At present, Congress is considering an expansion of the Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF) that it passed on September 14, 2001, and that allowed "the use of force against those nations, organizations, or persons [the President] determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided" the attacks of 9/11. The current version builds upon the previous open-ended war model and actually expands the number of possible targets for the use of force to those who "have engaged in hostilities or have directly supported hostilities in aid of a nation, organization or person" that is engaged in hostilities against the U.S. or its coalition partners.
Nor does it have an end date. How long this overly broad, overly vague policy would remain in effect remains unknown. It would be far better if current and pending revisions of the AUMF were more honest in acknowledging that the counterterrorism policy it promotes is slated to last indefinitely, much like the "wars" on drugs and organized crime. This would, at least, put in front of lawmakers the appropriate question: Are you willing to authorize military force as your perpetual state of risk management against an ever-expanding list of enemies? Perhaps, in the context of an endless state of war (and the expenses that would go with it), Congress might prove more circumspect about granting such broad powers to the president.
2. Release John Walker Lindh: This would be a symbolic act of compassion, a way to turn our attention back to the first moments of the Bush administration's disastrous Global War on Terror, and perhaps help along the process of heading Washington in new directions. Lindh, you may remember, was the young man captured and turned over to U.S. forces by Afghan allies in the early weeks of the invasion of Afghanistan.
An American who had spent time with the Taliban and was ready to fight for them (but not against the United States), he was the first person against whom the Bush administration, in one of their favored phrases, "took off the gloves." He was mistreated and abused while wounded. Later, faced with the prospect of never emerging from jail, he provided information to the authorities in exchange for a 20-year sentence in a plea deal.
Even George W. Bush described him as a "poor boy" who had been "misled," an upper-middle-class American kid whose teenage identity issues sent him deep into the fundamentalist part of the Muslim world, though with no indication on his part of any interest in jihad, nor the slightest idea that the United States would invade Afghanistan and he would find himself on the other side of the lines from his own countrymen.
Lindh's mistreatment in Afghanistan and subsequent sentencing here were essentially acts of symbolic revenge for the tragic death of CIA agent Mike Spann, the first official American casualty in what was already being called the Global War on Terror. His sentence was also meant as a warning to others who might consider his path.
As it happened, the judge in charge of the case acknowledged that there was absolutely no evidence Lindh had been involved in Spann's murder. Bewilderingly enough, he nonetheless allowed the prosecutor to tie Lindh inexorably to Spann's murder through the emotional testimony of Spann's father at sentencing.
The U.S. government was sending a message. If this country would punish one of its own in such a fashion without evidence of a crime or even of theoretical allegiance to the idea of jihad against the West, what wouldn't it do to its foreign enemies?
In prison, Lindh has since committed himself to the quiet life of a scholar of Islam. Many who have followed this case think that, at age 30, he should be returned to his family.
Lindh's release would be a signal that the United States was ready to return to an era of calm justice and that the war on terror, with all its excesses, was truly coming to an end.
3. Create a rehabilitation program for releasing Guantanamo detainees currently assigned to indefinite detention: In the same spirit, it's time to signal that, along with the war on terror, the paroxysm of fears that led us to detain individuals who had not committed crimes, but were otherwise deemed harmful, has come to an end. The Obama administration's most recent directive on Guantanamo follows its long-hinted-at intention to hold approximately four-dozen Guantanamo detainees in indefinite detention for a variety of reasons. Bottom line: although there is insufficient evidence to convict them, administration officials have determined that each of them could pose a danger to this country, if released.
Under U.S. law, detention without trial poses constitutional problems, which is why Guantanamo detainees were granted habeas corpus rights by the Supreme Court. Similarly, under the laws of war, the detention of prisoners is only justified while hostilities are ongoing. If there really is no "war" on terror, it is hard to justify holding detainees indefinitely without a fair adjudication of their rights in a court of law.
Why not, then, consider creating an American version of the de-radicalization or rehabilitation programs that flourish elsewhere in the world -- notably, for example in Indonesia -- as a prelude to release for those where the evidence for a trial is absent? A rehabilitation program might steer individuals towards non-violent behavior, whatever their ideological leanings; it might re-educate them on the subject of Islam; it might introduce notions of rights and liberties. Religious leaders, psychologists, and counterterrorism officials could fashion such a program jointly as they do elsewhere in the world. President Obama surprisingly inserted the word "rehabilitation" in his March 2011 directive on the future of Guantà ¡namo ("Executive Order -- Periodic Review of Individuals Detained at Guantà ¡namo Bay Naval Station Pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force"). Why not use this milestone moment in the war on terror to follow up in a concrete fashion?
4. Revisit the issue of prosecuting those responsible for America's offshore torture policies in the Bush years: The Obama administration made a decision not to investigate or prosecute the creators of the torture policy that defined the Bush administration's interrogation tactics in its war on terror. They did so, its officials claimed, in an effort to focus on the overwhelming issues the new presidency had to confront. They were visibly eager to avoid stoking a bitter partisan battle that they feared might further divide the country.
They banked instead on the idea that the lawyers and politicians responsible for that torture policy and the "black sites" and "extraordinary renditions" that went with it would quietly fade into the woodwork. This has obviously not been the case. On the contrary, in recent months former officials and members of the Bush administration have openly re-embraced those policies. In the aftermath of bin Laden's death, as if on cue, they immediately flooded the newspapers and air waves with unsupportable claims that torture had led Washington to the al-Qaeda leader and should be a crucial part of the American arsenal in the future.
Forget for a moment that torture has still not been shown to have extracted valuable information (not otherwise available) from terror suspects. We know, in fact, that on a number of occasions it led investigators down the wrong path. More importantly, it was a symptom of the war-on-terror frenzy that gripped this country and led it down the wrong path.
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