are being held in GUANTANAMO PRISON(without being charged for years) should be entitled to or granted ? Why?

None. They are prisoners of war. Can you tell me of any other war we've been involved in where we let the prisoners get legal representation or simply let them go?

These people were caught on battlefields and we have even recaptured a prisoner or two that we set free on yet another battlefield trying to kill Americans.

So, I ask you again, why should they be entitled to anything?

how do you know that any of those people there weren't just innocent bystanders?? You don't think they should at least be charged with a crime?? You think that even during a time of war, it's ok to take people and hold them prisoners without even charging them with anything?? That just doesn't seem right to me...

And just what crime do you charge against someone fighting to kill Americans? What did we charge all of the Germans we caught during WWII? What about the Viet Namese? Most of them were just held until the war was over, and then some of the higher ups were charged with crimes against humanity.

If you want to try them then let's do so in military courts. If you want them tried just like an American citizen maybe you can start a drive to raise the money to pay for it because I sure as hell don't want my money going to let some terrorist be tried with the same rights as a US citizen.

What are you going to say when one or more of these guys gets let out and ends up packing himself with explosives and killing hundreds of REAL innocent bystanders? Or worse yet, what if one of them ends up flying another plane into one of our buildings?

Innocent bystanders? I think you should need to know the circumstances that they were apprehended under before you go giving them that status.

"I think you should need to know the circumstances that they were apprehended under before you go giving them that status."

I absolutely agree

They should be fed pork every night. Okay, not every night. That might be a little extreme.

Well, we know for sure that, at the very least, the vast majority, if not all of them, we caught with AK-47's in their hands and after shotting at and killing our soldiers. To me that's enough to keep them locked up indefinetely.

Why is it so difficult for so many people to understand that these people want to kill you and me? Why don't people understand that their desire is to bring this country down and impose Sharia law wherever and whenever they can? Why don't people see that we are fighting an enemy that doesn't mind killing themselves in the process of killing others?

What really amazes me is the women who are against killing as many of these people as we can. The way these guys treat women is as bad as it can get on the face of the planet. I would think that women would want every one of them wiped from the face of the Earth.

Everlong,.even POWs are granted certain fundamental rights under the Geneva Convention, and under American law. This is where I truly lost faith with Bush. In failing to abide by certain legal protections granted to all held in United States custody, to include POWs, he demonstrated that he had no faith in the document he took an oath to uphold.

I'm not saying that these people being held in GITMO should be coddled, but they should be afforded certain legal rights. Either under the Geneva Convention, or under United States law.

Simply good protocol to abide by the parameters of the system. It insures that the system goes on.

Our system of government is not perfect but it has worked for for over 200 years. Those who lead us should have faith in the system, and not decide to abandon it or work around it for the sake of expediency.

Anybody under United States custody should be granted certain rights and protections under United States law This is the only thing that makes our high-sounding platitudes a reality.

Mistakes were made here in a climate of fear and paranoia, but mistakes can be corrected. What is important is that the system goes on as our founding fathers intended it to.

Denying certain detained individuals constitutional or certain military protections may often seem to be the expedient thing to do at times, but it is never the right thing to do, for it undermines the foundation of our great republic.

Regarding Bush, not an evil tyrant. Just a man who should have had a bit more faith in the system he took an oath to uphold.

What we allow to be done to the least desirable elements in our society will someday be done to all of us. People and politicians pass, but the system will endure for as long as we have the will to uphold it.

Certainly not a bad legacy to leave our children and grand children.

Bush should have had just a bit more faith.

I think we should distinguish between POWs under the Geneva Conv. and the non-uniformed insurgents we capture trying to blend into the civilian populace in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under the Geneva Conventions as I understand it, a combatant in civilian clothes can be summarily executed are is not due POW status.

There are good reasons for this. Uniforms are required for combatants because they go a long way towards keeping civilians out of harm's way. Of course, combatants don't need fancy DCU's like we have; a green arm-band similar marking would do the trick.

Insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan eschew such identifiers precisely because they want to involve civilians in the crossfire as much as possible, as this feeds into the atmosphere of fear and instability that they are trying to produce. That is why they are not POW's in the same sense as, say, German soldiers in WWII were. There is no need to treat them as such.

Your point is well taken, but in Vietnam most of the POWs we took (and they were damned few) did not wear NVA uniforms. But rather the standard "black pajamas" for the local popular force guerrillas, or the VC, if you will.

They were afforded the same rights by us under the Geneva Convention as the uniformed NVA regulars were. At least until we turned them over to the South Vietnamese, who did God only knows what to them.

My essential complaint against abandoning the Geneva Convention and the rules of warfare (and we sometimes did this in the field, though without official sanction) is that word of abuses always seems to get back to the local indigenous personnel, which often has a bad habit of galvanizing the same against you, and ultimately gives aid and comfort to your enemy. Which in turn creates more casualties for your own personnel.

I'm not trying to take any moral high ground here. I just know from experience what failing to abide by the Convention and the rules of warfare can do to damage your own efforts in winning popular support of the local population. Without this popular support, you're screwed. You have more more incidents of hostile fire, more battle deaths and injuries, and a native populace which is largely against you.

Unfortunately, non-hostiles will often get caught up in the middle of a fire fight. Your point is also well taken here. If we took fire from a village in Vietnam while on a mission near there, we'd fire back. No recourse there. You have to defend yourself. But still, you try to keep non-hostiles out of the line of fire as much as is possible, even if the bastards firing upon you bring them into the the thing. I remember an incident during the Korean conflict when North Koreans would mingle with the refugees trying to flee the war, and the poor officer in charge of guarding one crossroads had to light up the entire column of refugees with artillery fire to maintain his own position. Such things happen in war.

Still you want to have some kind of code of conduct in a battle zone. And you also want the popular support of the people you're trying to protect or liberate. And you can't get this without abiding by certain regulations and conventions.

Conventions and rules of warfare can be a pain in the ass, and expedience and self-preservation will often overrule them in the field. But you have to have some official code of conduct to abide by to separate you from the murderous bastards you're fighting. Something to set you apart from them in the eyes of the local indigenous population. Treating your captives, often their own countrymen, fairly and in accordance to established rules of warfare will go a long way in aiding your military mission.

Like I said, your points are well taken here. No mealy-mouthed moral platitudes here. Just bitter experience.

My own brigade in Vietnam was responsible for the My Lai Massacre, which did galvanize the local populace against us, gave support to the enemy, and made our own job a hell of a lot more damned dangerous than it already was.

Conventions and rules or warfare exist for good reason. And whenever possible or practical, should be abided by. The expedience of abandoning certain conventions may seem to be a good idea at the time, but it usually bites you in the ass in the long run.

A lesson Bush should have known.