Attorney General Eric H. Holder announced a change in the Obama Administration’s approach towards terror suspects in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” (see http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/10/us/politics/10holder.html?sq=holder%20miranda&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print). He urged Congress to limit Miranda rights for transnational terrorists. Such a change would allow investigators to interrogate terror suspects without informing them about their rights and using these statements as evidence afterwards.
Holder argued that “We’re now dealing with international terrorists and I think we have to think about perhaps modifying the rules that interrogators have and somehow coming up with something that is flexible and is more consistent with the threat we now face.”
“Modifying rules” because of the new kind of threat, sounds familiar. It has been the mantra of the Bush Administration for justifying its hard stance against terror suspects and one of the causes for its “overreaction”. The question now arises, why Obama has changed his way of thinking of how to handle terrorists?
A paper by Michael S. Rocca sheds some light on this question. Rocca (2009, 276) contends that “[i]nternational crises create position taking opportunities for members of Congress”. That means by taking position in such a moment they can “create future credit-claiming opportunities”. By opposing the war on Iraq and the tough stance of the Bush Administration towards terror suspects, Obama was able to gain credit during presidential elections. He now faces a Congress and a political environment willing to uphold the tough stance towards terrorists. Obama needs Congress for his most important legislative projects (health care or financial reform, etc.) and therefore will not fight a long lost battle.
That’s the sort of change we can believe in!
Rocca, M. S. (2009). 9/11 and Presidential Support in the 107th Congress. Congress & the Presidency, 36(3), 272-295.
The release of several video messages by Osama bin Laden and a German Al-Qaeda disciple, Bekkay Harrach (for more information on Harrach see “Bekkay Harrach – Der Mann der Deutschland droht“, “Wer ist Abu Talha, der sanfter Stimme Berlin mit Terror droht?“), has triggered a series of interesting reports and comments on the question of how serious such threats really are. Basically, all commentators and experts emphasize that such threats have to be taken seriously. Especially against the backdrop of similar threats in Spain in course of the elections 2004 and the Madrid bombings few days before election day.
However, these reports also differ in their evaluation if Al-Qaeda or affiliated groups are really planning attacks in Germany or if they only try to mobilize potential grass roots activists. Guido Steinberg, terrorism expert of the Institute for German and International Affairs in Berlin, argues that Harrach’s video message must be taken very seriously. According to him, Al-Qaeda cannot afford uttering idle threats. The movement has to maintain its reputation and cannot jeopardize it by announcing bombings without realizing them (see “Bekkay Harrach is keine Al-Qaida-Witzfigur“).
In contrast to Steinberg, Thomas Hegghammer writes in a post on JIHADICA, that the “al-Qaida would not issue all these messages if something really big was in the making in the next few days, precisely because media offensives put intelligence services on high alert” (see “Al-Qaida and the German Elections“). According to Hegghammer, it seems rather likely that such messages are aimed at inspiring independent grass roots activists and not the sign of imminent attacks.
Nevertheless, the German security establishment takes these threats very seriously and has altered the threat level and reinforced its security measures (see “Bonner Qaida-Kader ruft zum militanten Dschihad auf“, “Deutschland lässt sich nicht einschüchtern“, “Polizei riegelt Wiesn ab“) . It remains to be seen if these video messages are nothing but smoke and mirror or if Al-Qaeda really has the potential to coordinate and conduct attacks in Germany.
Afghanistan
As the situation in Afghanistan seems to deteriorate every day, US President Obama has to make a tough call. His generals, as the Washington Post reports, call for an increase of troop size, whereas public opinion and related to that Congressional support melt. Obama always thought of Afghanistan as the “right war” to fight but now it seems as if he will run out of time. Also the Economist dedicated this week’s edition to Afghanistan. As almost every story of the Economist, it’s worth reading!
Torture and Rendition
On a daily basis we receive reports from the C.I.A.’s secret counter-terrorism operations. There are some “good” news and of course bad ones too. Let’s start with the “good” news. A Justice Department report “forced” Eric H. Holder, the Attorney General, to choose John H. Durham (a well respected Republican but incorruptible prosecutor) to investigate the C.I.A.’s interrogation programmes. The report talks about C.I.A. officers “sexually assaulting members of a detainee’s family, staging mock executions, intimidations with a handgun and power drill, and blowing cigar and cigarette smoke into prisoner’s faces to make them vomit”. Holder seems to have the guts to investigate these allegations comprehensively, although President Obama always asked to look forward (or in other words, “don’t care about it”) instead of looking back.
The bad news has to do with rendition. The practice of sending suspects to third countries for detention and interrogation, which commenced under the Administration Clinton and was one pillar of Bush’s counter-terrorism policy, will go on. Human rights groups criticise the rendition programme because of the cooperation with countries with a history of torture (like Syria, Jordan or Egypt). But President Obama wouldn’t be President Obama if he didn’t reassure that this time everything will be fine. “Diplomatic assurance” will be monitored closely and so there is no need to be sceptical. At least, there is also a good side: Knuckles is back 
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Attorney General Eric H. Holder announced a change in the Obama Administration’s approach towards terror suspects in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” (see http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/10/us/politics/10holder.html?sq=holder%20miranda&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print). He urged Congress to limit Miranda rights for transnational terrorists. Such a change would allow investigators to interrogate terror suspects without informing them about their rights and using these statements as evidence afterwards.
Holder argued that “We’re now dealing with international terrorists and I think we have to think about perhaps modifying the rules that interrogators have and somehow coming up with something that is flexible and is more consistent with the threat we now face.”
