Captured Not Listed As 'POWs'
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Pentagon has all but abandoned the time-honored designation of "prisoner of war" for American military personnel captured in the war on terrorism.
The two U.S. servicemen held by Iraqi insurgents, Army Spc. Matt Maupin of Union Township, Ohio, and Marine Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun of West Jordan, Utah, are officially listed as "captured" rather than prisoner of war.
But that classification is not found in the Geneva Convention, the international agreement drawn up to protect the rights of prisoners of war. As a POW, an individual is entitled to humane treatment including adequate food, clothing and shelter; the receipt of mail; and regular monitoring by humanitarian organizations such as the Red Cross.
"To be a POW you have to be in the hands of a recognized military of a recognized government, and Matt is not," said Shari Lawrence, spokeswoman for the Army's Human Resources Command.
Hassoun is in the "captured" category rather than POW because he was "seized as the result of an unfriendly military or paramilitary force in a foreign country," said Gunnery Sgt. Kristine Scarber, spokeswoman for the Marine Corps.
Individual services make the determination whether someone is "captured" or a POW, said Jim Turner, a Pentagon spokesman.
" 'Captured' is a category available to describe a particular situation that fits in this case," he said. They [Maupin and Hassoun] don't fall into that [POW] category right now," said Turner.
That designation, say veterans groups and those in the POW/missing in action movement, roughly equates to Taliban and al-Qaida fighters captured by U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. Maupin's status is further muddled by claims that he was shot and killed earlier this week. The Pentagon has not substantiated those claims.
Lawyers familiar with the issue say that calling Maupin and Hassoun prisoners of war would infer that those who captured them are legitimate enemy combatants, something the Bush administration is reluctant to do.
"To insist that our people be given prisoner of war status would be tantamount to saying we are involved in a formal armed conflict with these people," said Bob Goldman, a law professor at American University in Washington.
Gary Solis, a retired Marine colonel who teaches law at Georgetown University, said the Pentagon is legally correct in classifying the two as captives.
"In order to be a prisoner of war, you have to have armed conflict in progress, and the U.S. declared the armed conflict over," he said.
Rather than being POWs, they are what the Geneva Conventions refer to as "protected persons," Solis added, and are due the same consideration as POWs. The classification of Maupin and Hassoun as "captured" has angered and frustrated veterans groups and POW/MIA activists.
"Putting our prisoners of war, and they are prisoners of war, into jeopardy by not calling them POWs officially is just unconscionable," said Rick Weidman, director of government relations for the Vietnam Veterans of America.
Steve Robinson, executive director of the National Gulf War Resource Center, a nonpartisan advocacy group for veterans, said the terminology used by the Pentagon since Sept. 11, 2001, has been ambiguous on many levels but that a POW should be called a POW.
"They are not calling this the insurgency on terrorism. They are calling it the war on terrorism. If it's a war, call it a war and give our people the protections under the Geneva Conventions," he said.
"Missing/captured is an oxymoron," said Lynn O'Shea, director of research for the National Alliance of Families, a group seeking an accounting of missing servicemen from all wars. "You're either missing or captured. The Geneva Conventions do not mention a missing/captured status."
When a POW/MIA group sent a box of bracelets with Maupin's name on them to his family members to wear, the group was told the family would wear them only if "POW" was removed.
"Technically, Matt is not classified as a POW," Maj. Mark Magalski, who is assisting the family, wrote the group in an e-mail.
The virtual removal of POW from the Pentagon lexicon apparently is the result of a revision of the Missing Persons Act under the Clinton administration and Department of Defense directive from 2000.
Ann Mills Griffiths, executive director of the National League of POW/MIA Families, said her organization and veterans groups protested the changes.
The opinion of those groups, Griffiths said in an e-mail, was "that protections afforded under the Geneva Conventions would not be applicable if the POW status was not a working category into which U.S. personnel could be placed."
Not so, said Bob Jones, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for POW-MIA affairs under Clinton. "It doesn't do away with POW. It's just a clarification of what categories people could be placed in at any particular time."
The categories listed in the DOD directive are "a legal status," he added. "It's a pretty complicated process they go through" to determine that.
But the National Alliance's O'Shea said that "morally, it diminishes the captured men" by not having a POW status for American service members.
©2004 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution