Suicide bomber was Gitmo releasee...

[Dragon67]

Foresight ?:

//SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - The U.S. military confirmed Wednesday that a former Guantanamo detainee from Kuwait carried out a recent suicide attack in northern Iraq.- AP//

This is what happens when you put your trust in civil or foreign courts. This guy was freed by a Kuwaiti court who the US turned him over too.

[Cpl Steiner]

Dragon67,

Did he cause any casualties? Where they military or civilian?

There is also the possibility - and I'm playing devil's advocate here - that the guy "turned extremist" because of being deprived of his human rights in Guantanamo for so many years.

The British tried something similar to Guantanamo when fighting the IRA in Northern Ireland in the '70s. Back then it was called "Internment" but it was effectively imprisonment without trial of suspected terrorists, just like Guantanamo today. In hindsight, Internment did no good at all in the fight against the IRA and only made them look like the good guys rather than the murdering scum-bags they actually were. It was once nicknamed the IRA's "biggest recruiting sergeant" because it turned the IRA from a small dying organisation into a national movement. It literally saved the IRA from going under.

Sorry to disagree but if you have evidence that someone is a terrorist then you put them on trial. If you don't have evidence then you watch them like hawks until you do. What you don't do is just lock them up anyway.

[ChrisND]

Originally posted by Cpl Steiner:

Sorry to disagree but if you have evidence that someone is a terrorist then you put them on trial. If you don't have evidence then you watch them like hawks until you do. What you don't do is just lock them up anyway.

Completely agreed. I wish this administration read more history books.

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by Cpl Steiner:

..but if you have evidence that someone is a terrorist then you put them on trial.

Some can be turned, some can safely be jailed, some can only be eliminated. Apparently this Kuwaiti fellow was in the latter group.

[hammelman]

Does it really matter that he blew himself up though? If not him, surely someone else would have done it. I also completely agree with Steiner on this one, you dont just go imprisoning people because you want to - thats what Saddam and his ilk did. Ironic isnt it?

[Dragon67]

//Sorry to disagree but if you have evidence that someone is a terrorist then you put them on trial. If you don't have evidence then you watch them like hawks until you do. What you don't do is just lock them up anyway.//

Apparently, he was locked up for a reason, placed on trial, then released.

He then went out and turned himself into a human bomb.

I am results oriented. He was in Gitmo for a reason. Yes, sometimes you do just lock them up.

[Dirtweasle]

They are and have been through a variety of processes. Some examples -

Suspect Charged in African Embassy Bombing

WASHINGTON, March 31, 2008 – Charges have been sworn against a Guantanamo Bay detainee, alleging he was involved in the preparation and planning of the 1998 attack on the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania

~~~~~~~

Charges Referred Against Detainee Al Qosi

U.S. Defense Deparment Press Release, Mar. 5, 2008 –The Defense Department announced today that two charges have been referred against Guantanamo detainee Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi of Sudan

~~~~~~~~~

U.S. Defense Deparment Press Release, Dec. 21, 2007– The Office of Military Commissions announced today that charges have been sworn against Guantanamo detainee Ahmed Mohammed Ahmed Haza al Darbi of Saudi Arabia

So, what must you mean to say is they are not processes which you approve of for some reason.

[hammelman]

Maybe i should get you locked up, you seem like a threat to peace loving people all over the world. How do i know you aren't going to take the form of a mushroom cloud if you're not agreed with on the forum? See the problem? Probably not.

[MikeyD]

Its not hard to imagine that arabs caught up in Rumsfelds prisoner torture policies of the early war years came out so traumatized that they're willing to blow themselves up in a crowd. By contrast, U.S. soldeirs traumatized by the same policies have been known to simply go into a corner and shoot themselves. Army Specialist Alyssa Peterson, C Company, 311th Military Intelligence BN, 101st Airborne was one of those unfortunates.

[ChrisND]

Judging by what I have now read about the guy, he should never have been released, and for credible reasons.

[Childress]

Originally posted by MikeyD:

Its not hard to imagine that arabs caught up in Rumsfelds prisoner torture policies of the early war years came out so traumatized that they're willing to blow themselves up in a crowd.

