April 9, 2007 Issue
Copyright © 2007 The American Conservative
by Gregory Cochran
I think almost everybody has wondered what would have happened if they had made a different choice in life, taken a different path. If you didn’t think of it by yourself, seeing “It’s a Wonderful Life” a few hundred times has probably driven the point home by now.
Many authors have applied this idea to big turning points, writing about alternative histories in which Hitler won World War II (Fatherland) or the South won the Civil War (Bring the Jubilee). The notion may not be pure fantasy: the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics suggests that these Worlds-of-If may really exist, although forever unreachable.
Or maybe not so unreachable. A very odd pattern of statements by prominent supporters and members of the Bush administration suggests that we may have some truly unusual visitors—literally out-of-this-world.
You see, the president and his associates keep referring to historical events that never happened, at least not as they did in the fields we know. And they keep referring to the same ahistorical events. Over and over, the secretary of state and the (now former) secretary of defense have referred to guerrilla warfare in Germany after the Nazi surrender. But there just wasn’t any. You can’t find it in the history books or in the memories of people who were there at the time. My uncle was in Bavaria in the summer of 1945: no trouble. Secretary Rumsfeld repeatedly talked about the similarities between today’s Iraq and America after the Revolutionary War, but again, I’m pretty sure that there aren’t any. I don’t believe we found tortured corpses in the streets of Philadelphia every morning back in 1784. And why does President Bush keep saying that Saddam refused to admit those UN arms inspectors back in 2002 and early 2003? Why did Condoleezza Rice, in 2000, say that Iran was probably backing the Taliban, when in fact the two had almost gone to war in 1998?
Now some might say that these statements were just talking points—that is, lies—but I sure wouldn’t want to accuse anyone of lying. More to the point, there have been many ahistorical statements that are just strange and don’t seem to advance any particular political agenda. For example, when President Bush said that the Japanese lost two carriers sunk and one damaged at the Battle of Midway (instead of losing all four, which is what actually happened), who gained? When POTUS said that Sweden has no army (it does), what political argument was advanced?
We’re talking about the rulers of the most powerful nation on earth. It can’t be that they’re just pig-ignorant—of their own history, yet. There has to be a deeper, more subtle explanation.
We can learn more by examining these statements in detail, including those of the administration’s close supporters. They too keep diverging from the history we know. Recently, Rep. Don Young of Alaska quoted Lincoln as saying, “Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs, and should be arrested, exiled or hanged.” Lincoln never said that, of course. Cliff May, at National Review, said “President Roosevelt waited until after World War II to put in place a commission to investigate what mistakes led to Pearl Harbor.” Pretty fly for a dead guy: FDR passed on just before Germany surrendered, well before the Japanese quit. And anyhow, the first of many Pearl Harbor investigations—the Roberts Commission—started only 11 days after the sneak attack.
More and more, I get the feeling that Bush and his friends come from one of the Worlds-of-If—a sad place, even worse than the one we actually live in, a world in which their odd statements are true.
When tired or stressed, they refer to the history that they lived and learned in school. But their briefing books recount an alternate history in which Iraq in 2002 was not a poor and backward country but the coming threat, as our Germany was in 1938. A history in which America, after the Revolution, was a flaming cesspool like Iraq today, a world in which Lincoln executed unruly legislators. One in which World War II dragged on long after the indecisive Battle of Midway. One in which our occupation of Germany was plagued by guerrilla warfare. One in which we’ve been fighting World War IV with Iran and Syria for 25 years, as Jim Woolsey has repeatedly said. One in which a hostile Islamic Caliphate has bothered to go through the formality of coming into existence.
Close study of such statements might eventually give a rough sketch of that other world’s history. This would be of immense value, for it would allow us to learn much about the inner workings of the historical process, just as the discovery of a different kind of life on Mars would be an epochal event in biology. The fact that a history that diverged from ours at least 200 years ago, judging from the differences in the Revolution, still bears some resemblance to ours—still had a battle of Midway, just not the same battle—suggests that unknown overarching forces constrain the course of events. But the story is never the same in detail.
