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Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come

By Jeralyn, Section War on Terror
Posted on Tue Jun 14, 2005 at 04:24:33 PM EST
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Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld today said the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay will be in operation for years to come - until the war on terror has ended.

But the war on terror has no end. It looks like Guantanamo is just another financial burden we will be saddled with for life - and it hasn't even produced a terrorist.

This is just a further indication that the military tribunals are a sham. Should there be an acquittal, as 60 Minutes pointed out a few weeks ago, the detainee will just be returned to his cell until the end of the war on terror. In other words, a life sentence.

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    Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come | 35 comments (35 topical)
    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#1)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:02 PM EST
    It's also more evidence that this administration wants to fight the war on terror in exactly the same way that they fight the war on drugs. By believing that you can control human behavior through intimidation and fear. Results don't matter as long as you look like you mean business.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#2)
    by The Heretik on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:02 PM EST
    Last week Rumsfeld says open, Bush says maybe not, Mel Martinez says it should close, Cheney says Gitmo will stay open. Just who is in charge of this disgrace?

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#3)
    by jimcee on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:02 PM EST
    After reading the TIME article that was available on-line as per your link I'm not impressed with the accusation that this fellow was abused. Yelled at? Yes. Teased about his self-idenity? Yes. Made to stand up for long periods of time? Sorry but I think they call that work; afterall we all can't have desk jobs. And gee, don't make me drink water what ever you do.... That finger to the chest thing brought back memories of my old gym teacher/hockey coach. Until they paddle these guys with a cricket bat as both my elementry and junior high principals did to me (and they were well desrved whacks) then putting water on these fellas or having a gal get in his space seems pretty lame. Heck guys in this country pay women to do that kind of stuff all the time. Over all the Left has become too soft to be able to coherently judge what life is like in the real world. If you live near a college campus then you'll be either sophmorically idealistic or you'll be ironically cynical. Sad to say but the Left started out with a worker's cause and ended up being the home of those who don't have to truly work for a living because they've been protected by tenure. The workers will do OK and the faux-intellectuals will whine over thier chablis at the plight of the workers whilst they complain about the price of Au Pairs today. The Left is nothing more today than "Whine and Cheese" Those that are protected will always wield thier tools ineffectually and whine for protection because they just don't appreciate what hard work is.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#4)
    by DawesFred60 on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:02 PM EST
    Well you need some-place to keep people right? but what kind of people are being kept in that place? if the government would let me i could reeducated all of the people in that place in 24 hrs, do you know how? The Old Way! on tape!

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#5)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    The left I'm a part of believes in workers rights, human rights, civil rights, due process, innocent until proven guilty....you know, classic American ideals. I don't think closing Guantanamo will change anything. We will just betray our ideals somewhere else. I'm sick of saying it, but here it goes. If the men held at Guantanamo and elsewhere are so dangerous, it shouldn't be too hard to prove. Try them, convict them. If not, let them go home. If you don't think there are a some innocent goat herders lumped in with the bad guys in our various prisons around the world, you trust our lying govt. too much.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    battlefield trials for enemy combatants? these aren't folks charged with crimes/what would you have them convicted of? what standard of proof/does Miranda apply? Please point to the war where this standard applied? Why would our lying government want goatherds imprisoned? I invite all concerned to simply take those individuals at Gitmo into their own homes. Don't dump them in other countries to continue to murder.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#7)
    by DawesFred60 on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    Ed, no standards of war, my ideals are just shot the guys and be done with it. and call it a war and call it what it is, a crusade and a cultural war. its all about who will rule what, like all other wars.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#8)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    It's not a crusade. We were attacked-that little fact is forgotten here on a regular basis because, apparently, 9/11 was really a zionist plot with the connivance of the CIA. Those who want to afford the protections of US courts to those captured simply and naively don't believe that the other side means to do us harm. It is a version of NIMBY(release them, just not in my back yard).

