[quote author="MojoJD" date=1255996775][quote author="Nude" date=1255665905]
As for torture during interrogation... while I support the ethical treatment of people captured on the field of combat, that support is conditional on reciprocal treatment. Targeting civilians earns an automatic exception to ethical treatment. I'm not advocating we begin targeting civilians in return, but I am not inclined to conform to the Geneva Convention either.</blockquote>
I always hate this argument. Stop and then ask, why does this not apply to neighborhood street gangs in LA, or Santa Ana? These ORGANIZATIONS with indoctrinated "soldiers/terrorists" go out and perform their illegal activities, spread their self-promoting propaganda, and target innocent civilians not only for theft, but for random acts of terrorizing and intimidating violence.
Are you suggesting that we go out and torture members of any gang that we arrest? Or is it ok because they come from a different culture.
<strong>I cant stand</strong> people bending and warping the law because its suits their present needs/fears. The law is the law. Apply it evenly across the board if the essential underlying facts are the same. We are dealing with a dangerous criminal organization and they should not be treated any more harshly than a gang member or the mob, once arrested.
Do you see what I am saying? If you still want to argue that this treatment is not harsh enough, then you should be for turning up the heat on all criminals, right? I mean hey, domestic street violence has killed WAY more people than the 9/11 attacks... show my why they deserve more of my fear and hatred.</blockquote>
Aside from the minor detail that those gang members, have rights... as American citizens... that guarantee them due process, defense lawyers, etc, the other major difference is that street gangs aren't declaring war on the country, attacking police stations, killing school children, or sending suicide bombers into crowded malls. The criminal acts of gangsters are already covered by current laws and their activities are as closely monitored as modern police intelligence operations allow. Foreign nationals are only entitled to the same treatment when on our soil, just as our citizens are not privy to the Bill of Rights when in foreign countries. This difference in legal standards was the reason for the creation of a mutually agreed upon standard at the Geneva Convention in the first place, so that all nations would treat prisoners of war equally, but it also laid out specific definitions of who met those standards and who did not:
<blockquote><span style="color: blue;">Art. 4. A. Prisoners of war, in the sense of the present Convention, are persons belonging to one of the following categories, who have fallen into the power of the enemy:
(1) Members of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict, as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces.
(2) Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, <strong>provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions:[ (a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; (b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance; (c) that of carrying arms openly; (d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.</strong>
(3) Members of regular armed forces who profess allegiance to a government or an authority not recognized by the Detaining Power.
(4) Persons who accompany the armed forces without actually being members thereof, such as civilian members of military aircraft crews, war correspondents, supply contractors, members of labour units or of services responsible for the welfare of the armed forces, provided that they have received authorization, from the armed forces which they accompany, who shall provide them for that purpose with an identity card similar to the annexed model.
(5) Members of crews, including masters, pilots and apprentices, of the merchant marine and the crews of civil aircraft of the Parties to the conflict, who do not benefit by more favourable treatment under any other provisions of international law.
(6) Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war.
B. The following shall likewise be treated as prisoners of war under the present Convention: (1) Persons belonging, or having belonged, to the armed forces of the occupied country, if the occupying Power considers it necessary by reason of such allegiance to intern them, even though it has originally liberated them while hostilities were going on outside the territory it occupies, in particular where such persons have made an unsuccessful attempt to rejoin the armed forces to which they belong and which are engaged in combat, or where they fail to comply with a summons made to them with a view to internment.
(2) The persons belonging to one of the categories enumerated in the present Article, who have been received by neutral or non-belligerent Powers on their territory and whom these Powers are required to intern under international law, without prejudice to any more favourable treatment which these Powers may choose to give and with the exception of Articles 8, 10, 15, 30, fifth paragraph, 58-67, 92, 126 and, where diplomatic relations exist between the Parties to the conflict and the neutral or non-belligerent Power concerned, those Articles concerning the Protecting Power. Where such diplomatic relations exist, the Parties to a conflict on whom these persons depend shall be allowed to perform towards them the functions of a Protecting Power as provided in the present Convention, without prejudice to the functions which these Parties normally exercise in conformity with diplomatic and consular usage and treaties.</span></blockquote>
That is taken directly from the Geneva Conventions, and I have bolded the specific portions that address this point. ObL, AQ, and other terrorist organizations specifically AVOID "conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war" by targeting civilians, concealing themselves in order to avoid being recognized as a combatant, and deliberately avoiding any sort of rank-and-file structure organizing them into a standing army.
In other words, your argument attempts to compare apples to oranges and makes as much sense as you claiming "rights" as a political prisoner when ticketed for a traffic violation in Greece.