The casual mention of World War IV strongly implies that these interlopers also had a World War III. They must have suffered greatly—maybe bombed out, likely short on resources such as oil. I would guess that those disasters irretrievably darkened their political perspective, just as our World War I left an entire generation embittered and disaffected. Certainly some kind of civilizational blight is needed to explain Vice President Cheney’s “Dark Lord” shtick.
Somehow they came here, so there must be a gate or portal. Judging from the spatial clustering of identifiable visitors, it’s somewhere in Washington, probably very close to the AEI building. Possibly inside. It may be an accident of nature, or it might be a scientific wonder used for judicial exile, just as bad Kryptonians were sent to the Phantom Zone. You have to wonder about that when you consider the kind of guys they’re sending.
If two-way transfer is possible, there could be vast business opportunities. There are reasons to suspect that science and engineering took a very different path over there: their limited understanding of nuclear weapons—they seem to think that nukes are roughly as easy to build as bottle rockets—suggests that nuclear fission may never have been developed on their timeline. But even if they’re behind us in some areas, they’re likely to be ahead in others. I’d guess that they know far more about torture than we do. Practice makes perfect.
Even if they’ve never split the atom, they have much to offer. The very existence of such a portal is the most significant new scientific result in a century, far more important than any result expected from the most advanced accelerator. The sheer physical presence of Condoleezza Rice on this plane suggests, indeed demands, new physics that may lead to the long-desired marriage of quantum mechanics and general relativity. It’s either this or string theory.
Of course this means that we need to corral some or all of these visitors for study and experimentation. Such experiments would, I suppose, interfere with their civil liberties, if they had any, but they’re obviously not citizens of these United States. Technically they’re illegal aliens. Gitmo’s a-waitin’.
And perhaps we can do more. Obviously this other world is in a sorry state and could stand some saving. They’re our closer-than-brothers—our other selves living in a world gone bad, a world in which the toast always falls butter-side down, a world where Mr. Potter owns the Building and Loan. Undoubtedly an irrepressible desire for freedom burns in every heart there. As soon as possible, we should begin preparing for their liberation.
It will be a cakewalk. .
___________________________________
Gregory Cochran is a physicist and evolutionary biologist.
Showing posts with label Gitmo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gitmo. Show all posts
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Friday, February 9, 2007
Gitmo Cover-up?
February 09, 2007 1:26 PM
But Lieutenant Colonel Colby Vokey, the superior officer to the Marine sergeant who filed the allegations, called the investigation "outrageous." "I am aware that the investigators interviewed only the suspects and some witnesses but did not interview any detainees or potential victims," he told ABC News. "Failure to interview those who may have been subjected to abuse is indicative of an incomplete investigation."
As first reported on "The Blotter" on ABCNews.com, Heather Cerveny (pictured), 23, a Marine Corps sergeant, who spent a week on the base last September working as a legal aide to Lt. Col. Vokey, said she was "shocked" to hear several guards from different parts of the base openly speak of mistreating prisoners.
THE BLOTTER RECOMMENDS
One said, "I took the detainee by the head and smashed his head into the cell door," she told ABC News in October after filing a sworn affidavit with the Pentagon Inspector General. Another "was telling his buddy, 'Yeah, this one detainee, you know, really pissed me off, irritated me. So I just, you know, punched him in the face.'"
The following investigation by SouthCom, which oversees military activities in the Caribbean and Latin America, looked into Cerveny's account and another filed by a civilian employee on the base that recounted a conversation between a female guard and a male interrogator on a training range. After interviewing 20 suspects and witnesses and combing through "three JTF-Guantanamo records systems used to trace detainee-guard interaction," investigators determined, "The evidence did not support any of the allegations of mistreatment and harassment."
Click Here for Full Blotter Coverage.
Amongst the recommendations issued by the investigating officer but ultimately rejected by the SouthCom commander following the investigation was "that disciplinary or other action be taken against Sergeant Cerveny," which Lt. Col Vokey says is the most "outrageous part of the investigation."
