Detainees and torture

A pair of recent articles further underlines this administration's willingness to use torture on detainees, as well as a very broad definition of who can be detained in the first place.

Concord Monitor

WASHINGTON - U.S. military panels reviewing the detention of foreigners as enemy combatants are allowed to use evidence gained by torture in deciding whether to keep them imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the government conceded in court yesterday.

In the face of Supreme Court cases to the contrary, the military will accept information discovered through torture (presumably by foreign intelligence agencies, since we "don't do" that sort of thing) so long as it can be deemed reliable.

"About 70 years ago, the Supreme Court stopped the use of evidence produced by third-degree tactics largely on the theory that it was totally unreliable," Harvard Law Professor Philip Heymann said in an interview.

It is clear to me that the military desires to use torture itself, but can't because of laws. The fact that Abu Ghraib happened, and the sadly unclear state of affairs in Gitmo, shows that they are willing to go right up to the line between firm questioning and torture, and will do what they can to make that line a fuzzy one. The use of Gitmo as a place to hold detainees grants them some latitude since it isn't actually US soil they're on and certain restrictive legislation doesn't apply there.

Marine Corp Times

Under detailed questioning by a federal judge, government lawyers asserted Wednesday the U.S. military can hold foreigners indefinitely as enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, Cuba, even if they aided terrorists unintentionally and never fought the United States.

This is a particularly nice bit of legal questioning. The Military asserted that it has the right to detain anyone who provided support to enemy combatants, even if they were unaware of the nature of their support. Even if 'unaware' means deliberate misdirection on the part of the receiver of funds.

Could a “little old lady in Switzerland” who sent a check to an orphanage in Afghanistan be taken into custody if unbeknownst to her some of her donation was passed to al-Qaida terrorists? asked U.S. District Judge Joyce Hens Green.

“She could,” replied Deputy Associate Attorney General Brian Boyle. “Someone’s intention is clearly not a factor that would disable detention.” It would be up to a newly established military review panel to decide whether to believe her and release her.

As you can see, they're asking for the stars here and hoping they get low earth orbit. A side effect of reasoning like this one plagued legitimate Islamic charities during the last Ramadan. There is a requirement of Islam that a minimum percentage of your income be donated to charity. To meet this need, Islamic charities sprout up to better enable people to donate to good causes. Since recent crackdowns on these same charities have revealed connections to terrorist financing completely unbeknownst to the givers, this is causing people problems. Givers don't know if donating to their usual charity will get them detained, charities have to handle the greatly reduced donation flow, and givers have to find a new place to put their donations that they can trust.

What is also clear is that once you are in the detainee system, it is devilishly hard to get out of it. Both articles mention this:

“The world is waiting to see if American justice will work ... whether these men will see their day in court,” Wilner told Green. He said that 440 of the 550 detainees have been through the process and only one has been declared a noncombatant and released even though the government has charged only a few with crimes.
--Marine Corp Times

They have finished reviewing the status of 440 of the prisoners but have released only one.
--Concord Monitor

440 status reviews, and only one released. Hardly an encouraging number if you are unlucky enough to find yourself being shipped to Guantanamo. US citizens are entitled to much improved due-process, but them ferriners.... nope.

To close, another little tidbit regarding torture and the US intelligence agencies. It would seem that there is a privately owned (but US government leased) jet that has been used a number of times to bring suspects from torture-banning countries to torture-permissive countries for the purpose of questioning. The incident given details here is from 2001, but there are rumors of sightings of the thing that are much more recent. Information gathered during these sessions was allegedly useful in cracking Afghanistan and certain anti-Al-queda operations, so the temptation to use such information against detainees is definitely strong.