Opening Pandora’s Box
February 5, 2009 • By Tony Spadaccia, The Breeze
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Guantanamo closure poses legal questions, logistical dilemmas
In 2006, former President George W. Bush admitted to the media that he would like to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. However, he understood the difficult dilemma that holding captured terrorists posed.
Bush described the situation perfectly: “I’d like to close Guantanamo, but I also recognize that we’re holding some people that are darned dangerous, and we’d better have a plan to deal with them in our courts.”
During last year’s campaign then-senator Barack Obama pledged to make closing Guantanamo one of his first priorities and in his first week as Commander-in-Chief; he signed an executive order that will do just that in a year from now.
When asked what would happen to the approximately 245 detainees currently held at Guantanamo, Obama responded, “We will be setting up a process whereby this will be taking place.” In other words, he doesn’t know what he’s going to do with them yet.
I’m not a national defense expert, but I am a thinker and I’ve learned from watching our government in action that setting a goal and establishing a deadline without any type of sound strategy to execute it makes for very bad public policy, especially in cases involving homeland security, where lives are at risk.
If President Obama remains so intent on closing Guantanamo so quickly, he will need to answer two questions: Where will the detainees go and how will they be tried?
If the president cannot find any other country willing to take some of the prisoners, the likely result will be that all of the detainees will be brought from Cuba onto American soil and held in a maximum security prison — likely Fort Leavenworth in Kansas — the military’s only supermax prison.
But Fort Leavenworth lacks the defense capabilities and isolation that Guantanamo benefits from, making it a potential terrorist target.
Also working to Obama’s disadvantage is that Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, Sen. Sam Brownback and Rep. Lynn Jenkins, in whose district includes the base, have all publicly opposed the use of Fort Leavenworth to house Guantanamo detainees.
Expect this to become a pattern. It’s hard to imagine any state governor or member of Congress who would be willing to offer up a prison or military bases their state to house dangerous terrorists.
In any event, such a move would only have the effect of shifting Guantanamo to America under a different name but do nothing to address the bigger issue of how captured terrorists should be prosecuted.
To date, President Obama has ordered that all military commission trials be halted, which seems to indicate that he is planning on ending the military commissions altogether in favor of prosecuting the detainees in civilian courts under U.S. criminal law.
But applying our civilian justice system to terrorists captured in battle or abroad carries great risks to our ability to gather the vital intelligence we need to disrupt terrorist attacks.
Consider that if we were to apply U.S. law to foreign terrorists, we would guarantee them access to counsel, which they will surely demand. The first thing their lawyers will do is tell them to keep quiet, preventing our intelligence officers from finding out what, if anything, they know regarding current or future terrorist activity.
In court, their lawyers will proceed to demand that our government provide all the intelligence that it has on them, as well as the methods used to get it.
Such was the case during the trial of Zacarius Moussaoui, the only Sept. 11 conspirator arrested before the attack. He was convicted after four years of pre-trial motions demanding that the government turn over classified information on him only because he chose to plead guilty.
As an alternative to civilian criminal trials, some legal experts have proposed that Congress create special national security courts operating under rules that would protect intelligence sources and methods. However, such rules would turn out to be almost identical to those used by President Bush’s military commissions.
Despite our president’s idealistic rhetoric, when it comes to homeland security and intelligence gathering, black and white does not exist; there are only shades of gray. The president’s claim that we “reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals” is extraordinarily naïve and nothing more than an overly simplistic illusion.
Once President Obama takes the time to examine all of his choices he might just come to the realization that perhaps President Bush’s system, flawed as it may be, was the best possible option.
Tony Spadaccia is a sophomore political science and business major.
Contact Tony Spadaccia at spadacav@jmu.edu
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I feel that you being a bit presumptuous about quite a few things here. First, the way you speak is as if all of the terrorists are guilty until proven innocent, and don’t deserve the rights of having a lawyer or to speak their mind. Second, the assumption that an attack on a U.S. prison housing terrorists is just that, a presumption. And how could one effectively attack a military maximum security prison without killing everyone? I think an attack on a prison housing those that you wish to be released is counter productive. Third, I know that Obama has made a lot of promises, but honestly, this man has only been in office for about a month and everyone is jumping at every word that he speaks. How about we let the man make a move without telling the public every aspect of his plans? That’s why we entrusted him right? And wouldn’t he be working against his cause to release all of his plans?
I definitely see the points you are making, and agree with some of them, but try to take a look at the other side as well.