View Full Version : Should the GWOT be meet with clinical justice or barbarism
Should the (major players like Zarqawi ) terrorists be dealt with extreme prejudice quickly or should the enemy be granted the same rights to a fair and impartial trial. What are the pros and cons of these methods in the elimination of terrorism (or at the very least reduction)? Will non-conventional methods to combat terrorism (such as feeding these punks to hungry pigs to trial by way of the gun) serve to relate to the Islamic-fascists (and dissuade them from their goals) or only entice more recruits? If the later is the true, would the only way to end terrorism be to send every extremest to Allah for judgment.
NousDefionsDoc
09-21-2004, 22:11
My personal opinion is that the question should never arise in the fog of war.
I would tend to agree with you. That said we live in a part of the world where rules are valued and justice prevails (more or less). Just curious as to what the members he think taken that into consideration.
Are you of the mindset of a bullet to the head or sending a message to any future recruits?
NousDefionsDoc
09-21-2004, 23:12
I am of the mindset that this individual is a very hands on terrorist. Nobody should be surprised if he had a weapon on him and went down fighting when he is found.
Airbornelawyer
09-22-2004, 11:50
Should the (major players like Zarqawi ) terrorists be dealt with extreme prejudice quickly or should the enemy be granted the same rights to a fair and impartial trial.What right to a "fair and impartial trial"? This is a war. Enemies in wartime are not criminal defendants.
Then why the Nuremberg trials, Milosovic (sp) and Saddam? Not trying to be a smart ass at all but it seems that these people were at war and are still being put on trial.
Then why the Nuremberg trials, Milosovic (sp) and Saddam? Not trying to be a smart ass at all but it seems that these people were at war and are still being put on trial.
I may be mistaken, but I believe that the "Wars" that those two were engaged in were waged against their own People.
Mil I could say against his neighbours but Saddam was at war with the US as well as his own people. I would just hope Airbornelawyer might be able to tell me how the examples I listed are different the trying Bin Laden or any other high profile terrorist.
Bravo1-3
09-22-2004, 19:47
Because the Nuremberg trials started after the war formally ended. We'd have gladly killed any of the defendents given the chance in a gunfight. Same goes for Milosevic, had he been killed during the Kosovo Campaign, we'd have been just as happy (eventually*).
We give the bad guys 2 options: Surrender or Die. Fortunately, not too many of them surrender.
*As unlikely as that was considering who was in office at the time, and his penchant for putting genocidal dictators and terrorists on some kind of pedistal.
Airbornelawyer
09-23-2004, 11:03
Again, I ask, what "right to a fair and impartial trial"? What is the source of this right? Nuremberg and ICTY are tribunals to try criminals for violations of the laws of war and international humanitarian law. They were/are part of a well-meaning effort to craft an international legal regime, but they created no right for a combatant to avail himself of any legal system. We took hundreds of thousands, millions, of enemy prisoners in WW2. None had any criminal rights until and unless charged with a crime separate from their status as combatants. Their treatment was governed by international conventions, not criminal law.
You create a false dichotomy that we either treat the enemy as criminals and act in accordance with criminal law, or we act extrajudicially and assassinate them (or whatever you think "dealt with extreme prejudice" or meet... with barbarism" means). We act judicially, i.e., in accordance with the laws of war, and take the battle to our enemies, killing or capturing them as the circumstances require or allow. If we capture them, it is our choice, again in accordance with the law of war, whether to further treat them as criminals. Then, and only then, do the rights of criminal defendants attach.