# Bush knew Guantanamo prisoners were innocent
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [April 14, 2010, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020 "2010-04-14T02:44:42Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/1 "2010-04-14T02:44:42Z")
From [TimesOnline:](http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7092435.ece)
> [@](#):
>
> George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld covered up that hundreds of innocent men were sent to the Guantánamo Bay prison camp because they feared that releasing them would harm the push for war in Iraq and the broader War on Terror, according to a new document obtained by The Times.
>
> The accusations were made by Lawrence Wilkerson, a top aide to Colin Powell, the former Republican Secretary of State, in a signed declaration to support a lawsuit filed by a Guantánamo detainee. It is the first time that such allegations have been made by a senior member of the Bush Administration.
>
> Colonel Wilkerson, who was General Powell’s chief of staff when he ran the State Department, was most critical of Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld. He claimed that the former Vice-President and Defence Secretary knew that the majority of the initial 742 detainees sent to Guantánamo in 2002 were innocent but believed that it was “politically impossible to release them”.
>
> General Powell, who left the Bush Administration in 2005, angry about the misinformation that he unwittingly gave the world when he made the case for the invasion of Iraq at the UN, is understood to have backed Colonel Wilkerson’s declaration.
I know, it seems so **dated** Pitting the W Admin. But distance of time makes this no less outrageous. That Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld are still walking around free is a national disgrace.
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### Author:  [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/2 "2010-04-14T03:04:43Z")
What is a couple of hundred innocent brown people when a war is underway? 😉
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### Author:  [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/3 "2010-04-14T03:18:26Z")
Ha! Ha! You can’t do anything about it! Losers!
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/4 "2010-04-14T03:18:44Z")
Old news now, nothing to see here, move along, doesn’t matter anyway, .
(Of course, in the day, it was “can’t comment as there is an ongoing war on terra’, but don’t worry, we’re going to get to the bottom of this.”)
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### Author:  [@Yumblie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yumblie)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/5 "2010-04-14T05:06:55Z")
It’s never too late for these types of stories. In fact, let’s keep them coming. If this administration of criminals isn’t going to be punished for what they did, then we at least can’t let their crimes be forgotten. Let’s apply the kitschy media slogan “Never forget” to the real tragedy of 9/11: the horrific actions of these creeps.
That whole article reads like an over-the-top Hollywood movie plot, and yet it really happened, and we let them get away with it. It’s disgusting.
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### Author:  [@Michael\_Ellis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Michael_Ellis)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/6 "2010-04-14T05:15:32Z")
But… but FDR did it first!
OK, now that the joke’s over, all I have to say is fuck Bush. Jesus Christ, I dare one of the local GOP bootlicking shitheels to try and come up with mitigating circumstances that make this not a horrific and criminal travesty of justice.
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/7 "2010-04-14T05:26:37Z")
> [@Michael\_Ellis](#):
>
> Jesus Christ, I dare one of the local GOP bootlicking shitheels to try and come up with mitigating circumstances that make this not a horrific and criminal travesty of justice.
A) Lawrence Wilkerson is clearly an un-American terrorist sympathizer. And so is Colin Powell.
B) The Times online is a Eurotrash rag of a liberal controlled media outlet
C) It’s an unproven accusation by a bitter ex-employee.
D) Can’t respond yet - don’t know what Rush will say
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### Author:  [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/8 "2010-04-14T05:43:23Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#):
>
> A) Lawrence Wilkerson is clearly an un-American terrorist sympathizer. And so is Colin Powell.
No, no, no.
“This doesn’t sound like the Lawrence Wilkerson I know.”
You must get behind someone before you can stab him in the back.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/9 "2010-04-14T06:14:35Z")
They were right to keep them, because if they let them go they’d never be grateful for their free room, board, and entertainment, and they’d go off and join the real terrorists.
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### Author:  [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/10 "2010-04-14T07:04:36Z")
They started admitting it relatively soon, by releasing people without making much fuss about it, just quietly cutting them loose. I pretty much assumed they were releasing people they knew were not guilty, since they wouldn’t likely cut someone loose who wasn’t. Still, they did hold that teenaged boy in terrorism juvie hall for years, and that 90-year old goat fucker…herder, right, _herder_. But hey, 90 years, it gets lonesome up in the mountains.
