Comments on: On Guantánamo, Lawmakers Reveal They Are Still Dick Cheney’s Pawns

By: House Kills Plan to Close Guantanamo « Politics or Poppycock

House Kills Plan to Close Guantanamo « Politics or Poppycock — Mon, 24 May 2010 23:35:08 +0000

[...] and backed by cowardly Democrats, Congress had only been prevented at the last minute from passing an insane law last year, which would have prevented the administration from bringing any prisoner to the US [...]

By: Obama’s Failure To Close Guantánamo By January Deadline Is Disastrous by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 01:01:04 +0000

[...] lawmakers were even prepared to go so far as to prevent the administration from bringing prisoners to the US mainland for any reason, even to face trials. Senior officials [...]

By: Rep. Jerrold Nadler and David Frakt on Obama’s Three-Tier Justice System For Guantánamo by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:46:24 +0000

[...] much of the media has been consumed with the whining of opportunistic right-wing politicians, who persist in maintaining the same hysterical level of unfounded fearmongering that has skewed the debate on Guantánamo for [...]

By: An Evening with Andy Worthington: “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantanamo” « Dandelion Salad

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 23:25:55 +0000

[...] the release of cleared prisoners onto the US mainland (and, until recently, was intent on preventing the release of any prisoner whatsoever, even to face the trials that the administration announced on [...]

By: Senate Finally Allows Guantánamo Trials In US, But Not Homes For Innocent Men by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 22:47:19 +0000

[...] for any reason — even for trials — which I wrote about most recently in an article entitled, “On Guantánamo, Lawmakers Reveal They Are Still Dick Cheney’s Pawns,” I’m delighted to report that, last Tuesday, the Senate finally saw sense, voting, by 79 votes [...]

By: Two More Guantánamo Prisoners Released: To Kuwait And Belgium by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 02:29:02 +0000

[...] from Guantánamo to the US mainland in May this year, who — in a sure sign that prisoners can be transferred to the mainland without endangering anyone — is in a federal prison awaiting a federal court trial scheduled to begin next [...]

By: Lawyer Blasts ‘Congressional Depravity’ on Guantánamo « Patrick J. Buchanan

Lawyer Blasts ‘Congressional Depravity’ on Guantánamo « Patrick J. Buchanan — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 05:13:28 +0000

[...] a recent article, “On Guantánamo, Lawmakers Reveal They Are Still Dick Cheney’s Pawns,” I spelled out my despair and disgust at lawmakers from both parties (their names can be [...]

By: Congressional Depravity on Gitmo « freedetainees.org

Congressional Depravity on Gitmo « freedetainees.org — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 16:55:57 +0000

[...] a recent article, “On Guantánamo, Lawmakers Reveal They Are Still Dick Cheney’s Pawns,” I spelled out my despair and disgust at lawmakers from both parties (their names can be found [...]

By: Lawyer Blasts “Congressional Depravity” On Guantánamo by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:14:27 +0000

By: Andy Worthington

Andy Worthington — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 09:21:32 +0000

The following inspiring message came from Vietnam veteran Wade Kane:

I’m a Vietnam US Army combat vet, June 67-June 68, Chinook door gunner, Tet ’68,. Battle for Hue, Relief of Khe Sahn, The April ’68 A Shau Valley debacle. When I was in the Army, the stuff we are doing to “combatants” at Gitmo was stated as being done by the evil commies in “why we fight” speeches by our commanders. Damned if I can see how attending a Taliban training camp can become life in prison without charges or a trial. Russia should go around South America arresting and transporting to a Siberian Gulag every single graduate of the “School of the Americas” Where we train people the same way. Funny running and funding “Charlie Wilson’s War” we trained Afghanistanis in Afghanistan. Terrorism, what was Nagaski and Hiroshima Atomic bombs? Even Curtis LeMay opposed using them. Before WWII Major General H H Arnold and Col Ira C. Eaker stated on page 9 of their 1941 book Winged Warfare, that several years earlier in international negotiations the Bombing Plane, like Poison Gas, be labeled taboo in warfare. This was because “the vision of the bomber dropping his deadly cargo on defenseless women and children, in crowded streets, on the seats of government, on the banks, the factories, the railroads, was provocative of unpleasant emotions.”

I guess those high ideals of a history of over a century of America being defensive not aggressive just went right out the window after Pearl Harbor. It was after all the US that humiliated the Japanese in the 1850s by forcing them to give our ships coaling rights. Their response was to buy battleships from Britain and France, and by 1905 decimated the Russian Pacific fleet. They, better than the US, learned the lessons of the Brit attack with torpedo planes on Italian battleships at Tarranto in 1940.

But could not Obama transfer the prisoners we hold at Gitmo by “extraordinary rendition” to the USA?

As a kid I learned that wherever the US flag flew, American Law applied. I guess the Navy don’t have a single flag pole at Gitmo.

To get full retirement I needed to retire in 2006. I left a full time position with the Air Guard in 2004 as I just could not stand to be a part of a military which was doing stuff we hanged Nazis and Japanese Officers for doing. Not in my Name!

Seems to me firing a hellfire missile from a drone aircraft flown by an operator in the US is a war crime. Maybe by 2025 Obama and Bush can share a jail cell at the Hague.

Thanks for your good work.

Wade