Posted on 01/17/2015 2:29:09 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
President Barack Obama has been making progress on his pledge to shut down the prison at Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba, having transferred out more than 20 prisoners since last fall, leaving fewer than 60 the administration considers eligible for release if countries can be found to accept them.
That would leave some 70 hard-core terrorists at the base. The president is reported to believe that Congress will then reject the high cost of keeping the facility open for these 70 prisoners, including the man who organized the aircraft attacks of 9/11, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, and agree to transfer them to a security prison in the United States.
The likeliest place would be the Navy brig in Hanahan, which has already held some high-risk terrorist prisoners. It could become the new Guantanamo. Why it would be cheaper to house them here than on the Cuban base is not clear, unless Mr. Obama also has a plan to return Guantanamo to Cuban jurisdiction, as suggested by some commentators.
That raises a wholly different set of questions, since Guantanamo has been the Navy’s main operating center for the Caribbean Sea and East Coast of South America for more than a century. If Cuba had a friendly government, the base would undoubtedly be welcome. But Cuba does not have a friendly government, despite Mr. Obama’s recent decision to resume diplomatic relations. Giving up Guantanamo should not be a U.S. objective.
Meanwhile, developments in the threat posed by Islamic terrorism raise the question of whether there may be a new reason to keep open the prison facility at Guantanamo. The success of the Islamic State in attracting Western adherents has led to a rapid increase in the number of trained terrorists with U.S. passports — now said to be in the range of 150 — and European passports with automatic entry to the United States.
The leader of the Islamic State has urged these fighters to return to their home countries and wage war on them.
In addition, other Islamic terrorist networks are still sending jihadists to attack Western targets. Al-Qaida in Yemen has claimed a connection to the French residents who attacked the Paris satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. (The New York Times reports that the majority of Guantanamo prisoners the Obama administration is seeking to release come from Yemen, a nation in the throes of at least two Islamist rebellions.)
The current strategy of drone attacks on jihad leaders gathers very little intelligence about their plans for attacks on the United States. Perhaps the time has come, as Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has suggested, to resume the pre-Obama policy of tracking down those leaders, capturing them and letting them be questioned by skilled interrogators within accepted rules for treatment of prisoners.
Guantanamo, not the Navy brig in Hanahan, remains the logical place to detain such terror suspects.
And one more thing, I guess it didn't seem "seemly" for Obama to march in solidarity against Islamic terrorism alongside international leaders in Paris on Sunday, then release (knew it was a done deal) 5 more Gauntanamo Islamic terrorist inmates to rejoin the fight on Wednesday.
I said the same thing the day he went all kissy-poo with the Castro brothers.
the Navy brig in Hanahan
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is that the Hanahan in Charleston, South Carolina ???
I suspect this is what he intends.
It's the policy of indefinite detention that is causing the problem to begin with.
None of these "suspects" should still be alive. Not one.
Now, it may be that in the original herd there were a few that got "swept up" by accident. If true, they should have been released long ago.
But when the Germans (including US citizen Germans) landed at Amagansett in 1942, out of uniform and planning terrorist attacks, it took six weeks, including their expedited USSC hearings, to put them to death in the DC city jail.
That leading enemies whom we have every legal and moral right to hang are still eating Halal food at ANY location reflects a much bigger problem than Obama's foolishness.
I had to put the iPad down, take a drink of water and some deep breaths. If that no-good, Kenyan muslim, ISIS sympathizing, homosexual troglodyte gives back Gitmo, I’ll freaking scream. What did we ever do to deserve that man? Seriously, what have we done to deserve this??
United States Congress. Please pick up the white courtesy phone.
Hello? US Congress? Are you there? .....................(crickets)
Yes, it’s that Hanahan. One time I was innocently driving around the back roads around there and I ended up on what looked like a charming country road...that took me to a truly alarming guard post with some seriously armed guards! The actual facility is way back in the woods.
They have had a number of truly bad actors there, but there’s no way Guantanamo’s population should be transferred there. For one thing, it would focus the attention of foreign terrorists on Charleston, which still has the Navy and a lot of Naval Aviation.
We don’t need the terrorists on our soil. Also, we don’t need to give Cuba a fully equipped base and high security prison.
But I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if this is what Obama is aiming at. Can’t somebody stop him? But I guess the legislature is meaningless nowadays. He just ignores it.
The photo (and video) of that Chinese man in Tiananmen Square, standing up against an entire column of tanks, remains one of the most emotionally powerful images I’ve seen in my life. It never ceases to move me.
If I recall correctly, we had Guantanamo before 9/11, and before we started sending Islamic prisoners there. Why would we need to give it up simply because Obama is releasing all the terrorists?
We actually lease the Guantanamo property from the Cubans, although I don’t think the rent has been paid for some time. It’s been a Navy base for over 100 years.
After the Spanish American war, in which Spain lost Cuba in 1898, we occupied the island for a number of years. After it was granted full independence about 10 years later, we then leased the land for the base.
So did I!
plus the AFB
Lost the Civil War.
To Obama, Guantanamo Bay is the last vestige of US colonialism. Of course he wants to get rid of it. That’s one of the “dreams” of his father.
Fk that!
Those 70 and every other released are worth whatever it costs...
I have felt (and posted) that this all about Gitmo from the start, he will transfer it through treaty modification and Congress will NOT be able to stop him.
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