"The interview of her [Sgt. Cerveny] was ridiculous and oppressive," he said. "The investigating officers, a colonel and a captain, walked straight into her office with the intent to accuse her of a crime before she even opened her mouth. The colonel already had the form in his hand to read her her rights and accuse her, before the interview started."
Lt. Col. Vokey says this investigation sets a dangerous precedent for all officers who find themselves in a position to report suspected criminal activity. "This was outrageous and sends a dangerous message to all our service members: you'd better not report anything that goes on at Guantanamo Bay, or you'll be threatened or charged with a crime."
Read the press release from United States Southern Command.
February 9, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (2)
Thursday, December 14, 2006
'Gitmo Is Like Being Alive in Your Own Grave'
PAKISTAN:
Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Dec 14 (IPS) - ''Guantanamo brings images of a man in orange overalls, his face down and a soldier holding him by the neck, like a dog on a leash," says 14-year-old Zahra Paracha. "Animals are treated better,'' she tells IPS.
"What's the point of talking to you," she then says, her eyes clouding up. "I'm tired of telling the media that my father is innocent. In the first press conference three years ago, I poured my heart out but that did not bring my father back. I think no one can help us, neither the government nor President Pervez Musharraf.
''When we sold our soul and became a United States ally, we lost any bargaining power we (Pakistan) ever had," adds Farhat Paracha, wife of Guantanamo Bay prisoner Saifullah Paracha and mother of another, Uzair Paracha.
But Muneeza Paracha, 24, her older daughter, a business graduate who has kept the family business stay afloat, is calmer. "I think the situation is somewhat different from what it was in 2003. I believe the Bush administration is under immense pressure to shut down Guantanamo. The media have done a lot and are still alive to the plight of the prisoners and this alone makes me very hopeful." She however, does not deny that life without her father has been tough.
Saifullah Paracha, 60, a successful businessman and a philanthropist, based in this southern port city, has been held at the U.S. military prison, in Cuba, since September 2004. While on his way to a business meeting in July 2003, he was picked up at the Bangkok airport and whisked away to the Bagram airbase in Afghanistan and, after 15 months, moved to Guantanamo.
Earlier that year, in February, 23-year old Uzair Paracha, on a business trip to the U.S., was arrested by intelligence agents and charged with terrorist conspiracy and alleged links to al-Qaeda, the terrorist group behind the Sep.11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. "My husband was such a strong person, but Uzair's abduction broke him. The first time I saw him cry was then. He felt so helpless to be unable to help his son,'' said Farhat
''I don't know if I will live to see my son in person, that's my greatest nightmare. He's been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison," says Farhat, 56, who survives on anti-depressants and the 15 minutes-a-month phone call from her son.
Her voice quivering with emotion, she said, "He was like any young twenty-something, with the world at his feet and a girlfriend by his arm. They were desperately in love and were just waiting for him to finish studies. She got married recently and I don't blame her, for she couldn't wait endlessly."
According to Farhat he's gained weight, 170 pounds, because he avoids going out for exercise as on the way prisoners are strip-searched. "He spends time reading and has also become regular with prayers." The only communication Farhat has had with her husband, since July 2003, was through his lawyer or e-mails from some rights organisations. She gets letters from him which are "short, hurried scribblings at the back of International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) pages''.
Not charged with any crime, the older Paracha was also suspected to have links with the al-Qaeda which he has denied. "He is alleged to have been part of a plan to smuggle explosives into the United States for al-Qaeda. He is also alleged to have spoken to Osama Bin Laden." says the Britain-based Reprieve's senior counsel, Zachary Katznelson, who has met Paracha twice, the last time in October 2006, and spoken to him once on the phone in November.
"He has never hidden the fact that he met Bin Laden in 1999. In fact, he used to brag about his meeting and was quite taken in by the soft-spoken man he thought Laden was. He said he wanted to have him interviewed to give his version, for his production house,'' says Farhat.
Asked if there was any link between the father and son's abductions, Katznelson says, "The allegations for both relate to contacts they had with Majid Khan, another Pakistani prisoner in Guantanamo." Khan, accused of being a member of al-Qaeda, has denied any links the two may have with the al-Qaeda or terrorism. He met them as Pakistani businessmen.
