“The man accused of plotting with al-Qaida to detonate a ‘dirty bomb’ inside the United States was a protege of a top lieutenant of Osama bin Laden, traveling at his mentor’s request to meet with other terrorists and using the Internet to research how to build a radioactive weapon, U.S. officials said Tuesday.”
The AP is reporting that
Jose Padilla, 31, also known as Abdullah al Muhajir, traveled to Pakistan and Afghanistan to meet with top al-Qaida leaders after the Sept. 11 terror attacks and surfed the Internet at a home in Lahore, Pakistan, to study ways to build a ‘dirty bomb’ that could spread radioactive material over dozens of city blocks, officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
But Padilla’s alleged association with Abu Zubaydah, the top lieutenant to bin Laden who was captured in March, was his apparent undoing.
Information leading to Padilla’s arrest came in part from Zubaydah himself. In April, weeks after Zubaydah’s arrest, he told interrogators of a plot to use radiological weapons, but he did not provide details. The CIA investigated and came up with Padilla’s name and other details.
That information — including Padilla’s name — was taken to Zubaydah, who confirmed it, according to a U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity. It’s unclear whether Zubaydah volunteered the information or was tricked into giving it.
Padilla apparently lost his passport in Karachi in February and sought a new one, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday. The government complied in March but tipped off the FBI and CIA about Padilla’s location and his request.
Padilla traveled to Chicago May 8 from Pakistan via Cairo and Zurich, Switzerland, a U.S. official said Tuesday. Swiss authorities confirmed Tuesday they were investigating Padilla’s travels to their country.
Padilla had $10,000 in cash on him when he was arrested, a government official said Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Officials suspect Padilla got the cash from al-Qaida, possibly while he was in Switzerland, the official said.
“Hah! He’s a patsy! Due process! Get him a lawyer! He won that money on a horse! Unfairly detained! American citizen! Free speech! Guilt by association! Civil liberties! CIA looking at your library records! Men in black with cattle prods! Mossad. Mossaaaaaaaaaaaadddddddd…..!”
…Okay, okay. I’m being a bit provocative here, I realize. But I’m doing so to make a point — which is that we’re fighting a new kind of war nowadays, one that requires us to take pre-emptive measures. Consequently, certain familiar, slippery slope “civil liberties” arguments simply don’t apply to this situation. The Constitution is a living document. It must adapt to new situations.
Here’s Claudia Winkler, writing on preemption for The Weekly Standard :
‘We must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans, and confront the worst threats before they emerge,’ said President Bush at West Point on June 1. The Bush doctrine of anticipatory self-defense, repeatedly enunciated since last September, is not an entirely novel […] But as an overarching principle, replacing deterrence and containment, it requires some getting used to. This latest case of an American who has joined the enemies of the United States and been designated an ‘enemy combatant’ by presidential directive is a small instance of that doctrine in action.
Al Mujahir was not arrested for past crimes, or even caught with a specific plot in hand. ‘He researched nuclear weapons and received training in wiring explosives while in Pakistan,’ said Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, ‘and he was instructed to return to the United States to conduct reconnaissance operations for al Qaeda.’ He is being held at a Navy brig in South Carolina without a lawyer and could apparently be detained indefinitely. In the era of nuclear terrorism, the logic of preemption is compelling, but its application carries us onto unfamiliar ground.
Indeed. This new war will force us to make difficult decisions. And I’m quite willing to debate the merits of each choice we’re given. What I’m unwilling to do, however, is to debate these particulars in the abstract. Al Mujahir, it bears repeating, was not selected at random for detention; he is tied to an organization that in the past benefitted (in terms of the intelligence it was able to gather) from its encounters with our criminal justice system. Handing him over to the Department of Defense, then, seems to me eminantly prudent.
You disagree? Fine. But “due process” applies to a particular set of circumstances. Detention without recourse to a lawyer applies to another set of circumstances — these circumstances.
And that’s that.
To call the Constitution a “living document” is only a way to justify its abrogation. Arresting and detaining citizens indefinitely, without due process? Since when is that the American way. It sounds more like the Soviet Union. Tim McVeigh declared war against the U.S. government too, but he was granted a lawyer and a trial. (Maybe he shouldn’t have been?) But I’m glad you trust this leadership to do the right thing. I’m glad you don’t think they’re trying to secure their power by using scare tactics on the American people. I’ll bet you’re one of those people who believed Lyndon Johnson when he lied about the Gulf of Tonkin, who believed Richard Nixon when he denied everything, who believed Reagan when he lied about Iran-Contra, who believed Bush the First when he lied about Iran-Contra, and so on into the current Bush Administration, which you seem to think is made up exclusively of Honest Abes who will always act in the public interest. You believe without reserve that Padilla is exactly what Ashcroft, Wolfowitz and others of Bush’s PR apparatus say he is, you believe that the Bushies have stopped Armegeddon as they claim, and that Padilla, based solely on the word of an administration desperate for some good PR, should be detained without recourse to counsel (where the case might be proved to be weaker than it appears??). Well I guess blind faith is better than no faith at all.
Sure, you’re right. Our tactics are just like those of the old Soviet Union. And by suggesting that the Constitution is a living document, I’m only trying to abrogate it.
Is there anyplace you don’t see a slippery slope or some grand conspiracy?
Here’s what I won’t do: I won’t dogmatically assume the worst about the government everytime it makes a security decision—y’know, write it off as their way of trying to “secure their power,” whatever that means. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes there are bad people who (like it or not) really <i>aren’t</i> part of the “Power Structure” lording over the Military Industrial Complex.
My faith is not blind faith. As I noted, Padilla wasn’t just plucked out of thin air.
I’ve made my peace with what liberties I’m comfortable trading. If you haven’t, that’s your right (however wrong).
Well, I’m not sure I agree with either of you. But <i>The New Republic</i> is smarter than I am, so read their <a href=”http://tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=express&s=hoffman061202″>their take</a>.
Hoffman’s an attorney who thinks nothing will be right with the world until the criminal justice system is alllowed to get involved in these cases. He’s staking out territory.
What he fails to make clear, though, is that the military justice system <i>is</i> part of the American justice system. Clearly, somebody in Defense thinks Padilla is valuable where he is. He’s a source of intel, and allowing him to lawyer up (his defense attorney would tell him to shut up, then supoena the U.S. intel reports) renders him unusable. During war—and given the legality of their position—I support the DOD’s plan, which is to try to sequester this guy and find out what he knows. This ploy IS subject to judicial review (and in fact, Padilla’s already filed a writ of habeus corpus).