Vito wrote:
But Doug, we're not talking about "just any old body" or "any old where".
We are talking about combatants captured out of uniform and without ID

No, we're talking about people that were handed over to military custody
by OGAs or even allied Afghan local forces. Many of them have a very
murky trail or custody, and an even more distant & foggy body of
evidence against them.

The long and short of it is, there are guys from some place outside the
U.S. (or so the Bush Administration says) who had the bad luck to get
grabbed & imprisoned. Some of them most likely are terrorists, which is
why the military doesn't want to let them go. And if they are granted
any legal process at all, the evidence against them will have to be
produced or they will have to be released.

In other words, they are being locked down for convenience.

A rather strange way of spreading freedom & democracy, don't you think?

.... Nor is it
my assertion. International law says if one wants to be treated like a POW
or Protected Person one must behave like a soldier or a noncombatant. These
people did neither.

You are repeatedly and purposefully missing this point... I'm not
claiming they are POWs. Nobody is claiming that.

OTOH nobody (but you that is) has claimed that theyhave received any
type of hearing, trial, due process, etc etc.

However I *am* claiming (because it is a fact) that there is NO law
saying it's OK to hold prisoners indefinitely, with no reason, no trial,
no due process at all (it's also stupid & expensive, but hey what do you
expect); and as for your claims that it would be legal to torture these
people, or shoot them "at whim" is simply barbaric... as well as being
far outside any law.

DSK