Maybe Khalid Shaikh Mohammad isn’t going to get that plea deal after all
I guess the feedback on the plea deal was awful, because Secretary of Defense Austin has said not so fast:
The deal that stirred national outrage and took the death penalty off of the table has been revoked by Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III in a terse memo.
Secretary Austin III is now taking the lead on the case for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin ‘Attash, and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi.
In his order, Austin relieved the official in charge of the military commission who had signed off on the original plea deals. …
No explanation was given on why this was not settled earlier before the deals were signed off and publicly released. …
The powerful House Armed Services Committee announced earlier Friday it was launching an investigation into the plea deals, which Chairman Mike Rogers, R.-La., called “unconscionable.”
Did Austin not know what was going on until it became public? Or did he not realize what outrage it would cause? Who’s minding the store here?
The reason it’s Austin, by the way, is that the trial is a military one and so the military is in charge.
And this is the ostensible reason the plea deal was settled in the first place:
[The defendants’] past torture is largely responsible for bogging down the case, since prosecutors and defense attorneys have been arguing for years over whether evidence obtained through torture is admissible in court. In a recent ruling that did not bode well for 9/11 prosecutors, a judge in another different Guantánamo case — the U.S.S. Cole warship bombing — threw out a confession because he said it was a product of torture.
That legal development may have played a role in the U.S. government deciding to settle the 9/11 case.
Who made the decision to settle?:
In a statement, the National Security Council said that “the President and the White House played no role in this process” and learned of the plea bargains on Wednesday.
No one bothered to tell them? And they didn’t bother to keep tabs on what was happening? Excuse me but, WTF? We are supposed to believe they are mind-bogglingly negligent – or they are just plain lying. They are fully capable of either or both, as we’ve learned many times before.
NOTE: I’ve previously written on the subject of the KSM case. Here’s a post that explains some of the reasons it’s taken so long – including that Obama wanted these people tried in civil courts rather than military courts. Astounding. Fortunately, he lost that fight.
I also have written quite a few posts on the subject of torture: see this one, for example.
This episode raises, again, the question of who’s actually in charge of the government, or if anyone is.
As i recall when john woo set up the guidelines about interrogations he followed european court of human rights rules
I have gotten a little numb about these protestations of ‘torture’ with regards to kingpins like ksm
So what was the “torture”? Was it waterboarding, which we put some of our troops through? Or, listening to Yoko Ono for 24 hrs a day?
That would be geneva convention violation and vienna yes waterboarding. Admittedly ksm did hide some elements from the interrogators
I don’t think the government/military wants to go to trial on this – so the Death Penalty is still probably not an option…back to square one.
President Austin took care of business before Kamala could screw it up, especially with her choice of advisors.
“Vice President Kamala Harris has a “powerful” new campaign adviser: her brother-in-law Tony West, the former Obama Justice Department attorney who defended a convicted terrorist sentenced to 20 years in prison for fighting with the Taliban and colluding with al-Qaeda.
West is now “a powerful adviser” to Harris’s “new campaign,” Axios reported Friday. Roughly 20 years prior, West held a different role: attorney for a Taliban terrorist.”
These cases should have been wrapped up 20 years ago. Even our courts-martial are atrocious.
==
Indubitably, the plea deals were scotched because of bad optics, and only because the optics are influencing a presidential campaign. The salient actors are amoral post-Americans who do not regard KSM as an antagonist or as the author of an outrage.
no they don’t think the material orchestrator, he planned recruited and trained the fighters, on at least two continents, as with Abu Zubeydah, who plays a role like verbal kint in the Usual Suspects, his logistics, have lead to all sorts of places like the Los Angeles Library Tower plot,
Credit to Austin.
Seeing as President Obama acted as judge, jury & executioner in the case of American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki–and later his American citizen son as well–why did they make this initial decision?
in the wadis of yemen, you can get away with a lot, I don’t doubt that awlaki was guilty all the way back to when he was counseling the first team of hijackers, there is blame to go all around, like General Hayden some how missing the communications with that team, the connections of bayoumi to them, which were known certainly long after September 11th,
Muslim terrorists, when captured, should be made to talk using any and all means. Water boarding would be a good start and if that does not work, power tools will.
