Military Justice Goes AWOL

This week President Bush issued a final executive order authorizing military commissions to begin trying suspected terrorists. Under rules drafted by the Pentagon last month, the commissions would be permitted to sentence defendants to imprisonment or even death on the basis of hearsay or coerced testimony.

This lack of basic legal protections provided by civilian courts or courts-martial has brought condemnation at home and abroad as an abandonment of this nation’s historic commitment to liberty and the rule of law.

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It is a measure of how far we have come as a nation — and in values at one time widely held — that military commissions, once seen as a great stride forward for American principles of justice and the rule of law, will now for ever after be associated with the abridgement of rights.

And it is a cruel insult to American military honor that where the nation once saw its military as called to an even higher duty in administering justice — because of the special place honor and duty hold for the soldier — it has now turned to the military as a way to shirk the American tradition of “justice, honor and humanity.”



http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/17/opinion/17budiansky.html?ex=1329368400&en=a815d0c5bdaae4e3&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

"Naval Operations" being taught that under the UCMJ the Prosecution was held to a higher standard than under civilian law. Also that those in custody received better treatment. Those involved with Military Law seemed to be more interested in Truth and Justice than getting a conviction. But that was back when Bush was avoiding his service obligations.

The fact that it has taken Bush this long to destroy this Institution speaks well for it.

It's going to take a long time to fix the Institutions that this Administration has defiled.