Don't laugh. Please. That is the title of this Washington Post piece today, written by Karen Greenberg, executive director of New York University's Center on Law and Security and the author of the The Least Worst Place: Guantanamo's First 100 Days, a forthcoming book, and it appears on the front page of the Outlook Section. Greenberg acknowledges that it is probably too late to undo the damage now associated with Gitmo. But at first there were officers and troops on the ground trying to do the right thing, before being defeated by civilians (under Rumsfeld) back in DC. And as she writes:
Those early days -- back before Gitmo became Gitmo -- strongly suggest that the damage the prison inflicted on America's honor and security could have been avoided if policymakers had been willing to follow the uniformed military's basic instincts. It may be too late for these revelations to help redeem Guantanamo in its waning days. But those crafting U.S. detention policy in the years ahead could still benefit from learning about these small initial efforts at decency.
Let me tell you more, to convince you to read the piece.
A 2,000 man Marine detachment, led by a Brig. Gen. named Michael Lehnert, arrived at Gitmo in early January of 2002, tasked with building the first detention camp for prisoners taken in Afghanistan.
The unit had a 96-hour deadline, according to Lehnert, and they were told that about 300 detainees were already en route to Cuba. As Col. William Meier, Lehnert's chief of staff, explained it, the task force had to scavenge materials from existing structures on the base to help build hundreds of cells and the massive tent city needed to house the U.S. troops coming in to guard them. One commander working on the construction mission, Lou V. Corielo, told a Marine Corps interviewer at the time that he found himself lamenting the absence of a Home Depot.
But of even greater importance, the task force was provided no meaningful policy guidance. Gen Lehnert notes that he had
been told by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the Geneva Conventions would not technically apply to his mission: He was to act in a manner "consistent with" the conventions (as the mantra went) but not to feel bound by them.
In the absence of clear direction, Lehnert told Greenberg
he felt he had no choice but to rely on the regulations already in place, ones in which the military was well schooled: the Uniform Code of Military Justice, other U.S. laws and, above all, the Geneva Conventions. The detainees, no matter what their official status, were essentially to be considered enemy prisoners of war, a status that mandated basic standards of humane treatment.
Stop and consider that for a moment. The general in charge of constructing a detention facility in 96 hours, without sufficient and adequate materials, and then running it, was given no clear policy, but rather intimations bout ignoring Geneva and other rules. Nevertheless, consistent with his training as a Marine and absent CLEAR directions to the contrary, chose to abide by the UCMJ and the Geneva Conventions.
What did that mean? Consider these actions taken by the Marines
.. they processed the detainees upon arrival, even though it meant working around the clock
.. they gave medical treatment where applicable
.. they provided general care
.. their lawyers studied Geneva, particularly Common Article 3, prohibiting "humiliating and degrading treatment."
And Gen Lehnert passed on a request to have the International Committee of the Red Cross come for the requisite inspection. That request was turned down, somewhere above in the chain of command. Guantanamo is in the Southern Command, based in the Canal Zone. What happened next is important:
Col. Manuel Supervielle, the head JAG at Southern Command, picked up the phone and called the ICRC's headquarters in Geneva. As one member of the Southern Command staff remembers the episode, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had warned the Gitmo task force that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office opposed getting involved with the ICRC. But now, according to Supervielle, a U.S. officer was asking the ICRC to help out at Guantanamo. The ICRC answered with an immediate "Yes."
Thus, at least for a while, the officers on the ground and immediately responsible for the camp and the prisoners had taken an action which Rumsfeld and his minions could not easily or immediately undo, even though, according to that JAG Colonel, Pentagon lawyers
including Pentagon general counsel William J. "Jim" Haynes II, asked the Southern Command lawyer days later whether there was "a way to back out of it now."
The ICRC arrived 6 days after the detainees, and Greenberg writes
Thus began what amounted to a period of subtle defiance of Washington's lack of direction. The ICRC worked with Joint Task Force 160 to create a rational, legal detention operation. ICRC representatives immediately began to help Lehnert's troops improve the grim physical situation of the hastily constructed camp: the open-air cages in which prisoners were held, the cells without toilets, the constant exposure to heat and rain.
Lehnert obtained a Muslim chaplain for the detainees, Hallal food, separate washing buckets for those cells lacking toilets, Korans and skull caps and prayer beads, and garments for showering to abide by Islamic prohibitions against public nakedness. The Marines even let the detainees talk among themselves. It was a camp run with
an overriding ethos that stressed codified law and the unwritten rules of human decency.