Interesting logical progression. Like the Khmer Rouge were so shaken up by Nixon's bombing campaign they went and murdered a third of the population of Cambodia?

[Pandur]

i am with MikeyD on that one, you lock em up, you give them the best torture the "mastermind" in question said it works best on arabs(naked stuff, fake sex, in front of women etc...), they most probably will get a beast.

if they where "dangerous" befor enprisonment they are ready to blow themselfs up after that one.

thats more than obviouse if you imagine "yourself" in that role.

[Clavicula_Nox]

Originally posted by hammelman:

Maybe i should get you locked up, you seem like a threat to peace loving people all over the world. How do i know you aren't going to take the form of a mushroom cloud if you're not agreed with on the forum? See the problem? Probably not.

Hm, what can be said for those who were captured in the field? Not everyone in Guantanamo is a peace-loving pacifist intent only on minding his own business. I have no doubt some, possibly a good number, were imprisoned on charges trumped up by some Northern Alliance jackels, but a far greater portion is most likely there for a very good reason. Separating the 2 is going to take quite a bit of time and resources, and frankly, there are other things going on right now, you know? Which is more important? If you only have $2, but $10 worth of stuff you need to buy or do, what do you choose to spend it on?

[Childress]

You're making zero sense. The individual mentioned above wasn't detained at Abu Ghraib, where, at any rate, procedures were considerably milder than in Saddam's torture rooms.

These, er, people have been committing mayhem all over the world from India to the Philippines. Mostly against their own co-religionists. Excuses? The 9/11 perpetrators were mostly cosseted young men from upper-middle class Saudi families.

[Bigduke6]

Problem is, the decision to hold or release doesn't have the benefit of hindsight.

They just let out Sami Al Hadj, an Al Jazeera employee that was held in Guantameno for about 7 years. He was accused of a lot of stuff but his main "crime" seems to have been he ran cash to the Caucauses in the late 1990s for Islamic humanitarian groups, and at least some of the money wound up in the hands of Islamic extremists.

When he got picked up in Afghanistan, he was a full time, salaried employee of Al Jazeera. That is the television channel with the longest reach, and the highest reputation for reliablity, in the Middle East.

From what I understand in late 2001 some Afghan tribesmen figured out the CIA was paying big bounties on foreigners with possible Al Quaeda links, and really wasn't too picky about who got accused, so they ratted ol' Sami out.

Before his detention, he supposedly was a chubby, happy-go-lucky kinda guy with maybe a skeleton in his closet from when he was in his early 20s, but now he was a family man with a wife and a kid.

During his detention, because he was a whole lot more educated than most of the others held in Guantameno, he became a prayer leader. Also taught people Arabic and English. He was peaceful and non-violent, but over the years he lost 55 pounds in repeated hunger strikes. He didn't die because the Marines force fed him, repeatedly.

Al Jazeera the picture of this guy on the air daily, about every three or four hours, every day of his detention. They showed pictures of his wife, his kid, his home, Guantameno, his letters, whatever. They reported on US force feeding techniques, the medical progression of starvation, you name it, if it was connected with Sami and a provable fact, they aired it.

Certainly, the fact that the US military had in the past targeted Al Jazeera offices with air strikes, and killed Al Jazeera staff, had something to do with the intensity of the reporting. Al Jazeera is a TV channel, they don't have aircraft carriers and or laser-guided munitions. Just cameras and people who operate them, or talk into them.

Of course, on a good day, Al Jazeera is watched by 40 - 50 million viewers, daily, in the very region the US is trying to hunt down terrorists.

This negative and very predictable media image of Sami al Hadj's detention, spread worldwide by a TV channel with the reach of the BBC, probably should have been weighed against the benefits of keeping under wraps, without a trial, a guy who just might have been a low-level bag man for some flakey Islamic organizations, and pretty much, that's it.

