US Supreme Court Ruling on Enemy Combatants

Again, if these were criminals, they would be tried, convicted and punished.

These are soldiers, not criminals. You can't punish soldiers.
You can kill soldiers, capture and hold soldiers until the end of hostilities, interrogate captured soldiers for whatever battlefield intelligence they have or release them.

The idea that they need to be punished in the context of an ongoing war is fundamentally at odds with reality. Perhaps, after the war is over, there may be some rationale behind trying, convicting and punishing individuals who have acted particularly heinously in wartime.

Think of it like this, by giving these enemy combatants rights, you give ALL enemy combatants these rights, even those NOT in our custody. So, we can't kill bin Laden even if we knew where he was, because he has the presumption of innocence before the law. We can't kill him; we must capture him alive, at great risk and low potential for success.

Imagine if cops went on a rampage and started shooting suspects, instead of detaining them for trial by jury. Outrageous, right?

But this happens in war all the time. There is no evidence brought in a court before someone shooting at our guys is killed. We just go and kill them, no warrant or anything. War is not a civil exercise.

Extending these rights to enemy soldiers means that this is not a war, and our soldiers can't just go kill them, because there is a presumption of innocence, followed by a trial by jury. Until they are convicted, they are INNOCENT, even if they are shooting and killing us! Either we capture them alive, or we die.

This is crazy! And this is what the court has basically said.