Closing Guantanamo a Little

It seemed apparent even to President Obama himself that he was making no dramatic changes in the war on terror. When a heckler interrupted his National Defense University speech to complain that he was making no substantive changes, the president remarked that “these are tough issues, and the suggestion that we can gloss over them is wrong.” He added that her complaints were “worth paying attention to.”

For nearly an hour, Obama explained on Thursday how he intended to moderate his rabid anti-terrorism war in the future. In fact, he announced how he intended to modify his current policies on the Guantanamo detainment facility. He also said he intends to ratchet down his internationally controversial deployment of unmanned drone strikes on suspected terrorists and couple them with stronger controls. But Obama’s good will and many words can’t hide the fact that much remains unexplained.

As a reminder: When Obama came to the White House in January 2009, he promised an immediate break with the anti-terrorism policies of his predecessor. About four years later, 166 suspected terrorists still sit in detention at Guantanamo, none of them save six ever brought to trial.

Beyond that, no previous U.S. president had ever killed as many suspected terrorists without benefit of trial than Obama. On his orders, the CIA and the U.S. military launched hundreds of unmanned drone attacks in Afghanistan and Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia. The targets were the leaders of al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations. The casualties included four U.S. citizens along with large numbers of those civilians falling into the category of collateral damage.

Drone Attacks Will Continue

The president left no doubt in his speech that the drone attacks on enemies in foreign lands would continue, citing the danger of terrorist attacks against which America was obliged to defend itself. Thanks to modern drone technology, the number of casualties would be far below that caused in a conventional large-scale ground war, Obama said.

Nonetheless, the president announced stricter guidelines for the deployment of drones. Only those suspects impossible to reach and take into custody without great risk and those who represent an ongoing and imminent danger to the lives of Americans would henceforth be targeted. Drone attacks on U.S. soil and those carried out as revenge are already prohibited. Obama also suggested a legal review of proposed lethal attacks in the future.

Still, despite all the explanations, the former professor of constitutional law left many questions open — political as well as legal. Have America’s drone attacks seriously damaged relations with Pakistan? In the final analysis, have they perhaps been more harmful than helpful to U.S. interests?

How concrete must the evidence against suspects be? Who decides that? Can civilian victims demand compensation? And how is a death sentence without trial to be justified after the war on terror is over and the excuse that there’s a war on no longer applies? The president dogmatically asserts that American and international law gives ample reason to declare the use of drones as justified. But that’s something that’s highly controversial even among Obama’s supporters.

Obama has no credibility on the Guantanamo issue. He has promised over and over to close the infamous Guantanamo chapter as quickly as possible. He hasn’t done much in the past few years to fulfill that promise. Most of the prisoners there have long since been declared to be no longer a threat and should have been repatriated to their homelands long ago. But nobody in the U.S. government apparently feels responsible for doing that.

Now Obama wants to lift a moratorium on the prohibition in force since 2009 against returning Yemeni prisoners to their homeland. A high-ranking State Department official has been charged with implementing his plan.

Additionally, the president wants to increase pressure on Congress to lift the prohibition on transferring Guantanamo prisoners to the United States. They can then stand trial in U.S. criminal courts and if found guilty they will serve their sentences in high-security American prisons.

But what to do with the 30 to 40 prisoners that, for one reason or another, cannot be tried but are considered too dangerous to be set free?

Justice Will Continue To Be Mocked

Fortunately, Obama has not given in to the disastrous idea that they can be locked up indefinitely in preventative detention. However, he has yet to put forth a suggestion for action, instead only tersely saying that a solution will eventually be found.

That won’t come about on its own. In contrast are the lessons already learned and the intransigence of the political opposition that refuses to make any concessions concerning Guantanamo.

In his speech to members of the military and intelligence services, Obama complained that Guantanamo has become the symbol of an America that mocks the rule of law. That won’t change until not a single terrorist suspect continues to languish in an American prison without benefit of trial.