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#9)
    by Jlvngstn on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    Ed, all I want is a fair trial, if they are part of a broad conspiracy to commit terrorist acts against americans, let it be proven in court and sentence them accordingly. Methinks there is no proof, hence no trials. It is quite transparent to the entire world save for those obsessed with protecting the administrations party line.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#10)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    We were attacked
    Yes, we were. I don't find that reason enough to deny people basic human rights. Don't be such a coward to be so cavalier with the lives of those you've never met.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#11)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    With allegations of abuse cropping up at American detention centers across Iraq and afganistan, what good will closing Gitmo do? Maybe we could pretend we care though, by sending in an observer or two from amnesty international (Wait for jim on that one) and coming up with concrete policy on where we draw the torture line and releasing it publicly. Then maybe us lefties would think the administration cared.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#12)
    by Richard Aubrey on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    People captured in battle stay behind the wire until the war is over. Trials are not part of the deal. In the usual warning, careful what you ask for. Suppose we find a guy is guilty as sin of, say, blowing up a bunch of civilians. What then? We shoot him. Suppose we find he's only guilty of fighting against us. He stays. We don't need a trial to find out if he's there by accident. Right now, they're just getting their three religion-sensitive squares a day and being asked to view porn. Being on hold isn't so bad when execution is called for by law. According to Gonzales recently, as well as Duncan Hunter, twelve releasees have been found to be fighting against us, again. The implication is that either we're pretty generous--to a fault--or not very bright about who we release. If we release twelve guys who are willing to go back into the field, it would seem the requirements for keeping the rest are pretty high. Your other goal, lie about Gitmo and then demand the administration act as if the lies were true, seems to have failed.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#13)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    Of course we are killing enemy combatants at what sort of daily rate richard? I think it may take the american army all of a year to kill these 12 if they exist. See I have no problem with a soldier shooting the enemy, so lets find where they are fighting against us and kill them.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#14)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    Red Cross already visits. AI, given the stand it has taken, would be a mistake(hence not shooting one's mouth off to get on Fox News). As far as being cavalier with the lives of others, reflect on your own desires in regards to the detainees before you make such a statement. do you care if they are released to kill again-not if it scores points against Bush.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#15)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    People captured in battle stay behind the wire until the war is over.
    But when does this war end, when "terror" ceases to exist? See you in 5000 years. This isn't a war at all. You can't fight a war against a tactic. And about the 12 supposedly released and found on the battlefield. Isn't it plausible they only started fighting after being wrongfully imprisoned and possibly tortured. I know that might make me a little militant. And in my opinion, anyone who first picked up arms after an invasion of their country is 100% justified. I'd do the same if the US was invaded. As we can see, illegal and unjust wars open up a hornets nest of problems.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#16)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    AI didn't take a "stand." It simply reported its findings in much the same way it always does. When the Bush Admin likes what they report, it cites the hell out of them. When it doesn't like what they report, then it goes ad hominem. With the generous help of NewsCorp, I might add. To what depths must one sink to find it necessary to villify Amnesty International, for goodness' sake? But never mind. Just stay alert, and stay with Fox.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#17)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    do you care if they are released to kill again
    We don't know that they have ever killed anyone, our govt. won't present its evidencve. I believe it is better to let 10,000 guilty men free than to put one innocent man in chains. I used to think all Americans believed this. I guess not. This ideal should not stop at US citizens or at our borders. Freedom by nature is unsafe, messy, and dangerous. But it's glorious and worth the risk. C'mon Ed...stop hating on freedom. Places like China lock people up on a whim, perhaps you'd fell more safe in a totalitarian enviroment.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#18)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    As far as being cavalier with the lives of others, reflect on your own desires in regards to the detainees before you make such a statement.
    Let me say that I am not being cavalier with other's lives. I am saying that I would rather they all go free and if they return to fighting they may die in said fighting. The ones being cavalier about lives are the administration that started the whole damn war.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#19)
    by Dadler on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    And hopefully, someday very soon, Rumsfeld will clutch at his chest, gasp for a breath, and be dead by the time he hits the floor. Is there a more worthless, lying, patronizing as*wipe in this administration? Not counting Cheney and Bush, of course.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#20)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    AI sold its "credibility" to be on Fox. Their US head admitted as much in his interview on the channel. Of course, the Gulag comparison is the height of wisdom here(of course, posters here compare Fox to the Third Reich). Do you understand that these folks are not accused of criminal acts and criminal trials are not warranted? Better yet, the goatherds go from being goatherds to militants because of our conduct-why can't you accept that there were bad guys there to begin with-would that be judgmental? Would you have let 10k Nazis go free to fight again if an innocent streudal maker had been captured?

