-Caveat Lector-
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Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War!
POW vs Detainee?
Date:
Thu, 31 Jan 2002 11:07:33 -0500
From:
"James Gregory" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Organization:
1st National BankCard
To:
<Undisclosed-Recipient:@sumter.awod.com;>
Cuba-based captives are not POWs
When my husband, U.S. Marine Col. William R. ''Rich'' Higgins, was
captured by radical
Islamic terrorists in Lebanon in 1988, our country never called him a
''prisoner of war,''
but maintained he was a ''detainee'' (''Terrorism victim remembered,''
Letters, June 19,
2001).
I'd like to believe that if those same officials were in the government
today, things might
have been different. Had my late husband been declared a POW, our
country could have
insisted on ''humane treatment and certain accommodations'' ('' 'POW'
has legal rights; a
'detainee' might not,'' News, Tuesday).
I always thought of my husband as a prisoner of war. After all, he met
the ''traditional
definition'' of a POW, according to the unnamed officials quoted in USA
TODAY's article:
He wore a uniform, had a ''recognized hierarchy'' and subscribed ''to
the international
norms of warfare'' -- although as a United Nations peacekeeper, he was
unarmed.
I know that even as he was dying of torture, abandoned by the Red Cross
and the United
Nations, he thought of himself as a POW. I'm also sure he thought his
country did, too.
The terrorists being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are not POWs. Col.
Higgins was.
Robin Higgins
© Copyright 2001 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
_________________________________________________
Colonel William R. “Rich” Higgins, a United States Marine serving with
the
United Nations in the Middle East, was captured February 1988, held for
an
indeterminate time, and murdered sometime before his remains were
returned
home almost four years later, in December 1991. His friends and family
could
never get the United States to declare him a Prisoner of War during that
time.
There was never any outrage on the part of the international community
and no
insistence on humane treatment or any other rules of the Geneva
Convention.
Do you believe that when a man or woman in the uniform of this country
is
taken by hostile forces because of who the servicemember represents, he
or
she should be treated by our country as a Prisoner of War? It is
recognition of
the bond this country has with those who would go into harm’s way for
our
country.
In the midst of the debate over what to call and how to treat the
terrorist
criminals being held in Cuba, please let us not forget our own
servicemembers. Please consider asking the Defense Department and your
elected representatives to declare Colonel William R. Higgins,
posthumously, a
Prisoner of War.
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