But Rumsfeld was frustrated that he was not getting the information from the detainees he thought he should have. He set up a separate and parallel interrogation and intelligence command, something the Brig. General who was Lehnert's chief contact at Southern Command considered a "recipe for disaster" (in the military, there is a strong preference for clear lines of command for both clarity of orders and of responsibility). And note what else Greenberg offers:
At the same time, Navy Capt. Robert Buehn, the commander of the naval base at Guantanamo, recalled, the Gitmo task force's initial expectations of orders to build a courtroom began to fade.
You really have to read the entire piece to get the full sense of what was happening. As the intelligence and interrogation unit became more active, the prisoners mounted hungers strikes as the rights Lehnert's men had provided them were being stripped away. Lehnert would actually go and negotiate with prisoners, promising for example to remove a guard who had kicked prisoners, etc., even calling one prisoner's wife to be able to inform him that she had safely delivered a son.
Thanks in large part to Lehnert's efforts, the hunger strike dwindled to a couple of dozen fasters by the first week of March. But as much as he might have championed the need to respect the detainees as individuals -- albeit allegedly dangerous terrorists -- Guantanamo's future had been decided. As the hunger strike wound down, Lehnert said, he and his unit were given notice that they would soon be leaving.
The Gitmo with its abuses that the world has come to know and loathe happened took shape. And worth noting, even though Greenberg does not mention it, that Gitmo had wider consequences when Gen. Geoffrey Miller was sent to Abu Ghraib to "Gitmoize" it, leading to the infamous abuses that so shocked the world. And here we should remember that when the picture that Sergeant Darby passed on were shown to members of the United States Senate, they were physically sickened at what they saw - what we have seen is, according to Sy Hersh who has seen much more than we, far worse.
Greenberg believes that the story she tells is of particularly significance now that Obama is moving to close the camp at Guantanamo. She writes
Had the United States been willing to trust in the professionalism of its superb military, it could have avoided one of the most shameful passages in its history. Lehnert still regrets the legal limbo that Guantanamo became -- and the damage .that did to America's "stature in the world." As he put it, "the juice wasn't worth the squeeze."
the juice wasn't worth the squeeze - there were never any ticking bomb scenarios, and even if there were, it still would not have justified what we did, how we violated Common Article 3, which prohibits humiliating and degrading treatment
Greenberg ends her piece with an irony. One place now being considered as a replacement holding facility for those Guantanamo detainees who cannot be released is a Marine facility near San Diego, Camp Pendleton.
The base's commanding general is none other than Michael Lehnert, now a major general. The detainees might well be returned to his custody. In several senses, we could wind up right back where we started. This time, however, we should have the law on our side -- not to mention a conscience.
It is important as we look back over the tragedy and shame of much of the so-called Global War on Terror that we realize there were people who tried to do the right thing. Some were military lawyers who fought within the Pentagon for the right thing, such as Navy Jag Alberto Mora. Others were lawyers who advocated vigorously for their clients, and as a result saw their careers ended. Perhaps it was a young West Point graduate named Ian Fishback who wrote a letter in protest. We know some of these names, and we should honor them.
I read this article and I want to acknowledge those in the early days who tried to do the right thing, before the criminals in the Pentagon overrode them and their attempts to abide by law and international agreement. The article discusses many, most notably Gen. Lehnert, who deserves our thanks for what he attempted to do.
I have no trouble applying the word "criminals" to those in Rumsfeld's coterie. I have nothing but contempt for their shredding of the rights to which any human being should be entitled by civilized people. I hope and pray that the new administration will fully expose all that they did. And whether or not we prosecute them for their many abuses, let them worry that should they set foot in many other nations they will be at risk of arrest, prosecution, and punishment for crimes against humanity, war crimes, crimes for which we as a nation executed people after World War II.
I am not vindictive, but they have shown no remorse, no sign of conscience, and thus should face the strictest sanctions.
I could not finish without asserting that. But for today, that is less important, at least for this one occasion. We need to know the history of what happened. And that history is not all dark. There were those, the Marines of Task Force 160, under the command of General Lehnert, who tried to do the right thing. We should acknowledge what they did, even as we condemn those who destroyed the good they were doing.
Read Greenberg's article. Pass it on. And remember - there will always be those who try to do the right thing. Our task is to ensure that they have leaders worthy of the humanity they demonstrate.
Peace.