Paracha senior is being held in Camp-5 Delta, which, he told his wife, is ‘like living in your own grave.'
This is qualified by Katznelson. "Camp-5 is a maximum security prison. Each cell is approximately 6 feet by 8 feet. The lights are on 24 hours a day. The prisoners are allowed out of their cells only two hours per day. For a long time, the guards would vary temperatures to great extremes. One week, they would turn the air-conditioning on maximum making the prisoners freeze (they were given only a thin cotton sheet at night which was taken away early the following morning)." The next week, the guards would turn off the air-conditioning to bring up the temperatures to a stifling 35 degrees Celsius.
"Fortunately, since the start of Ramadan, the guards have stopped switching the temperatures between extremes, but rather keep it generally cool."
The two occasions Katznelson met Paracha, he was in fetters. "When I met him the first time, it was in the prison hospital. Both arms and both legs were shackled to the bed. The second time we met, it was in a meeting room in Camp-5. He was shackled to the floor. They removed the hand shackles when I requested but not those of the leg."
Apart from exposing prisoners to extreme temperatures, Katznelson said, for a long time, deviation from the rules was met with violence. "For instance, if a prisoner being led to a shower looked at another prisoner, or spoke to anyone, he was beaten. If the prisoner put his food tray down in the wrong place for collection, he was beaten. Any guard at any time could order a beating or that a prisoner be sent to isolation. In isolation, prisoners' beards and heads are forcibly shaved." But, says Katznelson, the beatings have since become fewer now that a new commander is in place.
The long years of incarceration have taken a toll on Paracha. According to Katznelson, he has "experienced severe chest pains and is at grave risk of a heart attack."
The Guantanamo inmate recently made news when his petition to be transferred to a civilian medical centre for a cardiac procedure was rejected. His wife argues that "he finds the camp facilities to carry out cardiac catheterisation inadequate and risky. It's not an emotional decision but a rational one".
"He is not getting proper medical care. His life is at risk. The Pakistani government must intervene as soon as possible to get Mr. Paracha home," said Katznelson.
Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Dec 14 (IPS) - ''Guantanamo brings images of a man in orange overalls, his face down and a soldier holding him by the neck, like a dog on a leash," says 14-year-old Zahra Paracha. "Animals are treated better,'' she tells IPS.
"What's the point of talking to you," she then says, her eyes clouding up. "I'm tired of telling the media that my father is innocent. In the first press conference three years ago, I poured my heart out but that did not bring my father back. I think no one can help us, neither the government nor President Pervez Musharraf.
''When we sold our soul and became a United States ally, we lost any bargaining power we (Pakistan) ever had," adds Farhat Paracha, wife of Guantanamo Bay prisoner Saifullah Paracha and mother of another, Uzair Paracha.
But Muneeza Paracha, 24, her older daughter, a business graduate who has kept the family business stay afloat, is calmer. "I think the situation is somewhat different from what it was in 2003. I believe the Bush administration is under immense pressure to shut down Guantanamo. The media have done a lot and are still alive to the plight of the prisoners and this alone makes me very hopeful." She however, does not deny that life without her father has been tough.
Saifullah Paracha, 60, a successful businessman and a philanthropist, based in this southern port city, has been held at the U.S. military prison, in Cuba, since September 2004. While on his way to a business meeting in July 2003, he was picked up at the Bangkok airport and whisked away to the Bagram airbase in Afghanistan and, after 15 months, moved to Guantanamo.
Earlier that year, in February, 23-year old Uzair Paracha, on a business trip to the U.S., was arrested by intelligence agents and charged with terrorist conspiracy and alleged links to al-Qaeda, the terrorist group behind the Sep.11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. "My husband was such a strong person, but Uzair's abduction broke him. The first time I saw him cry was then. He felt so helpless to be unable to help his son,'' said Farhat
''I don't know if I will live to see my son in person, that's my greatest nightmare. He's been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison," says Farhat, 56, who survives on anti-depressants and the 15 minutes-a-month phone call from her son.
