a long hard look at how Great Britain treated its colonies throughout the 18th and 19th century, indeed only letting the 1st colony reach its independance in 1921! Seems like now they think it’s their turn. ---
**Author:** ![gex\_gex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/94ad74/32.png) [@gex\_gex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gex_gex)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/37 "2003-04-24T14:47:55Z")
> [@](#): > > _originally posted by Monster104_ > If they do not fit the definition of a POW, then they are not POWs. And if they were terrorist fighting against US armed forces, they are not simply “accused criminals”, they are enemy combatants. So terrorism isn’t a crime now? If they are terrorists, then they are accused criminals and should be charged with a crime. “Enemy combatants” doesn’t mean a thing. They’re either criminals or P.O.W.s and the US Govt should make its mind up. > [@](#): > > _originally posted by millroyj_ > Isn’t it a war crime to use children as combatants in the first place? The blame lies with Al-Queda and the Taliban. This is the most bizarre twisting of logic yet. You are now arguing that they are _victims_ of a war crime, and that’s why they should be locked up??? ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/38 "2003-04-24T15:47:57Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. The were captured as members of a voluntary armed force during combat and are therefore Prisoners of War. Which is nullified if they engaged in combat ‘out of uniform’. I do seem to recall that the enemy combatants in Afghanistan often did not wear uniforms. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/39 "2003-04-24T16:03:11Z")
> [@](#): > > I do seem to recall that the enemy combatants in Afghanistan often did not wear uniforms. Neither, as I said, did the _allied_ combatants, nor _eg._ US/UK special forces, nor any number of combatants in numerous wars since 1950 to whom PoW status has been immediately bestowed upon capture. This is legal circumlocution is a laughable attempt at trying to push elephantine illegitimacy through a loophole that’s just too small. ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2003, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511/40 "2003-04-24T16:07:08Z")
Article 5 of the Convention states: > [@](#): > > Should any doubt arise as to whether persons, having committed a belligerent act and having fallen into the hands of the enemy, belong to any of the categories enumerated in Article 4, such persons shall enjoy the protection of the present Convention until such time as their status has been determined by a competent tribunal. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-being-held-at-camp-x-ray/170511.md?page=3)