Then it turns out they kept the really, really bad guys in black ops prisons, so everybody at Guantanamo was at best a second stringer. Plus those guys from China who not only had nothing to do with AlQ, they had nothing to do with us!
Man, we are the Americans, when we screw the pooch, the pooch _stays_ screwed!
America! Fucked, _yeah_!
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### Author:  [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/11 "2010-04-14T12:46:34Z")
> [@Michael\_Ellis](#):
>
> OK, now that the joke’s over, all I have to say is fuck Bush. Jesus Christ, I dare one of the local GOP bootlicking shitheels to try and come up with mitigating circumstances that make this not a horrific and criminal travesty of justice.
Those circumstances would be as follows: “9/11! Wah! Wah wah! 9/11 wah!” I’m summarizing, of course.
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### Author:  [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/12 "2010-04-14T12:49:48Z")
Look, we can’t focus on the past. We need to keep moving forward!
-Joe
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### Author:  [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/13 "2010-04-14T12:56:36Z")
I know you’re joking but you’re unlikely to hear
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#):
>
> B) The Times online is a Eurotrash rag of a liberal controlled media outlet
given that it’s part of the Murdoch empire.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/14 "2010-04-14T15:46:51Z")
Here’s the original [source document (PDF).](http://www.truthout.org/files/Wilkerson.pdf) It’s from _[Truthout.org](http://Truthout.org)_. I don’t have any reason to think this guy is not telling the truth, but there seem to be a few leaps in logic. On the one hand, he says there was no way of knowing if these guys were guilty or innocent, and then he says most were innocent.
Frankly, I don’t really need this guy to tell me that we fucked up big time in that whole detention process.
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### Author:  [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/15 "2010-04-14T16:42:02Z")
Did he?
[http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html)
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### Author:  [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/16 "2010-04-14T17:25:10Z")
> [@Michael\_Ellis](#):
>
> OK, now that the joke’s over, all I have to say is fuck Bush. Jesus Christ, I dare one of the local GOP bootlicking shitheels to try and come up with mitigating circumstances that make this not a horrific and criminal travesty of justice.
You’ll have a long wait (on this board at least):
Bush commits a crime or lies: SDMB consevatives remain silent.
Cheney commits a crime or lies: SDMB consevatives remain silent.
Beck et al. says something outrageous: SDMB consevatives remain silent.
Tea Partiers wave their guns around and threaten assassinations/sedition: SDMB consevatives remain silent.
Obama says something innocuous that gets their panties in a knot: SDMB consevatives rant and rave!
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### Author:  [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/17 "2010-04-14T17:26:59Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> I know, it seems so **dated** Pitting the W Admin.
I think “retro” is a better term.
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### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/18 "2010-04-14T20:04:33Z")
> [@Clothahump](#):
>
> Did he?
>
> [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html)
1. That there were actual guilty people in the place does not somehow disprove that there were innocents.
2. If I were innocent, and I were kidnapped and tortured for no reason too, I’d probably give some thought to fighting against the people who had done that to me.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/19 "2010-04-14T20:06:40Z")
> [@Clothahump](#):
>
> Did he?
>
> [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52670-2004Oct21.html)
No one is claiming that every detainee at Gitmo was an innocent bystander. The process of obtaining the detainees was shoddy, at best, including bounties paid local mercenaries and/or warlords for some.
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### Author:  [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2010, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-knew-guantanamo-prisoners-were-innocent/536020/20 "2010-04-14T21:44:44Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#):
>
> 1. That there were actual guilty people in the place does not somehow disprove that there were innocents.
>
> 2. If I were innocent, and I were kidnapped and tortured for no reason too, I’d probably give some thought to fighting against the people who had done that to me.
You are much more contemplative than I. I wouldn’t think about it all, I’m pretty sure, I’d just do it. Stuff like that gets on my nerves.
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