WASHINGTON — In a decision that may mark a final blow to the Guantanamo Bay military commissions, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on July 11 blocked guilty pleas by three 9/11 defendants, effectively ending what many believed was the only viable path to closure in the decades-long legal process. The ruling signals deep systemic failure in the U.S. military commissions system created to prosecute alleged terrorists after Sept. 11, 2001.
According to a detailed analysis by Natalie K. Orpett published on Lawfare on July 30, the 2-1 ruling reversed earlier military court decisions that upheld the plea deals and found they had begun performance. In contrast, the D.C. Circuit majority rejected those findings, paving the way for indefinite delays and a renewed spotlight on legal dysfunction at Guantanamo.
The ruling arose from In re United States, a case initiated after Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin abruptly rescinded three plea deals last summer, including one involving alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The deals had promised life sentences and victim engagement opportunities instead of death penalty trials, but Austin’s office canceled them without citing legal grounds or following established procedures under military law.
As Orpett reports in Lawfare, “The majority posited that this whole system, built on the aspirational principle that terrorism could be vanquished with the law, has failed.”
The D.C. Circuit’s decision contradicts years of precedent within the military justice system. Both the trial-level judge and the Court of Military Commissions Review had determined that the plea agreements were binding and that the defendants had already begun to fulfill their terms. Orpett emphasizes that both courts relied on Rule for Military Commissions 705(4)(b), which places strict limits on the ability of the convening authority—Austin in this case—to withdraw from a plea once performance has begun.
The D.C. Circuit majority, however, saw it differently. Judges Patricia Millett and Neomi Rao argued that the defendants had not yet “performed” under the agreements, invalidating the deals. Judge Robert Wilkins dissented, warning in his opinion that the majority’s approach represented a “grave error” that disrespected the findings of two military courts and ignored a clear precedent from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces—United States v. Dean.
“In a move that dissenting Judge Wilkins called ‘stunning’ and a ‘grave error,’ the majority held that mandamus was proper,” Orpett wrote.
The ruling arrives at a moment when many in the legal and victims’ communities had hoped for a resolution. The plea deals had included an unprecedented provision: allowing 9/11 victims’ families to directly question the defendants, offering them a path toward personal closure. With the collapse of those agreements, any remaining hope for a final judgment now appears bleak.
Orpett describes the impact: “Even hoping for a resolution, let alone justice, is almost certainly futile in the absence of guilty pleas.”
Legal scholars and military lawyers are also raising alarms over what the ruling suggests about the federal courts’ view of military justice. Rather than defer to the military commissions’ rules and precedents—such as the near-identical court-martial rule also governing plea withdrawals—the D.C. Circuit turned instead to general contract law.
“By granting mandamus,” Orpett notes, “the majority asserted that two specialized military courts’ adherence to prominent, well-established legal precedent was not only wrong, but so wrong that extraordinary relief was warranted.”
That decision undermines not only the authority of military courts but the system itself. Orpett emphasizes that the ruling “is fundamentally a vote of no confidence.” It suggests that civilian judges no longer believe the commissions are competent to deliver justice, even after 20 years of legal development, investment and reform.
Orpett also draws attention to the underlying political context. While Austin’s office has offered little legal justification for canceling the pleas, critics argue the decision was driven by optics and political sensitivities surrounding plea deals with individuals responsible for the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil.
Still, by sidestepping the rules, Orpett argues, Austin compromised the very legal system he was tasked with upholding. “He didn’t even acknowledge that the regulations limit a convening authority’s ability to withdraw from a plea,” she wrote, emphasizing that his actions disregarded established military procedure and contributed directly to the legal uncertainty now unfolding.
Orpett’s article repeatedly stresses that nearly all parties involved—including the defendants, prosecutors and victims’ families—recognized that guilty pleas were the only realistic way to end the 9/11 case. Yet now, despite years of negotiations and the near-resolution of the matter, all parties are being forced back into a system that has yet to hold a single 9/11 defendant fully accountable in a trial.
“This decision… all but ensured that the 9/11 case will result in neither justice nor closure,” Orpett concludes.
The D.C. Circuit’s decision may be legally narrow, but its implications are wide. For those still seeking justice for 9/11, the ruling is a reminder that America’s promise to answer “brutal murder with patient justice,” as President George W. Bush once put it, remains unfulfilled.
