“We’re making history, bad history.” – Senator Lindsey Graham
Last week, in the wake of the Justice Department’s decision to try alleged 911 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a New York federal court, Senator Lindsey Graham challenged a badly stuttering Attorney General Eric Holder:
Graham: “can you give me a case in United States history where an enemy combatant caught on a battlefield was tried in civilian court?”
Yes we can.
Holder was not prepared for the question, hesitated, and Graham interjected, asserting there were none. It turns out Graham’s no historian. He supplied erroneous “facts” but scored points in the “baffle them with bullshit” category. Graham also appeared the aggressor, making Holder uncomfortable. Holder was not well prepared and should have come armed with a list of legal precedents and a litany of Bush Administration abuses and failures done with Graham’s support.
A good example of an enemy tried (and convicted) in civilian court is former military dictator Manuel Noriega.
The Noriega case was not a simple drug bust. It was a major U.S. Military invasion of a foreign country (Panama), launched by President George H.W. Bush, with a short but bloody battle that was largely underplayed in the U.S. media. Estimates of casualties range from about 1,000 to 3,000.
From GlobalSecurity.org:
“The United States suffered 23 KIA and 324 WIA, with estimated enemy casualties around 450. There were an estimated 200 to 300 Panamanian civilian fatalities. Some were killed by the PDF (Panamanian Defense Forces), others inadvertently by US troops. More civilians almost certainly would have been killed or wounded had it not been for the discipline of the American forces and their stringent rules of engagement (ROE). However, the United Nations (UN) put the civilian death toll at 500; the Central American Human Rights Defense Commission (CODEHUCA) and the Peace and Justice Service of Panama both claimed between 2,000 to 3000; the Panamanian National Human Rights Commission and an independent inquiry by former Attorney- General Ramsey Clark claimed over 4,000. Thousands were injured. As it turned out, the figure of Panamanian dead was large enough to stimulate debate over the need for the invasion to remove Noriega, but not large enough to generate a sense of outrage in Panama or abroad, or to turn the Panamanian people against the US intervention or the nation-building program that followed it.”
Road block during Operation Just Cause. Source: JFQ and DOD
Noriega eventually surrendered, was flown to Homestead Air Force Base and later tried in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida in Miami.
Noriega was convicted and sent to federal prision. His sentence officially ended in 2007, but he remains incarcerated, pending extradition to France and Panama, who want him to answer for alleged crimes. According to the Wikipedia article, “under Article 85 of the Third Geneva Convention[24], Noriega is still considered a prisoner of war.”
It’s doubtful Noriega will ever go free, even though he was never convicted of killing anyone. A statement he made about the U.S. and Panama being at “a state of war” was used, in part, to justify the invasion.
Additional information on Operation Just Cause is available at Joint Force Quarterly (JFQ).
Tags: 911, enemy combatatne, Eric Holder, George H.W. Bush, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Lindsey Graham, Manuel Noriega, Operation Just Cause, United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida
Noriega was not captured on the battlefield, he took refuge in the Vatican embassy s and surrendered to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency which already had an indictment against him. That was the reason he was tried in federal court in Miami
An indictment has already been issued (in 1998) against OBL, . The text is here: http://www.fas.org/irp/news/1998/11/98110602_nlt.html
KSM has been under indictment since 1996. There’s more about that here: http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/south/03/02/mohammed.biog/
Trying KSM in New York is consistent with how the U.S. government handled Noriega.