Posted By Ray McGovern On December 4, 2011

Ambiguous but alarming new wording tucked into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and just passed by the Senate is reminiscent of the “extraordinary measures” introduced by the Nazis after they took power in 1933.

And the relative lack of reaction so far calls to mind the oddly calm indifference with which most Germans watched the erosion of the rights that had been guaranteed by their own constitution. As one German writer observed, “With sheepish submissiveness we watched it unfold, as if from a box at the theater.”

The writer was Sebastian Haffner (real name Raimund Pretzel), a young German lawyer worried at what he saw in 1933 in Berlin but helpless to stop it since, as he put it, the German people “collectively and limply collapsed, yielded, and capitulated.”

“The result of this millionfold nervous breakdown,” wrote Haffner at the time, “is the unified nation, ready for anything, that is today the nightmare of the rest of the world.” Not a happy analogy.

The Senate bill, in effect, revokes an 1878 law known as the Posse Comitatus Act, which banned the Army from domestic law enforcement after the military had been used — and often abused — in that role during Reconstruction. Ever since then, that law has been taken very seriously — until now. Military officers have had their careers brought to an abrupt halt by involving federal military assets in purely civilian criminal matters.

But that was before 9/11 and the mantra “9/11 changed everything.” In this case of the Senate-passed NDAA — more than a decade after the terror attacks and even as U.S. intelligence agencies say al-Qaeda is on the brink of defeat — Congress continues to carve away constitutional and legal protections in the name of fighting “terrorism.”

The Senate approved the expanded military authority despite opposition from Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and FBI Director Robert Mueller — and a veto threat from President Barack Obama.

The Senate voted to authorize — and generally to require — “the Armed Forces of the United States to detain covered persons” indefinitely. And such “covered persons” are defined not just as someone implicated in the 9/11 attacks but anyone who “substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.”

Though the wording is itself torturous — and there is a provision for a waiver from the Defense Secretary regarding mandatory military detentions — the elasticity of words like “associated forces” and “supported” have left some civil libertarians worried that the U.S. military could be deployed domestically against people opposing future American wars against alleged “terrorists” or “terrorist states.”

The Senate clearly wished for the military’s “law and order” powers to extend beyond the territory of military bases on the theory that there may be “terrorsymps” (short for “terrorist sympathizers”) lurking everywhere.

Is the all-consuming 10-year-old struggle against terrorism rushing headlong to consume what’s left of our constitutional rights? Do I need to worry that the Army in which I was proud to serve during the 1960s may now kick down my front door and lead me off to indefinite detention — or worse?

My neighbors have noticed, after all, that I now wear a longish beard and, sometimes, even a hat like Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. And everyone knows what a terrorsymp he was. “If you see something, say something!”

Worse still, a few of my neighbors overheard me telling my grandchildren that President Obama should be ashamed to be bragging about having Awlaki, an American citizen, and later his 16-year-old son murdered without a whiff of due process. “If you hear something, say something!”

A Lost Respect

Citizens of powerful countries used to have their rights widely respected — at home and abroad. “I am a Roman citizen” — civis Romanus sum — once counted for something. Even more respect tended to greet “I am an American” — because of our power abroad and our once-famous adherence to a written Constitution at home.

Adherence? Lately not so much. Not since power-hungry politicians set out to exploit 9/11 so that “everything changed,” including even the rights formerly guaranteed us by the Bill of Rights and the habeas corpus protection in the Constitution itself.

Awlaki’s is an interesting case in point. A Muslim whose moderating influence was sought by the Washington establishment in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, he became “radicalized” by our warring on his fellow Muslims. By noting that little-known fact, am I showing “support” for “al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces”? Will the U.S. military be obliged to target me, too?

“Not you, Grandpa,” my grandchildren reassured me at Thanksgiving. “Even with the beard and the hat, you don’t really look very much like Awlaki, or like any kind of terrorsymp. You look different; and your light skin and American citizenship should suffice to keep you safe.”

I agreed that I would probably be okay, even if I kept up my vocal criticism of what is happening. But, truth be told, I harbored doubts even on Thanksgiving. And that was before the Senate version of the defense appropriation bill passed last Thursday.

Civis Americanus sum. Yes, I am. But does that really count for much today? It certainly offered no protection to Awlaki, or to his son. What’s to prevent one of my former colleagues at the military or the CIA — those I have roundly criticized for endorsing and cheering on the kidnappers, torturers, and assassins in their employ — from adding me to the “kill or capture but preferably kill” list?

What has been happening in this continuation of a seemingly endless “war on terror” — amid widespread public indifference — makes Richard Nixon’s “enemies list” look like a board game. At least the Nixon White House had a modicum of good sense not to flaunt its skirting the law and violating constitutional rights.

It is a safe bet that functionaries at the National Security Council are updating the kill-or-capture list even now, confident that President Obama will sign the Senate version of the bill into law once it gets predictably endorsed by the Republican-controlled House.

Then, what is to prevent NSC “counterterrorist” functionaries from summoning the go-to lawyers still ensconced in the Justice Department and asking them for help in navigating what appear to be deliberate ambiguities in the new bill’s language.

Backed by a John Yoo-style “legal justification,” an order could be issued to “terminate” me while reassuring my neighbors that, yes, just as you suspected, he was a terrorsymp. Or maybe they’ll simply order some troops from the 82nd Airborne at Fort Bragg, where I was stationed a half-century ago, to apprehend me and give me a free one-way ticket to Guantanamo.

After all, how bad could that be? Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld explained to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer in June 2005 that the detainees at Guantanamo were “living in the tropics. They’re well-fed. They’ve got everything they could possibly want.” And would Rumsfeld lie?

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