NYT editorial on Gitmolag hearings

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NYT editorial on Gitmolag hearings

 

 

<<Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, a military lawyer, later courageously

testified that he was assigned to represent one of the prisoners at

Guantánamo, for the sole purpose of extracting a guilty plea. He

provided a written order that contradicted the denials of the man who

made the assignment, Brig. Gen. Thomas Hemingway, who oversees the

military tribunals Mr. Bush created after 9/11 to screen selected

prisoners away from public and judicial scrutiny.>>

 

 

Published: June 18, 2005

 

For more than three and a half years since the terrorist attacks on the

World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Congress has been derelict in its

duty to assert control over the prison camps created by President Bush

in the shadows beyond the Constitution, the rule of law and a

half-century of international laws and treaties. So it was a relief to

watch the hearing this week by Senator Arlen Specter's Judiciary

Committee on the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and to hear Mr.

Specter declare that it was time for Congress to do its job and bring

the American chain of prison camps under the law.

 

While the hearing was too long in coming, its timing was useful - one

day after Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who should have been fired

for bungling the Iraq war and for the prison abuse scandal, offered the

bizarre declaration that " no detention facility in the history of

warfare has been more transparent " than Guantánamo.

 

Mr. Rumsfeld seems to be confusing transparency with invisibility.

 

At the hearing, four military and civilian officials overseeing the

processing of prisoners at Guantánamo could not, or would not, provide

the most basic information - such as how many detainees there are and

what countries they came from. Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, a military

lawyer, later courageously testified that he was assigned to represent

one of the prisoners at Guantánamo, for the sole purpose of extracting

a guilty plea. He provided a written order that contradicted the

denials of the man who made the assignment, Brig. Gen. Thomas

Hemingway, who oversees the military tribunals Mr. Bush created after

9/11 to screen selected prisoners away from public and judicial

scrutiny.

 

William Barr, who was attorney general for President George H. W. Bush,

arrogantly dismissed the entire debate as a waste of time. " Rarely have

I seen a controversy that has less substance behind it, " said Mr. Barr,

who was sent by the administration to dilute a panel of critics of the

prison policy.

 

But the hearing only confirmed the urgency of subjecting the post-9/11

detention system to the rule of law - starting with the president's

legally dubious invention of " unlawful enemy combatant. " J. Michael

Wiggins, a deputy associate attorney general, said the administration

believed it could hold anyone given that label " in perpetuity " without

even filing charges. Excuse us, Mr. Barr, but that sounds like

something of great substance, especially given how bad the

administration is at telling actual villains from taxi drivers who

happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 

The administration should, as a first step, shut down the Guantánamo

prison. Beyond that, Mr. Specter was exactly right when he said

Congress must establish legal definitions of detainees from

antiterrorist operations, enact rules for their internment and

determine their rights under the Geneva Conventions and American law,

including what sorts of evidence can be used against them. Those steps

would help fix a system in which prisoners have been declared enemy

combatants on the basis of confessions extracted under torture by

countries working in behalf of American intelligence.

 

The Bush administration says 9/11 changed the rules and required the

invention of new kinds of jails and legal procedures. Even if we accept

that flawed premise, it is up to Congress to make new rules in a way

that upholds American standards. The current setup - in which

politically appointed ideologues make the rules behind closed doors -

has done immense harm to the nation's image and increased the risk to

every American in uniform.

 

A trial " says as much about the society that holds the trial as it does

about the individual before it, " Commander Swift reminded the Senate.

" Our trials in the United States reflect who we are. "

 

The detention camps should meet no less of a standard.

 

 

 

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company