Trial of the Decade in NYC

We have been hearing a lot about the decision of the Obama Administration Justice Department to try Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four others in a civilian court rather than via a military commission for the attacks on the World Trade Center.

Mr Steve Simon,♠ a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, writing in The New York Times, gives us a good argument for going the way of a civil trial.  In fact, he does a better job than Attorney General Eric Holder has.

The main argument for this approach is that imams in the Middle East are turning against Osama bin Ladan.  These trials will likely reinforce the split between OBL and mainline Islam, including some fairly radical clerics.

And, Mr Simon's bottom line:

... a judgment in New York, where the greatest suffering was inflicted, will remind us both of the narrow viciousness of the terrorists’ cause and of the enduring strength of our own values.

And that "remind us" includes the rest of the world.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Co-author of The Age of Sacred Terror: Radical Islam's War Against America, available here.