> Me: > I'm afraid I don't know who wrote the above.
Bob Z First, the trick of using > intelligence while protecting sources is the eternal dilemma facing > intelligence agencies and the governments who rely upon them. So you try to use >them judiciously, and do everything you can to minimize the risk. > Famously, in the case of Enigma, Winston Churchill was willing to allow the bombing >of the city of Coventry rather than reveal that Britain had broken > the code. It's hard to think of a more appropriate example of just how > important protecting sources and methods is. And yet they had to use the information at some point and the more it was used the more likely it was that German's would find out that they had broken the code. The only absolute way to insure that this knowledge was secret was to not use information obtained. Whether Churchill was correct to allow the bombing Coventery or not is beyond my knowledge of history or war but at some point you must use your info. I think it would be important if we caught Bin Ladin and/or the senior people in Al Qaeda to demonstrate to the world that they were quilty. If some sources or techniques are compromised so be it. Sooner or later they will compromised no matter what we do. The Clinton Administration failed when it > revealed that we were intercepting satellite communications between Bin > Laden and members of his organization in its quest to prosecute those > responsible for the embassy bombings. In doing so we lost our best source > of information on Al Qaeda. That was a failure. > > Second, Alberto Gonzales, the White House counsel, has written in the New > York Times about these tribunals. Gonzales, btw, is rumored to be on the > very short list for the next Supreme Court seat. The article is at I read it when it came out. It boils down to "Trust us". As I have said before, in the US we have trusted our institutions rather than the individuals in them. > > He points out that the tribunals will be open, not closed, and so on. I > advise everyone to read it. > If they are open, if their processes are defined before hand then this discussion is mute. But I would point out that Anthony Lewis in today's NYT wrote about a Palastinean held for a very long time by the government and was then let go after the judge in the case discovered that the government had no evidence against him at all, has been rearrested. > During the Civil War, Lincoln set up military tribunals all over the > country, suspended habeas corpus, and shut down hostile newspapers. > Roosevelt imposed censorship on every part of the American media. Both > remained subject to elections. But the Constitution recognizes that during > wartime the Executive Branch gains a great deal of authority - it was > designed with precisely that in mind, and designed also to make sure that > once the wartime emergency is over, that authority is again given up. It > has worked remarkably well in the past. As long as we stay within the > strictures of what the Constitution allows - and we are doing exactly that - > then we are fine. > > Gautam
