Law Games

[Geee]

National Review:

Abd al Rahim al Nashiri is charged with organizing three al-Qaeda attacks including the suicide bombing that killed 17 American servicemen aboard the USS Cole in 2000. Reed Brody, counsel with Human Rights Watch, is concerned about him. In an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, Brody argues that it is unjust and outrageous that Nashiri is to be tried by a military tribunal in Guantanamo rather than in a civilian court in America. Brody claims he’s concerned for America, too. The U.S., he asserts, “needs a trial that is accepted around the world as a fair search for the truth.”

Around the world? Like in Iran? Syria? Saudi Arabia? Sudan? China? Russia? What exactly are the standards for fair truth-seeking in Cuba and Venezuela?

Such questions do not appear to interest Brody and the many other “progressive” activists aggressively seeking to expand the rights of those waging an unconventional and blatantly illegal war against liberal democracies. Simultaneously, the activists seek to restrict — and often criminalize — the rights of those liberal democracies to defend themselves.

Let’s stipulate that unlawful combatants such as Nashiri deserve due process. That raises the question: What process is due an unlawful combatant? Surely, not the same process that is due an honorable prisoner of war. That would reward terrorists and make chumps of warriors who abide by the laws of armed combat even when to do so imperils their lives. And certainly they do not merit the same process that is due an American citizen accused of a criminal transgression — that’s an entirely different kettle of fish.