Her voice quivering with emotion, she said, "He was like any young twenty-something, with the world at his feet and a girlfriend by his arm. They were desperately in love and were just waiting for him to finish studies. She got married recently and I don't blame her, for she couldn't wait endlessly."
According to Farhat he's gained weight, 170 pounds, because he avoids going out for exercise as on the way prisoners are strip-searched. "He spends time reading and has also become regular with prayers." The only communication Farhat has had with her husband, since July 2003, was through his lawyer or e-mails from some rights organisations. She gets letters from him which are "short, hurried scribblings at the back of International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) pages''.
Not charged with any crime, the older Paracha was also suspected to have links with the al-Qaeda which he has denied. "He is alleged to have been part of a plan to smuggle explosives into the United States for al-Qaeda. He is also alleged to have spoken to Osama Bin Laden." says the Britain-based Reprieve's senior counsel, Zachary Katznelson, who has met Paracha twice, the last time in October 2006, and spoken to him once on the phone in November.
"He has never hidden the fact that he met Bin Laden in 1999. In fact, he used to brag about his meeting and was quite taken in by the soft-spoken man he thought Laden was. He said he wanted to have him interviewed to give his version, for his production house,'' says Farhat.
Asked if there was any link between the father and son's abductions, Katznelson says, "The allegations for both relate to contacts they had with Majid Khan, another Pakistani prisoner in Guantanamo." Khan, accused of being a member of al-Qaeda, has denied any links the two may have with the al-Qaeda or terrorism. He met them as Pakistani businessmen.
Paracha senior is being held in Camp-5 Delta, which, he told his wife, is ‘like living in your own grave.'
This is qualified by Katznelson. "Camp-5 is a maximum security prison. Each cell is approximately 6 feet by 8 feet. The lights are on 24 hours a day. The prisoners are allowed out of their cells only two hours per day. For a long time, the guards would vary temperatures to great extremes. One week, they would turn the air-conditioning on maximum making the prisoners freeze (they were given only a thin cotton sheet at night which was taken away early the following morning)." The next week, the guards would turn off the air-conditioning to bring up the temperatures to a stifling 35 degrees Celsius.
"Fortunately, since the start of Ramadan, the guards have stopped switching the temperatures between extremes, but rather keep it generally cool."
The two occasions Katznelson met Paracha, he was in fetters. "When I met him the first time, it was in the prison hospital. Both arms and both legs were shackled to the bed. The second time we met, it was in a meeting room in Camp-5. He was shackled to the floor. They removed the hand shackles when I requested but not those of the leg."
Apart from exposing prisoners to extreme temperatures, Katznelson said, for a long time, deviation from the rules was met with violence. "For instance, if a prisoner being led to a shower looked at another prisoner, or spoke to anyone, he was beaten. If the prisoner put his food tray down in the wrong place for collection, he was beaten. Any guard at any time could order a beating or that a prisoner be sent to isolation. In isolation, prisoners' beards and heads are forcibly shaved." But, says Katznelson, the beatings have since become fewer now that a new commander is in place.
The long years of incarceration have taken a toll on Paracha. According to Katznelson, he has "experienced severe chest pains and is at grave risk of a heart attack."
The Guantanamo inmate recently made news when his petition to be transferred to a civilian medical centre for a cardiac procedure was rejected. His wife argues that "he finds the camp facilities to carry out cardiac catheterisation inadequate and risky. It's not an emotional decision but a rational one".
"He is not getting proper medical care. His life is at risk. The Pakistani government must intervene as soon as possible to get Mr. Paracha home," said Katznelson.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Four Good Reasons Why Guantanamo Should Be Closed
By JOANNE MARINER
----
Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2006
The U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should be closed. Its continued existence is unfair to the individuals held there, and of negative benefit to the United States.
Why exactly should it be closed? Here are four good reasons.
First, Guantanamo is a symbol of lawlessness. It was chosen as a detention site because it is located offshore, on foreign territory, and the Bush Administration therefore believed it was safely beyond the jurisdiction of any court. It was, as a British court pointed out in a 2002 decision, a "legal black hole."
