Iraqi Leaders Want U.S. Military Trainers To Stay, But Not Give Them Immunity

Detention Without End:

In a time of austerity, and with the planned drawdown of U.S. troops from Afghanista­n and Iraq, you might expect congressio­nal proposals to reduce the military’s footprint around the world. You’d be wrong.

Instead, the defense spending bill passed by the Senate Armed Services Committee and now heading for a vote in the full Senate would dramatical­ly expand the U.S. military’s role in counterter­rorism — potentiall­y inciting more attacks on U.S. interests.

At the same time, it would very likely undermine the ability of our best-train­ed experts in counterter­rorism to investigat­e, prosecute and bring to justice internatio­nal terrorists from all over the world.

In addition, this defense authorizat­ion bill marks the first time since the McCarthy era that Congress has sought to create a system of military detention without charge or trial — including U.S. citizens arrested on U.S. soil.

The bill would do that by authorizin­g such military detention of anyone, captured anywhere, believed to be “part of or [who] substantia­lly supported” Al Qaeda, the Taliban or undefined “associate­d forces.”

Not since 1950, when Congress passed the Internal Security Act, which allowed the government to indefinite­ly detain suspected Communists who the administra­tion determined “would probably commit espionage or sabotage,” has Congress authorized such broadbased indefinite detention based on only suspicion.

Back in the 1950s, however, the threat of indefinite imprisonme­nt without trial remained just that. No president ever actually invoked that draconian power. But with some 2,800 “war on terror” detainees now imprisoned indefinite­ly by the U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay and at the U.S.-run Bagram Air Base in Afghanista­n, the use of that power here at home is hardly far-fetche­d...

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost