More Juxtaposition

EDITED 7/2

Item 1 -- From Sunday's CentreDaily:

Iraqi civilian deaths in Baghdad dropped significantly in June, a possible indication that recent American military operations around the country and raids on car-bomb shops in the "belts" ringing the capital are starting to pay off.

But June also marked the end of the bloodiest quarter for U.S. troops since the war began in March 2003.

Unofficial figures compiled by McClatchy Newspapers' show 189 Iraqis, including police and government security forces, were killed in the capital through Friday, a drop of almost two thirds since this year's high in February, when 520 were killed. The average monthly death toll of Iraqis in Baghdad was 410 from December through May.

Item 2 -- Embedded with US and Iraqi forces, Michael Yon documents the aftermath of Al Qaeda for a village on the outskirts of Baqubah:

The village had the apparent misfortune of being located near a main road--about 3.5 miles from FOB Warhorse--that al Qaeda liked to bomb. Al Qaeda had taken over the village. As Iraqi and American soldiers moved in, they came under light contact; but the bombs planted in the roads (and maybe in the houses) were the real threat.

The firefight progressed. American missiles were fired. The enemy might have been trying to bait Iraqi and American soldiers into ambush, but it did not work. The village was riddled with bombs, some of them large enough to destroy a tank. One by one, experts destroyed the bombs, leaving small and large craters in the unpaved roads.

The village was abandoned. All the people were gone. But where? . . .

As we passed through the village, Captain Combs pointed out the nice houses, saying the people had been simple farmers with comfortable homes and lives.

Until al Qaeda came.

Caution--Yon's answer, and the photos on his page, are gruesome:

We passed by two donkeys each shot in the neck. Al Qaeda had killed their livestock.

Al Qaeda often plants bombs inside the dead bodies of the animals and people they’ve killed.

We walked into the palm groves nearby. There was a terrible stench. The heat and the vegetation reminded me of the Killing Fields in Cambodia where I had visited shortly before the most recent trip to Iraq.

Soldiers from 5th [Iraqi Army] said they’d found some of the villagers: They were dead. . .

Soldiers from 5th IA said al Qaeda had cut the heads off the children. Had al Qaeda murdered the children in front of their parents? Maybe it had been the other way around: maybe they had murdered the parents in front of the children. Maybe they had forced the father to dig the graves of his children.

Dan Collins asks if this is "al-Qaeda My Lai." Perhaps that's why Reuters reports that "Sunni militias that once fought U.S. troops are now seeking to join them, frustrated by al Qaeda's influence in parts of Baghdad."

Item 3 -- The same enemy is battling Britain, but failed by the skin of our teeth. And some of the suspects already were being monitored so, as detailed by the ABC News blog, it shouldn't have been that close:

British police have a "crystal clear" picture of the man who drove the bomb-rigged silver Mercedes outside a London nightclub, and officials tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com he bears "a close resemblance" to a man arrested by police in connection with another bomb plot but released for lack of evidence.

Officials say the suspect had been taken into custody in connection with the case of al Qaeda operative Dhiren Barot, who was convicted of orchestrating a vehicle bomb plot involving targets in London, New York, Newark, N.J. and Washington, D.C.

Item 4 -- T.K. at Lifelike Pundits:

As a necessity, the U.S. Military needs to have the ability to detain those who would likely seek to do them, or the U.S. generally, harm. Nevertheless, an enemy combatant, as well as an official prisoner of war under the Geneva Conventions, has not been charged or tried for any crime. Reports of torture and ill-treatment aside, the United States is still claiming the power to hold an individual for an indefinite period of time on nothing more than his presence in a war zone. . .

Letting terrorists go free is ridiculous, but keeping a man locked up for his entire life as an enemy combatant undercuts the freedom Americans stand for when we fight terrorism. . .

Under the Geneva Conventions, prisoners of war should be returned to their homeland after the war has ended. The Geneva Conventions, however, were penned in an effort to cope with traditional warfare in a time when wars had obvious sides and obvious conclusions. Therefore, even if a prisoner of war was improperly held, the detaining country would be forced to return him at some point in the foreseeable future. The war on terror, though, has no foreseeable conclusion. Even if it did, the prisoners that the President is detaining fall outside of the protections of the Geneva Conventions.¹ However, we should not allow any of our Presidents to hold men indefinitely without trial. If the United States is to lead the charge against terrorism, then we need to lead by example.