Second, detainees at Guantanamo have been arbitrarily detained, physically abused, and even tortured. They have spent years without any fair legal process, held on the basis of secret evidence.
Third, Guantanamo has harmed the fight against terrorism. It has undermined international cooperation and alienated Muslim communities. And fourth, the moral authority of the United States has been severely compromised by Guantanamo's existence, with disastrous results for the U.S. government's ability to promote human rights abroad.
Four and a Half Years of Detention Without Charge
We'll start by briefly reviewing the facts. The first detainees were brought to Guantanamo on January 11, 2002, more than four and a half years ago. Since then, none of the roughly 775 detainees who have been held there has ever seen a judge. For the first two-and-a half years that detainees were held on Guantanamo, none of them were even allowed to see lawyers. Because the Bush Administration has deemed them unlawful enemy combatants, it has claimed the right to hold them without charge until the "war on terror" ends.
From the information that is known, it appears that only a minority of the detainees were captured on the battlefield in Afghanistan. Many detainees were picked up in Pakistan, often being sold to American troops for a bounty; others were arrested in countries ranging from Bosnia to Indonesia to Egypt.
Since Guantanamo opened, 38 detainees have been declared "no longer enemy combatants" -- a status that's the official equivalent of "oops" -- and hundreds more have been returned home because the U.S. had decided they were no longer a threat. The vast majority of these ex-detainees are now free, even though the U.S. has put pressure on many of their home countries to detain them.
A few detainees have sought a different way of escaping Guantanamo. Three detainees committed suicide this year; dozens more have tried to. Hunger strikes are common.
A Legal Black Hole
Even were one to believe that the Guantanamo detainees have been correctly deemed enemy combatants, there's no good reason to keep them in Cuba.
During World War II, the United States held hundreds of thousands of German and Italian POWs on U.S. territory -- in Texas, Arizona, and elsewhere. At present, we have more than two million prisoners in U.S. prisons and jails, including a number of convicted terrorists. It is obvious we could have easily incarcerated a few hundred more on U.S. soil.
So why the choice of Guantanamo? Guantanamo was attractive as a place of detention for one reason alone: it was thought to be a legal black hole. More specifically, because of a series of court rulings in the 1990s involving Haitian and Cuban refugees, Guantanamo was believed to be beyond the reach of the Constitution and the courts.
The Supreme Court's 2004 decision in Rasul v. Bush, which held that the courts had habeas corpus jurisdiction over Guantanamo, changed this picture dramatically. Detainees got access to counsel, and information about Guantanamo began to reach the public.
The impact of Rasul has been put into question, however, by the jurisdiction-stripping provisions of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 and the Military Commissions Act of 2006. Whether the courts will continue to monitor abuses at Guantanamo may hinge on a constitutional challenge.
Arbitrary Detention and Abuse
Detainees at Guantanamo have been subject to arbitrary detention. The combatant status review tribunals that are supposed to assess whether the detainees are enemy combatants base their decisions on secret evidence that the detainees have no opportunity to confront. The decision-making process is quick, efficient, and nearly worthless in terms of reaching a reliable result.
Moreover, the U.S. war with Afghanistan is long over, and thus the only legitimate justification for these men's detention is gone. As of June 19, 2002, when Hamid Karzai was elected to the presidency of Afghanistan, the international armed conflict in that country was at an end. Detainees from that conflict should either be tried for war crimes or other criminal offenses, if there's evidence against them, or they should be returned to Afghanistan.
With arbitrary detention, has come physical abuse. The President said in his February 7, 2002, Executive Order that the detainees at Guantanamo should be treated in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, "to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity." In adding this caveat to the rule of humane treatment, he opened the door to a whole series of abuses.
Ex-detainees have reported beatings and cruel treatment, but it may be that the worst abuses at Guantanamo were endured by a prisoner who remains detained. Muhammed al-Qahtani, a Saudi citizen who is alleged to have been implicated in the September 11 plot, was physically and mentally mistreated from mid-November 2002 to early January 2003. For six weeks, he was intentionally deprived of sleep, put into painful stress positions, forced to stand for long periods, and subject to sexual and other physical humiliation. He was refused trips to a latrine, so that he urinated on himself at least twice. He was also threatened with forced enemas, and on one occasion was subjected to one.
