Something’s going on between Great Britain and the United States. Maybe Gordon Brown thinks Barack Obama is the new whiz kid in how to deal with captured terrorists.

Or maybe Britain’s Attorney General, Lady Scotland of Asthal, has managed to hack into Eric Holder’s computer and download a copy of his new instruction manual: “How to Close Down Gitmo (and Give the Terrorists Some Walking Around Cash).”

Whatever the case and cause may be, Great Britain has decided to do with its terrorists what America is doing with ours: let them go.

The UK Times is reporting on this new British version of musical chairs for terrorists:

Most of the Pakistani men arrested last week in an anti-terrorist operation will be deported rather than charged, senior counter-terrorism sources told The Times last night.

Officials in London and Islamabad said that Britain had begun seeking assurances about how the men would be treated if they were returned to Pakistan. “The British wanted to be reassured that if some of these men were deported they would not face torture,” an informed source in Pakistan said.

One of the 12 men detained, an 18-year-old, has been freed from anti-terrorist detention and is in the custody of immigration officials.

Operation Pathway, the codename for the inquiry, has already led to the resignation of Britain’s most senior anti-terrorist officer, Bob Quick, after he accidentally revealed details of the arrest plans to photographers in Downing Street. If it results in deportations rather than charges, it will also embarrass the Prime Minister, who said that the police were dealing with “a very big terrorist plot” and had criticised Pakistan for not doing more to tackle Islamist terrorism.