As nearly as I can see, that wasn't how the US decision-process went. It was rather, for years, "Al Jazeera is the enemy, and this guy Sami al Hadj is definately the enemy, and for the national security we need to keep this enemy locked up for as long as we feel like it. If we charge him for cash smuggling he'll get 6 months to a year pretty much anywhere, so better to just hold him indefinately and call him an 'illegal combatant'."

So for years this smart guy is inside Guantameno organizing the prisoners, teaching them about media relations and passive resistance. At the same his employer - a TV station backed by one of the richest royal famlies in the world (and whose fortune is built largely on selling energy to the US and its friends) is doing everything it can to make sure no one forgets Sami al Hadj.

And there was nothing the US could do to stop it. Quatar (Al Jazeera's home base) is a US ally in the War on Terrorism, so it's not like the US could invade Quatar to shut Al Jazeera up.

The US let him go free last week, and the picture of him finally hugging his son, who was an infant when he last saw him, are pretty compelling. It's really hard to look at this skinny Sudanese Dad with tears in his eyes, and conclude "Yep, that's a definate potential terrorist, good thing we locked him up, and too bad we let him out."

Those images have gone around the friggen' planet.

This is a problem when some one else from Guantameno decides to be a terrorist, logically to get back at his jailers. Sure, that's an arguement that maybe people in there should stay there.

But with so many people aware of the Sami al Hadj story, that arguement is really hard to sell. To most people who know who he is, he a good guy. As far as they are concerned, it was the bad guys that locked him up in Guantameno.

[Clavicula_Nox]

Problem is, the decision to hold or release doesn't have the benefit of hindsight

Yeah, I would like to see those who don't need to be there taken out and returned to their families immediately. I have no problems with punishing "bad guys," but I don't want us to have to perpetuate injustices to get at them.

[hammelman]

Man, Big Duke has this way of coming into debates and seriously shutting them down with his great writing skill. I am in awe. Duke, did you get your handle from Wing Commander - loved that character, such a bad ass.

But seriously, I think Clavicula_Nox is on the right track with the above statement, of course none of us want to see injustice done to just people, but when you start dragging in everybody because you "think" or someone who got paid a bounty says they might pose a threat we have serious moral issues to deal with.

There's always going to be dead enders, and unfortunately there is no way to stop these people from executing their mission. All we can do is work our best to get to them (in a non-violent way) before they turn into these people that would do these horrible things. I'm no pacifist, and i think that some people get whats coming to them and rightly so, but to condemn people without process is very bad for us.

[Clavicula_Nox]

Man, Big Duke has this way of coming into debates and seriously shutting them down with his great writing skill. I am in awe. Duke, did you get your handle from Wing Commander - loved that character, such a bad ass.

Nope, unless I'm mistaken, Big Duke 6 was the call-sign for the Air Cav Colonel in Apocalypse Now.

because you "think" or someone who got paid a bounty says they might pose a threat we have serious moral issues to deal with.

This is the root of the problem. For whatever reason, not enough care was taken to weed out the prisoners before they became detainees.

[hammelman]

This is the root of the problem. For whatever reason, not enough care was taken to weed out the prisoners before they became detainees.

Perhaps this should be the lesson taken away from all of this stuff. Know your sources.

[Clavicula_Nox]

Yeah, we have this problem were we take "The enemy of my enemy is my friend," to too much of an extreme.

[Wisbech_lad]

Originally posted by Dragon67:

Foresight ?:

This is what happens when you put your trust in civil or foreign courts.

Yeah, screw those civil courts. Next time I'm in a dispute, I'm just going to lock the other party away until they agree with me.

[Dragon67]

Originally posted by Wisbech_lad:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Dragon67:

Foresight ?:

This is what happens when you put your trust in civil or foreign courts.

Yeah, screw those civil courts. Next time I'm in a dispute, I'm just going to lock the other party away until they agree with me. </font>

[Dogface]

What the hell does this have to do with CM:SF? You know there is a General Forum to post things like this right?

[Guest Mike]

So what's the vote for he was a ter before Gitmo, vs Gitmo screwed him up so much it turned him into a ter?

[Abbott]

They should have shot the SOB instead of releasing him.