Enemy Combatants

In 2001, the Bush administration coined the term unlawful combatant (later renamed enemy combatant) to describe certain individuals either captured [Page 289]during the war in Afghanistan or suspected of having links to the terrorist organization Al-Qaeda. Currently, any individual who the administration deems a threat or danger to the United States, including “citizens who associating themselves with the enemy and with its aid, guidance, and direction, or enter into this country bent on hostile acts are enemy belligerents” (U.S. District Court, Lower Manhattan, U.S. v. Padilla [2002]), may be defined as an enemy combatant. In other words, U.S. citizens may also be designated as enemy combatants.

As of March 2003, two Americans have been categorized in this way: Jose Padilla and Yassar Esam Hamdi. Padilla was named an enemy combatant in June 2002 after he was “captured” not on a battlefield, but at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. The government says he was planning to detonate a radiological bomb in America. Padilla was transferred to a Navy brig in South Carolina where he has been questioned by military interrogators and denied contact with outsiders, including his attorney. He has not been charged with a crime. Hamdi is an American-born Saudi who was captured in Afghanistan. He is being detained at a Navy brig in Virginia. Provisions for future enemy combatants include a special wing at Goose Creek (SC Navy Brig) to accommodate up to 20 U.S. citizens. Attorney General John Ashcroft is said to have announced additional plans to construct detention camps for U.S. citizens deemed as enemy combatants.

Categorization as an enemy combatant denies a captive access to the rights of the Geneva Convention to which prisoners of war are entitled. Enemy combatants are not permitted contact with lawyers, family, or friends. They may also be denied counsel, detained indefinitely, and held incommunicado, without due process and without review of their designation as enemy combatants by the U.S. Court of Appeals.