Comments on: Terror Experts: No Rehab for Gitmo Detainees

By: Reason60

Reason60 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:04:19 +0000

“They are civilian warfighters”
Cite your sources;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seton_Hall_reports
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/06/17/yoo/

These are my sources, which discuss how not all of the detainees were captured during fighting on the battlefield; some were in fact picked up at their homes, at checkpoints, based on tips from unknown sources.
See, this is my point- the government makes a grand pronouncement that these are “civilian warfighters”, and paints a pictire of deadly terrorists machine gunning our troops, and everyone buys it.
The fact is, we have no way of knowing how many of these were actually like that, and how many were just innocent people picked up for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. the government’s standards were so lax, that anyone who got fingerd by a enemy with a grudge, could be picked up and shipped off to Gitmo or Bagram on the flimsiest of grounds.

I have no problem detaining actual fighters, found on a real battlefield; but this is like sweeping up German civilians and calling them SS stormtroopers; it just doesn’t wash.

By: sinz54

sinz54 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:19:45 +0000

Reason60: Has anyone here seen any evidence any of these detainees are dangerous?
If our soldiers capture a guy on the Afghan battlefields who has been chopping the heads off Afghans who are loyal to the Kabul government, what would you suggest we do with him? Read him his Miranda rights?

We are at WAR, and these terrorists are NOT just common criminals. They are civilian warfighters.

FYI, in past wars going all the way back to the Franco-Prussian War, enemy civilian warfighters, when caught, were usually SHOT on the spot. No trial, no POW camp, nothing.

The mere fact that these guys are still alive is testament to America’s restraint and forbearance.

By: Reason60

Reason60 — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:36:49 +0000

Has anyone here seen any evidence any of these detainees are dangerous?
Or are we just ready to accept the government’s word for it that they are scary dangerous guys?
If we call ourselves conservatives, shouldn’t we be a bit more skeptical of government claims?
If these are prisoners of war captured on a battlefield, then lets repatriate them; if we have evidence they were planning an attack, lets see it in open court.

We have rules and laws for a reason- so that the government can’t just sweep up people and hold them at the whim of the King, er, President.

Because if the government can just pick someone up, call them a terrorist, and hold them forever, then Glenn Beck should be even more nervous than he is.

By: Reality Chick

Reality Chick — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:24:41 +0000

It seems that a Saudi terrorist “rehab program” is harder to get into than Harvard University and with a questionable success rate even for Saudi nationals.
Let’s not forget that one “drop out” can translate to multiple innocent lives lost.
Remind me…Who is the genius that came up with this idea?
Gitmo is looking more and more appealing as time goes on.

By: jreb

jreb — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:39:16 +0000

While release and rehabilitation of Gitmo detainees may sound like a noble gesture, the risks in doing so at this time may not justify the means in doing so. As has been pointed out the Saudi method seems to be having some success. The program is still too young to be judged as a success and the Saudi program appears to have been modified from its original plan in that under the original Saudi plan the Saudi detainees were tried before a Saudi court and charged with several offenses. If convicted they served up to two years before entering the rehabilitation program, however there appears to have been a change in the program in that individuals are no longer charged with crimes but are allowed to enter directly into the rehab plan for a truncated period of time, only several months. While the government of Yemen has agreed to receive its nationals from Gitmo, at the beginning of this year Yemen had no program, curriculum or facility in place to process returning Yemeni nationals. Closure of Gitmo by the end of this year was an appealing campaign strategy for the Obama administration, however in reality it appears to be a very risky proposition.