A U.S. Naval base in Cuba is holding one of the most interesting trials of the year. Five men are being charged with terrorism, conspiring with al Qaeda, and bringing down the twin towers on 3,000 people. As the pretrial commences, the main issue has been whether the military has been spying on these five men as they talk with their lawyers.

Staff judge Navy Capt. Thomas J. Welsh was concerned. He viewed a carefully monitored meeting in the military complex, Echo II, that suggested to him that these men be under surveillance. The recorded meeting was unrelated to their trial, however, and when he confronted the Joint Detention Group commander Army Col Donnie Thomas, he said “Don’t worry, we do not monitor any attorney-client meetings.”

Should we be so sure? Cheryl Bormann, a civilian attorney for one of the men, Walid bin Attash, was told that a smoke-detector looking device was not a microphone when in fact it was.

“It was really not identifiable, it was not readily noticeable,” said Welsh. “If I knew [improper monitoring] was going on, I would have notified my authorities, I would have notified my boss, I would have notified my supervising attorney.”



It matters, after all, that the trials go as cleanly as possible, because the attack on the United States was symbolically an attack on our freedom system. To deny our citizens those very freedoms, say, by spying on them when they are in private meetings with their lawyers, would undermine the very values we are fighting to uphold.