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#21)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:03 PM EST
    There are bad guys all over the world Ed. I had an axe murderer living in my neighborhood, but I wouldn't want my whole neighborhood occupied and detained because of one bad guy. That's pretty much what we did. That is not "freedom on the march".

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#22)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    War against a tactic-that is true. Our war is against a psychotic strain of Islam-the Administration failed to honestly state as much. By your failure to answer, apparently you would have let the 10k Nazis go. War is not the equivalent of street crime. Is freedom on the march? I don't know in the long run-ask those who voted for the first time at enormous risk to their own lives. Compare to their future should your views prevail(lots of whining, no actions-a lot like the UN)

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#23)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    The WOT is like the War on Drugs. It is a PR thing, NOT AN ACTUAL WAR. The WOT, just like the WOD will never ever be over.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#24)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    The "war on terror" is not the equivalent of WWII. Didn't we let all the captured Germans go once the war ended? The Taliban has been ousted, Saddam has been ousted, Bush said "Mission Accomplished"...why are they still being detained? Now, as JLV said, if the govt. has proof that the men detained plan on attacking us upon release, try them for conspiracy and give them life if convicted. If the govt. has proof that the men detained participated in terror acts previously, try and convict them to life. The basic premise of my argument is you can't detain people indefinitely over maybes. It is unjust and unamerican, not to mention sick and inhumane.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#25)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    Nothing is the equivalent of WWII. WWII had bad people on the other side-you don't even acknowledge that(we picked up 500 innocent goatherds). You want trials for prisoners not charged with crimes who still have intelligence and are inclined to still attack us as per those released that did so. Following your prescription, please be prepared to lose even more freedoms as we will lose.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#26)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    What possible intelligence could these people have after being locked up for several years with no access to the outside world. Thats just another flavor of kool-aid for the swallowers of bush. Charge them, try them, or let them ago. It is the American way.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#27)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    Again, lots of bad people in the world. Bin Ladin, Bush, Saddam...take your pick. I cannot make the leap that all the detainees are bad people, I don't know them. I have seen what Bush and Bin Ladin can do, they are bad people. How do we go about getting them detained indefinitely? By the way, the average German soldier wasn't a bad guy, he just had a criminal govt. that commited atrocities I am beginning to know what that is like, to a lesser extent.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#28)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    BL/Bush/SH-I can see why we'll never agree. Like a twilight zone episode, I wish you were granted the opportunity to live under BL or SH to put things in perspective. It appears to make the left feel courageous to compare our government to the Gulag/fascist/whatever. I believe there have been some controversy over the extent to which the average German soldier was ok-I believe the book Hitler's Willing Executioners(?) covered topic.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#29)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    If you were an Iraqi whose home was under a cluster bomb, you'd call Bush a bad guy too. That's what I was getting at. Obviously, living in the USA is far better than Iraq or Afghanistan. I am trying to keep it that way, defending the American ideals that make us great. The ones you want to ignore for convenience and a false sense of "safety".

