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Pastimes : Rarely is the question asked: "is our children learning" -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Sladek who wrote (1700)	1/3/2004 3:50:51 PM
From: John Sladek	Respond to of 2171

11Jun03-Victoria Toensing-In What Court? - Policy and precedent in the Abdullah al Mujahir case. June 11, 2002, 8:45 a.m. In What Court? Policy and precedent in the Abdullah al Mujahir case. By Victoria Toensing BI Seizes 8 Saboteurs" headlined the New York Times on June 28, 1942. The eight had arrived by cover of night, in two groups of four, disembarking from German submarines, and landing on Long Island and the Florida coast. Their mission, in support of Nazi Germany, was to bomb targets in the United States, including industrial plants, and canals and locks along the Ohio River. All eight were tried and convicted as enemy belligerents by a military commission. Two were United States citizens. There are those today objecting to the U.S. government's decision to take U.S. citizen Abdullah al Mujahir into military custody and possibly bring him before a military tribunal on charges of planning to detonate a dirty bomb (a conventional weapon that would spread radiation) in Washington, D.C. Their objections must be based on policy — not on the law or the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court spoke clearly on this issue 60 years ago when it affirmed the status and convictions of the eight saboteurs, which resulted in six executions, including one of the two U.S. citizens. In Ex Parte Quirin, the Court affirmed that entering a country by stealth (in non-military garb) to destroy "life or property" is an offense "against the law of war subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals." The Court concluded that U.S. citizenship "does not relieve" an individual from the consequences of violating the law of war. "Citizens who associate themselves with the military arm of the enemy government, and with its aid, guidance and direction enter this country bent on hostile acts, are enemy belligerents within the meaning of the Hague Convention and the law of war," declared the Quirin Court. Seven Army generals, not the traditional peer jury, tried the group. The Court upheld that procedure too. So if the legal issue is settled, what would be the policy rationale for sending al Mujahir to Pentagon custody and a possible trial by a uniformed jury? Here we see in operation the administration's new strategic approach to thwarting terrorism: Prevention trumps punishment. For months, commentators, anchors, and politicians have blasted our law enforcement and intelligence agencies for failing to foresee the attacks of September 11. The American people have demanded that future attacks be detected and stopped. In short, we need to question al Mujahir about plots to kill us. If we take him into our civil-court system, a la John Walker Lindh, we will not be able to question him — his attorney will insist on his Fifth Amendment "right to remain silent." In fact, if his counsel argues the same issues as Walker Lindh's attorneys have, he will be the one questioning our intelligence officers — not vice versa. Because preventing future attacks is paramount, we also cannot reveal how and from whom we received the information about the dirty bomb plot. If we do, those communications methods will shut down. As we learned from the Walker Lindh pre-trial motions, defense counsel will demand U.S. authorities turn over certain information and, if they do not, the court may rule there can be no trial and the defendant is to be released. The questions President Bush had to ask were: Do we put al Mujahir in a Supreme Court-approved process where there is a possibility we may learn more about future terrorist attacks? Or do we put him into our federal-court system, where we cannot question him and where he might be set free to plot again? All presidential decisions should be this easy. nationalreview.com