This is why we're increasingly going for option three: summary execution on foreign soil on sight via military robot spyplane.
Not that I have a problem with that, really. The real problem is that our legal categories haven't caught up with reality. Regular criminals we catch, try and imprison. But soldiers of an enemy nation we shoot on sight... unless they surrender, in which case we're obliged to keep 'em as POWs until hostilities end and then return them to the other country. Unless they're not legit combatants (e.g. they're spies or saboteurs or otherwise not dressed in proper military uniforms) in which case we can declare 'em illegal combatants and shoot them.
That's the way it used to be, but now that we live in a world where non-state organizations make war against states (well, war against everything) there's a need for some new legal classification. If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda then I don't think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy. On the other hand "kill 'em as soon as they pop their head up" has too high a risk of false positives.
If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda, I think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy. Specifically, I think it's a better strategy than the "occupy their countries and capture or kill them" strategy. I think it's on the order of thousands of times better, judging by the dollar costs and human costs of our actions in the Middle East.
"If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda then I don't think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy."
That's a very big if.
Why should anyone trust the US government to decide who is and who isn't a member of Al Qaeda?
The US government repeatedly proven themselves to be liars (or at least incompetents) on precisely this subject (not to mention many, many others).
"If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda"
what process do you suggest for proving that?
Without a court trial, how can your membership in Al Qaeda reasonably be established?
Also, membership of what other clubs or groups also allows the government to imprison you indefinitely without trial and torture you? who decides that?
Comments
This is why we're increasingly going for option three: summary execution on foreign soil on sight via military robot spyplane.
Not that I have a problem with that, really. The real problem is that our legal categories haven't caught up with reality. Regular criminals we catch, try and imprison. But soldiers of an enemy nation we shoot on sight... unless they surrender, in which case we're obliged to keep 'em as POWs until hostilities end and then return them to the other country. Unless they're not legit combatants (e.g. they're spies or saboteurs or otherwise not dressed in proper military uniforms) in which case we can declare 'em illegal combatants and shoot them.
That's the way it used to be, but now that we live in a world where non-state organizations make war against states (well, war against everything) there's a need for some new legal classification. If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda then I don't think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy. On the other hand "kill 'em as soon as they pop their head up" has too high a risk of false positives.
If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda, I think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy. Specifically, I think it's a better strategy than the "occupy their countries and capture or kill them" strategy. I think it's on the order of thousands of times better, judging by the dollar costs and human costs of our actions in the Middle East.
"If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda then I don't think that the civilian "release 'em until they actually kill someone then try 'em for murder" is a good strategy."
That's a very big if.
Why should anyone trust the US government to decide who is and who isn't a member of Al Qaeda?
The US government repeatedly proven themselves to be liars (or at least incompetents) on precisely this subject (not to mention many, many others).
"If you're a real honest-to-Allah member of Al Qaeda"
what process do you suggest for proving that?
Without a court trial, how can your membership in Al Qaeda reasonably be established?
Also, membership of what other clubs or groups also allows the government to imprison you indefinitely without trial and torture you? who decides that?