By National Commander Marty Conatser
Photo By John Raughter
There’s a saying I once heard: “You can’t talk a hog into slaughtering itself.” I am not sure I believe that anymore, after the U.S. Supreme Court’s June decision to give detained enemy combatants the ability to sue us in our own judicial system. Captured terrorists from foreign lands, or so the ruling suggests, have U.S. constitutional rights, just like you and me. Members of al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and various other rogue cells committed to our destruction, are now granted legal privileges previously enjoyed only by U.S. citizens.
The decision is what it is. And we must respect it. However, the 5-4 ruling raises many chilling concerns about the future of America’s ability to fight and defend itself in a time of war.
The ruling punches a hole in the president’s wartime decision-making authority and subordinates Congress, in order to give suspected terrorists their day in our courts. To extend the argument, split-second battlefield decisions of U.S. officers and troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan may soon be influenced by the odds of winning in court, should it come to that. That’s a lot to ask of soldiers caught in firefights against an enemy without insignia, flag, military uniform or any respect for the Geneva Conventions.
To shoot or not to shoot? To detain or let go? U.S. combat troops have to trust their training, instincts and morals, which are already far superior to those of any foe on the planet.
As the high court’s decision was reported, I thought of Matt Maupin and his family. In 2004, the 20-year-old private first class from Ohio was captured by insurgents in Iraq. He was riding in a fuel tanker as part of a 26-vehicle convoy between Balad and Baghdad International Airport when the ambush came. The last time the young Army reservist was seen alive, he was surrounded by masked gunmen in a video aired by Al Jazeera. Another video was later released, depicting the execution of a U.S. soldier who may have been him. Maupin’s parents spent four years in anguish without word – not knowing – until their son’s remains were identified last spring, using DNA testing.
Such is the courtroom of our enemies.
Maupin’s terrorist captors, who stormed out of private homes and roadside ditches in their ambush on the convoy, scoff at justice. They simply attack, capture, murder and make a public spectacle of it. That’s Terrorism 101.
We need to remember who the enemy is. The enemy hijacked four U.S. jetliners on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, and killed thousands of innocent people. The enemy seized journalist Daniel Pearl and executed him in a cowardly act of public bravado in Pakistan; a terrorist at Guantanamo Bay took credit for that beheading in 2007. The enemy is not a soldier but a fanatical thug who, at Guantanamo Bay, is fed well, treated by doctors and dentists, given religious freedom and afforded recreational activities. Those who are not dangerous are returned to their countries of origin. Those who remain devoted to our destruction, or are seriously suspected of it, remain in U.S. detention.
It’s pretty simple, really. At least it was until the ruling in June.
Comments (3)
Yes, it seems terrorists are all for anarchy and have caused us much suffering. We as a nation are committed to the rule of law and rights for all. I don't want the terrorists to succeed in bringing us down to their level. Our forefathers carefully crafted a means of checks and balances that I believe we should honor.
Either the system works or we are just animals being led to the slaughter by a craftier animal.
I served during 'Nam and learned things aren't nice and cut and dry, that we are humans, fallible in our immediate actions and need a higher standard to live up to. I'm not just talking about the military, the politicians and every citizen has the same obligation.
Posted by Thomas Schulte | 08/05/08 4:52 PM |
I believe we, as Americans and living in this country, are entitled to be heard and tried if we are accused or convicted of a crime. To put the terrorists in that same category...is a shame. They conducted a dastardly attack on our country and our people before that. We, our past Presidential regime let them get away with the bombing in Beirut and the first World Trade Center attack. Now to allow them their day in court...why don't we extend citizenship to them...
Posted by Nick Lombardi, Adjutant Post 924. | 08/05/08 10:07 PM |
All one need do to clearly understand the founders intent by their carefully crafted system of checks and balances is to read the Preamble of the Consitution again.
Doing so also shows the great disreguard this US Supreme Court holds for the founder's intentions with their ruling on the "rights" of captured criminal terrorists from foreign lands now in detention at GTMO.
The Preamble reads, in the simply english of that time that is in no way difficult to read or understand in this time:
"We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to >OURSELVES< and OUR posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of The United States of America."
Nor is this bit of current time Political Correctness handed down by the high Court what I served my country for by eight years of good and faithful service in uniform during the Vietnam Ear.
I weeped when this ruling was handed down as I thought about the 58,000+ names of my fallen brothers and sisters etched in the black granit that Stands today on the lower end of the Mall in Washington. And let us not forget the sacrifice of the 4,000 plus Young Americans who have given this nation their last full measure of devotion in this struggle against terror no matter what the learnered justices of the High Court might think about it.
Posted by Dave Butler | 08/06/08 1:07 AM |