Human Rights Watch has obtained an unredacted copy of al-Qahtani's interrogation log, and believes that the techniques used during al-Qahtani's interrogation were so abusive that they amounted to torture.
Weakening the Counterterrorism Effort and Undermining U.S. Leadership on Human Rights
Another reason to close Guantanamo is that abuses committed in the name of counterterrorism have aggravated the terrorist threat. International counterterrorism cooperation has weakened, as courts in places as varied as Spain, France and Kuwait have condemned Guantanamo and refused to accept information obtained there. Worse, the use of torture and arbitrary detention against Muslim detainees has alienated Muslim communities whose good will and cooperation is needed, both in reporting suspicious activity and in bolstering shared norms against terrorism.
A final reason to oppose Guantanamo is that its existence has severely weakened the U.S. government's moral standing, and therefore its ability to press for human rights improvements abroad. Worse, abusive governments now claim that Guantanamo gives them license to engage in similar practices.
A $125 Million Mistake
The good news is that the detainee population at Guantanamo has been steadily shrinking since late 2004. There are currently 430 detainees at Guantanamo, and over 100 more are slated for release.
The bad news, however, is that Guantanamo shows little sign of readying for closure. Right now, in fact, it's expanding. The U.S. military announced last week that it plans to spend $125 million to build a new compound at Guantanamo, including a new high-security detention facility.
Congress, which will soon be debating legislative proposals to correct the worst aspects of the Military Commissions Act, should also consider ways of blocking this unnecessary new mistake.
Joanne Mariner is a human rights attorney based in New York and Paris.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/mariner/20061122.html
----
Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2006
The U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should be closed. Its continued existence is unfair to the individuals held there, and of negative benefit to the United States.
Why exactly should it be closed? Here are four good reasons.
First, Guantanamo is a symbol of lawlessness. It was chosen as a detention site because it is located offshore, on foreign territory, and the Bush Administration therefore believed it was safely beyond the jurisdiction of any court. It was, as a British court pointed out in a 2002 decision, a "legal black hole."
Second, detainees at Guantanamo have been arbitrarily detained, physically abused, and even tortured. They have spent years without any fair legal process, held on the basis of secret evidence.
Third, Guantanamo has harmed the fight against terrorism. It has undermined international cooperation and alienated Muslim communities. And fourth, the moral authority of the United States has been severely compromised by Guantanamo's existence, with disastrous results for the U.S. government's ability to promote human rights abroad.
Four and a Half Years of Detention Without Charge
We'll start by briefly reviewing the facts. The first detainees were brought to Guantanamo on January 11, 2002, more than four and a half years ago. Since then, none of the roughly 775 detainees who have been held there has ever seen a judge. For the first two-and-a half years that detainees were held on Guantanamo, none of them were even allowed to see lawyers. Because the Bush Administration has deemed them unlawful enemy combatants, it has claimed the right to hold them without charge until the "war on terror" ends.
From the information that is known, it appears that only a minority of the detainees were captured on the battlefield in Afghanistan. Many detainees were picked up in Pakistan, often being sold to American troops for a bounty; others were arrested in countries ranging from Bosnia to Indonesia to Egypt.
Since Guantanamo opened, 38 detainees have been declared "no longer enemy combatants" -- a status that's the official equivalent of "oops" -- and hundreds more have been returned home because the U.S. had decided they were no longer a threat. The vast majority of these ex-detainees are now free, even though the U.S. has put pressure on many of their home countries to detain them.
A few detainees have sought a different way of escaping Guantanamo. Three detainees committed suicide this year; dozens more have tried to. Hunger strikes are common.
A Legal Black Hole
Even were one to believe that the Guantanamo detainees have been correctly deemed enemy combatants, there's no good reason to keep them in Cuba.
