Obama administration abolishes the term "Enemy Combatant"

[Smurf-Herder]

So what do we call them now?

Obama Administration Abandons Use of Term 'Enemy Combatant'

By Del Quentin Wilber and Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, March 13, 2009; 5:25 PM

The Obama administration today dropped the term "enemy combatant" to describe those held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and increased the legal threshold needed to detain them.

The Justice Department disclosed the move in a court filing in response to a federal judge's order seeking a definition of the term "enemy combatant."

Judges have said the definition will play a key role in determining whether the government has justified the confinement of scores of detainees who are challenging their status in U.S. District Court.

In a break with the Bush administration's policies, the Justice Department said it would only seek to detain those who "substantially supported" the Taliban, al-Qaeda or associated forces or participated in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The Bush administration had argued it could detain those who provided support to those groups and others "engaged in hostilities" against the United States and its allies.

The Justice Department did not define "substantially supported" in the court papers but said the term would not include those who "provide unwitting or insignificant support" to terror groups. "The particular facts and circumstances justifying detention will vary from case to case," they wrote.


Though dropping the term "enemy combatant" will have little practical effect, it is a symbolic move by the Obama administration to break with the past.

"As we work towards developing a new policy to govern detainees, it is essential that we operate in a manner that strengthens our national security, is consistent with our values and is governed by law," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/13/AR2009031302371.html?hpid=topnews

[MintJulep]

So what do we call them now?Terrorist pieces of shit.


The Obama administration today dropped the term "enemy combatant" to describe those held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and increased the legal threshold needed to detain them. Of course. They are his Mooslim bruthas.

[Smurf-Herder]

Terrorist pieces of shit.

Of course. They are his Mooslim bruthas.

It really kills me, when I think of KSM being proud of the 911 Attacks - and Obama deciding to no longer call them "Enemy Combatants", when they are the ones who started the war!!!

Detainees Say They Planned Sept. 11

The five detainees at Guantánamo Bay charged with planning the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks have filed a document with the military commission at the United States naval base there expressing pride at their accomplishment and accepting full responsibility for the killing of nearly 3,000 people.

The document, which may be released publicly on Tuesday, uses the Arabic term for a consultative assembly in describing the five men as the “9/11 Shura Council,” and it says their actions were an offering to God, according to excerpts of the document that were read to a reporter by a government official who was not authorized to discuss it publicly.

The document is titled “The Islamic Response to the Government’s Nine Accusations,” the military judge at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp said in a separate filing, obtained by The New York Times, that describes the detainees’ document.

The document was filed on behalf of the five men, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who has described himself as the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

President Obama halted the military proceedings at Guantánamo in the first days after his inauguration, and the five men’s case is on hiatus until the government decides how it will proceed.

Several of the men have earlier said in military commission proceedings at Guantánamo that they planned the 2001 attacks and that they sought martyrdom. The strategic goal of the five men in making the new filing, which reached the military court on March 5, was not clear.

In their filing, the men describe the planning of the Sept. 11 attacks and the killing of Americans as a model of Islamic action, and say the American government’s accusations cause them no shame, according to the excerpts read by the government official.

“To us,” the official continued reading, “they are not accusations. To us they are a badge of honor, which we carry with honor.”

It appears that the men wrote the document at meetings they are permitted to conduct periodically at the detention camp without lawyers.

In his brief court order describing the filing, the military judge who has been handling the case, Col. Stephen R. Henley of the Army, said the men sought no specific legal action. Judge Henley ordered that the filing be released immediately, but officials said objections from lawyers for two of the men had held up release Monday.

All five of the men have said they want to represent themselves, but in the case of these two men, Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, the military judge had not yet determined their competency when the proceedings were halted.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/10/us/10gitmo.html?_r=3&hp

[doctordog]

Terrorist pieces of shit.

Of course. They are his Mooslim bruthas.

towel heads maybe?:lmao2:

[MintJulep]

towel heads maybe?:lmao2::lmao2:

Or ragheads in a pinch.

[doctordog]

:lmao2:

Or ragheads in a pinch.

camel jockeys

[mwillman]

See its when you are trying to be funny that your racist tendencies come out.

While I don't support terrorists I also don't support ignorant racists.

