It’s not really my personal opinion. I would have preferred the original position of the Bush administration, which was later the unanimous decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals, that the Conventions don’t apply to al-Qaeda detainees. But the Supreme Court overruled them, and we have to live with it. I would not argue for a position that the Court already ruled differently on without explaining it.
So, it’s not my own personal opinion that I am citing. It’s the law. I don’t think any of the Supreme Court justices, or any of the judges in the lower courts, or even any of their clerks on these cases, would have agreed with you.
Addendum:
I should add that there were some in the Bush administration who thought the full Conventions should be applied. But they believed it wouldn’t matter to most of the detainees. Colin Powell thought there were advantages to doing this. He had told Bush that, at worst, there might be a handful of Taliban soldiers who could then ask for a tribunal, and there was some chance that those few would then get POW status. But it wouldn’t make any difference at all to most of the detainees. He didn’t even think they would merit getting the tribunal.
