Can Obama Close Guantanamo Prison?

Great Debates
61

To clarify my position:

IMHO:
SOME of the Gitmo detainees are POWs. They should be treated as POWs. They were captured during the war on either the Taliban or during the war against insurgents in Iraq. They should be treated as POWs, and eventually repatriated to the governments of Iraq / Afghanistan. It is SOP in the world to keep POWs locked up until a war is over.

SOME of the Gitmo detainees are prisoners of the War on Terror. We need to determine what the correct legal path is for these people. The standard US criminal court is not designed for these types of crimes, nor are the rules of evidence, etc.

SOME of the Gitmo detainess are Unlawful Combatants, an area that has not been deeply explored. That used to be the category for spies and others fighting without a uniform. A member of my family spent time in a German camp for spies after he was captured behind the lines. His treatment was not at the same level as regular POWs, and that was expected given the circumstances of his capture. We now have more than just spies being picked up, and that is messing with our regular operating rules.

After we separate the detainees into those two (or three?) camps, we have the additional issue of what to do with them after either the war is over or their sentence has been served. If we dump them back to some of their origin nations, they will probably be executed. If we let them go someplace neutral, many will show up fighting us again. This MUST be considered, and can not be just hand waved away.

I am all for human rights, for treating prisoners properly (even when my opponents do not give me same consideration), and I believe the research that shows that torture does not get you a lot in terms of decent information.

I blame Truman and Johnson for the “police actions” of Korea and Vietnam where we started muddying the waters around the definitions of War vs. Crime. Calling it the “Cold War” did not help, and it only opened the door to the “War on Terror.”

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And some, at least at the start, were people in the wrong place at the wrong time. BBC NEWS | Europe | Guantanamo Uighurs' strange odyssey

I know we’ve made an effort to release some of them. I have no reason to believe that we’ve released all of them-especially given how they were picked up, and that the Bush administration argued for many years that they were all the “worst of the worst”. If we had a process to ensure all the people in guantanamo were in the three categories you list, I’d have much less of a problem.

However, in large part, i do agree with you. We have a problem, it’s a problem we created, and there are no easy answers.

I do think how we treat prisoners says something about us, and our standard should be FAR above “we’re better than the other guys.”

63

What about the people who are wholly innocent of any charges, yet because of their detention (or maybe the reason they were handed over in the first place) face abuse and/or death if repatriated? That’s the question. If they are guilty of a crime, I don’t think anyone is disputing that they should be tried and punished accordingly, but if they are innocent it seems you don’t give a shit as to what happens to them. The US has a responsibility to those it kidnaps and detains, and that responsibility doesn’t end when it deigns to free them. If they cannot return to their country of origin without facing further breaches of their human rights, then they should be given either asylum or citizenship of the US (if they wish).

The US has flagrantly violated the UDHR with regards the detainees at Gitmo, and as a result has to make amends to them.

64

Yes, and even the Intl Red Cross has chided the USA for not holding those hearings. We really need to. I dont have a huge problem with a overseas prison for terrorists and POWS, but we need to at least give them a hearing if we say they are POWS or charge them if they are not.

65

Szalter: “but if they are innocent it seems you don’t give a shit as to what happens to them”

Watch the personal insults - this is a GD, not the Pit.

My concern is that if we completely close the entire operation, it will NOT be replaced with something appropriate. We need new rules to make sure that we can both protect human rights AND the lives of Americans. I also do not want to hear about Marines reading people their Miranda rights on the battlefield, or worrying about rules of evidence during mopping up operations after a firefight.

Some current news on the topic:

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20081120/D94IUT600.html

Here we have what is needed. A judge listened to some testimony on the capture of some Algerians, and has released them. This should have happened a long time ago. This is the system FINALLY starting to work.

66

I recalltha in afghanistan, US Forces captured a number of taliban prisoners. We turned them over to a general dostum (head of the “Northern Alliance”.
He dealt with them using islamic law-he had them buried alive.

67

You have convinced me, I mean if you can call someone a terrorist merely for fighting with the Taliban and Al Queda against the United States, anyone could be called a terrorist. First, they came for Al Queda and I did not speak up because I was not a part of Al Queda, then they came for the Taliban…
I mean really, it is as if there are people in the US government who think that terrorism is an actual problem. They even seem to value the lives of their fellow citizens more than the opinions of pretentious Europeans.
They obviously want to do nothing but cover up what has been going on in Gitmo, except for all the tours they have been giving elected officials and journalists, that place is impossible to get access to.

