9/11, al Qaeda, Barack Obama, detainees, Eric Holder, Gitmo, Guantanamo, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Military Commissions, USS Cole

New York Daily News: Keep 9/11 trial ‘the hell out’ of New York City (we say ‘not in America’)

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The New York Daily News nearly matched their title ‘Keep the hell out: Obama must stop waffling and move 9/11 terror trial’ with the content of their editorial:

One of the most astonishing aspects of Obama’s struggle to find a location for perhaps the most important trial in American history is that the Justice Department got around to considering those “practical, logistical issues” only after Attorney General Eric Holder decided on New York.

Without consulting Mayor Bloomberg or Police Commissioner Ray Kelly in advance.

Without figuring the cost of security, estimated at $200 million a year, or making provision to pick up the city’s tab.

Without taking into account the extreme, long-term disruptions a trial would visit on downtown neighborhoods.

Without remembering the elemental truth that New Yorkers refuse to be played for chumps — a fact that puts Obama deep in the hole.

We’d be near full agreement with the Daily News had they not hedged by using ‘preferably’ in their closing line.

Since AG Eric Holder’s November 13, 2009 announcement, all major, national polls have shown a wide majority of Americans think that not only should the 9/11 trial not be conducted in New York City, foreign terrorists should not be afforded the Constitutional rights a federal court trial would provide them. Yes, some politicians would foolishly endanger the safety of their constituents and disrupt thousands of lives in their communities for years by inviting terror trials and detentions; they are the exception, not the rule.

Gitmo is no “black eye” on America; it is a uniquely suited, heavily defended, remote terrorist detention facility. Last year, during a meeting with 9/11 and U.S.S. Cole families, President Obama said Gitmo has been “confused with Abu Ghraib.” Our troops there are closely supervised by the DOJ and highly disciplined. The propaganda from the Left and al Qaeda would only move to the new locale if it is closed.

DOD sources have told us that had Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four fellow 9/11 conspirators been allowed to plead guilty and refused to appeal, the remaining prosecution costs for them would have been approximately $50,000. Had they not pled guilty and if they and all the other prosecutions were done by military commission at Gitmo, it would likely add tens of millions of additional dollars. Yet the total costs of prosecuting and detaining those now at Gitmo in the United States would run into the billions of dollars.

Detaining America’s enemies should never become a jobs program. Our valiant troops are already doing that tough and thankless duty for a hell of a lot less; it costs $100 million per year to operate the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. Thomson Correctional Center alone will cost three times that much to purchase and twice as much to operate as a detention facility.

Last February, President Obama promised 9/11 and U.S.S. Cole families that “swift and certain justice” would be brought against those who had slaughtered our loved ones. Yet no one credible has disputed former U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White saying it will likely take three years just to prepare federal trials against the 9/11 conspirators. And last July, it was reported that military commissions for 66 detainees there were ready to proceed. Even with the revisions Congress made to military commissions, which the President signed into law this past October, they would surely get underway much sooner, at Gitmo, than by a federal trial.

We keep hearing that military commissions are untested. They’ve been around in some form since General George Washington used them during the Revolutionary War. Lincoln used them. Not including the Nurnberg trials, more than 1,100 were tried by military tribunal during and after WWII with an 89% conviction rate. The judges, lawyers on both sides, and legal assistants are well-experienced at conducting military trials.

What is really untested is successfully trying dozens of Gitmo’s terrorists in federal court, with trial and appeal judges accustomed to applying our Constitution. Why? Because there will be hundreds perhaps thousands of motions about delaying “their” speedy trial due to national security concerns, not reading them “their” rights, and not offering them “their” right to remain silent and the opportunity to speak with “their” attorneys before deciding if to speak at all. And here is news that perhaps you have read nowhere else: All those same Constitutional challenges would occur if military commissions are conducted on U.S. soil.

Non-New Yorkers are also not chumps.

With thanks for their editorial and due respect to the New York Daily News, the vast majority of those out here in fly-over country say no federal trial for those at Gitmo should ever happen inside the United States; all their trials should be by military commission, at Guantanamo Bay.

Abdulmutallab, Barack Obama, Binyam Mohamed, Congress, Eric Holder, Flight 253, Gitmo, John Brennan

Obama administration misleads and repeats intelligence failures of the past

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The Obama administration apparently never made or discovered a mistake not worth repeating.

