I don't like this line of thinking, because it blurs the very real distinction between military actions on foreign soil and police actions on American soil. Those two things are, in history and practice, utterly different.
Looking at the footage of cops in humvees patrolling the streets after the Boston marathon, life in DC eight years ago, and even as far back as actions in the nineties, I'm not sure that the distinction is as clearly delineated as any of us would prefer.
I find those activities troubling and I don't think it serves the purpose of ameliorating them to pull international terrorists under the umbrella of police and criminal enforcement. The protections available to ordinary criminal defendants has already become quite eroded and distorted by the necessity of accommodating enforcement against organized crime and drug kingpins within the same framework.
I think you have to be a little careful here, because while the distinction between military action and police action is a good one, the classification of valid responses to terrorism doesn't necessarily follow. Some effective responses to terrorism have been, essentially, police work. And, obviously, some very ineffective responsive responses to terrorism have been military.
