Murder trial or terror circus?

The reasons are legion for opposing the Obama administration’s decision to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other al-Qaida terrorists to New York City for civilian trials.

But the most significant reason is the most fundamental: Why extend constitutional protections to the worst of enemies, the man who has bragged about his role in planning the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that killed 3,000 civilians in New York; Washington, D.C.; and Pennsylvania.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is not a U.S. citizen and he was not even apprehended on U.S. soil. He is not part of a uniformed standing army and probably shouldn’t deserve protections under the Geneva Conventions. Let’s get it straight: He is a terrorist, not a criminal or a soldier.

The United States is engaged in a war against terrorists, killing lesser Taliban and al-Qaida targets without extending them the opportunity for constitutional protections. Yet we are supposed to now give Sheikh Mohammed all of the opportunities for the now-familiar American spectacle of a circus trial that will capture the attention of the world.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Eric Holder deems it appropriate for others captured and held at Guantanamo Bay to be tried before military tribunals. How can this be? Why the red-carpet treatment for Mohammed?

There are many well-informed observers who easily predict the pitfalls that lay ahead in New York. One of the best is Andrew McCarthy, the former federal prosecutor who led the case against the “Blind Sheikh,” the man behind the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

“As experienced defense lawyers well know,” McCarthy wrote this week, “when there is no mystery about whether the defendants have committed the charged offenses, and where there is controversy attendant to the government’s investigative tactics, the standard defense strategy is to put the government on trial.”

That’s right. Beyond motions for changes of venue and other delaying tactics, there will be motions for the discovery of evidence related to U.S. intelligence gathering and there will be challenges over interrogation techniques. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, as everyone knows, was waterboarded. Will his confessions hold up?

Or will there be enough doubt for a hung jury? Or will a judge find some technicality to acquit. Despite President Obama’s stated confidence that Mohammed will be convicted and executed, there are no guarantees except for the certainty that the trial will be lengthy and expensive.

It took five years to prosecute and convict Zacarias Moussaoui for his role as an accomplice in the 9/11 attacks, and there is no reason to expect this trial to be any shorter. New Yorkers are rightly concerned about the costs of providing security for years on end, as well as their own safety.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his cohorts should be tried before a military tribunal, period. Even that is more than they deserve.