Once they have spilled the beans, they should be hog tied and dropped – head first – into a vat of pig blood until they are dead.
Their bodies should then be fed to ravenous pigs.
Terrorists have no problem using the most gruesome and horrific forms of torture and murder. They deserve the same fate if captured.
It is sickening that those terrorists held at Guantanamo are treated like humans and actually provided legal representation and three squares a day.
yes if he fell into a Russian filtration center, or even a prison like La Sante in France, you don’t get the same kind of accomodations,
Seeing as President Obama acted as judge, jury & executioner in the case of American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki
==
It’s a matter of no import that he had notional American citizenship (which he should never have been granted). He was in Yemen and a locus of criminal activity.
==
Paleoconservatives are not your friends.
“The salient actors are amoral post-Americans who do not regard KSM as an antagonist or as the author of an outrage.” – Art Deco
Well said.
The whole process has been an affront to the victims of 9/11 and their families. Asd well as all those who were killed or injured in the GWOT. Military tribunals can be done without all the gnashing of teeth over “torture.”
People born on 9/12/2001 have, in many cases, graduated from college already and some of them no doubt are early in their careers in government.
I’m guessing the median age of commenters here is somewhere around retirement age. I mention this only to point out that 9/11 to the people starting working in government right now is something like Pearl Harbor to most of us here–something we heard about growing up, and maybe a lot of us even care about it, but it didn’t happen to us. And processing KSM, however it’s done, would just be an exercise in ticking boxes to people that young.
The moral urgency around anything to do with 9/11 is fading out. Nothing like it has happened to Americans since to keep it going. There’s going to be a time, sooner than we like to think, when what was proposed for KSM will go over without a second thought, because not enough people will still be around to be emotionally engaged by what he did.
This is what happens when one waits around to be attacked. Yet president after president does it. Both Bushes were almost OK. Still Iran still sits safely – after Clinton, after Obama, after Trump, and after Biden. Lots of talking involved whilst waiting to be attacked…
Russia has been a threat forever, yet many Republicans don’t want to help Ukraine. Ukraine doesn’t ask for boots on the ground – they ask for weapons to kill Russians and defend themselves. Russia has never been weaker, and yet many don’t want to see Ukraine defeat them.
Why does Iran still have a military? No need for American Boots there either. Just destroy the navy, nuclear capabilities, troops whenever possible, all air force, tanks, artillery, missile & drones—and their production sites. Not for America leaders tho – their voters only want them to talk…and wait to be attacked.
The president is the commander in chief. There’s no way this was done and announced via press release without passing through the executive in some fashion. This is just some cya to cover for the abdication of Biden.
Not for America leaders tho – their voters only want them to talk…and wait to be attacked.
Karmi:
I’d argue it’s worse than that.
As you probably know, Obama thought elevating Iran to regional hegemon (over Israel, natch) was a really cool idea.
Thus the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPA) (2015) under Obama, which Trump nullified, then Biden restored.
Which unfroze billions of dollars for Iran and no doubt played a significant role in Iran’s sponsoring Hamas’s 10/7 attack on Israel.
Elections have consequences.
huxley:
Agreed.
Baloney. Ditto on the baloney of the rest. 😉 Trump was a bigger talker than Obama & Biden combined. Bigger than even Clinton. Worst part about that is his MAGA supporters always give him a pass for his talking. The Buck never stops on Trump’s desk unless it’s positive – the negative get passed downstream.
In regards to Iran – Freezing and unFreezing assets is just lots of talking and posturing in order to allow Iran to continue building and supporting their radical Islamic puppets. Iran didn’t stop building and supporting its Axis of Resistance under Trump’s term. Sure, freezing $6-billion or whatever of their assets had to hurt (probably akin to Trump taking his baseball and bat and quitting the game because it didn’t suit him).
Everyone knows that Obama, Biden, and Harris wasn’t/didn’t/won’t take out Iran’s military & nuclear capabilities.
Trump should’ve taken out Iran’s military & nuclear capabilities when he had the chance. Instead, he talked a lot, gets lots of credit (for something?!) from his supporters—as he continued to follow the same Modus Operandi of other American Presidents, i.e., Wait until an Enemy Attacks America.