Item 5 -- Charles at Lifelike Pundits:

The possibility that these terrorists may spend the rest of their lives in detainment does not bother me. We put our own citizens in jail for life terms when they murder one or two people for monetary gain. These men in Guantanamo seek to kill thousands if not millions for no other motivation than pure hatred. These men in Guantanamo are not like captured soldiers in a war who will go home and stand down after hostilities are over. The war is never over in their minds, not so long as one American draws breath. These men in Guantanamo are not like the aggressors of the former Soviet Union, who did not wish to die. These men seek death eagerly, so long as they can bring some of us with them. The mindset of these terrorists is that it is wonderful and praiseworthy to strap dynamite to oneself, walk into the middle of a crowd of women in Jerusalem pushing baby strollers, and then set the explosives off. The evil that drives that mind deserves no mercy.

Item 6 -- Seventh Circuit Judge, and Law & Econ scholar, Richard Posner speaking in Australia:

A top-ranking US judge has stunned a conference of Australian judges and barristers in Chicago by advocating secret trials for terrorists, more surveillance of Muslim populations across North America and an end to counter-terrorism efforts being "hog-tied" by the US constitution.

Judge Richard Posner, a supposedly liberal-leaning jurist regarded by many as a future US Supreme Court candidate, said traditional concepts of criminal justice were inadequate to deal with the terrorist threat and the US had "over-invested" in them.

His proposed "big brother" solutions flabbergasted delegates at the Australian Bar Association's biennial conference, where David Hicks's lawyer, Major Michael Mori, is to be awarded honorary life membership.

"We have to fight terrorism with our strengths, and our strengths evolve around technology, including the technology of surveillance," said Justice Posner, a prolific legal scholar who sits on the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

"Are there terrorist plots that are at a formative stage among the large US Muslim community of two to three million people? In the 600,000 Canadian Muslim population, are there people planning attacks on the US?

"What we have to do is discover the extent of the terrorist threat to the US. There is a danger, and it demands a rethinking of some of our conventional views on the limits of national security measures.

"We should think of surveillance as preventative, not punitive. We should think of controls that have nothing to do with warrants or traditional criminal justice to prevent abuses."

Item 7 -- StrategyPage on Sunday:

Al Qaeda operations continue to decline, as the number of al Qaeda members, and leaders killed or captured, goes up. Then there's al Qaeda media activity. . .

Al Qaeda is having some success in the Western media, and among Moslems living in Europe. But those expatriate Moslems are handicapped by many of their brethren who are not enthusiastic about Islamic terrorism. The police get tips, make arrests, and al Qaeda losses a few more true believers. Al Qaeda is desperate for another highly visible attack in the West. Many such operations are apparently being planned, but by amateurs who can get no help from al Qaeda experts. Most of al Qaedas traveling experts are dead or in prison.

Item 8 -- Bryan at HotAir.com:

If I’m right about the timing, 2009 is probably the next time we can look forward to a bona fide and spectacular al Qaeda attack attempt on American soil. Whatever they’re cooking up, it’s in the planning stages right now, in New York or the DC suburbs or wherever they believe they can operate without detection and will have access to their supplies and targets. Until they move or are busted, we can look forward to more idiotic posturing from Democrats who are at the same time promising to blow billions on new government programs for all kinds of things, while de-funding the war in Iraq and cutting the funds to house some very bad men at Gitmo. We can look forward to more context-free reports of carnage from all over the world, and we get to enjoy the downright delicious prospect of even Republicans deserting the war effort.

Their priorities tell us that virtually no Democrat and fewer Republicans are serious about the threat that those men at Gitmo and their mates in London pose.

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¹ Actually, unlawful combatants are addressed in the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions--it's just that having violated the Conventions and the Law of Land Warfare (see Army Field Manual 27-10, Chap. 8, Section II), such captives are denied the rights of POWs or civilians, potentially warranting certain reprisals. Covered, yes; coddled, no--and to treat them otherwise risks encouraging Al Qaeda to commit more war crimes.