Combatant Status Review Tribunals: Flawed Answers to the Wrong Question

Abstract

This Comment argues that the Combatant Status Review Tribunals were not competent to deny Prisoner of War status because they were charged only with identifying enemy combatants, a broad category that by its own terms includes many POWs. Given the substantial overlap between the definitions of "enemy combatant" and "POW," a CSRT's affirmative enemy combatant determination actually supports a detainee's POW status. Thus, even after their enemy combatant status has been adjudicated by the CSRTs, Guantánamo detainees should still be treated as presumptive POWs.

Keywords: Guantanamo, Combatant Status Review Tribunal, Prisoner of War, Geneva Convention