[MintJulep]

http://steviez.badlybent.ca/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/kleenex.jpg

[Binky]

About calling them what they are? In a word and simply put for all to get the gist of, is EVIL and hasn't a damn thing to do with race.

[MintJulep]

The new term is "Obama's buddies".

The problem is they should have never been "detained" to begin with. If not shot on sight they should have been interrogated with pliers and blowtorches and then dropped out of a plane at 25,000 ft over shark infested waters.

[foxbaron]

Let's call them what they are. OUR ENEMIES

And we kill our enemies.

[Smurf-Herder]

Obama is screwing around with the original Geneva Convention terminology with this:

Enemy Combatant

An “enemy combatant” is an individual who, under the laws and customs of war, may be detained for the duration of an armed conflict. In the current conflict with al Qaida and the Taliban, the term includes a member, agent, or associate of al Qaida or the Taliban. In applying this definition, the United States government has acted consistently with the observation of the Supreme Court of the United States in Ex parte Quirin, 317 U.S. 1, 37-38 (1942): “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.”

“Enemy combatant” is a general category that subsumes two sub-categories: lawful and unlawful combatants. See Quirin, 317 U.S. at 37-38. Lawful combatants receive prisoner of war (POW) status and the protections of the Third Geneva Convention. Unlawful combatants do not receive POW status and do not receive the full protections of the Third Geneva Convention.

The President has determined that al Qaida members are unlawful combatants because (among other reasons) they are members of a non-state actor terrorist group that does not receive the protections of the Third Geneva Convention. He additionally determined that the Taliban detainees are unlawful combatants because they do not satisfy the criteria for POW status set out in Article 4 of the Third Geneva Convention. Although the President’s determination on this issue is final, courts have concurred with his determination.

Authority to Detain

The President has unquestioned authority to detain enemy combatants, including those who are U.S. citizens, during wartime. See, e.g., Quirin, 317 U.S. at 31, 37 (1942); Colepaugh v. Looney, 235 F. 2d 429, 432 (10th Cir. 1956); In re Territo, 156 F. 2d 142, 145 (9th Cir. 1946). The Fourth Circuit recently reaffirmed this proposition. See Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 296 F.3d 278, 281, 283 (4th Cir. 2002). The authority to detain enemy combatants flows primarily from Article II of the Constitution. In the current conflict, the President’s authority is bolstered by Congress’s Joint Resolution of September 18, 2001, which authorized “the President . . . to use all necessary and appropriate force” against al Qaida and against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines” committed or aided in the September 11 attacks.” Pub. L. No. 107-40, § 2(a), 115 Stat. 224 (2001) (emphasis added). This congressional action clearly triggers (if any trigger were necessary) the President’s traditional authority to detain enemy combatants as Commander in Chief.

Presidents (and their delegates) have detained enemy combatants in every major conflict in the Nation’s history, including recent conflicts such as the Gulf, Vietnam, and Korean wars. During World War II, the United States detained hundreds of thousands of POWs in the United States (some of whom were U.S. citizens) without trial or counsel. Then as now, the purposes of detaining enemy combatants during wartime are, among other things, to gather intelligence and to ensure that detainees do not return to assist the enemy.

http://www.cfr.org/publication/5312/enemy_combatants.html

[Hog Trash]

I foresee a day when these ex-Enemy Combatants will be called litigants and will be suing the US for billions of dollars for false imprisonment as a direct result of the actions of Barack Hussein Obama.

Remember, you heard it first here on WHOG radio! :thumbsup:

[Smurf-Herder]

These guys legally have no right whatsoever to a trial - except for war crimes, AFTER the end of hostilities. Except for the cases where they were not captured ON the battlefield itself. Those instances are appealed before a D.C. Federal judge; and their legal status as an "Enemy Combatant" (under the Geneva Convention) is decided there; verifying or nullifying the status determined by the Commander in Chief of the military during wartime.

Obama's decision has in essence created a potential Separation of Powers conflict - if the Judicial Branch has determined they were legally classified "Enemy Combatants" and the Executive Branch has arbitrarily decided to remove the term from the english language concerning the present war. Overriding something that is already accepted Judicial Precedent in the US legal system.

But the term "Enemy Combatant" is an internationally recognized term, from the Geneva Conventions for half a century. Obama is violating the Geneva Convention on prisoners in wartime.