Editorial: Tribunals questioned

Saturday, July 15, 2006 | 7:48 a.m.

Less than a month after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Geneva Conventions protections apply to terrorism suspects detained by the United States, confusion abounds in Congress and the White House about how that applies to military tribunals.

According to a story by The Washington Post on Thursday, some House Republicans said this week that Congress should "just ratify" the special military commission trials set up by the Defense Department, as President Bush and Defense officials favored before the Supreme Court's ruling.

Many key members of the Senate, meanwhile, have embraced a more literal - and, we think, more correct - interpretation of the ruling and called for following the standards set forth by the Geneva Conventions.

Unfortunately, the Bush administration's stance on the issue has not been clear. Consider that House Republicans said Wednesday that the administration supported their view on establishing military commission trials, but on that same day Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican and former prisoner of war, said White House officials had told him that the administration favored the Senate's position.

Meanwhile, Bush administration officials told the Post on Wednesday that the court didn't find any actual problems with the tribunals, but simply wanted the rules passed by Congress.

Such doublespeak and lack of leadership aren't acceptable. The Geneva Conventions, which prohibit "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment," are what we expect to be extended to U.S. soldiers who are captured. We should abide by them as well. Doing so does not suggest, as Republican hard-liners in the House claim, that the United States is soft on terrorists. It shows that our nation values fairness and humanity.

Congress needs to stop wasting time with inflammatory rhetoric and establish rules that are clear, humane and fair. And it needs to do so soon. Waiting until next year to figure out how the United States is going to treat those its military detains is irresponsible.