Is this the Volksgerichtshof?
I know, I know: the "People's Court" is a bad analogy. A better one would be the current kangaroo court in Guantanamo.
Update, 2/20: And right on cue...
- DN!: EXCLUSIVE: Rigged Trials at Guantanamo
- The Nation: "Rigged Trials at Gitmo" (Here's the LAT op-ed noted in the piece.)
- Scott Horton in Harper's: "Are the Gitmo Trials Rigged?" (or try here if he creates a new post)
When asked if he thought the men at Guantánamo could receive a fair trial, Davis provided the following account of an August 2005 meeting he had with Pentagon general counsel William Haynes--the man who now oversees the tribunal process for the Defense Department. "[Haynes] said these trials will be the Nuremberg of our time," recalled Davis, referring to the Nazi tribunals in 1945, considered the model of procedural rights in the prosecution of war crimes. In response, Davis said he noted that at Nuremberg there had been some acquittals, something that had lent great credibility to the proceedings.
"I said to him that if we come up short and there are some acquittals in our cases, it will at least validate the process," Davis continued. "At which point, [Haynes's] eyes got wide and he said, 'Wait a minute, we can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't have acquittals, we've got to have convictions.'"
Davis submitted his resignation on October 4, 2007, just hours after he was informed that Haynes had been put above him in the commissions' chain of command. "Everyone has opinions," Davis says. "But when he was put above me, his opinions became orders."