Our Nation is at war, and JTF-Guantanamo serves as an integral component of OPERATION
Enduring Freedom. We are the model organization for safe and humane enemy combatant detention operations, and for the collection and dissemination of strategic intelligence supporting the Global War on Terror. We operate under the watchful gaze of the Nation and the world. We are a strategic asset operated by a highly trained and patriotic team of military and civilian professionals, dedicated to supporting our Nation’s interests in the Global War on Terror.
You have done a hard job well. Your new political masters’ “reward” for devotion to duty will be much less than you deserve.
Guantanamo Bay was chosen as a detention facility and site for trials because of its unique legal standing. The 45-square-mile U.S. naval base was liberated by U.S. Marines during the Spanish-American War in 1898. The indefinite 1903 lease for Guantanamo Bay grants the U.S. power to exercise complete jurisdiction and control over the base while leaving ultimate sovereignty with Cuba. These distinct parameters were the basis for the U.S. Government’s early assertion that detainees had no access to U.S. courts and, therefore, could not challenge their detention using habeas corpus. — Jeffrey H. Norwitz, Defining Success at Guantanamo: By What Measure?
I thought it was brilliant to store ’em at Gitmo. The alternatives were Diego Garcia or prison ships in the Indian Ocean, and the Brits would have wimped out on DG, just like we’re wimping out now.
We keep these unlawful combatants alive for two reasons:
1) Intelligence from interrogation
2) Lawfare
If it weren’t for lawfare we could execute them when their intelligence value has been exhausted. Lawfare, according to Colonel Charles Dunlap,
military interventions.”25
They will end up turning most of them loose. Probably about 10% will go back to Jihad. They will kill people. The MSM will bury those stories. They’ll be too busy providing megaphones for the few we bother to try in court, who will probably go scott free.
And when an outraged American caps one of these assholes, the MSM will whine about vigilantes.
UPDATE 020220091720: Moe names names.
Civilian Irregular Information Defense Group 
Mind you, if the terrorists HAD been kept on ships in the ocean, we could have locked them in their cells, gotten the crews off, and sunk them.
Can anybody explain the insanity of the left?
Had we kept them at sea, a couple thousand miles away from the nearest land, or lawyers or journalists, we could’ve water boarded the shit out of ’em until we had extracted everything they knew and sent ’em to Davy Jones’ Locker.
But there were a bunch of them when OEF started, and keeping that many afloat for years at a time wasn’t logistically supportable.
the insanity of the left explained:
. . . the followers of Leftist dogma do so because of a deep seated personal emotional pain. This deep personal pain is the result of one’s parent(s) having been in competition with their child rather than being available to provide unconditional love and nurturing. The result is a child growing up with a high level of insecurity and an extreme revulsion to all criticism. It is those feelings that feed an inner wellspring of rage that is never too far from the surface emotionally.
This parent based anger and insecurity is too painful for some to explore or resolve internally. As they begin to enter maturity, this anger and insecurity gets transferred from being focused at themselves (and by extension their parent), to being focused on “a more personally acceptable oppressive power or protagonist”. This more personally acceptable oppressive power or protagonist can consist of many entities: Blacks, Jews, Christians, Republicans, Infidels etc.
As these teens become adults, their minds are extremely open to suggestions as to what entity is the best candidate for their own personal greater oppressive power. The uneducated often choose different races, religions or similarly easy to identify “other” to blame for their personal unhappiness. The educated (formally and informally) receive the luxury of being provided with a ready made and well defined oppressive power: America herself. The angry and insecure are very receptive to this Leftist message proffered by the media, primary education and colleges.
As a result of this process of transferring unacceptable personal anger into a more personally acceptable greater oppressive force, a cadre of angry and “justified” Leftist anti-Americans has been created. They are motivated by psychological forces within themselves and as such they are not interested in facts, history, or reality. Opposing points of view are not looked at as social debate or the comparison of facts. Opposing points of view are viewed as oppression directed against them or as personal insults . . . .
Thanks for reading my article. I appreciate the thoughtful comments. Stay strong.
– Jeff Norwitz
It was a good article, Jeff. Thanks for writing it. And thank you for your service to our country. Corrections gets no love.
Our people doing what has to be done to keep us safe from the detainees get almost no public attention, encouragement or support, yet the cells and exercise yards and medical facilities are as much a part of the battlefield as the streets of Mosul or the crags of the Hindu Kush.
I watched the detention facility at KAF being built in 2005. Toured it before they opened for business. Grim place. A big Quonset across from the Container Reception Point. Four very bad guys had recently escaped from Bagram back then, and the criticality of the detention mission became obvious to me.
In your last sentence, “one of these assholes” is ambiguous; it could refer to a jihadi or a member of the MSM. Or is the ambiguity only in my own mind?
Six on the one hand
Half a dozen on the other
Ever shook the hand of a man with six fingers?
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I’ve quoted you and linked to you here: http://consul-at-arms2.blogspot.com/2009/01/re-integral-part-of-oef.html