Theater Critics
by digby
Speaking of the latest kerfuffle over Seymour Hersh’s reporting on Cheney’s assassination squad, Emptywheel quotes ex-official John Hannah on CNN today explaining why it would be perfectly legal:

Hannah: There’s no question, in a theater of war, when we are at war–and there’s no doubt, we are still at war against Al Qaeda in Iraq, Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. and on that Pakistani border–that our troops have the authority to go out after and capture and kill the enemy, including the leadership of the enemy.

This fellow might quarrel with that seeing as how he’s just been convicted of murder for capturing and killing the enemy in Iraq:

An American army sergeant faces up to 35 years in prison after admitting his involvement in the summary executions of four bound and blindfolded Iraqi prisoners. US Sergeant First Class Joseph Mayo told a court martial in Vilseck, southern Germany, that he thought the shootings were in the best interests of his troops because he feared the prisoners would attack them if released. The 27-year-old and fellow soldiers killed the four men with pistol shots to the head before pushing their bodies into a Baghdad canal in spring 2007 after fatal attacks on their patrol. His lawyer claimed that American troops on the ground in Iraq received insufficient support but military prosecutors said Mayo had demonstrated a “total lack of moral courage”. Mayo, from Fort Bragg, North Carolina, told his court martial at the US Army’s Rose Barracks that he was guilty of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. Asked by the judge whether he thought he had the authority to shoot the prisoners, he replied: “I thought it was in the best interests of my soldiers.”

Turns out there are all kinds of laws that forbid such things even in the “theater of war.” And there are laws that forbid assassinations and torture too. Cheney and his minions just believed those laws didn’t apply to them.