WASHINGTON -- Three terrorism suspects being detained at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba may soon go on trial in military tribunals.

In some ways, the United States will be on public trial on how it handles these cases. The world will be watching.

Some of the rules of the military proceedings don't fit into prized U.S. legal traditions. For example, communications between a defendant and his defense lawyers can be monitored. But Pentagon officials insist the rules will be fair.

The trials are expected to begin in a couple of months at Guantanamo where a courtroom is being built.

Some critics have said the United States appears to be taking the approach that the "enemy combatants" are guilty before proven innocent.

When President Bush established the military tribunals in November 2001, the administration came under fire for denying some 680 prisoners taken to Cuba from Afghanistan the rights accorded prisoners of war under the Geneva Accords.

Since then the Pentagon has modified its procedures somewhat to quiet outcries of "kangaroo courts" and "star chamber" proceedings from human rights groups, legal scholars, foreign governments and members of Congress.

The independent Council on Foreign Relations said some administration officials have been reluctant to try terrorism suspects in the civilian court system because of concern that the proceedings could become spectacles and, with appeals, take years to conclude.

Attorney General John Ashcroft asked in congressional testimony in December 2001: "Are we supposed to read (alleged terrorists) their Miranda rights (the right to a lawyer and the right to remain silent), hire a flamboyant defense lawyer and bring them back to the United States to create a new cable network of Osama TV or what have you?"

My answer would be, "Yes, Mr. Attorney General, if necessary."

Tribunal rules have been softened to the point where they are beginning to take on the earmarks of the civilian courts. For example, suspects are officially deemed innocent until proven guilty.

Most of the tribunal trials will be open to the press, but cameras will be banned from the courtrooms.

The new rules do not completely satisfy the critics since appeals to civilian courts are forbidden. There have been reports that U.S. officials might continue to hold suspects even if they are acquitted because their status as "unlawful combatants in war" is separate from charges under which they will be tried.

Air Force Major John Smith, a Pentagon legal spokesman, said the POW rules don't apply because al-Qaida is not a country and not a party to the Geneva Accords on prisoners of war. The same thinking applies to former members of the Taliban, the ousted rulers of Afghanistan.

The juries will consist of three to seven military officers and will require a two-thirds vote for conviction and sentencing. A defendant has to be proved guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

The death penalty would require a unanimous vote by a seven-member military jury. Bush has the last word with a final review of the verdict.

The charges are still a secret, although each of the defendants was apparently a suspected al-Qaida terrorist or an accomplice to terrorism.

The first group of terrorism suspects heading for trial before military tribunals originally included two Britons and one Australian.

Bush, in response to requests from British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Australian Prime Minister John Howard, has put a hold on those three prosecutions and appears likely to order the three men turned over to their respective governments for prosecution.

Military tribunals were first used by George Washington in 1780 to try a British spy captured behind American lines. Abraham Lincoln used military tribunals during the Civil War to try some 4,000 citizens on a variety of charges, including reason and bootlegging.

The last military tribunal was convened in the World War II-era when it tried and sentenced to death a group of Nazis caught spying on the United States.

The Bush administration should realize that the U.S. reputation for fairness is at risk here and that the first round of terrorism trials should be conducted in an open manner. Anything less would damage the U.S. image in a world where the administration's militant foreign policy has already lost us a lot of friends and allies.

(Helen Thomas can be reached at the e-mail address helent@hearstdc.com).