To Some a Militant; to Others, a Terrorist

Reading in your May 19 editorial, “Send Him to Caracas,” that “Venezuela’s judiciary admittedly does not have all the due-process guarantees that Luis Posada Carriles might have found in a U.S. court,” I had to laugh. What protections? Being tried on secret evidence for secret charges while not being allowed to cross-examine key witnesses, as is now possible in the U.S.? Being declared an “enemy combatant” and never see a court? I wonder where The Times has been the last four years.

Christian Haesemeyer

Princeton, N.J.

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Re “To Cuba, a Terrorist; to the U.S., a Quandary,” May 18: The only reason the case of anti-Fidel Castro militant Posada is a “quandary” for the United States is that it has permitted Cuban exiles to engage in terrorist activities, both from the United States and inside the United States, for more than four decades, as long as they were “anti-Castro.” President Bush said it well when he said that one who harbors a terrorist is as guilty as the terrorist himself. Which is it going to be now?

Walter Lippmann

Los Angeles