Khalid Shaikh Mohammed
KSM's sudden confession of having undertaken so many terrorist attacks appears suspicious. I wonder how much torture he underwent.
Newsweek, Mar. 15, 2007
How Not to Win the War on Terror
The KSM case points up what's wrong with the way the Bush administration fights terrorism. How the next president can do better.
WEB-EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY
By Michael Hirsh
The abrupt reappearance of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed—and his brazen comparison of himself to George Washington—four years after the alleged 9/11 mastermind was captured in Pakistan should provoke some serious self-examination in the minds of Americans. The first question we need to ask ourselves is: Does the Bush administration have any clue any longer how to fight the "war on terror" legally? The next question should be: Can't our next president, whoever he or she turns out to be, do any better than this?
Let's hope so. Because if there is even a shadow of a doubt that the United States is losing the battle for hearts and minds to the self-confessed murderer of 3,000 people—that would be KSM—then something is very wrong. Let's get one thing straight: despite his touching claim that he doesn't like to kill "kids," KSM is a very bad man. Most people frankly wouldn't have much of a problem if he were waterboarded or beaten to an inch of his life in a dark room somewhere—which is almost certainly what happened to him in one of the CIA's secret prisons.
But the fact that four years to the month that he was captured—near Islamabad in March 2003—KSM is just beginning the process of being deemed an "enemy combatant" at the "Combatant Status Review Tribunal Hearing" at Guantanamo Bay shows that something is very wrong. The Bush administration has argued, with some legitimacy, that this is a new kind of war in which new rules are needed. Fair enough. But should it really require all this time, such a complicated series of court decisions and legislative maneuverings, to decide what those rules are?
The issue that the administration confronted after 9/11 was what to do with evil people like KSM. The Bush team decided that this was a war rather than a criminal matter—and a war unlike any other. Therefore none of the previous rules of war, like the Geneva Convention protections, applied, in their view. That left culprits like KSM in a legal limbo for four years while they were ferried around to secret prisons, long after their intelligence value had been milked dry (a process that by the estimate of most interrogators should take no longer than a year). Even some CIA officials were privately upset by this, fearing that the agency would be the fall guy in the end (they were right). "Where's the off button?" one retired CIA official said to me two years ago, in February 2005, before the military tribunals that KSM and others are being judged at—at long last—were created. Lawyers for the agency "asked the White House for direction on how to dispose of these detainees back when they asked for [interrogation] guidance. The answer was, 'We'll worry about that later.' Now we don't know what to do with these guys."
John Sifton of Human Rights Watch says the case of KSM and other key detainees—as well as some who are likely innocent—shows that the Bush administration has simply never defined what kind of enemy KSM is. Sifton adds: "This really is an example of how the war paradigm for counterterrorism—that it is only armed conflict—has backfired. Now we have a man comparing himself to George Washington. It might have been more appropriate to just call him a criminal and indict him in federal court, to say, 'You're no warrior, you're no George Washington. You, sir, are a criminal.'"
Scott Horton, another prominent human-rights attorney, agrees. Had the case been handled properly, KSM's confession to plotting 9/11 and many other actual or planned terror acts could have made him a "showcase defendant" for America's cause, rallying support and allies around the world. "He could have been charged within six months of his detention and prosecuted in a proceeding, which would have added to the reputation of our country for justice," says Horton, "and would have supported the righteousness of the cause of going after KSM."
Newsweek, Mar. 15, 2007
How Not to Win the War on Terror
The KSM case points up what's wrong with the way the Bush administration fights terrorism. How the next president can do better.
WEB-EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY
By Michael Hirsh
The abrupt reappearance of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed—and his brazen comparison of himself to George Washington—four years after the alleged 9/11 mastermind was captured in Pakistan should provoke some serious self-examination in the minds of Americans. The first question we need to ask ourselves is: Does the Bush administration have any clue any longer how to fight the "war on terror" legally? The next question should be: Can't our next president, whoever he or she turns out to be, do any better than this?
Let's hope so. Because if there is even a shadow of a doubt that the United States is losing the battle for hearts and minds to the self-confessed murderer of 3,000 people—that would be KSM—then something is very wrong. Let's get one thing straight: despite his touching claim that he doesn't like to kill "kids," KSM is a very bad man. Most people frankly wouldn't have much of a problem if he were waterboarded or beaten to an inch of his life in a dark room somewhere—which is almost certainly what happened to him in one of the CIA's secret prisons.
But the fact that four years to the month that he was captured—near Islamabad in March 2003—KSM is just beginning the process of being deemed an "enemy combatant" at the "Combatant Status Review Tribunal Hearing" at Guantanamo Bay shows that something is very wrong. The Bush administration has argued, with some legitimacy, that this is a new kind of war in which new rules are needed. Fair enough. But should it really require all this time, such a complicated series of court decisions and legislative maneuverings, to decide what those rules are?
The issue that the administration confronted after 9/11 was what to do with evil people like KSM. The Bush team decided that this was a war rather than a criminal matter—and a war unlike any other. Therefore none of the previous rules of war, like the Geneva Convention protections, applied, in their view. That left culprits like KSM in a legal limbo for four years while they were ferried around to secret prisons, long after their intelligence value had been milked dry (a process that by the estimate of most interrogators should take no longer than a year). Even some CIA officials were privately upset by this, fearing that the agency would be the fall guy in the end (they were right). "Where's the off button?" one retired CIA official said to me two years ago, in February 2005, before the military tribunals that KSM and others are being judged at—at long last—were created. Lawyers for the agency "asked the White House for direction on how to dispose of these detainees back when they asked for [interrogation] guidance. The answer was, 'We'll worry about that later.' Now we don't know what to do with these guys."
John Sifton of Human Rights Watch says the case of KSM and other key detainees—as well as some who are likely innocent—shows that the Bush administration has simply never defined what kind of enemy KSM is. Sifton adds: "This really is an example of how the war paradigm for counterterrorism—that it is only armed conflict—has backfired. Now we have a man comparing himself to George Washington. It might have been more appropriate to just call him a criminal and indict him in federal court, to say, 'You're no warrior, you're no George Washington. You, sir, are a criminal.'"
Scott Horton, another prominent human-rights attorney, agrees. Had the case been handled properly, KSM's confession to plotting 9/11 and many other actual or planned terror acts could have made him a "showcase defendant" for America's cause, rallying support and allies around the world. "He could have been charged within six months of his detention and prosecuted in a proceeding, which would have added to the reputation of our country for justice," says Horton, "and would have supported the righteousness of the cause of going after KSM."
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