It's also important to recognize that these people aren't being "punished" per se; rather, they are being detained to prevent them from carrying out or supporting another terrorist attack or terrorist activities against our nation.

In fact, the deeper I look into the issue, it doesn't appear that these detainees would see any significant upgrade even if they were made into POW's - the GC doesn't require POW's have rights to access to lawyers, or the ability to refute their incarceration, or to be released from detention before the end of hostilities.

So, I'm not seeing any reason to give these people fair trials, except obviously for good sportmanship and PR, I suppose.

And as far as the topic of POW's in history goes, compared to the despicable treatment of American soldiers by our enemies (Bataan Death March, Vietnamese/Chinese prison camps), any sort of military imprisonment of terrorists by the United States is like getting a reservation at the Waldorf.