News: What to do about Guantanamo?

I don't know.

However, I've been reading some news items to get some understanding of what the situation is.

Today, SCOTUS ruled 5-3 that the current mechanism of military tribunals was not within the boundaries of the executive branch. The ruling does open the door for the Congress to write legislation establishing them however.

According to the article there are about 450 prisoners still there. Excerpt:

The ruling raises major questions about the legal status of about 450 men still being held at Guantanamo and exactly how, when and where the administration might pursue the charges against them.

The prisoners at Gitmo are a mixture of individuals. It isn't as easy as it looks to figure out who should be kept in prison and who should be let go. This item from National Journal shows some of the challenges the military faces as they investigate the backgrounds of the prisoners. Excerpt:

Like many of the men who came handcuffed to Cuba, Detainee 032 has never been accused of fighting against America. He fell into U.S custody far away from any battlefield. But today, after four years of interrogations and investigations, he is still an "enemy combatant," even though he was never an enemy or a combatant. He is something else: something that might be dangerous or might not. But he's securely in our custody, and raise your hand if you want to be responsible for releasing the man who next flies an airplane into a skyscraper.

In reading on in the article, the case against Detainee 032 seemed awfully weak. Nonetheless, the military tribunal ruled he was an enemy combatant and will continue to be detained.

It is hard to blame them for making that determination because according to the article some of the prisoners they had released earlier were eventually captured again. Excerpt:

The officers serving on the tribunals were told that a handful of prisoners released long before the tribunals began had subsequently appeared in battle, one bragging of how he had convinced the Americans that he was a goat farmer. The officers' friends and colleagues in uniform were dying every week in Iraq, every month in Afghanistan.

Nonetheless, lawyers have investigated Detainee's 032 story further and if what is described in the article is accurate, it would seem he should be released.

This news item pointed out another difficulty of what to do with the prisoners. Excerpt:

"It really shows the conundrum that we're in," said John B. Bellinger III, the State Department's legal adviser. "We want to get out of the Guantanamo business while continuing to protect ourselves and protect others."

Bellinger said the U.S. wants to return many detainees but has been blocked by countries who don't want the men or who don't recognize them as nationals.

Imagine if you are country X and the USG says to you, you want your citizen back? We don't think he is actually a terrorist.

I suppose if you are country X you might say, well, why don't you hang on to him for now, we'd rather not take a chance on your investigation being wrong.

The article then goes on to pose another problem which I never would have thought of. In some cases, the prisoners might actually face a worse fate if released to the countries that claim them. Excerpt:

A big headache for the U.S. has been what to do with a group of Uighurs, an ethnic group that lives mainly in western China. About two dozen Uighurs were captured by U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

China has demanded their return, but the United States feared they might face persecution there. China blames Uighur separatists for sporadic bombings and other violence in the Xinjiang region.

Five Uighurs were sent to Albania last month, but no other countries have offered to take in the rest.

Other nations "were concerned that the Chinese government would be very unhappy with them if they were to take the Uighurs," said Sam Whitten, head of the State Department's war crimes office.