In regard to your Nov. 14 editorial "KSM Hits Manhattan—Again": In what can be characterized as emboldening the enemy, Attorney General Eric Holder by proxy has once again shown his willingness and even eagerness to signal to our adversaries that our nation is weak on terrorism.
In a week that showed America and the rest of the world that our commander in chief is unwilling to characterize the murderous acts of Maj. Nidal Hasan for the murders of 13 people at Fort Hood as an act of terrorism and now the announcement of Mr. Holder opting to move the venue for trying the 9/11 terrorists from a military tribunal into our U.S. federal judicial system, Americans should have little doubt that this administration continues to place politics and political correctness ahead of our national security interests.
Further evidence of pandering to the left here and in Europe is clear with the recent call by Mr. Holder for the investigation of the CIA for its involvement in Enhanced Interrogation Techniques, aka water-boarding, to which Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) himself was subjected. Lest we forget, water-boarding provided intelligence that likely saved thousands of Americans. Alas, in a move to treat known terrorists to the liberties afforded to U.S. citizens, the same people who KSM and his ilk seek to destroy, we can hold our heads high to the world by showing them that we are quick to take advantage of every opportunity to appease our critics.
Todd Johnson
Potomac, Md.
Your assertion that Mr. Holder's decision to try the 9/11 conspirators honors their acts by treating them like any other crime misses the point. To the contrary, the determination to try them in a civilian court is an affirmation of the strength of our justice system, flawed but unmatched by anything else in the world today. It reflects our nation's confidence that our courts and citizen jurors are fully capable of judging even the most heinous acts in the open, based on exposition of facts and even-handed application of fundamental legal principles.
Eric A. Savage
Short Hills, N.J.
If there is still a measure of common sense remaining in the Democrat majority Congress, each house of Congress should seek to pass by veto-proof majorities an amendment to the federal Judiciary Law withdrawing subject matter jurisdiction from all federal and state civilian courts over criminal proceedings pertaining to all detainees held at Gitmo and mandating that jurisdiction shall instead reside exclusively with military tribunals. Congress can, and should, promptly act for the reasons expressed in your editorial.
Edwin D. Schindler
Huntington, N.Y.
As your editorial put it, "Foreign terrorists who wage war on America and everything it stands for have no place sitting in a court of law born of the values they so detest. Mr. Holder has honored mass murder by treating it like any other crime." Military tribunals were established by Congress under the 2006 Military Commissions Act for the purpose of trying terrorists such as KSM, but this seems to matter little to the Obama administration, which is apparently more concerned about protecting the "rights" of mass murderers.
The administration will live to regret the decision to try KSM and comrades as ordinary criminals in a civilian court of law. As you contend, "One certain outcome is that an open civilian trial will provide valuable information to terrorists across the world about American methods and intelligence."
Does it not matter to Mr. Holder and the administration that the New York trial would increase the likelihood of another catastrophic attack on U.S. soil? Or, to put it another way, is the attorney general more concerned about reversing the policies of President George W. Bush than defending the safety of the American people?
Brian Stuckey
Denver
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 