Enemy Combatant - Change of Meaning in The United States

Change of Meaning in The United States

In the 1942 Supreme Court of the United States ruling Ex Parte Quirin, the Court uses the terms with their historical meanings to distinguish between unlawful combatants and lawful combatants:

Unlawful combatants are likewise subject to capture and detention, but in addition they are subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals for acts which render their belligerency unlawful. The spy who secretly and without uniform passes the military lines of a belligerent in time of war, seeking to gather military information and communicate it to the enemy, or an enemy combatant who without uniform comes secretly through the lines for the purpose of waging war by destruction of life or property, are familiar examples of belligerents who are generally deemed not to be entitled to the status of prisoners of war, but to be offenders against the law of war subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals.(Emphasis added)

In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks the United States Congress passed a resolution known as the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF) on September 14, 2001, wherein the Congress invoked the War Powers Resolution. Using this authorization granted to him by Congress, on November 13, 2001, President George W. Bush issued a Presidential Military Order: "Detention, Treatment, and Trial of Certain Non-Citizens in the War Against Terrorism". The administration chose to call those who it detained under the Presidential Military Orders "enemy combatants". Since then, the administration has formalized its usage of the term by using it specifically for detained alleged members and supporters of al-Qaida or the Taliban. For example

Under the provisions of the Secretary of the Navy Memorandum Implementation of Combatant Status Review Tribunal Procedures for Enemy Combatant Detained at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base Cuba ... An enemy combatant has been defined as "an individual who was part of or supporting the Taliban or al Qaida forces, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners. This includes any person who committed a belligerent act or has directly supported hostilities in aid of enemy armed forces."

This lead has been followed by other parts of the Government and some section of the American news media. The result of this new usage means that the term "enemy combatant" has to be read in the context of the article in which it appears as to whether it means a member of the armed forces of an enemy state, or if it means an alleged member of al Qaida held prisoner by the United States.

Read more about this topic:  Enemy Combatant

Famous quotes containing the words united states, change, meaning, united and/or states:

    “The rising power of the United States in world affairs ... requires, not a more compliant press, but a relentless barrage of facts and criticism.... Our job in this age, as I see it, is not to serve as cheerleaders for our side in the present world struggle but to help the largest possible number of people to see the realities of the changing and convulsive world in which American policy must operate.”
    —James Reston (b. 1909)

    “I hope we shall give them a thorough drubbing this summer, and then change our tomahawk into a golden chain of friendship.”
    —Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)

    “Several classical sayings that one likes to repeat had quite a different meaning from the ones later times attributed to them.”
    —Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)

    “It was evident that, both on account of the feudal system and the aristocratic government, a private man was not worth so much in Canada as in the United States; and, if your wealth in any measure consists in manliness, in originality and independence, you had better stay here. How could a peaceable, freethinking man live neighbor to the Forty-ninth Regiment? A New-Englander would naturally be a bad citizen, probably a rebel, there,—certainly if he were already a rebel at home.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    “Today’s difference between Russia and the United States is that in Russia everybody takes everybody else for a spy, and in the United States everybody takes everybody else for a criminal.”
    —Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)