Broken Promises: Obama and Guantanamo
“I have said repeatedly that I will close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that.” -- President Obama on 60 Minutes in November, 2008.
Soon-to-be former President Obama did indeed repeatedly claim that one of his first actions as Commander in Chief would be to close the controversial prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Yet here we are, just days before his presidency will end, and Guantanamo is still open for business.
Jackson, L. (2016). Guantanamo Bay Prison. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/14/us/politics/harsher-security-tactics-obama-left-door-ajar-and-donald-trump-is-knocking.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FGuantanamo%20Bay%20Naval%20Base%20(Cuba)&action=click&contentCollection=us®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=9&pgtype=collection
The United States requisitioned Guantanamo Bay in 1903. Up until George W. Bush’s “War on Terror,” the base was a naval facility that was used mainly for benign purposes. Around 2002, individuals captured during campaigns against al-Qaeda and the Taliban began to arrive. Many detainees at Guantanamo never had official charges filed against them.
Prisoners at Guantanamo have been subjected to “questioning” (read: torture), including waterboarding, severe sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, humiliation, mock executions, temperature extremes, and other horrors (The Justice Campaign, 2017). Utterly powerless, detainees have resorted to hunger strikes as their only means of protest. In response, US personnel force-fed the inmates.
Force-feeding is a gut-churning experience to watch. Yasiin Bey (aka Mos Def) voluntarily underwent the procedure in 2013 to draw attention to the plight of prisoners at Guantanamo. A video of his experience can be seen below, courtesy of The Guardian. Viewer discretion is advised: the video contains disturbing content.
Nine prisoners have died while serving time in Guantanamo, including Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, Ali Abdullah Ahmed, Abdul Rahman Ma'ath Thafir al Amri, Awal Gul, Mohammad Ahmed Abdullah Saleh al Hanashi, Abdul Razzaq Hekmati, Inayatullah, Mana Shaman Allabardi al Tabi, and Yasser Talal al Zahrani. A full list of Guantanamo detainees can be found here. Although explained away as suicides or deaths by natural causes, at least three were claimed by Staff Sgt. Joseph Hickman to have been tortured to death (Connelly, 2015).
The prison has been the center of legal battles, protests, and human rights inquiries since it's use as a detention facility began. It goes against American values to hold prisoners in such deplorable conditions and subject them to these inhumane treatments. It is time to shut it down.
President Obama did release most of the prisoners from Guantanamo during his time in office. Of the original 779, only 55 men remain. However, President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to begin sending more detainees to the prison when he takes office. President Obama had a chance to make sure that the mistakes of the past could not be repeated, but it appears that the closing of Guantanamo is a promise that he was unwilling or unable to keep.
Sources:
Connelly, S. (2015). Guantanamo Bay staff sergeant claims three men believed to have committed suicide were actually tortured to death. The New York Daily News. Retrieved from http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/guantanamo-bay-sergeant-claims-cia-tortured-3-men-death-article-1.2082610
The Justice Campaign. (2017). Torture Techniques used in Guantanamo. Retrieved from http://thejusticecampaign.org/?page_id=273#TT
