Political Correctness interferences in war

Pocono Joe

Political Correctness and Justices should stay out of running Wars.

On a cool autumn day just about one year ago, Master Sgt. Troy Anderson, a Green Beret sniper, had a terrorist in his sights near the Afghan border with Pakistan. The man, Nawab Buntangyar, was on a 10 most wanted list for training and outfitting suicide bombers who targeted civilians. The Taliban terrorist was an elusive guy, but had been lured out of his home by Afghans friendly to NATO forces. On the order of Green Beret Captain Dave Staffel, Sgt. Anderson shot Buntangyar dead.

And so began a nightmare for the two Special Forces soldiers that never should have happened. The Afghans involved reported the killing to their government, and the United States Army was asked to investigate. Two separate probes cleared the Green Berets of any wrongdoing. But that wasn't enough for Lt. General Francis Kearney, who ordered the soldiers back to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, where they faced possible court-martial.

Thus, seemingly employing a bizarre political correctness, General Kearney prolonged the ordeal of the two Green Berets when he shouldn't have. It was a political play, pure and simple.

After months of agony and uncertainty, Major General Thomas Csrnko, commander of Army Special Forces at Fort Bragg, exonerated Captain Staffel and Sgt. Anderson of any wrongdoing. Said the General: "(We) take all credible allegations of misconduct seriously."

Most troops in Iraq and Afghanistan will tell you the rules of engagement are dangerous and stupid. The terrorists can and will do anything, including hiding behind children to shoot at Americans. But U.S. troops have to restrain themselves at nearly every turn because some opportunistic officers and a corrupt American press are ready to turn every mistake into a scandal.

So, what is right and what is wrong?

GuanYin

You omitted what the charges were.

The story reads like it's missing a whole heap of facts and that the prosecution just ordered the soldiers home on a whim. Were they following orders or was it a rogue operation?

RedPlanet

More importantly, what does that have to do with closing Gitmo?

Pocono Joe

GuanYin wrote: »

You omitted what the charges were.

The story reads like it's missing a whole heap of facts and that the prosecution just ordered the soldiers home on a whim. Were they following orders or was it a rogue operation?

Here is some info for you from The New York Slimes
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/20/us/20abuse.html?ex=1347940800&en=1c3f832f7ff2e978&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

GuanYin

RedPlanet wrote: »

More importantly, what does that have to do with closing Gitmo?

Good point

Moved to spin-off thread.

Ludo

IMHO there is NO clear right and wrong here (as far as the military are concerned). It is all one big grey area that people are muddling through as best they can. They are trying to avoid civilian casualties as much as possible while fighting an "enemy" who is amongst them.

I would not want to be in their position as it is a no win situation.
It is a failure of the political leadership.

Pocono Joe

GuanYin wrote: »

Good point

Moved to spin-off thread.

Not so good of a point IMO. It's a comparison to enforce my contention that War is not and should not be handled as a Criminal matter to be fought in the courtrooms.

Ludo

Is there an actual war? The "war on terror" is a PR term. There has been no declaration of war in order to avoid having to abide by international conventions which govern the conduct in war. Yet criminal/civilian laws are also being ignored.

As I said it is a deliberate grey area invented by the political leadership which puts the military on unsure ground.

Nodin

Pocono Joe wrote: »

Political Correctness and Justices should stay out of running Wars.

No, its politics. And politics and war have been molesting each other since they began.

oscarBravo

Pocono Joe wrote: »

Not so good of a point IMO. It's a comparison to enforce my contention that War is not and should not be handled as a Criminal matter to be fought in the courtrooms.

If it's war, then the detainees are prisoners of war, and their treatment is in disgraceful and flagrant violation of the Geneva Conventions.

You can't win this one, Joe. The US has been guilty of a terrible, terrible wrong with Guantanamo Bay. Future generations of Americans will equate it with the internment of Japanese Americans, and a future (or possibly current) president will apologise for it.

Pocono Joe

I’m confused as to where to post this stuff now. :mad:

You may be right OB that I won’t win the debate here in this forum. But I won’t say what is being done by our country is wrong either by classifying the Gitmo detainees as Enemy Combatants . I pity Obama though (actually sincere) with his justice appointments. I think they will block him every step of the way if he is to have an effective stance on the war on terror. And if his weak policies causes another attack on American soil, or American territory, then I think he can kiss a second term goodbye. I think Obama will soon discover there is a big difference between campaign rhetoric and now that he has taken an oath to protect our citizens, and see daily threats. Maybe Joe Biden knew what he was talking about when he warned about what will happen shortly into Obama’s presidency during the campaign.

