Nearly 56 years ago, the judges presiding at the Nuremberg war crimes tribunals were faced with an unusual question. If any of the Nazi defendants were sentenced to death, how should they be executed?

For military defendants, the French thought a military firing squad would be the most appropriate method of execution. But the Soviets objected vigorously, insisting the Nazi thugs and criminals were just that — thugs and criminals who did not deserve the legitimacy a military association would confer.

In Nuremberg, on Oct. 16, 1946, 10 condemned Nazi criminals were hanged. Not shot, but hanged.

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Consider the present debate over the status of the Taliban and al-Qaeda detainees at Guantanamo Bay. As things now stand, the Bush administration has decided to apply the Geneva Conventions to only the Taliban detainees, but considers neither the Taliban nor the al-Qaeda to be prisoners of war.

For all the fancy language, both groups of detainees are being treated the same. Moreover, sensationalism aside, few would disagree this treatment is humane. The question isn’t whether or not we should feed and shelter the detainees; it is whether we are feeding and sheltering captured combatants or murderous thugs.

When the Nuremberg judges considered the means of execution, the issue wasn’t the outcome (death), but merely the particular nature of that outcome — death as a military officer or death as a heinous criminal.

In 2002, just like in 1946, the matter is more semantics than substance. While classifying the detainees at Guantanamo as POWs would not change their treatment, it might have the unintended effect of legitimizing their crimes as an acceptable tool of war.

The macabre question of appropriate wartime conduct has been spelled out quite explicitly at two Hague conferences (1899 and 1907) and five Geneva conventions (the first in 1864, the last in 1975). To some, they were absurd occasions where powerful men discussed appropriate and inappropriate ways to kill each other (or their subjects). But to others, they represent the best attempt to establish a semblance of morality under amoral circumstances.

The resulting agreements, bolstered by the horrors of the world wars, served to articulate an important principle that has since become a cornerstone of modern combat: War, by its very nature, is incomprehensibly ugly, but there are some things you just do not do.

As weapons have become far deadlier and their delivery systems much more impersonal, this principle has only increased in importance, and the circumstances of the current conflict require us to confront the ramifications of this principle: Should belligerents who have clearly rejected these “laws and customs of war” enjoy their protections? And do we best honor this principle by applying it universally or by excluding those who would tarnish it?

Article Four of the 1949 Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War seeks to define “prisoners of war.” Included in this definition are “members of other militias,” provided that they are captured and “fulfill the following conditions: (a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; (b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance; (c) that of carrying arms openly; (d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war,” a reference to the earlier Hague conferences.

This clearly excludes the terrorists of al-Qaeda. But Article Four in its entirety does make a compelling argument for the classification of captured Taliban as POWs.

Proponents of this classification (including Secretary of State Powell) have pointed out that our adherence to the Geneva Conventions may determine how captured U.S. soldiers are treated in any future conflicts, or will at least give credibility to our demands for humane treatment.

While there is certainly merit in this argument, our true enemies seem unlikely to adhere to international norms under any circumstances; Geneva did not seem to affect the actions of Saddam Hussein or the Somali warlords.

And our moral authority is grounded more in what we represent than what we sign. The detainees at Guantanamo enjoy food, shelter, religious freedom and superior medical care, even though our government does not consider them POWs. They are being treated humanely, not because of what they are but because of who we are.

So we return to semantics. And when I think about the acts of terror visited upon the United States and Afghanistan by these groups and individuals, I can’t help but recall the question faced by the judges at Nuremberg.

Are these people combatants, akin to our heroic men and women who proudly wear their uniforms and courageously defend our ideals abroad?

Or, are they brutal thugs and murderers whose crimes are abhorrent to humanity and whose elevation to any other status would give them a dignity that they do not deserve and that we cannot tolerate?

Bryant Walker Smith (bsmith@badgerherald.com) is a senior majoring in civil engineering.