KR Washington Bureau | 11/30/2003 | Military officers file brief against Bush's policy in Guantanamo:

"WASHINGTON - Navy Rear Admiral Don Guter felt the Pentagon shudder when an airliner hijacked by terrorists crashed into it on Sept. 11, 2001. He helped evacuate shaken personnel and later gave the eulogy for a colleague killed that day.
'I would have done anything that day, and I fully support the war on terrorism,' said Guter, who served as judge advocate general, the Navy's chief legal officer, until he retired last year.
Nonetheless, he's joining his predecessor and a retired Marine general with expertise on prisoner issues to challenge the Bush administration's indefinite detention of suspected terrorists at the Navy base in Guantanamo, Cuba.
Guter, Rear Adm. John Hutson and Brig. Gen. David Brahms worry that lengthy incarcerations at Guantanamo without hearings will undermine the rule of law and endanger U.S. forces.
'For me it's a question of balance between security needs and due process, and I think we've lost our balance,' Guter said.
The trio of retired officers recently filed a Supreme Court amicus brief on behalf of 16 detainees held for almost two years. The government contends that all are enemy combatants, most captured in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and have no legal rights, prisoner of war status or access to federal courts. "