“Asked by reporters about the treatment [of prisoners captured in the war on terror], [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld suggested at a January 11 [2002] Pentagon news briefing that they would be ‘handled not as prisoners of war, because they’re not, but as unlawful combatants [who] do not have any rights under the Geneva Convention.’ He made no distinction between al-Qaeda and the Taliban but said that the military planned, ‘for the most part, [to] treat them in a manner that is reasonably consistent with the Geneva Conventions, to the extent they are appropriate.’ ”
– Karen DeYoung, Soldier: The Life of Colin Powell, Page 367