All at sea

Here's some Bush-quality legal analysis by Andy McCarthy [via Andrew Sullivan]. He's writing about the British captives in Iran and joins others in arguing, contrary to the Geneva Conventions, that they are prisoners of war. Amid the veneer of legal expertise, consider this section --

Under Article 2, [the Conventions] apply in "all cases of declared war or of any other armed conflict which may arise between two or more of the High Contracting Parties, even if the state of war is not recognized by one of them." (Emphasis added.) Even if Iran had not for years been abetting the Iraqi insurgency against coalition forces, the seizure itself was an armed conflict on the high seas between two Geneva signatories -- had it not been, the Britons would not have been captured.

Note that he's trying to slip the Iranian seizure into that "any other armed conflict" clause even though the UK itself has never claimed that the incident was an example of, or put it in, armed conflict with Iran. But the booby prize is clinched by his rhetorical flourish of describing the "conflict" as being on the "high seas" when the dictionary tells us ---

1. the sea or ocean beyond the three-mile limit or territorial waters of a country.
2. Usually, high seas. a. the open, unenclosed waters of any sea or ocean; common highway.
b. Law. the area within which transactions are subject to court of admiralty jurisdiction.

Note that the only issue in the dispute is whether the sailors were in Iraqi or Iranian territorial waters.

UPDATE: A similar mistake from Powerline's Deacon, who is supposed to be a lawyer -- " the seizure of British sailors minding their own business on the open seas". And [final update] -- Dick Cheney!

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, I think it's important that if you get into the business where you reward that kind of behavior, there will be more of that kind of behavior. Once people start taking hostages, or kidnapping folks on the high seas, and then are rewarded for it by getting some kind of political concession or some other thing of value, that would be unfortunate.

[Recall that McCarthy is the same person who stealthily changed his position on whether US permanent residents have habeas corpus rights under the Military Commissions Act]