Us Versus Them: How Innocents are Sent to Guantanamo

I wrote this after reading "The End of America", by Naomi Wolf, a book which I highly recommend.

In “The End of America”, Naomi Wolf asserts that even the average American citizen should be worried about America’s possible shift into fascism, and the increased oppression and persecution of ordinary people – yet few Americans are, in fact, worried. Many doubt America’s alleged use of torture, unlawful imprisonment, etc, or believe that such things would never happen to them – that they only happen to the “enemy”.

Before reading “The End of America”, I, too, didn’t think I had anything to worry about, either. I believed that only “real” terrorists – i.e., murderers or those plotting murder – were imprisoned in places such as Guantamano, and any discomfort they experienced was only to get them to reveal information that could save lives. I believed that all Americans could easily get access to a lawyer if they were arrested, receive information about the charges and evidence against them, post bail, and get a speedy trial.

Now, I’m not so sure. Does the war against terror only target true threats, or can any American be treated as a dangerous terrorist? Wolf claims it is the latter, and is very convincing in backing up this claim.

America’s use of “secret prisons” – prisons that often function as interrogation camps and are considered outside the rule of law – may come as a shock to many Americans. It certainly came as a shock to me. I had heard a bit about Guantanamo, but not quite understood what it is and what it functions as. I had heard a bit about cases of torture and unlawful imprisonments, but believed that such cases were only isolated incidents of no real consequences, and their victims only terrorists.

However, Wolf shows that such prisons commonly abuse human rights, and that such abuses are sanctioned by the Bush administration. As early as March ’02, President Bush sought to legalize torture at such prisons, claiming that the Geneva Convention should not apply to the conflict with al-Queda or the Taliban. The Taft-Haynes Memo, also known as the “torture memo”, concludes that in order for the infliction of physical pain to be considered torture, it “must be of an intensity akin to that which accompanies serious physical injury such as death or organ failure.” For the infliction of mental pain to be considered torture, it must arise from physical pain and have long-lasting psychological effects such as PTSD.

Under such broad definitions of torture can and are used at Guantanamo and similar prisons. Prisoners can be kept in extreme heat or cold, be hooded and naked in solitary confinement for days, be denied food, beaten, threatened, and far more.

Some might think that surely such things happen only to “real” terrorists – dangerous murderers who would go on to kill many more if they were not caught and interrogated. Although the thought of torture is distasteful to me, I might agree to its use if I believed that it would save lives. However, Wolf points out, torture has not been shown to be an effective means of gaining information. Under torture, false confessions are more likely.

Wolf gives several examples of people, both US citizens and not, who suffered abuse in such prisons during unlawful and unreasonable imprisonment. For instance, she cites a study done by Seton Hall University, which shows that most Guantanamo prisoners are not terrorists, but innocent villagers swept up by the Northern Alliance warlords of Afghanistan simply for the sizeable bounty the US pays for each prisoner.

Wolf then cites another study (Ratner and Ray, “Guantanamo: What the World Should Know”), which gives a graphic account of how prisoners are treated en route to Guantanamo and at the prison itself.

The study describes how at least in one occasion, Northern Alliance soldiers kept prisoners inside metal shipping containers, in conditions of extreme heat and crowding. In order to stop the prisoners from suffocating, they shot holes into the containers, killing some of the prisoners inside. This example is particularly chilling to me, as it reminds me of the conditions suffered by the Jews and other groups targeted by the Nazis, when they were taken in crowded shipping containers, by train, to concentration camps and death camps.

Once at Guantanamo, conditions don’t improve for the prisoners. Many suffer permanent injuries and even death from abusive treatment. Few of the interrogators and guards who harm or kill prisoners are ever sentenced. Only fourteen members of the military out of the thirty-four suspected of causing a prisoner’s death have been sentenced at all – with the highest jail sentence being five months.

As well as being physically and mentally abused in Guantanamo, prisoners are repeatedly interrogated under torture and duress, and they or their families threatened if they do not give a “confession”. They are often unable to see a lawyer for months or even years. They can be imprisoned even with no evidence against them, without even hearing of the charges against them.

These prisoners, Wolf says, are not terrorists – they are just ordinary people, like you and I. She points out how the Espionage Act of 1917 allows the government to label people who have committed no crime as “traitors”, “terrorists”, “collaborators”, and so forth. The Espionage Act makes it illegal for an “unauthorized” person to have “unlawful possession of information relating to the national defense”. This law is now making a comeback, with people being arrested, imprisoned, and convicted for “crimes” like a reporter accepting a leak from a government employee. A person who overhears the wrong conversation or posts the wrong photograph on the internet can, too, find themselves being treated as a “terrorist”, even if they have no such involvement.

After reading Wolf’s examples of ordinary people imprisoned in Guantanamo, I agree with her – and feel that even the average American should be concerned about their own risk of being imprisoned. There is a line between “us” and “them”, but it’s becoming more and more blurred. If we remain indifferent to the increasing oppression of others, eventually we will be those oppressed, and who will come to help us then?

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