U.S. General Who Opened Guanatanamo: Time to End the Mistake

By Jeralyn, Section Terror Detainees
Posted on Thu Dec 12, 2013 at 12:33:46 PM EST
Tags: Guantanamo (all tags)

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Retired Gen. Michael Lehnart, who was in charge of Guantanamo when it opened in 2002, says it's time to close it and end the mistake.

"In retrospect, the entire detention and interrogation strategy was wrong..."

"We squandered the goodwill of the world after we were attacked by our actions in Guantanamo, both in terms of detention and torture," Lehnert wrote. "Our decision to keep Guantanamo open has helped our enemies because it validates every negative perception of the United States."

[More...]

"It is time that the American people and our politicians accepted a level of risk in the defense of our constitutional values, just as our service men and women have gone into harm's way time after time to defend our Constitution," Lehnert wrote. "If we make a mockery of our values, it calls us to question what we are really fighting for."

Lehnert says his doubts began early on:

Even in the earliest days of Guantánamo, I became more and more convinced that many of the detainees should never have been sent in the first place. They had little intelligence value, and there was insufficient evidence linking them to war crimes. That remains the case today for many, if not most, of the detainees.

On the treatment of detainees at Gitmo:

Many of my young Marines and soldiers were clearly troubled by my insistence on humane treatment, pointing out that “the terrorists wouldn’t treat us this well.” My answer to each of these young service members was always the same: “If we treat them as they would treat us, we become them.”

Lehnert says closing Gitmo should coincide with our departure from Afghanistan. He says it's the "perfect time" to close it.

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U.S. General Who Opened Guanatanamo: Time to End the Mistake | 9 comments (9 topical)

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As a supporter of the original idea of Guanatanamo (5.00 / 1) (#1)
by redwolf on Thu Dec 12, 2013 at 02:54:10 PM EST

the first thing Obama should have done when elected was to shut it down. No should have been held for longer than a year without trial and it's a disgrace that we created a permanent political prison. We gave the Nazi's trials with in 6 months of capture. It's inexcusable that we allowed people to languish only on the suspicion of being a terrorist without a formal trial.

: Except (5.00 / 1) (#6)
by jbindc on Fri Dec 13, 2013 at 03:10:25 PM EST

It wasn't that easy. That's why the moment he said that he would shut down Guantanamo within a year of taking office, I knew he had absolutely no clue what the job of president entailed and that he was not ready for prime time. It was never about just saying "Close it." It was about politics and the law. And since he doesn't have the authority to just strike aside legislation he doesn't like, he was going to have to work with Congress - a Congress hell bent on "making him a one term president." Add to that, he never really fought for it, and instead, focused on Obamacare.
Here's a good synopsis from 2011.

In Retrospect ? (5.00 / 4) (#2)
by ScottW714 on Thu Dec 12, 2013 at 05:09:49 PM EST

Why does it seem like there are a lot of really dumb people in very powerful positions who are incapable of abstract thought.

It never occurred to this guy before, or even while it was happening, that torturing human beings is despicable, that detaining people indefinitely is unconstitutional, that paying dirt farmers large sums of money for terrorist might not be the smartest way to get actual terrorists, or that the entire reason we chose GITMO was to try as loophole the Constitution. I guess he didn't bother reading that thing he swore to defend.

Every argument he is making was made over and over and over, all of falling it, on deaf ears, still falling on deaf ears.

And now we have a mess we can't clean up and now he's seeing the light. How many detainees died under his supervision before this epiphany finally hit him. Just another black soul trying to get a little redemption a decade too late.

Instead of stating the obvious, it would be nice if he just said he was sorry for managing a complex where innocent people were tortured for years and some to death. He can't even acknowledge it, there is mention of the people he actually tortured, just how it gave us a black eye and how our people were effected and how it didn't benefit us intelligent wise.

What about the souls you strung up make for days in positions meant to stress the body and how those people felt, especially the innocent ones you simulated drowning in hopes that they might know something. Who may have hopes and dreams and enjoyed freedom as much as any of us. Or how it effected their families, who had to live with the idea that their loved one was being treated worse than lab rats.

My answer to each of these young service members was always the same: "If we treat them as they would treat us, we become them."

Just another clueless republican who actually believes they are worse than us. I wish they would just crawl back into their holes instead of trying to convince us that he knows best.

We Should Have Closed Gitmo Years Ago (5.00 / 1) (#4)
by john horse on Thu Dec 12, 2013 at 11:07:35 PM EST

As a matter of fact, it should never have been opened to begin with.

As General Lehnart points out "If we make a mockery of our values, it calls us to question what we are really fighting for." How very sad that so many lives have been lost or ruined in our march of folly. The War on Terrorism has been a mockery of our values.

A fat lot of good your remorse does now, General (5.00 / 1) (#5)
by scribe on Fri Dec 13, 2013 at 04:00:28 AM EST

Now, when you can't do jack sh*t about it. We told you so then and made all the arguments and pointed out all the downsides then. But we were just some dirty f'g hippies and didn't bear the effort to listen to, let alone heed.

In case they didn't tell you in training somewhere along the line - and I know they told this dumbass ex-lieutenant contemporary of yours b/c I saved the training materials - everything about Gitmo was Wrong from jump.

And you went along with it.

The best that can be said about you is that now, looking at old age and the statistical probability of meeting your maker sooner rather than later, you'll be able to go forward feeling good about yourself, having salved what residue remains of your conscience before checking out.

These guys (none / 0) (#3)
by lentinel on Thu Dec 12, 2013 at 08:24:51 PM EST

always seem to speak out once they've retired.

Anyway, all I can say to this:

"We squandered the goodwill of the world after we were attacked by our actions in Guantanamo, both in terms of detention and torture," Lehnert wrote. "Our decision to keep Guantanamo open has helped our enemies because it validates every negative perception of the United States."

is: Really? Ya think?

: It's called the cowadice in their hearts (5.00 / 2) (#7)
by scribe on Fri Dec 13, 2013 at 05:35:24 PM EST

finally bursting out through all the lies they used to conceal it.

Its Called The Smedley Syndrome (none / 0) (#8)
by john horse on Sat Dec 14, 2013 at 06:17:53 AM EST

This is an example of what Andrew Bacevich (who I consider one of the most insightful critics of the war in Iraq and the military/industrial complex) calls the Smedley Syndrome. It is the tendency of those in the military to wait until they are out of the military to speak out. General Lehnart is only following a long established military tradition.

But maybe we have been too hard on General Lehnart. Even though I would have preferred he speak truth to power earlier, at least he finally spoke out. Now I'm sure that he will be on all the major news shows, like Meet the Press and Face The Nation (sarcasm alert).

Should have (none / 0) (#9)
by Mikado Cat on Tue Dec 17, 2013 at 08:17:01 AM EST

been closed long ago never has been the issue, its what to do with the people, and it would be foolish to assume they are not at this point hardened enemies of the US. What politician wants a few hundred "Willie Horton's" as their legacy?