breastle screen for HLA Adventure Need help designing one 947

Robert Redelmeier

I don't see where it allows forcible interrogation of spies, etc. It just denies them the communication rights given to civilians. It does not deny them other rights.

I don't think there are loopholes like that. I am not certain, but I believe that the conventions are supposed to be interpreted liberally in favor of the people being held. Protocol I also seems to have expanded protection.

I understand the Danes were also emphatic that resistance movements have protection.

You're welcome.

Quite possibly they should be clbuttified as unlawful combatants, but that does not mean that they have no rights.

Yes, more details would be nice. I find it interesting and suggestive that a brief explanation is given of why the Taliban is covered, but no explanation at all is given for why their fighters are not POWs.

He has more data, primarily because he won't let us see what data he has that is relevant to a determination of the status of the detainees. Has their been oversight in Congress of this issue?

See Art. 43 of Protocol I. The ICRC has a book called Constraints on the Waging of War that can be downloaded from their website. It has this to say: "For all armed forces , these requirements can be summed up as: a measure of organisation, a responsible command, and an internal disciplinary system designed notably to ensure compliance with the written and unwritten rules of armed conflict. Compared with the traditional requirements of the Hague Regulations, the most striking difference is that qualification as an armed force is no longer made dependent on its members having a uniform or carrying arms openly at all times, as means to distinguish the members of the armed force from the civilian population."

I had not looked at Protocol I before, but it is very important, and very different from what went before. Virtually anyone taking part in the fighting is a combatant and all combatants enbreastled to a presumption of POW status if caught. The distinctive sign requirement is relaxed so that you only have to wear one when on the attack.

Under PI, he only has to where it when attacking.

Bush is CinC, but does not wear a uniform.

I don't think so. The Taliban never took the entire country, so there was remnant of the legitimate government still extant. We also had too few troops there to occupy the country. Most of the ground fighting was done by Afghans. I don't think we every administered the country. Just like France in WWII; we liberated it, but did not occupy it.

I don't think that is the correct interpretation. GCIV generally gives more protection than GCIII.

Well, you got me there. Yes, it will end, not later than the time the sun goes red giant. Not much earlier than that, though.

Art. 46 also has a pretty specific definition of 'spy', which probably does not fit most of the detainees.

There is also Art. 45, which gives all combatants a presumption of POW status, and gives those detained the right to a hearing on their status if the detaining power decides they are not POWs. See also Art. 75, expecially para. (6) and (7).

Protocol 1 seems to substantially limit that authority.

Do you mean that applying thumbscrews or putting someone on the rack is okay if you are trying to extract information?

That would depend on the nature of the punishment or coercion.

After last year's decision? Anyway, Rule 11 of the SC rules allows pebreastions for cert. to the Court of Appeals before judgment, and Rule 18 allows for direct appeals to the SC 'when authorized by law'. One or the other of those rules was invoked in the Microsoft anbreastrust case, for instance. So Hamdi's lawyers were not necessarily being provocative by going straight to the SC.

Well, they can take it. Considering that judges are the only officials who can throw critics in jail, I'm not really bothered by this.

He didn't get his writ, though, because the government moved him before the pebreastion was filed. Playing musical jails is an age-old trick to thwart habeas.

Wikipedia has a good article on unlawful combatants, with some good links:

See especially the article by Dormann. Also, the ICRC website has several publications available for download.

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