Rare News Desk
The Pentagon recently released its 2015 “Department of Defense Law of War Manual,” a massive document containing more than 1,100 pages of rules for American warfare. As the Washington Times has discovered, one of those rules declares that journalists may be considered “unprivileged belligerents”—which is basically a new term for enemy combatants who don’t get constitutional rights. Here’s the passage in question, which can be found on p. 173:
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In general, journalists are civilians. However, journalists may be members of the armed forces, persons authorized to accompany the armed forces, or unprivileged belligerents.
As the Times quotes a legal expert, this is “an odd and provocative thing for them to write.”
It is especially noteworthy in light of the case of Jawed Ahmad, an Afghan reporter who was arrested by American troops as an enemy combatant back in 2007. Ahmad was held at the notorious Bagram Prison, where he was interrogated by Americans who insisted he was a spy for the Taliban. His detention included torture: “For nine days they didn’t allow me sleep,” Ahmad said. “When I landed first of all they stood me in snow for six hours. It was too cold — I had no socks, no shoes, nothing. I became unconscious two times.” He described the overall experience as “hell.”
After a year, Ahmad was suddenly released without explanation. Before his death in 2010, he recounted the last conversation he had with his American guard at Bagram: “I will never forget it. They said ‘you know what?’, and I said ‘what’ and they said there is no right of journalists in this war.”
This Pentagon manual seems to be formalizing and expanding that view as official military policy, and it is not difficult to imagine it resulting in more torturous, unjustified detentions like Ahmad’s.
