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Court curbs Bush power, fans Guantanamo debate

Posted on: Thursday, 29 June 2006, 14:48 CDT

By Caroline Drees, Security Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - By declaring the Guantanamo Bay military tribunals illegal, the U.S. Supreme Court put fresh curbs on President George W. Bush's powers in the war on terrorism and gave ammunition to those demanding the prison be closed.

Thursday's ruling, in a case brought by Osama bin Laden's former driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, marks the third time the nation's highest court has placed limits on the president's powers in the fight against terrorism and dealing with prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

The court found the tribunals, which Bush created right after the September 11 attacks, violated the Geneva Conventions and U.S. military rules.

"The administration was asserting incredibly broad, essentially plenary, executive authority in this very broadly and very nebulously defined context of the war on terror," said retired Air Force lawyer, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Walker. "This is nothing but a slap in the face of the administration."

Critics have often accused the Bush White House of using the war against terrorism to expand executive powers while curtailing congressional oversight. Among the most frequent examples they cite is a secret domestic eavesdropping program that has enraged both Republican and Democratic lawmakers.

Todd Gaziano, a Supreme Court expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said Thursday's Supreme Court ruling placed inappropriate limits on executive authority.

"It is profoundly disturbing that the court would take away from the commander in chief the sole discretion of determining what is militarily necessary," he said, describing the ruling as "a historical disgrace on the court."

But he said the decision would not have a major impact on the president's ability to wage the war against terrorism, since he could still resort to other procedures not denied by the court and Congress could "fix the errors that the court has read into the treaties and statutes."

THE FUTURE OF GUANTANAMO

The United States currently holds about 450 detainees at Guantanamo Bay prison, most detained without charges for more than four years. Hamdan is one of only 10 prisoners who have been charged with crimes and face the tribunal.

While the decision has no direct bearing on the future of the controversial detention center, legal and security experts say it has indirectly strengthened the hand of those demanding it be closed.

Scott Silliman, a retired Air Force attorney who is now executive director of Duke University's Center on Law, Ethics and National Security in North Carolina, said that while the ruling only affected the 10 men who were charged, it reopened the festering question of what to do with the roughly 440 others.

The Supreme Court decision quickly triggered calls by critics such as the American Civil Liberties Union, which said "the president should make good on his promise and close Guantanamo." Bush had said last week he eventually wanted to shut the prison.

"My suspicion is that the whole future of the Guantanamo structure is now in some turmoil," said Michael Krauss, a law professor at George Mason University in Virginia and a fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, which is hawkish on national security issues.

Krauss called the ruling a "devastating defeat for the administration, and I'm not rejoicing that this is the case."

Former Air Force officer Walker, who now works in a private practice, said the ruling would probably open the door for new legal challenges to the Guantanamo system soon.

"It's coming," he said. "The next obvious issue might well be somebody trying to challenge the indefinite detention issue."

Source: REUTERS

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