Double Tap Political News Bonanza!
As I've mentioned recently, I will probably be compelled to post various news bits about politics as we get closer to the 2008 election; my intent is still to focus on security issues, but this is really my only outlet to vent about various things that frustrate me (aside from my journal, which no one else reads). There are two things that are in the queue right now.
* * *
A while ago, I saw an article on Fox; it happens to be a (London) Times article, as Fox and CNN are both almost completely incapable of generating any of their own content, instead relying primarily on the Associated Press and (to a lesser degree) Reuters. Anyway, the article was about a Gitmo detainee named Ahmed Belchaba who was literally begging, via his attorney, to stay at Gitmo in solitary confinement, rather than being sent back to his native Algeria. An exceptional case? Maybe not: a second detainee, a Tunisian named Mohammed Abdul Rahman, has had has repatriation to Tunisia blocked by an American judge.
As far as I'm concerned, these two cases probably aren't unique or coincidental, and I feel that they take a lot of wind out of the claims that American military and intelligence forces are torturing the detainees and committing flagrant human rights violations. The example of John Walker Lindh should serve as an example that the United States does not send people from Afghanistan to Gitmo for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It's also worth noting, once again, that a number of released detainees have been recaptured or killed in Afghanistan or Pakistan; that article claimed ten as of three years ago, while the Wikipedia entry lists seven. These people are not victims, and the folks who think they're being abused ought to study up on the Italian prisoners of war who were put to work building "Churchill Barriers" in Orkney; they were neither abused nor tried, to the best of my knowledge, nor do the Gitmo detainees have to perform any labor.
As a side note, I'm frequently astonished by how ignorant most anti-Gitmo folks are about the Geneva Conventions that they seem to revere. The whole point of the Geneva Conventions was to force nations to fight wars according to rules, and to force them to do so by using uniformed, regulated, accountable, professional military forces. The point of the protections of prisoners of war was that those who fought by the regulations of the Geneva Conventions would be accorded certain provisions. The fact that neither Taliban nor al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan operated according to these guidelines requires that they not be accorded the same rights of real soldiers, who are held accountable for their actions and fight according to a rule of law. Does this mean that we can torture those who don't observe the Geneva Conventions? Of course not, but it also means that those who ignore these laws should not be given the same rights that we would expect to give those who do fight according to the rule of law. In point of fact, their own conduct compels us to treat them as the unlawful combatants that they are, rather than the privileged prisoners of war that they are not.
* * *
One of the major political stories today is the decision made by the Democrat-led U.S. House of Representatives to declare that the Turkish treatment of Armenians after World War I was genocide. (AP, CNN, BBC) This follows their decision in February to censure Japan for sex slavery in World War II.
Now, I'd like to put a couple of things right out there on the table, so that nothing is held back. Turkey's operations in Armenia following World War I could definitely be described as "genocide". Further, the alleged (but probable) sex slavery practiced by the Japanese during World War II was horrible. I don't want anyone to think that I'm trying to excuse these horrible actions. However, these things happened almost ninety and seventy years ago, respectively. Further, these two nations, Turkey and Japan, are now two of our most important allies: one of them being one of only a handful of moderate, secular, pluralistic democracies in the Middle East, and the other being one of our two most important allies adjacent to our primary economic, political, and military rival, China. Thus, there are three questions that every responsible American citizen (which is to say, those who pay taxes instead of drawing welfare, and those who vote) should be asking themselves:
What possible good could come of some symbolic (read: empty) resolution more than half a century after the fact, directed at an American ally in a strategically crucial region?
Doesn't the Democrat-led Congress have anything more important or productive to do than picking fights with our friends, like Turkey and Japan, instead of our enemies/rivals, like Iran or China?
Is this really the best way to pursue the Democrats' oft-stated (read: repeated ad nauseum) goal of improving America's supposedly strained relations with the international community?
If I wasn't used to nonsense like this from the distinguished membership of the Congress of the United States, I'd be amazed that they would attempt something this irrelevant, arrogant, and belligerent.
* * *
As always, there are more things to post. They'll have to wait; but, for the record, I have several upcoming posts in mind, including a review of some recent developments in the Libyan government and the aforementioned Tactical Decision Game campaign.
Thus saith the Fly.
A while ago, I saw an article on Fox; it happens to be a (London) Times article, as Fox and CNN are both almost completely incapable of generating any of their own content, instead relying primarily on the Associated Press and (to a lesser degree) Reuters. Anyway, the article was about a Gitmo detainee named Ahmed Belchaba who was literally begging, via his attorney, to stay at Gitmo in solitary confinement, rather than being sent back to his native Algeria. An exceptional case? Maybe not: a second detainee, a Tunisian named Mohammed Abdul Rahman, has had has repatriation to Tunisia blocked by an American judge.
As far as I'm concerned, these two cases probably aren't unique or coincidental, and I feel that they take a lot of wind out of the claims that American military and intelligence forces are torturing the detainees and committing flagrant human rights violations. The example of John Walker Lindh should serve as an example that the United States does not send people from Afghanistan to Gitmo for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It's also worth noting, once again, that a number of released detainees have been recaptured or killed in Afghanistan or Pakistan; that article claimed ten as of three years ago, while the Wikipedia entry lists seven. These people are not victims, and the folks who think they're being abused ought to study up on the Italian prisoners of war who were put to work building "Churchill Barriers" in Orkney; they were neither abused nor tried, to the best of my knowledge, nor do the Gitmo detainees have to perform any labor.
As a side note, I'm frequently astonished by how ignorant most anti-Gitmo folks are about the Geneva Conventions that they seem to revere. The whole point of the Geneva Conventions was to force nations to fight wars according to rules, and to force them to do so by using uniformed, regulated, accountable, professional military forces. The point of the protections of prisoners of war was that those who fought by the regulations of the Geneva Conventions would be accorded certain provisions. The fact that neither Taliban nor al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan operated according to these guidelines requires that they not be accorded the same rights of real soldiers, who are held accountable for their actions and fight according to a rule of law. Does this mean that we can torture those who don't observe the Geneva Conventions? Of course not, but it also means that those who ignore these laws should not be given the same rights that we would expect to give those who do fight according to the rule of law. In point of fact, their own conduct compels us to treat them as the unlawful combatants that they are, rather than the privileged prisoners of war that they are not.
One of the major political stories today is the decision made by the Democrat-led U.S. House of Representatives to declare that the Turkish treatment of Armenians after World War I was genocide. (AP, CNN, BBC) This follows their decision in February to censure Japan for sex slavery in World War II.
Now, I'd like to put a couple of things right out there on the table, so that nothing is held back. Turkey's operations in Armenia following World War I could definitely be described as "genocide". Further, the alleged (but probable) sex slavery practiced by the Japanese during World War II was horrible. I don't want anyone to think that I'm trying to excuse these horrible actions. However, these things happened almost ninety and seventy years ago, respectively. Further, these two nations, Turkey and Japan, are now two of our most important allies: one of them being one of only a handful of moderate, secular, pluralistic democracies in the Middle East, and the other being one of our two most important allies adjacent to our primary economic, political, and military rival, China. Thus, there are three questions that every responsible American citizen (which is to say, those who pay taxes instead of drawing welfare, and those who vote) should be asking themselves:
If I wasn't used to nonsense like this from the distinguished membership of the Congress of the United States, I'd be amazed that they would attempt something this irrelevant, arrogant, and belligerent.
As always, there are more things to post. They'll have to wait; but, for the record, I have several upcoming posts in mind, including a review of some recent developments in the Libyan government and the aforementioned Tactical Decision Game campaign.
Thus saith the Fly.
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