Since the Geneva Convention applies to signing countries, and if the Governments that the Gitmo Detainees want nothing to do with the detainees, won’t take them back, how does the Geneva Convention apply?

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do?

Ludo

Pocono Joe wrote: »

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do?

A few sample options:

1. If this is a war situation, capture him and treat him as a prisoner of war in accordance with international treaties.

OR

2. Arrest him and hand him over to the authorities in the country this happens in to be tried as a criminal and dealt with according to the law.

OR

3. Arrest him and send him to the USA where he is tried according to American law and sentenced to death (or whatever sentence the court hands down).

OR (my personal choice)

3. Not have illegally invaded the country to begin with and therefore this crazy legal/moral black hole situation never arises.

p.s. looks like we are still discussing gitmo here alright

oscarBravo

Pocono Joe wrote: »

Since the Geneva Convention applies to signing countries, and if the Governments that the Gitmo Detainees want nothing to do with the detainees, won’t take them back, how does the Geneva Convention apply?

The US is a signatory to the GC, and as such is bound by it - at least that's my understanding, and I'm open to correction.

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do?

I'd probably lock him up in a little cage for the rest of his life, deny him basic human rights, never mind due process, and throw in a little torture for good measure. That's what people who are committed to the ideals of democracy do, right?

The above may contain traces of irony.

Nodin

Pocono Joe wrote: »

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned.

And theres somebody in Guantanamo that your artfully constructed scenario is based on?

sceptre

Pocono Joe wrote: »

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do?

What would I do? Softy liberal that I must be with my desire for due process and habeas corpus, I wouldn't have detained him in the first place so your question is moot.

What would I do if I arrived into government and someone who wasn't that pushed about habeas corpus had detained the guy for years without charge? I'd find a neutral but friendly country that would take him and send him out there. With my apologies for detaining the guy because I believe in due process because my standards are higher than theirs and if I play the game by their rules I've lost before I've started.

What would I do if I wasn't all that pushed about due process and had a "known terrorist" that I couldn't pin any crime on, even conspiracy or looking at me sideways? He'd never have reached Gitmo alive, that's what assassinations are for.

I like options 1 and 2 myself but if you're going to try and hold people outside the law with no respect for human rights, especially if it's not going to discourage others carrying out terrorist attacks anyway because of all those virgins available in the afterlife for those who die taking infidels with them, you're a fool if you tell people about it.

nesf

Pocono Joe wrote: »

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do?

The problem is with the thought experiment that many of us wouldn't agree that the person should be detained. Either shoot them or they surrender in a war situation. So either dead or PoW. This essentially boils down to international law on war being written in a time where wars were nice declared things with people in uniforms shooting at each other. It's wholly unsuitable for dealing with terrorists in an occupied country/part of your sovereign nation (as the Troubles in the North so aptly demonstrated with the H-block protests).

Previous wars were just as ugly as the one in Iraq but the media didn't have close to as much coverage so the people back home were left in blissful ignorance of the worst of what was going on on the ground. I think we need to sort out some new international law to deal with this "new" grey area. I don't think there's any easy answer to your question Joe because international law doesn't cover it.

Matt Holck

vows to kill every American he can when freed

I believe threat can be prosecuted

Manic Moran

The US is a signatory to the GC, and as such is bound by it - at least that's my understanding, and I'm open to correction.

I'm still trying to parse Art 2. In one line, it says 'applies in cases of conflict between two contracting powers', in the next line it says 'if one party is not a signatory, the other is still bound as far as mutual relations are concerned.' I'm not entirely sure what the mutual relations are in this context, if they refer to each others or third parties. If the former, why bother specifying 'applies between two contracting parties' in the line above?

And what would you do in this situation. An RPG is fired from a house at a US military vehicle. The only person in the house is a known terrorist, but he was not caught "red handed" firing the RPG. The terrorist is detained, and vows to kill every American he can when freed, whether civilian or not. The country the terrorist hails from will only kill him if he is returned. What would you do

If you hunt around in the archives a few years, you will find an extract from my blog in which I faced a very similar situation, with the (now unarmed) RPG gunner in my sights, but not detained. I did not shoot the gentleman in question, most would have. In hindsight, I should have, and were the situation to come up again, I would. I just got caught up by the whole 'he's not carrying a weapon right now' concept.

