Saddam Hussein and some of his top henchmen sit in U.S. detention in undisclosed locations, awaiting trial for war crimes. But there is a prominent Washington DC lawyer who believes another national leader may face war crimes charges. The leader is President George W. Bush. The lawyer is White House counsel Alberto Gonzales. In a 2002 memo, the White House lawyer focused on a little known 1996 law passed by Congress, known as the War Crimes Act, that banned any Americans from committing war crimes—defined in part as "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. Reports Newsweek:
One key advantage of declaring that Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters did not have Geneva Convention protections is that it "substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act," Gonzales wrote. "It is difficult to predict the motives of prosecutors and independent counsels who may in the future decide to pursue unwarranted charges based on Section 2441 [the War Crimes Act]," Gonzales wrote.
In our name, the American government is holding without charge and in often humiliating conditions, thousands of prisoners - some combatants, some terrorists, some bystanders. They have no redress, no legal protection, no legal status. And in our name, some are being tortured, and some subjected to conditions that lead to their deaths. And this is an Administration that has argued against adherence to the Geneva Conventions - and one reason for that argument was to protect Bush and his ministers from prosecution on war crimes charges by successor administrations.
In the end, says Newsweek, after strong protests from Colin Powell, the White House retreated. In February 2002, it proclaimed that, while the United States would adhere to the Geneva Conventions in the conduct of the war in Afghanistan, captured Taliban and Qaeda fighters would not be given prisoner of war status under the conventions. America's disgrace in the eyes of the world continues.
from Amazon.