Now, we have Iran becoming even closer with Russia every day. How close? This close – ISW August 3, 2024: Russia trying to ‘transfer unspecified missiles and other military equipment to the Houthis in Yemen .. Russia’s reported plan highlights its growing military partnership with Iran and suggests that Russia likely aims to leverage Iranian proxies to indirectly confront the West and shape Western decision making.
Somehow it all comes back to prison in the end. With others high school was their peak life experience. But no matter, there is redemption in chasing The Great Orange Whale?
om the infamous ‘Gay Commenter‘ can’t resist humble hermit me – no matter how hard it tries…
Still stuck in prison, it seems.
Sad.
om the infamous ‘Gay Commenter‘ foolishly believes that ‘high school was their peak life experience‘ or in my case “prison” was. I feel sorry for anyone who believes high school was it for them—or even prison.
I’ve had an exciting, fun filled, and adventurous life – and each year has gotten better since 2009.
Perhaps om’s lustful thoughts have clouded his mind…
And yet prison is a recurring theme. “The lady doth protest too much ….. ”
Psst – Other have noticed, it might be a bug in the noggin.
You just can’t stop yourself from having lustful thoughts about humble hermit me. Are you going to church with those thought on your mind? Shame shame shame…
Sigh you vote for the democrats you vote for the terrorists certainly in this case if the last year hasnt taught you anything you will never learn anything
The “bony eared ass fisher” is back to trolling.
Democracy has been an exceedingly rare thing in Western history, Athens Rome, then 1400 years later, Western Europe and the US, now we grok why
Athens collapsed under the ruins of the pelopennesian war, Rome after the Civil Wars and the Triumvirates, now we see how Europe is collapsing from within, and without,
there is gallows humour in seeing it happen in real time
so the Dems pushed Muh Russia, but when needed released a hitman, two spies, two hackers and a partridge in a pear tree much like they treated the future taliban negotiating team for one disgruntled corporal,
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Someone figured that the optics of a plea deal would be bad for Kamala. It will be back on the day after the election, and completed with unseemly haste if Trump beats the margin of fraud.
miguel @ 10:23am,
As a historical record of the Jewish people the Bible is a 3,000 (5,000?) year history of the recurring theme of a group of people begging for a strongman to save them, and that leading to their enslavement. Seems to be the history of all societies.
It’s very difficult to get humans to choose freedom over security. The men who wrote the U.S. Constitution knew this and would not be surprised to see how powerful and controlling we citizens have allowed our government to become.
I was doing a Durant level overview, yes Israel had wise kings and rotten ones, it had noble leaders in the exile and ignoble ones,
closer to home, our good qatari friends have foreclosed any use of al udeid airborne, presumably against Iran or Islamic State,
miguel,
The Greeks, Romans, Jews and Chinese (Egyptians?) are the cultures we have with the longest, written historical records. Literacy and record keeping were prized in all 3. There are recurring themes in all their histories of government overreach leading to suffering and civilizational collapse.
Our schools never taught Chinese history and they made teaching the history of the Jews illegal in the ’50s, then, in the ’70s began the big push to get rid of the Greeks and Romans. “Hey! Ho! Western Civ has got to go!” They’ve also found reasons to stop teaching Shakespeare who wrote of Emperors and Kings and the folly of human hubris.
If the citizenry wants subjugation, democracy is no more a bulwark against tyranny than tyranny itself.
miguel @ 1:02pm,
Of course, history is written by the victors and the Levite priestly class were the keepers of the record, but the good, wise Kings were those who placed God’s word above all. Even within the lore of the most revered Jewish rulers; Moses and David, there are accounts of how they and the people were punished when hubris led them to ignore God’s word.
One can believe in a God(s), or not, but, with humans, things go south fast when a group of rulers, or the entire populous, believe humans are all powerful. As demonstrated in the 20th century by the Nazi’s, Soviets and Chinese Marxists.
representative government for shorthand, there have been evolutions from hipparchus to pericles and devolutions down to subjugation by phillip of macedon,
from the roman monarchs to the likes of Scipio thats very short hand, no the gracchi cicero, well it goes down hill from there,
https://www.ynetnews.com/article/hjazkcqdr?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=internal