68

Those hearings, although important (and we should hold them), are for people that there’s little dispute we can detain (say, captured on a battlefield shooting at us)-the question is whether they’re entitled to POW status, or are (in effect) criminals.

There’s another category: many of the prisoners in GITMO were not captured in afghanistan or in iraq (let alone on a “battlefield”), and claim not to be associated with Al Queda at all.
So with them, we have a different problem-not are they entitled to POW status, but are they people we have a right to detain at all…

As I note above, there are two questions:

  1. Legally, can we detain this person if they did what we say they did
  2. Can we prove that they did what we say they did

Until courts got involved in habeas proceedings, the prisoners couldn’t even practically argue “you arrested the wrong guy” to someone who wasn’t a part of the army that arrested him, and who had the power to release him if we couldn’t show he was who we claimed him to be.

That is the more important hearing. I’m less worried about (although we still have a legal obligation to hold) hearings for people who shot at our troops, to determine if they are POWs or not.

I’m more worried about all the people we have no right to detain, and who are going to go back home and tell about all the terrible things we did (most notably, locking them up without due process for years).

I’m not sure I can think of a better way to make someone angry with, or want to attack America than to arrest them when they’re innocent, lock them up for years, perhaps torture them, and then fight HARD against letting them go).

This is what was needed. It was what was needed five years ago. The fact that it’s taken us so long, and that the U.S. government fought against allowing these hearings for years, has catastrophically damaged our image abroad, and has demonstrated the disrespect the Bush administration has for the rule of law. The administration will certainly appeal the order-so it’s not clear that these people will be released promptly.

But given how the judge’s order was phrased, it doesn’t seem like a close case in any way. We should all be ashamed it took so long to allow such a basic part of the rule of law.

69

Wrong.

Obama’s job is to balance the rights of…

People who are (1) POWs (which means we can hold them as long as the war is going on–but it–the initial war in Afghanistan–is over now), (2) international criminals (which means we can try them or send them to their nation or origin or to the next nation that wants to try them), or (3) innocents seized by mistake (which still means trials, & acquittals–of course some will have become radicalized anti-Americans in the last seven years in custody)

…against…

Americans who don’t want to be killed by terrorists released on our soil, & will risk any injustice to another to protect themselves.

That’s the key. The principle of self-interest, that a man will risk any injustice to another to protect himself, & a “good” government will risk any injustice to foreigners to protect its citizens. To hear many Americans speak, it appears to be that principle that the USA & our understanding of rule of law is built upon.

That’s the problem. Abstract justice means nothing to many voters.

70

He probably reads 2000 AD.

71

To be clearer: There is an “unlawful combatant” category of prisoner covered in the Geneva Accords (which are law in the USA). This sets rules for how those who take arms outside of a legal military are to be treated. It’s not that different from how regular POW’s are to be treated.

The Bush administration relied on the opinion of a low-level flunkie in the Justice Department that somehow denied that these rules applied to unlawful combatants in Afghanistan, & that the USA had much broader discretion. Then the “broader discretion” was also applied to lawful combatants from the Afghan government of the time, & to various suspects picked up from Morocco to the Philippines in US intelligence operations.

But it’s all been handled without regard for the treaties we are subject to, which is what we call a blatant disregard for international law, an invitation to rogue behavior by other nations, & damned dangerous.

Obama, politically, has to change the Bush administration’s policy to meet Geneva rules, or he’s in BIG trouble internationally, as is the WHOLE OF THE USA. While it was just one administration, it appeared we could remove them & patch it up. If a new administration of another party sticks with Bush’s plan, we either become a rogue state in the world’s eyes long-term, or destroy the Geneva Accords altogether.

72

I think their position is the opposite, actually. The U.S. government does not know that these people are innocent - or guilty either, for that matter. Which is precisely the problem.

73

It probably will be. Everyone in that prison falls into one of three categories:

1: Prisoners of war. Those are easy to deal with: Prisoners of war are repatriated to their country after the war is over, and both of the wars in question are officially over, so we send them back to Iraq and Afganistan.

2: Criminals. Anyone who isn’t a prisoner of war and for whom sufficient evidence can be brought forward in court to prove their guilt of a crime is a criminal. These are also easy to deal with: We deal with them the same way we deal with any other criminal, either locking them up in our own prisons on our soil and treating them according to our laws, or extraditing them to other countries where they’re also wanted for crimes.