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#30)
    by jimcee on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:04 PM EST
    OK let us just say for the sake of argument that these fine fellows are tried in the US court system. Well they weren't "Mirandized" at the time of thier detention so the judge is required to toss the case at the outset and these fellas walk before the trial gets started. Where do they go? Were they guilty? Who knows there would be no trial. Then with the over abundance of lawyers it would be just a matter of time before these detainees sued the Federal gov't for false detention and win a bundle, take to the road and use thier ill-gotten awards (minus 33% cut for thier lawyer) and fund some more fun and games with the proceeds. No, the mistake the military made when these folks were captured on the battlefield was not just killing them. The idea that some on this site believe that this relative handful of prisoners compared to those that were released are not hard core jihadists is a joke. Goat herders my arse. Any shepherd would have been far from Tora Bora when they saw the Allies were coming there just to protect thier flock from harm. Ed has it about right. If Satan himself said he was abused by the Bushies at Gitmo knee-jerk Bush haters would take his side if it might make Bush look bad. The Left and the Taliban as allies? Fanatical leftist secularists and fanatical Islamist holding hands and singing kum-bay-a, who'd a thunk it. I always thought that the Lefties only like secular dictators that torture and kill people but I guess you learn something new every day.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#31)
    by Richard Aubrey on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:05 PM EST
    Jeez. This sign-in thing is inconsistent. Here's hoping. We hold the bad guys until the war's over, just like all wars. If the war takes longer than other wars, well, no other prisoners ever got a get out of jail before the war's over if it lasts too long card. Remember that they weren't tortured at Gitmo. See the Time circ stats. That's the bottom number of people who know you lie. It's actually millions more. The goal, of lying about Gitmo and then insisting the administration act as if the lies are true seems to have failed. Duncan Hunter and Att Genl Gonzales have both said a dozen guys went back to the fight. The bar for keeping the rest must be pretty high. Is the left against going into Afghanistan? What, exactly, is the difference between what the left wants the US to do in Afghanistan and what the Taliban and al Q want the US to do. Letting ten thousand guilty go free is a nice principle but it does inevitably lead to the death of an unknown number of innocents. These are not dead yet, so they have no name and are harder to identify with than the guilty who are actually in prison trying to act like angels so as to get out. Those who want the ten thousand guilty to be let go ought to at least address the question of their future victims. We're fighting a war on Islamofascism. Unfortunately, some people are sufficiently dishonest as to try to misrepresent the war as being literally against a tactic, which any fool knows is false. You want to take the name literally? Ask any Brit what was so great about The Great War.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#32)
    by Dadler on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:05 PM EST
    Mr. Aubrey, But I thought the administration line you follow was that this "war" IS different, that we're NOT fighting a clearcut enemy in the uniform of another nations, that we CAN'T do what we've done in past wars. I'm confused. And if this is true, then how can there be ANY way to know who's an enemy soldier and who isn't? Or who's just been sold for the cash? And why would you trust a secret process more reminiscent of totalitarian regimes over the transparent processes of democracy? Especially when there is no logic in keeping people locked away in perpetuity when it can never be verified that they were ever a member of anything to begin with. You're saying to the world, when in doubt in matters of individual detainees we will act in the MOST tryannical and secretive and thuggish manner possible. Explain how this gains us anything, much less any good will abroad. It's a lose-lose operation. In short, you're supporting a policy that is akin to its authors claiming with absolute certainty they heard a particular tree fall in the forest when 1) they were thousands of miles away and 2) all the trees fell and they're all the same.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#33)
    by chupetin on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:05 PM EST
    It's not a crusade. We were attacked-that little fact is forgotten here on a regular basis...
    True, but not by Sadam Hussein. That little fact seems to have been completely forgotten by a large number of Republican faithfull. But being of the Republican Party, they defend anything that this Administration does, even policies that are opposite of what I understood was their ideology. I mean, using our Armed Forces for "Nation Building"? Since when?

