Speakeasy: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, others to face trial in New York

Jewish capital of America

I wouldn't call it stupid, but might get interesting. Actually might be the safest place now to have such a trial. Did you see the part where the govt just seized a skyscraper and several mosques?

(NT) those are some good reasons.

Trust me

If they get off, they'll "live comfortably" for around five minutes.

Point is... 9/11 was an act of war...

treating it as a mere criminal offense is a huge mistake. It's part of the attempt to deny there's a war on terror.

Misses the point....

In reply to: In age-old terminology ... by Kees Bakker 

It was an act of war by a foreign entity. The fact that it wasn't a nation in the conventional sense doesn't change that fact. This should be handled, as originally planned, by the military. This misbegotten decision is purely political.

LBJ started a "War on Poverty" it was a spectacular failure. But that has no relevance to this situation.

The British said the same...

...about the Americans, basically calling them "rebels" among other terms, yet from it a nation that truly already existed was born, even when it was years before it was recognized as a nation, even in 1812 when the British still thought of America as not a nation. Yet, Britain was beaten I guess in their opinion, not by a nation, but by rebels in an insurrection, not a war. Just words. Reality is what counts.

Just a note re

by Roger NC  - 11/14/09 9:52 AM

In reply to: In age-old terminology ... by Kees Bakker 

that definition of war.

Civil wars are referred to as wars, and they're not wars between states (states as in countries).

he Wars of the Roses was a series of battles internal to England for control by two different nobilities. And in the US we had our own Civil War, though technically it was between "states" since the southern states of the US officially succeeded from a (their position) a voluntary confederation and created their own confederation for the war against the remaining members of the US.

Indeed, all "revolutionary wars" aren't against existing states, but one group fighting a parent country to form it's own state. Civil wars within a state, or revoluntary wars to create a new nation, may be as common as wars between nations/states. Consider all the revolutions just of recent decades. The communist revolution in Russia and China began basically as a civil war. Searching for communist revolutions and the list is extremely long. And it includes groups that have been infamous for human rights violations, and outright atrocities. So in a very real sense, these are war crimes without a declared war between two recognized political states.


The Crusades were certainly wars. While there was countries involved, it was a called by a religious authority to war, not initially a civil authority. And they weren't against specific nations/states, but mainly against another religious group. And they weren't restricted to just "recovering the holy land" as often portrayed back then.

I will concede the Crusades were at least in part a response to earlier invasions by allied Muslim states to take over and rule more territory. While some of these conflicts did take place mainly between a group of nations/states, the Crusades themselves were fought on the Christian side by members of a wide number of nationalities. While the secular authorities may have encouraged and support people joining the Crusades, they didn't always recognize a state of war between their nation and the opposition.

One cynical view of the local authorities regarding volunteers to join the Crusades is it was a way to distract warriors, trained and natural, from fighting internal strifes and direct the attitude and energy outside of the country. In other words, a way to get rid of trouble makers. But that's just an interesting aside, not relevant to the fact not all "war" is between recognized political units called states or nations.