Obama Orders American Gulag Closed

As one of his first acts as president, Barack Obama signed an executive order to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and the “secret” prisons in eastern Europe run by the CIA. While many defenders of the Bush administration claim this will undermine American security, the closure deprives Al Qaeda and its fellow travelers of one of their greatest propaganda points. Additionally, the American gulag didn't rehabilitate any alleged terrorists. Instead, it created and hardened them. Above all, the order restores the rule of law to the US.

The pictures of inmates at Guantanamo in orange jumpsuits with black bags over their heads are familiar to the entire world. The open-air cages in which the prisoners have been kept remind many of kennels, and Muslims believe dogs to be unclean. Pakistan's Tasnim Noorani, who oversaw the handing of suspects into US custody while a senior interior ministry official from 2000 to 2004, said Guantanamo “bore no fruit for the Americans nor did it provide any leads in the war on terror.”

According to CNN, “Saeed Shihri, Prisoner No. 372, is believed to have been responsible for an attack on the US embassy in Yemen that killed nearly a dozen people in September, barely a year after he was released from Guantanamo.” This begs the question of whether he was a terrorist before his incarceration. If he was, the time he spent in US custody didn't change him. If he wasn't, his Cuban vacation turned him into one. Presuming, that is, that he really was responsible for the attack.

Mr. Noorani is sure that Mr. Shihri is not unique, “Instead, the experience converted [inmates] into becoming more hardline. It gave a boost to those promoting militancy. Images from there and Iraq were good material for handlers to encourage suicide bombers.”

Another Pakistani official, who spoke with the Agence France Presse anonymously, said, “The very fact that the Americans announced they will close down this infamous prison will have a positive effect on efforts to curb militancy. It will deprive them, the militants, of a tool used to propagate their mission in recruiting suicide bombers.”

However, the greatest effect that the closure of Guantanamo and the other prisons will have is in returning America to its roots: due process, the right to confront one's accuser, the right to know the charges against one, and the right to a speedy trial. If the US government has evidence (real proof, not a coerced confession) that a Guantanamo inmate is guilty of a crime, the world will not oppose prison if the sentence follows a fair trial.

© Copyright 2009 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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