  1. People for whom insufficient evidence can be brought in court to prove their guilt. These are the easiest of the lot to deal with: We let them go free. We either take them back to where we took them from, or if there’s reason to believe that they won’t be accepted back where they came from, we accept them as refugees, and treat them the same way as anyone else to whom we grant political asylum. Such people should receive the same degree of police oversight as you or I, because, get this, our legal system has found them just as innocent as you or I.

In short, the appropriate thing to replace Gitmo with is absolutely nothing. There’s only one category of detainee we have to hold onto, and we already have prisons to deal with those.

74

When Ireland does what the US has done look for me. I’ll be the guy in the thread saying it’s Ireland’s responsibility to sort the mess out.

BTW Ireland did do the Interment thing. We locked up suspected IRA members witout trial on the UK model. It was a disaster and a dream recruitment coup for the IRA. Lessons were learnt the hard way.

75

Or maybe you find it amazing that a foreigner would have the gaul to talk about American resonsibilities.

If that’s the case well then you don’t understand a lot of things. Mainly the nature of this board but also that your country has directly involved my country in this mess. If you don’t know how then you need to educate yourself before you talk to me about it because I’m neither interersted or care to bring you up to speed.

You must be up to speed though as you find it amazing.

To clarify matters you could tell us what exactly you do find amazing about my post.

76

Actually, only the French have the gaul to do that. The Irish have the hibernia to talk about America, and the Italians have the roma. :stuck_out_tongue:

77

I want to point out things are not as bad as they used to be- the ICRC has been given full access to GITMO, and the US has allowed the detainees full rights *as if *they were POW’s. There are no longer abuses as occured in the past.

What is the one Big issue is the fact that we have not given the Detainees their heraings: we ned to either:
Consider them POW’s (which does not mean we have to let them go right now, mind you- there’s a question if 'the war" is over, and even if so, POW’s during WWII were not released immediately)

Charge them or

Let them go (which includes releasing them to other national authorities for trial there)

“The US authorities and the ICRC maintained a frank and open
dialogue on issues related to US detention in Guantanamo Bay,
Afghanistan and Iraq. Through contacts with agencies of the
US administration at a variety of levels, the ICRC continued to
encourage the US authorities to define the status and rights of
individual internees/detainees and to ensure they fitted into a
proper and adequate legal framework providing in particular
more robust procedural safeguards. Nevertheless, fundamental
disagreement on what constituted an appropriate legal framework
persisted…The ICRC regularly visited people held in the US detention facility
at Guantanamo Bay, one person held in Charleston Navy Brig,
South Carolina, and another held in Miami Federal Prison.
Following these visits, the ICRC reported its findings and recommendations
to the US authorities at both the operational and
Washington levels.
Internees/detainees held in Guantanamo Bay were able to restore
or maintain contact with family members through the RCM
network, a process involving more than 25 ICRC delegations and
Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies worldwide.”

78

What crime, exactly, did any of these people commit? Hell, we could, if we had chosen to, simply blown their brains out on the spot they were captured.

79

Do you have any comments on the recent court case referenced in the link above? Here is another link:

Judge Orders 5 Gitmo Inmates Released. The Judge, Richard J. Leon, is a Bush appointee that was previously overturned by the US Supreme Court this summer in the case that gave the detainees the right to challenge their detainment. Judge Leon found no credible evidence that the five detainees released were enemy combatants. Hell, no justice department lawyers would even sign the fact narrative that was filed with the court for this case. These people are clearly innocent.

I don’t get how you are so ready to give so much power to your Government with oversight or checks and balances. Terrorism is a problem, but so is oppression by governments. Remember Ruby Ridge? Waco? What about all the seizure of property in the drug war? You obviously trust Bush to do the right thing, but what about Obama and Hillary?

80

I expect that there might be a bit more of that if too many combatants are released to just return to the battlefield to fight. I can see that attitude going through my mind - take no prisoners, because someone wants to play catch-and-release with the enemy.

Someone stated that the time of POWs is over, since the war is done in Afghanistan and Iraq. I disagree - the war in Afghanistan is still going on, and releasing would result in just handing over additional troops to the Taliban.

Iraq is a different story - it is no longer a war as much as an occupation. The Iraqi government can decide what it wants to do as part of the handover.