LET’S CALL IT “THE MCCAIN TREATY WITH AL QAEDA” [Andy McCarthy]
To add to the points made by Rich and Jonah, the bottom line here is that al Qaeda is not, under current law, entitled to any protection under the Geneva Convention, the UNCAT’s “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment” terms, or the Army Field Manual. Terrorists are entitled not to be tortured, which is illegal under both U.S. law and the portion of UNCAT we ratified without reservations.
This means – as I have argued previously, here – that to get additional, prisoner-of-war protections from coercive interrogation, al Qaeda needs a treaty with us. Given that their approach to earning such a treaty has been to mass murder our citizens, no politician in his right mind would ever propose such a thing openly.
But a Geneva-like treaty with al Qaeda is exactly what McCain is proposing – just without calling it that. After all, McCain’s protections are not needed for anyone else – other countries and their noncombatant civilians are already covered by Geneva and UNCAT. McCain’s Amendment would only be of help to terrorists. (The so-called "international community" actually tried this in 1977 with "Protocol I" to Geneva; ultimately, President Reagan wisely rejected it.)
If we started calling it the “McCain Treaty with al Qaeda” rather than the “McCain Amendment,” would that change the perception of it?
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