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#34)
    by Richard Aubrey on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:06 PM EST
    Chupetin. Since the thread is about Gitmo, the question is the origin of the Gitmo prisoners who, as far as I know, are all from Afghanistan. This is not exactly a new kind of war. See the Spanish ulcer (work safe, it's what the war in Spain was like for Napoleon, including irregulars) But we're fighting it in a new way. In the old days, the Legions, the Wehrmacht, the Russian Army, the French in Spain, the Spanish in the New World, etc, fought this kind of war with mass extermination. I know you will cry that's what's happening now, but you know, by now, that I know it's a lie. Save your breath. In past wars, these guys wouldn't have gotten to Gitmo, wouldn't have gotten past battalion and a couple of broken fingers and twisted other parts to give up some tactical info before being shot. For all you whine about Gitmo, it's a hell of a lot better than the historical practice. As you know. Yeah. They're there for the duration. That's not new. Keeping people who want to kill you from killing you is not new. In the old days, of course, they'd have been shot, but not now. Think of it this way. If they'd been shot, their plight would have gradually faded. With Gitmo, you have something current to complain about which won't go away. I see it as a plus for lefties. Every morning when you wake up, it's still there. I checked some weather. It's going to be about 107 in Needles, CA today. The Mustangs start their two-a-day football practice in August. I visited Needles a couple of years ago in August. It's a dry heat. The locals were complaining about it being muggy--35% humidity. But that person had also warned us about tarantula crossings on secondary roads (the state doesn't post them) so I may have been subject to a bit of a leg pull. It'll be in the nineties in Gitmo next week. 115 in Baghdad, 86 in Kabul, and 108 in Rihyad. Sleep deprivation. When I was in the Ninth Officer Candidate Battalion ("Champagne Ninth--???), we lived across the street from Tower Field, where the second week of jump school is held. We ran the Airborne track when the paratroopers weren't using it. I discovered I could run while asleep. Anybody can walk while asleep. The first and fourth squads--outside files--needed to maintain a higher level of consciousness in order to not miss the turns. It wouldn't do to trot off and wake up miles from where you're supposed to be. I recall trying to tell a guy on a training exercise that he'd left his rifle someplace and was carrying a stick. But I kept micro-sleeping, knees unlocking and waking part-way to the ground. I couldn't keep track of what I'd planned to say, or whether I'd said it, or dreamed I'd said it during my instants of unconsciousness. Stress positions: How about a day walking up and down hills with sixty-plus pounds on your back and not enough water? That's been the story of the grunt since Marius loaded up his legionaries to the point they called themselves Marius' Mules. Being a stay-at-home sort, I don't have a clue how much it costs to get a woman to professionally invade my space. All of which is to say that Durbin needs to get a new shrink. He needs to get himself into the Gestapo torture cellars to find out what it's really like. Not that it would change his tune--except by a couple of octaves--which is to do anything to damage Bush, even if it costs us hugely in the war. He's a lefty.

    Re: Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come (none / 0) (#35)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:08 PM EST
    According to Richard, there never was a UN treaty. He refers to the Napoleonic Wars -- no UN treaty there. According to Richard, there never was a Genocide Convention. He refers to the trials of training to fight in a war -- what does that have to do with untried civilians, scooped up by PAID foreigners? Nothing. According to Richard, there never were Nuremberg trials. He says the Gestapo did far worse. If we Nuremberg Don Rumsfeld under the EXACT same law as existed in 1946, he would be imprisoned or hanged. But that was 50 years ago, and our laws have changed across the board. We have a Genocide treaty, a UN treaty, and a range of Geneva-based concords about the treatment of prisoners. In an illegal war -- no legal prisoners. Were we talking about terrorists, REAL terrorists, like Posada Carriles, who Bush is currently harboring, like Iyad Allawi, who committed multiple murders in front of US soldiers -- then sure, confine them. That's what is done to people proven guilty of such crimes. Unless they are aligned to Bush's business interests or R-traitor political purposes. Then it's Carte Blanche, the divine right of kings. How long do you think these unconstitutional lies will stand, Richard?

    Rumsfeld: Gitmo Will Operate for Years to Come | 35 comments (35 topical)