Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, calmly told a U.S. military court Thursday that he wishes for a death sentence so that he can become "a martyr."
Call me cynical, but last week, the CIA was saying al Qaeda is on the run.
This week, Mohammed is finally going on trial, despite being in custody for five years.
Presumptive Republican nominee John McCain has consistently presented himself as the national security candidate. Dubya's time is winding down. He needs a legacy.
Whatever could it all mean? :^)
The article makes it clear that in certain respects, this is something of a show trial:
The cases against these detainees are largely for the purposes of the United States government obtaining death sentences, because even acquittal likely would mean that the detainees remain in U.S. custody indefinitely. The U.S. government has determined each of the men to be "enemy combatants" and serious threats to the United States and its allies.
Thursday's arraignment is just the first step in what is certain to be a lengthy and contentious legal process, one that likely will put the untested military commissions system itself on trial. Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas W. Hartmann, the chief legal adviser for the military commissions, argued Wednesday that the trials will be "fair, just and transparent," but defense lawyers have said that the system is a sham and that justice cannot be pursued in the courtrooms of this island military base.
Though other military commissions cases have reached the stage of arraignment and legal motions, only one other case has been fully adjudicated. That occurred last year when Australian David M. Hicks reached a politically brokered plea agreement and was shortly repatriated and later released.