Counter-terror chief John Brennan incredibly states the four Members of Congress he briefed on Christmas Day should have assumed Flight 253 bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab was read Miranda warnings. Yet the administration has given mixed signals on if and when terrorists will be provided a right to remain silent and a lawyer. For example, during his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on November 18, 2009, in response to a question by Senator Amy Klobuchar, AG Eric Holder said:

“The people in the field have been making determinations about giving Miranda warnings or not for some time now. They have had thousands of people come into their custody; only a small number of them have been given Miranda warnings.”

Minutes before that, Holder refused to offer a clear opinion to Senator Lindsay Graham on whether custody begins (for the purpose of civilian trials and Miranda warnings) at the same time a terrorist is captured.

Congressman Pete Hoekstra is disputing John Brennan on both the facts and his presumptions:

Brennan told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Hoekstra and other top Congressional Republicans were told on Christmas Day that the Detroit bomber was in FBI custody, and should have known that he would therefore be read his rights according to Miranda.

But Hoekstra tells National Review Online that it would have been unreasonable to infer any such thing from his phone call with Brennan, which was brief and carried over an unsecured line.

“He never brought this stuff up,” Hoekstra says, adding that the FBI was the natural choice to hold Abdulmutallab until a detainment and interrogation strategy could be settled. “No, I wouldn’t expect the military to be at Detroit Airport waiting to arrest somebody,” Hoekstra adds, but he thought the administration would carefully investigate alternatives and consult with national security principals before moving forward with Miranda rights and other criminal procedures.

Abdulmuttalab was not read Miranda warnings until approximately 11 PM Eastern time and it is likely Brennan briefed the four well before that time. While it is not clear Brennan then told them whether Abdulmuttalab had provided intelligence during his initial interrogation, we now know that he was not initially read the warnings. President Barack Obama has acknowledged that some number of agencies and personnel failed in their responsibilities prior to the Christmas Day attack and Abdulmuttalab stopped providing intelligence when read “his” rights. (AG Holder directed that he be Mirandized prior to the FBI’s clean team attempting to question him further.)

In addition, we know that on Tuesday, February 2, 2010, the White House Press Secretary’s Office intentionally leaked “on background” sensitive information to the media that Abdulmuttalab was now cooperating:

Gibbs explained that the White House felt the need to provide background briefings about what Abdulmutallab was now saying in order to “contextualize” the information after receiving inquiries from reporters.

In other words, the Obama administration was getting pounded for providing a foreign terrorist Constitution rights not afforded them in that document. The White House felt the need to push back politically. They leaked secrets, made the intelligence we are now getting from Abdulmuttalab less valuable, and then falsely implied that Senator Kit Bond had disclosed the information.

Stupid is as stupid does, that Richard Reid was read “his” rights was a poor example to follow; that too was an intelligence failure.

Reid was arrested not three months into our invasion of Afghanistan, while the hunt was still under way in Tora Bora, and several months before Jose Padilla, Binyam Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, and Ramzi Binalshibh were captured. Bush 43 could have ordered Reid turned over for military detention as his November 13, 2001 Military Order proscribed and yet he at least seemed to learn from his mistake; he ordered Padilla turned over for military detention and the rest eventually ended up at Gitmo.

After leaving Afghanistan, Reid traveled separately through several countries in the Middle East. His interrogation would likely have provided valuable intelligence on both al Qaeda in Afghanistan and the contacts he made during those travels. Only through the interrogations of other detainees was Reid’s accomplice, Saajid Badat, discovered and arrested, in England in November 2003. Ten months after Reid pled guilty, British police found Badat’s still armed shoe-bomb when they searched the home of his parents. Badat did not use his bomb for he had had a change of heart, immediately confessed to police, told them how to disarm the device, and pled guilty. Richard Reid was (and is) a committed jihadist who we should have interrogated.

Update, February 9, 2010: Ed Morrissey of HotAir.com reports that John Brennan is at it some more, in USA Today:

Politically motivated criticism and unfounded fear-mongering only serve the goals of al-Qaeda. Terrorists are not 100-feet tall. Nor do they deserve the abject fear they seek to instill. They will, however, be dismantled and destroyed, by our military, our intelligence services and our law enforcement community. And the notion that America’s counterterrorism professionals and America’s system of justice are unable to handle these murderous miscreants is absurd.

Ed also has a link there to Byron York’s deconstruction of Brennan’s op-ed.