Colonel Morris Davis: Guantánamo’s Charade of Justice

MoonHowler

Colonel Davis’s op-ed piece appeared Friday in the New York Times.

Guantánamo’s Charade of Justice

LAST week, we learned that, only months into the job, the official in charge of the military courts system at Guantánamo Bay was stepping down, after judges ruled he had interfered in proceedings. The appointment of an interim replacement was the sixth change of leadership for the tribunals since 2003.

This is yet another setback for the military commissions, as they tackle two of their highest-profile cases: the joint trial of the chief planner of the 9/11 attacks, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and four alleged co-conspirators, and the trial of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, accused in the bombing of the American destroyer Cole.

That’s not all. Besides the revolving door at the convening authority’s office, six military attorneys have served as chief prosecutor for these courts over the same period. (I was the third.)

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Colonel Morris Davis: The worst of the worst?

MoonHowler

Maybe the men traded for Bergdahl weren’t the worst of the worst.  Moe had never dealt with them which meant that they weren’t the worst of the worst or even on the list of 75 to be prosecuted for war crimes.   These men had been at Guantanamo for over 12 years.  They had never been charged.

No one is saying they are no longer a threat to the USA.  There are no guarantees.  However,   the risk will never be zero.

Moe did an excellent job of explaining the situation.  Thank goodness  Chris Matthews wasn’t around to interrupt and answer his own questions.  Alex Witt has far better manners and a more professional journalist.

Colonel Morris Davis to the Prez: Man UP!

MoonHowler

Moe Davis was interviewed this week by Christiane Amanpour to discuss  the prisoners still in Gitmo.  Contrast the professional discussion with Christiane Amanpour and the rude way he was treated by Chris Matthews.  What we can learn from Moe Davis, according to CNN.com:

 

Hearing Colonel Morris Davis speak, it’s easy to forget that he used to be the chief prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay.

“We used to be the land of the free and the home of the brave; we’ve been the constrained and the cowardly,” he told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday.

President Obama promised to close the Guantanamo detention facility when he took office in 2009; four years later, it’s still open.

A majority of the detainees, over 100, have been on hunger strike for more than three months to protest their detention; the military has resorted to force feeding them.

Eighty six of the detainees, Davis said, have never been charged with a crime. Many of those who were convicted of crimes were sent back to their home countries, and many are now free.

“It’s a bizarre, perverted system of justice,” he said, “where being convicted of a war crime is your ticket home, and if you’re never charged, much less convicted, you spend the rest of your life sitting at Guantanamo.”

A scant six years ago, as chief prosecutor at Guantanamo under President Bush, Colonel Davis sounded like a true believer.

On Friday the Gitmo hunger strike will be 100 days old.

 

Colonel Davis speaks frankly about President Obama and Gitmo

MoonHowler

Disclaimer:  The content of the guest contribution is the opinion of the guest and does not necessarily represent the opinion of the management of Moonhowlings.com.

Some things just have to explain themselves.

Colonel Morris Davis speaks with RT.com:

“The slogan “Close Guantanamo” sounds fairly simple. Actually following through and doing it is a much more difficult process,” he said.“Guantanamo is still open, the military commissions have resumed and in my view the president just didn’t have the balls to follow through with doing the right thing.”


 

Interview on RT about Guantanamo, indefinite detention, and the drone program.

So, is Colonel Davis spot on?  Did President Obama learn more information or does he simply lack the …nads?  I want to think he learned things were harder once one became president than  during a campaign when the decisions aren’t real. 

Are issues of war always that cut and dry?  My guess is that things look easier from the outside than from inside, when you know all the facts and what you have to work with.  Take Harry Truman for example.  How would you have liked to have been that poor bastard?  He knew nothing about the atomic bomb.  Here he was FDR’s vice president.  He knew NOTHING about this weapon that he had to make the final decision to drop. 

Harry Truman always seemed like the practical sort from what I have read. But can you imagine he didn’t know about the atomic bomb?  Churchill knew there was such a thing but our own vice president did not.  What was FDR thinking?

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/truman/player/