However, that was in the day before an independent Iraqi government. Now things get much more difficult. I went through the refresher class today, as it happens, on evidence collection procedures and documentation. Ever since mid-2004 or so in Iraq, people detained on purely criminal activity (i.e. shooting at Americans in Iraq) have had to be brought in with supporting evidence which will stand up in court. There were a number of known 'bad guys' in our AO which we left free simply because we couldn't gather the evidence to put them away. There is a misconception that Americans just gather whomever they will off the street and detain them without charge or trial, and this is not the case. The vast majority of detainees are released shortly thereafter or handed over to Iraqi police authorities for judicial processing. Only a small portion suspected of more notable activities than simply lobbing mortars at Americans are retained under American control.

NTM

Overheal

As far as evidence gathering, what do you have on hand to help you in that regard?

Manic Moran

How do you mean? Generally speaking, if we find something, we tag it and bag it, then send it to the rear. More complicated things like telephone records, recordings, etc are above my level.

NTM

Overheal

Well I mean is it typically a case of he said she said, or do you have combat footage available of some description? I guess a smoking Launcher/rifle/defused IED helps too for fingerprinting.

Black Swan

Pocono Joe wrote: »

Political Correctness and Justices should stay out of running Wars.

PC aside, it's really too bad that there was no "Justices" or justice in this bloody American-Afghanistan undeclared "war." What message was sent to the world by the actions of the US in Afghanistan, or worse, Iraq (which had no WMD that were used to con the US Congress into going along with GW Bush's Iraq undeclared "war").

The fact is the US Congress did not officially declare "war" on Afghanistan, consequently to detain persons indefinitely (for years at Gitmo) without due process as if they were POWs, without rights to legal council, hearings, trial, and dismissal or sentencing is in violation of US laws.

The Bush administration are the spin masters when it comes to being "PC," calling the Gitmo detainees "military combatants" and denying them due process as if a "war" had been declared by the US Congress.

The Bush administration acted as if it was above the law, and pretty much got away with it while it controlled both houses of the US Congress (first 6 years of GW Bush), the Executive, and began stacking the US Supreme Court with Justices like Roberts. But that started to fall apart as they lost control of the US House two years ago, and now the Senate and Executive.

I can see why the general in your original OP evidenced a bit of confusion in terms of how to handle the troopers in question, and took additional safeguards when the rules are in contradiction between "military combatants" in a non-declared "war." It's unfortunate for the military to be placed in such an ambiguous situation, but it's not their fault, but rather that of their former Commander-in-Chief Bush who created the ambiguous situation in the first place with his use of a contradictory PC word "military combatant" in a non-declared "war."

The Bush administration has really made a mess of things, starting two very expensive non-declared "wars," and warming the domestic White House seat for 8 years, ignoring several warnings during those 8 years that demanded action to resolve or otherwise limit the impacts of the greatest economic meltdown since the Great Depression. Never in US history has the federal deficit gone so high, almost doubling since the Clinton administration, going from $5.6 trillion to almost $11 trillion at the end of 8 years. The Bush administration ignored their fiscal responsibilities. And Republicans wonder why they were swept from office, losing control of both the US House and US Senate, as well as the Executive?

The Republican Party lost in 2008! Let me repeat that, because there are many in denial on these boards. THE REPUBLICAN PARTY LOST IN 2008! Now, it's time for them to stop and think why, learn from it, and start rebuilding their party into something positive and proactive, with solutions to problems for the American people, instead of spending all their energy and time looking for the Obama administration to make the slightest mistake, and point fingers... See, see, see!

Matt Holck

Manic Moran wrote: »

However, that was in the day before an independent Iraqi government. Now things get much more difficult. I went through the refresher class today, as it happens, on evidence collection procedures and documentation. Ever since mid-2004 or so in Iraq, people detained on purely criminal activity (i.e. shooting at Americans in Iraq) have had to be brought in with supporting evidence which will stand up in court. There were a number of known 'bad guys' in our AO which we left free simply because we couldn't gather the evidence to put them away. There is a misconception that Americans just gather whomever they will off the street and detain them without charge or trial, and this is not the case. The vast majority of detainees are released shortly thereafter or handed over to Iraqi police authorities for judicial processing. Only a small portion suspected of more notable activities than simply lobbing mortars at Americans are retained under American control.

NTM

I want to believe that
but since I'm not allowed to see who is detained and why,
I don't have the evidence to place any trust in the authorities

The Mad Hatter

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

Never in US history has the federal deficit gone so high, almost doubling since the Clinton administration, going from $5.6 trillion to almost $11 trillion at the end of 8 years.

