Three prisoners, none charged with any crime and two scheduled for release, turned up dead around midnight on June 9, 2006. The official explanation from the military was that they had hung themselves in an attempt at "asymmetrical warfare." According to the official narrative, the three detainees hung sheets up to hide themselves in their cells, shaped pillows on their mats to appear to be in bed, then bound their own hands and feet, stuffed rags down their own throats, tied cloths around their mouths to keep the rags in, climbed up on their washbasins, secured nooses around their necks, and leaped to hang until asphyxiated. Somehow these impossible feats were all accomplished nearly simultaneously in non-adjoining cells, with the very limited amount of linens in their cells, and without attracting any attention from the guards until after hanging for two hours.
The truth is that they were taken to a secret interrogation site, unofficially known as Camp No, and when they were brought back, they were dead due to suffocation from rags stuffed down their throats. Gitmo leadership, along with NCIS, FBI, and Justice Department collaboration, then embarked on an elaborate cover-up, which continues to this day. Fortunately, the sergeant in charge of security that night has exposed the truth, as corroborated by at least three other witnesses. For more details about that fateful night, please read Horton's indispensable account. You can also hear a great interview with him on Antiwar Radio here.
This story is a tragic microcosm of the pure evil that is Guantanamo. We have been told for years by Republican politicians that Gitmo is practically a spa, a paradise of a prison where dirty rotten terrorists get better treatment than common American criminals. The claim is that Gitmo holds only "the worst of the worst", and that these diabolical masterminds will unleash untold violence and chaos on our land unless we deny them their unalienable rights to be charged, face their accuser, be tried, and then released if found innocent.
But the truth is that the huge majority of Gitmo detainees are innocent and should never have been imprisoned in the first place. In a recent interview on Antiwar Radio, Andy Worthington, author of The Guantanamo Files, revealed that the Geneva Conventions require that any prisoners captured in a time of war that lack the uniform or markings of an official enemy must go through an initial screening process to determine if they should truly be detained. In fact, during the first Gulf War, the U.S. captured 1200 such persons, and after review, released 900.
Without such processes in Afghanistan and Iraq, and with the U.S. offering bounties of $3,000 to $5,000, countless innocent men were detained and sent to Guantanamo. At least 759 prisoners have cycled through Gitmo, with the current population at 198. Worthington estimates that only 60 prisoners at the most actually deserve to be in custody.
As further evidence of just how many innocents are held at Gitmo, of the 41 Habeas Corpus suits brought by detainees over the last year and a half, 32 have resulted in a ruling releasing the prisoner. The standard of evidence at a Habeas Corpus hearing is the lowest of any legal proceeding. This means that for at least 32 Gitmo detainees, the government has absolutely no evidence or reason to hold them! Many of these rulings have come from conservative, Bush-appointed judges no less.
Now, after years or torture, abuse, and hopelessly indefinite detention, U.S. authorities are afraid to release innocent prisoners because of the fear they have been radicalized by their experiences. And this is to speak nothing of the prison camp at Bagram in Afghanistan, the black sites circling the globe, and U.S. detainees rendered to prisons in complicit foreign countries.
One of the things I find most discouraging in all this is that Christian conservatives, who loudly claim to adhere to the principles of the Constitution and their faith, support Guantanamo and the atrocities committed there, which directly violate those very principles they supposedly hold dear. I've been hearing a lot lately that the Constitution and Bill of Rights apply only to American citizens. This assertion is wrong both from a philosophical view and a historical view.
For the philosophical basis of the Constitution, we must visit the Declaration of Independence, which declares that our rights to life and liberty are endowed by our creator, embedded in our very humanity, and not in our nationality. Whether Christians like it or not, God created Muslims too -- even the evil ones -- and they therefore deserve to be treated with the same dignity that we would demand for an American (ever hear of the Golden Rule?).
The concept of Habeas Corpus extends back 800 years, and has been long relied on as a vital protection from unlawful detention. Every human, if he is to be imprisoned, deserves to be formally charged with a legitimate crime, have a chance to argue his innocence, and be convicted only by a reasonable and fair process. These rights are formally protected by the 5th through 8th Amendments to the Constitution. Evidently, the founders saw this as an important area; one far too often abused by rulers throughout the centuries.
The 5th Amendment begins, "No person...", and 6th, "In all criminal prosecutions...", so there should be little doubt that these not only apply to American citizens but also anyone who comes under the jurisdiction of the U.S. government. Some argue that Gitmo detainees are prisoners of war and therefore should not be afforded the privileges of the Bill of Rights, but instead fall under military justice. But keep in mind that 1) congress has not declared war constitutionally, so any legal arguments based on the presumption that we are at war start out on shaky ground, 2) the huge majority of detainees have not been arrested on a field of battle, and 3) "war on terror" detainees are not being held under normal, historical U.S. military justice.
There is also the important fact that we have a recent history of trying terrorists in federal court, both citizen and alien: Timothy McVeigh, "Shoe Bomber" Richard Reid, the 1993 World Trade Center bombers, and even 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussoaui. For a very good article on this subject, please see Judge Andrew Napolitano: "The Case Against Military Tribunals."
But even all these reasons should be secondary for a true Christian. The first call of every Christian is to love, even to love our enemies. And yet millions of American Christians support the atrocities committed at Gitmo and elsewhere, and sadly, by that support they are complicit. How can we claim to be followers of Christ and turn a blind eye to such horrific disregard for the image of God that every human carries? If we hold principles that we conditionally suspend for brown people of a different religion, are they really principles in the first place? Justice can and should be sought in a humane, Christ-honoring way.
