How can the few Bushies that are left argue that the Guantanamo prisoners are POWs when war was never declared

Question

The constitution says that only Congress can declare war, not the President. I know the constitution is an inconvenience Bush would like to ignore but until we repeal it he's sworn to uphold it. If you don't declare war you can't have POWs. They love to use legalisms when they work in their favor, but they gnash their teeth when that sword cuts the other way.

Mission accomplished = Bring the troops home.

Answer 1

Bushies blind in his worship don't realize, if Geneva conventions & human rights are to be ignored when we are concerned, they can be ignored against us as well.

Then there will be no shout for Morality, Geneva Conventions or

fair treatment, expecting rest of the world to condemn, it'll simply be thrown back at US citing Guantanamo.

As you sow so shall you reap!

Answer 2

We better classify them as something, because if the prisoners at Guantanamo had things their way, you would not be allowed to express your opinion.  I don't know why liberals always feel the need to defend islamic extremists - they flog and mutilate people for moral offenses that liberals like you fight for (i.e. womens rights, homosexuality, etc.)

Answer 3

Only difference is the name.

Answer 4

Only by one side as in Al-Qaeda declaring  Jihad but The Taliban did not declare war on The U.S. and neither did  Iraq.

This means they are illegally held prisoners. Only Al-Qaeda can be held and since they did declare war or at least Holy War they could be prisoners of war. But war in a sense involving one nation against another had not been declared so the war would be illegal.

Answer 5

Boy..

(using my best Clint Eastwood voice here)...

U got some growin' up to do

(spits chaw tobacco in a most unfortunate direction)

Answer 6

They are not POWs. They are illegal combatants as defined by the Laws of Land Warfare (Geneva Conventions). In previous conflicts they would have been summarily executed after capture without any violation of U.S. or international law happening in the process.

Congress did authorize offensive military operations in the war on terrorism by passing Public Law #107-40 on September 18, 2001. It authorized offensive military operations against Iraq in Public Law #107-243 in October of 2002. We did not begin that military offensive until March 19, 2003.

Both of those laws were enacted in accordance with Congress' enumerated power under Article One, Section Eight of the Constitution.

The last time the Congress actually declared war on another nation was in April of 1917, when we entered World War One. The act passed after the attack on Pearl Harbor of December 7, 1941 certified that a "state of war between the United States and the Empire of Japan had already existed" since the date and time of that attack.

Answer 7

look at your history books on december 7 1941 franklin d roosevelt declared war on japan and bush did pretty much the same thing on september 12th. if you look at it like that then those 2 presidents were the only 2 in US history to get a standing ovation by congress. that being the case sounds to me like congress said yeah it is time for some payback. look at all of US service men kept as POWs for years after the vietnam conflict?? we werent at war then either.  i feel like they want a dirty war ...well they got one. i feel like we ought to start carpet bombing for about 2 weeks straight and then ask them if they still want to fight and if they say yes bomb them for another 2 weeks.

Answer 8

because they're still dangerous. plus the war was declared on Terrorism... so terrorists are the enemy, or am i just crazy?  

do you realize what would happen if we left now? while Iraq is in a huge state of turmoil?

(and DONT tell me we should have left it that way. innocent people were dying at the hands of a madman, and they still are by his followers)

Iran has been eyeing Iraq ever since we finished saddam off. we leave now, and Iran moves in with no force at all and take Iraq for themselves. yea, lets just give Iran more resources to build their war machine.

Answer 9

They are terrorist.  They are enemies of our country.  They are war criminals.  They do not have the benefit of our rights.

Answer 10

There is a little article known as the "War Powers Act of 1973" in which Congress gave away most of their power of declaring war to the President.  The President can also commit the U. S. armed forces to a conflict if the country is attacked without a declaration of war if such declaration or resolution is granted by Congress within 48 hours.  

I seem to recall that the Congress passed such a resolution granting the President authority to pursue terrorists and their supporters, using whatever military action necessary, wherever necessary, shortly after 9-11-01.  Have you forgotten this?

We have also had two other undeclared wars since WWII, Korea and Vietnam in which American military personnel were held as POWs by the enemy.  Try telling the survivors of those camps that they weren't prisoners.

According to the Geneva Convention, the terrorists captured in Afghanistan and Iraq don't even qualify as Prisoners Of War, because they were fighting without any sort of national uniform or any sort of national backing.  In other words, they were terrorists and thereby could have been shot at the scene under the Geneva Convention.  

Which was the more humane treatment?  Being shot at the scene or being held in Guantanamo Bay?

You want to give the same rights to murderers who would cut your throat without thought of YOUR right to live?  These people would trash our Constitution in a heartbeat to install their own Sharia Law, yet they attempt to use our laws against us.  Let 'em rot in Gitmo' until the War on Terror is over and Radical Islam is broken and whipped.

The Constitution is meant to protect the rights of US citizens, within the boundaries of the United States.  When you get Supreme Court Justices attempting to find rights in the Constitution that are not there, and incorporating teary-eyed liberal international law into our laws, liberties and rights, you are also going to get the beginning of our loss of sovereignty and right to determine our own laws by which we live.

The five justices who wrote this decision need to be impeached by the Congress and removed from the bench.  But go figure the odds of that ever happening with this do-nothing DEMOCRAT Congress.

Answer 11

you don't like the way America protects you ,?  Bush has used the presidential rite of protecting us any where, it can be here or there.,,...............lets finish the job..not another nam!