The making of American domestic policy 251
No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be
inflicted on prisoners of war to secure from them information of any kind
whatever. Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened,
insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of
any kind.
Prisoners of war shall be quartered under conditions as favourable as
those for the forces of the Detaining Power who are billeted in the same
area. The said conditions shall make allowance for the habits and customs
of the prisoners and shall in no case be prejudicial to their health.However, the ‘War on Terror’ proclaimed by President George W. Bush
was seen by his administration to be very different from a normal war, and
the status of prisoners was therefore also different. Ari Fleischer, the White
House Press Secretary, stated that the prisoners ‘are not and will not be con-
sidered POWs’. He explained the administration’s view as follows:
Under Article 4 of the Geneva Convention... Taliban detainees are not
entitled to POW status. To qualify as POWs under Article 4, Al Qaeda
and Taliban detainees would have to have satisfied four conditions: They
would have to be part of a military hierarchy; they would have to have
worn uniforms or other distinctive signs visible at a distance; they would
have to have carried arms openly; and they would have to have conduct-
ed their military operations in accordance with the laws and customs of
war.
The Taliban have not effectively distinguished themselves from the
civilian population of Afghanistan. Moreover, they have not conducted
their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war. Instead,
they have knowingly adopted and provided support to the unlawful
terrorist objectives of the Al Qaeda.
Al Qaeda is an international terrorist group and cannot be considered
a state party to the Geneva Convention. Its members, therefore, are not
covered by the Geneva Convention, and are not entitled to POW status
under the treaty.The prisoners were therefore classified as ‘enemy combatants’, and a spe-
cial camp was set up at the US naval base at Guantánamo Bay on the island
of Cuba. The treatment of prisoners there did not fit the conditions normally
accorded prisoners of war, and pictures and press reports of prisoners in or-
ange uniforms, housed in individual cages, being transported on stretcher
trolleys, being made to kneel by guards, shocked many people in the United
States and around the world. The prisoners were of many nationalities, and
efforts were made by the British and other governments to obtain the release
of their nationals, with only partial success. Other individuals suspected of
links to al-Qaeda were arrested, including some with American citizenship
and held in military prisons on American soil. The legality of these deten-
tions, without trial, for potentially unlimited periods, provoked many legal