During World War II, the United States held hundreds of thousands of German and Italian POWs on U.S. territory -- in Texas, Arizona, and elsewhere. At present, we have more than two million prisoners in U.S. prisons and jails, including a number of convicted terrorists. It is obvious we could have easily incarcerated a few hundred more on U.S. soil.
So why the choice of Guantanamo? Guantanamo was attractive as a place of detention for one reason alone: it was thought to be a legal black hole. More specifically, because of a series of court rulings in the 1990s involving Haitian and Cuban refugees, Guantanamo was believed to be beyond the reach of the Constitution and the courts.
The Supreme Court's 2004 decision in Rasul v. Bush, which held that the courts had habeas corpus jurisdiction over Guantanamo, changed this picture dramatically. Detainees got access to counsel, and information about Guantanamo began to reach the public.
The impact of Rasul has been put into question, however, by the jurisdiction-stripping provisions of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 and the Military Commissions Act of 2006. Whether the courts will continue to monitor abuses at Guantanamo may hinge on a constitutional challenge.
Arbitrary Detention and Abuse
Detainees at Guantanamo have been subject to arbitrary detention. The combatant status review tribunals that are supposed to assess whether the detainees are enemy combatants base their decisions on secret evidence that the detainees have no opportunity to confront. The decision-making process is quick, efficient, and nearly worthless in terms of reaching a reliable result.
Moreover, the U.S. war with Afghanistan is long over, and thus the only legitimate justification for these men's detention is gone. As of June 19, 2002, when Hamid Karzai was elected to the presidency of Afghanistan, the international armed conflict in that country was at an end. Detainees from that conflict should either be tried for war crimes or other criminal offenses, if there's evidence against them, or they should be returned to Afghanistan.
With arbitrary detention, has come physical abuse. The President said in his February 7, 2002, Executive Order that the detainees at Guantanamo should be treated in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, "to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity." In adding this caveat to the rule of humane treatment, he opened the door to a whole series of abuses.
Ex-detainees have reported beatings and cruel treatment, but it may be that the worst abuses at Guantanamo were endured by a prisoner who remains detained. Muhammed al-Qahtani, a Saudi citizen who is alleged to have been implicated in the September 11 plot, was physically and mentally mistreated from mid-November 2002 to early January 2003. For six weeks, he was intentionally deprived of sleep, put into painful stress positions, forced to stand for long periods, and subject to sexual and other physical humiliation. He was refused trips to a latrine, so that he urinated on himself at least twice. He was also threatened with forced enemas, and on one occasion was subjected to one.
Human Rights Watch has obtained an unredacted copy of al-Qahtani's interrogation log, and believes that the techniques used during al-Qahtani's interrogation were so abusive that they amounted to torture.
Weakening the Counterterrorism Effort and Undermining U.S. Leadership on Human Rights
Another reason to close Guantanamo is that abuses committed in the name of counterterrorism have aggravated the terrorist threat. International counterterrorism cooperation has weakened, as courts in places as varied as Spain, France and Kuwait have condemned Guantanamo and refused to accept information obtained there. Worse, the use of torture and arbitrary detention against Muslim detainees has alienated Muslim communities whose good will and cooperation is needed, both in reporting suspicious activity and in bolstering shared norms against terrorism.
A final reason to oppose Guantanamo is that its existence has severely weakened the U.S. government's moral standing, and therefore its ability to press for human rights improvements abroad. Worse, abusive governments now claim that Guantanamo gives them license to engage in similar practices.
A $125 Million Mistake
The good news is that the detainee population at Guantanamo has been steadily shrinking since late 2004. There are currently 430 detainees at Guantanamo, and over 100 more are slated for release.
The bad news, however, is that Guantanamo shows little sign of readying for closure. Right now, in fact, it's expanding. The U.S. military announced last week that it plans to spend $125 million to build a new compound at Guantanamo, including a new high-security detention facility.
Congress, which will soon be debating legislative proposals to correct the worst aspects of the Military Commissions Act, should also consider ways of blocking this unnecessary new mistake.
Joanne Mariner is a human rights attorney based in New York and Paris.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/mariner/20061122.html
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