Bizarrely, many Republicans blame Clinton for this. A case of psychological denial if I ever saw one.

Black Swan

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

Bizarrely, many Republicans blame Clinton for this. A case of psychological denial if I ever saw one.

Makes you wonder what GW Bush Administration did for 8 years in terms of fiscal responsibility, especially when the Republicans had one-party-rule and controlled the US Congress (both the US House and US Senate) for the first 6 years of the GW Bush presidency? It's not like they did not get warnings of the coming credit and housing bubble crises, as I can find (google) numerous articles in The Economist and other financially oriented publications that warned of the coming crisis years before 2008. They did nothing to mitigate or otherwise limit the economic meltdown that Americans are now experiencing, and America has not hit bottom yet with the credit card bubble yet to completely burst (and there were many published warnings of this during the GW Bush years that were ignored).

And I always love it when a Republican (or wanna-be Republican) refers to the "spend, spend, spend" Democrats, when no presidential administration in US history has allowed the federal deficit to almost double by adding $5 trillion debt like the Bush administration. Wasn't that the exemplar of "spend, spend, spend?" During the 8 years of Clinton, only about $1 trillion was added, while GW Bush added about $5 trillion during his 8 years.

Furthermore, what was Dr Rice (then National Security Advisor), Donald Rumsfeld (then Sec of Defense), George Tenet (then CIA Director), and America's former Republican Commander-in-Chief and President GW Bush doing about national security from 20 January 1991 to 11 September 1991? How many months was that before somebody hijacked and flew civilian planes into two towers, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field? What was the Bush administration doing those months about national security? Having tea parties? Sure, the Clinton administration fell on its face trying to wipe out bin Laden and his training camp with cruise missiles and whatnot earlier, but it's not like the GW Bush administration was in the complete dark about the threat to America. And what party controlled the US Congress during the last 4 years of Clinton, and during the 9/11 attack, huh?

Frankly, I believe that one-party rule of the Executive and both Houses of the US Congress at the same time is a big mistake, be they Republicans or Democrats. It's a huge flaw in the American system of government, because one-party-rule limits checks-and-balances important to keeping corruption down and abuses of power to a minimum.

Victor

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

Furthermore, what was Dr Rice (then National Security Advisor), Donald Rumsfeld (then Sec of Defense), George Tenet (then CIA Director), and America's former Republican Commander-in-Chief and President GW Bush doing about national security from 20 January 1991 to 11 September 1991? How many months was that before somebody hijacked and flew civilian planes into two towers, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field?

How many months? About 120. :pac:

Black Swan

Victor wrote: »

How many months? About 120. :pac:

Whoa! LOL! My bad!:o

Good catch Victor! Should have been 2001 (B!ue throws pint of Murphy's in trash and reaches for cup of coffee)

Pocono Joe

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

Makes you wonder what GW Bush Administration did for 8 years in terms of fiscal responsibility, especially when the Republicans had one-party-rule and controlled the US Congress (both the US House and US Senate) for the first 6 years of the GW Bush presidency?

No one will admit it, either Republican or Democrat, but Bush bought off Democrat support for the war (behind the scenes, not publicly, that’s why pretty much of everything regarding the war was voted on) and paid off in Bush’s indifference to Congress’s uncontrolled spending habits.

Victor

Pocono Joe wrote: »

No one will admit it, either Republican or Democrat, but Bush bought off Democrat support for the war (behind the scenes, not publicly, that’s why pretty much of everything regarding the war was voted on) and paid off in Bush’s indifference to Congress’s uncontrolled spending habits.

Congress’s uncontrolled spending habits? Has general government expenditure grown as quickly as the military budget?

Black Swan

Pocono Joe wrote: »

No one will admit it, either Republican or Democrat, but Bush bought off Democrat support for the war (behind the scenes, not publicly, that’s why pretty much of everything regarding the war was voted on) and paid off in Bush’s indifference to Congress’s uncontrolled spending habits.

How do you know this to be true? Source? Link to support your comment?

GuanYin

Pocono Joe wrote: »

No one will admit it, either Republican or Democrat, but Bush bought off Democrat support for the war (behind the scenes, not publicly, that’s why pretty much of everything regarding the war was voted on) and paid off in Bush’s indifference to Congress’s uncontrolled spending habits.

If you're going to make an accusation of corruption, either post evidence or withdraw the statement.

You know the rules by now.