I read your article on CounterPunch with interest.

Even if you believe that Guantánamo holds the “worst of the worst” al-Qaeda operatives their guilt regarding the numbers of lives they have taken pales to insignificance next to the world’s worst terrorists, who largely live and work in Washington DC and consider themselves above the law.

No legal system can expect to be respected when it is so obviously biased and corrupt.

Most of the inhabitants of Guantánamo are just pawns in the evil games of corrupt governments (the only kind that appears to exist at the moment).

I was born and grew up in the UK, but now live in Canada. A question that often springs to mind regarding the direction the UK government is heading regarding freedom is why were the repressive laws that have been put in place since 9/11 not put in place to combat the IRA who were way better at terrorism than the ones operating now? Maybe the fact that the IRA were largely funded from the US has something to do with it.

The world is turning to rat shit fast. My biggest frustration is that so few people seem to care.

This was my reply:

Thanks for the comments. What’s particularly interesting, I think, is that the British government responded in an extra-legal manner to the “Irish problem,” introducing internment and torture in a system that clearly presages Guantánamo.

Dave replied:

Another thought – did the Brit’s blindly go along with the US with the quid pro quo being the ending of funding for the IRA from the US? The IRA seemed to come around to negotiations rather suddenly after all the years of fighting.

I have to agree that the H Blocks were the forerunner of Guantánamo. It was also the British that invented the concentration camp during the Boer War – Something Else the British Government can be proud of!

And my response:

And Kenya in the 1950s as well. What a glorious history these little islands have! Not sure about the IRA funding question. I haven’t looked into it, to be honest, but I’d be surprised. I don’t recall any stories about IRA fundraisers being blacklisted, unlike certain legitimate Muslim charities in recent years, of course.

I recently learned of your work and thank you for it. I was surprised to read you say this about Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in your latest article: “the self-confessed architect of 9/11.” That seems inconsistent with your other writings about forced confessions. Is it?

This was my reply to Dwight:

As a general rule, I’m prepared to accept statements made by detainees at their Combatant Status Review Tribunals as facts. KSM did say that he was responsible for 9/11 in his tribunal last March, whereas, in contrast, both Abu Zubaydah and Abdul Rahim al-Nashiri denied the allegations made against them.
A different question, of course, is why KSM claimed responsibility not only for 9/11 but for a host of other plots, some of which appeared to be little more than ideas.

Had he “broken” or was he showing off, prepared, metaphorically, to go to the gallows ranting about how he was responsible for every terror plot against the US in the years before his capture?

I don’t know.

And this was Dwight’s response:

My response is simply that just because 9/11 indeed happened, and because KSM unlike Zubaydah and al-Nashiri is not denying responsibility for 9/11, that does not mean that KSM’s statements are true. The fact that his statements on other matters seem incredible only lessens the weight that should be given to his statements about 9/11. The same issues of torture apply, and it is also reported that KSM’s family was kidnapped and threatened, which is another form of psychological torture.

Your position seems close to that of Professor D’Amato, who doubts KSM’s claims of responsibility for other acts and plans, but does not seem to question his claims about 9/11.
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2007/03/true-confessions-tale-of-khalid-shaikh.php

As you say, we don’t know if he made these statements because he was “broken” or is “showing off,” or I would add for some other reason. As
Stephen Grey said in reviewing your book “The Guantánamo Files,” “terrorist suspects became guinea pigs in a vast experiment of methods to crack the human soul.” In this context, his statements should not be given much weight as to any of his claims. These claims can only be proven by independent evidence, which I have yet to see. And of course I would like these crimes tried in a real court, not a military commission in Guantánamo Bay, and with a vigorous, well-funded defense. That of course assumes a willing, competent defendant.

In this context, I would note that Moussaoui is asking the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to allow him to withdraw his guilty plea based on recent revelations that CIA says it had tapes and destroyed them. The dissenting judge in Moussaoui’s first Fourth Circuit appeal was of course correct that the use of “interrogation summaries” was fundamentally incompatible with the criminal justice system. Moussaoui pleaded guilty after losing this appeal. But of course Moussaoui was marginally competent to begin with.

What is really disturbing is that these statements have been used to imprison Moussaoui in the United States and Mottasaddeq in Germany, less for involvement in the crime than for association with the alleged perpetrators, yet the underlying crimes have not been proven to have been perpetrated by the persons with which they were associated. I would submit that the physical evidence, and lack thereof, raises very serious doubts as to whether these suspects did or even could perpetrate 9/11.

I realize this puts me into the world of the so-called “conspiracy theorists,” but what I am stating are simple principles of criminal law applicable to any crime, whether for example a drive-by shooting where witnesses are afraid to testify or have given false testimony because of threats of gang members, or 9/11.

Given that 9/11 was murder and a crime against humanity, and is the premise of the “War On Terror” and has had a myriad of profound effects on the world and our world view, the people of the United States and the world have a right to know the truth about what happened. Elias Davidsson makes that argument well here. I find the principles he argues more interesting than the particular facts he cites to show that there is good reason to believe we don’t know the truth about 9/11:
http://www.aldeilis.net/english/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2335&Itemid=107

The upcoming “trials” at Guantánamo are unlikely to further the pursuit of truth.

With all due respect, I would submit that you are using these rather weak justifications for giving weight to the KSM statements not because they are logical. Rather, you and so many other journalists, activists, and scholars in the areas of human rights and international law do this because the alternative is to seriously interrogate the facts about 9/11, which is just not done in “respectable” circles. Given the profound impact of the 9/11 narrative on human rights and the law, and the massive number of deaths after 9/11 in Afghanistan and Iraq, I ask you to consider whether your view is a function of facts and logic, or of social pressure.

I would also like permission to quote your response, and my reply, in two places. One is a listserv of the American Society of International Law, the other is a website called 9/11 Blogger, where your Counterpunch article has been praised in a comment about the Guantánamo tribunals.
http://www.911blogger.com/node/13796

And this was my reply:

Thanks for the reply, and for the explanation of your doubts about the case against KSM et al. From my perspective, I’ll be looking closely at how this pans out over the coming months, and doing further research into the story.