Thus far in the war against terrorism, the United States has been doing a first-rate job. The fury of our military prowess has been routinely decimating the Taliban and al-Qaida forces and we have sustained fairly minimal casualties. However, the latest development in the war has unleashed a controversial question.

What to do about the captured Afghanistan soldiers?

Bush made it U.S. policy that the United States does not regard Afghan prisoners as Prisoners of War as defined in the Geneva Convention. Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld have both supported this stance. They feel that, as far as the letter of the law is concerned, the prisoners are not POWs.

However, a memo by Secretary of State Colin Powell has created some second thoughts about the matter. He contends that the prisoners should be considered POWs and thus subject to rights granted by the Geneva Convention.

Powell is absolutely right. The Afghan prisoners should be considered to be full-fledged POWs.

One reason surrounds our allies. One of the most important assets in our war against terrorism is our wide array of major allies such as Great Britain and France.

Most of our allies have expressed concern and disgust with our position on the POW issue. Granted, the terrorist attack was on the United States and not Great Britain, but the last thing the U.S. wants is to alienate its closest allies and take the burden of eliminating terrorism solely on its back. We need our allies to stand with us until we see this ordeal through.

A popular argument supporting Bush's stance is that if they are not considered POWs, we can't interrogate them. This is false.

Under the Geneva Convention, all that is required of them is that they give their name, rank, date of birth and serial number (or other form of identification). That is all that is required. We can still interrogate them and ask all the questions we want. The Geneva Convention merely states that they are not required to reply. If this argument implies that we would lose the opportunity to torture them for information, well, we shouldn't be torturing them regardless.

Another argument states that if we call them POWs, we would be restricted from trying them for crimes of terrorism and would have to return them to Afghanistan immediately after the war is over. This too is false.

The Geneva Convention completely allows us to accuse, try, convict and sentence war criminals. Only if they are acquitted, have completed their sentence or weren't tried at all would they be returned to Afghanistan. They would still have their day in court and, if found guilty of being in any way related to terrorist attacks or "attempting to kill U.S. nationals," we would be free to inflict justice upon them.

The last reason to label them as POWs is that it is simply the right thing to do.

We are the good guys in this fight and we must restrain ourselves to the moral high ground. While the thought of inflicting punishment on the captured terrorists while pounding information of the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden is extraordinarily enticing, we must remember that they are the butchers, not us.

Bush should extend the prisoners Geneva Convention POW recognition as soon as possible so we can retain the respect of our allies, support our image as the righteous in the court of public opinion and get busy convicting the terrorists and making them pay for Sept. 11.

Editorial Board: John Wakefield, Heather Mangold, Melissa Davis, Laura Pelner, Dave Stephens.