Actually, being a terrorist doesn’t make you exempt from being deemed a “soldier” (under the GC, anyway) in the same way that actions performed while not in uniform does.
Oh, and Elendil’s Heir, thanks for your response.
Cite please?
I think you will find this is not so. I.e. ‘terrorist’ is not defined in any legal instrument that may apply.
Non-soldiers attacking anyone, falls under an illegal act (attacking, not defending; as there are different rules regarding such actions); terrorism is not covered under the GC, but definitions of soldiers (and requirements for their actions) are. The UN Resolution 1373 (2001) covers the ground rules for terrorism (several other resolutions have followed, and there is a counter-terrorism group at the UN now).
The best difinition I have found for a ‘terrorist’ (and seems to be the most common as well, from groups on terrorism to dictionaries) would be : the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion. Where terror is defined as: violence (as bombing) committed by groups in order to intimidate a population or government into granting their demands <insurrection and revolutionary terror>.
I see no issue with that defintion and the actions described.
Though if you want to use the GC as a guideline; we can simply summerally kill all those non-soldiers, as they have no protections.
The Hague Accords would classify them as spys, and their fate wouldn’t be ‘fun’.
An “illegal act” is AKA a “crime.” We have mechanisms for dealing with crimes. Those mechanisms include protections for persons accused of them.
I believe the ‘other side’ believes those protections apply to US citizens or crimes commited in the US. Illegal act is the term used in several of the GC’s and much of the UN resolutions, but yes I would accept that an illegal act is a crime. According to international law those crimes commited during time of war are the purview of military tribunals, though that is not the way I would like to see it handled.
Not sure what would be specific enough, but the first one I could find (again… I’ll keep looking if this does not satisfy your request was here page 10-11.
I would have not know what legal instrument you were going to accept, but you are correct if you are speaking to the GC, UN charter, or HA. Though as I posted above the UN has since added some defining characteristics, and a few different definitions (all similiar, but not exactly the same).
Trying to do some cursory research on that, I came across the following, which is interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorist#Etymology The word “terrorism” originally (in the 18th and 19th centuries) was applied only to actions by states. Rebels who used what we now would call “terrorist” tactics were known as “incendiaries.”
Thanks for the link, I did not know the Etymology of the word. I’l also not aware of the mention of “incendiaries” in the HA or GC (and pretty sure it isn’t in the UN charter). I’ll some searching through the HA’s and GC’s and see if there is any stated way of dealing with “incendiaries”.
It’s a little more complicated than that, but your point is still well taken. From the GC:
I’m not sure what point you are trying to make with that post. The section that I was specifcally referring to in my post is listed as #2b; which is a requirement for any PoW application.
There is a similiar statement in the HA and the UN charter.
Thanks for the correction. No offense was intended; please don’t sue me, ha ha, he said in airy jest.
Actually I’d be immensely relieved if you could pick nits from my main concern as well. In all seriousness, the colonel’s notion of keeping the Gitmo detainees imprisoned without trial for “centuries” sounds genuinely batshit insane. I can’t think of a single realistic scenario that could possibly justify treatment even remotely approaching his suggestion. In any case, the admission that the U.S. government is even open to the possibility of holding people without trial for the extent of their natural lives seems like an odd way to persuade a roomful of legal professionals that the Guantanamo system is fair and just. How was this remark recieved by the audience?
…around the Bush Adm’s neck. i can’t see any positive outcome to this. Consider the options:
- release them: if they wer’nt terrorists, they sure will want to be now! Also, some of them may be killed by Al-Queda, as the terrorists would have assumed they have blabbed.
- try them; aside from the technical difficulties, what happens if nothing can be proven? -back to option (1)
- keep them in custody: this way the US gets a barrage of bad press from ACLU, AI, etc.
This leads me to believe: most of these people are real terroists. If that is the case, release them with monitoring devices-see where the rats gather.
unfortunately, no good course of action possible.
What point was I trying to make? I was just correcting your oversimplification of the POW determination. It’s not just a matter of uniform vs no uniform. Do you still think it is?
Thanks for clearing that up for me. I never thought it was a question of ‘uniform or no uniform’ (though that is a requirement); I was giving a criteria that I know wasn’t met, I can’t say the same for the rest of the requirements.
I know it’s bad form to talk about the Google Ads, but why in the hell are they advertising 36 hour MCAT review videos, Med. School Admissions counselors, and 4/6 year European medical schools?
…I think that you will find that your definition of terrorist does not conform to any recognized definition of the word. I think that you will also find the definition of “combat” as used by US forces is one that is different from the one you would imagine as well. Remember, only around 25 out of 500 detainees were captured by the Americans. The rest of the prisoners were given to them. Can you show me what the Geneva Convention says about prisoners who were obtained via third parties for money?
Probably my reference to the American Medical Association.
I’m assuming you mean the implied definition given in your quoted statement. To that end, you might find it interesting to read over the resolutions passed by the UN Committee on Counter-Terrorism http://www.un.org/sc/ctc/
Unless it has changed since I was IN combat; I believe I have a pretty strong idea of what it means (also if you read some of my further posts, I have passed cited passages of fighting against US troops).
My comment was never that they were caught in combat with the US (though some were, as you seem to suggest), and since the GC is international in its intent it doesn’t matter who they were in combat with, they are not considered soldiers by the international standards of the HA’s, GC’s, nor UN charter
If you accept his premise that the War on Terror might grind on for generations - he likened it to the Cold War, for instance - and such detainees are to be held “for the duration,” then some if not all of them might very well die in custody, having never been charged or brought to trial. I strongly disagree with this policy, but it is least consistent with the Bush Administration’s overall approach to the conflict.
It’s hard to judge audience reaction. No one was shouting in protest, but I didn’t hear any muttered "Right on!"s, either. The audience was polite and let him say his piece, but many of the later questions were quite pointed, as I noted in the OP.