Torture, extrajudicial killings, and mass murder are now a routine feature of the American empire.
Wow. This was one of the most poignant articles I've ever read.
I am absolutely in awe of this lawyer and her client and the writer of this article for capturing Gitmo in all of its tragedy and travesty.
I would like to hope the nightmare will be over soon but this is just another example of how the US has fallen in its ideals.
With the current Administration and Congress, it seems this embarrassment will only be perpetuated.
3
These military tribunals are a fraud of the U.S. judicial system. They are supported by spineless Congressmen who failed to hold the war criminals in the Bush administration accountable. But these spineless Congressmen receive plenty of campaign contributions from the military contractors who take millions of tax dollars. These men should be tried in federal courts & in the open so citizens can see the evidence of our war crimes.
2
I have never understood why these terrorists weren't simply executed within weeks of capture as illegal enemy combatants just as spies and saboteurs are under laws of law. Allowing these criminals access to expensive civilian lawyers paid for by the U.S. taxpayer just adds insult to injury to the victims of 9-11.
About nomenclature/propaganda, as in this quote: "That was one way she wound up auditioning, unwittingly, for one of the most high-profile detainees still there: Ammar al-Baluchi, ...."
Dear Mr. Stern: "Detainees" is not the correct English word for use by the press. The correct word/phrase is "Prisoner of War," as he was picked up "in theater" (the theater being the whole wide world, in this case.)
The government uses the incorrect term to avoid the terms of the Geneva Conventions. The press should make that clear in every POW story.
It's easy to do. "POW Jones, whom the US calls a 'detainee' to avoid the strictures of the Geneva Convention, .... " The skirting of the Geneva Conventions can be used high or low in the story. You might also mention that it's a war crime to deliberately (or negligently) break the Geneva Conventions. In what used to be US law, 18 USCode §2441 or so made it a US crime to break the Genea Convetions. And if a POW died because of the breach--if he were tortured to death, say, or died as a result of torture, the penalty could be death. It wasn't meant to be tiddly-winks stuff, but real, like, law & order stuff.
It's an old tactic. Ike used it in US POW camps--called 'em "DEFs"--disarmed enemy forces.
So let's not cede fairness and control over the English language to our public servants. We the People...ordained and established the Constitution, and we delegated neither all of our powers nor our dictionary to our federal employees.
5
Bless her and all the people held there without recourse. She is a true patriot and I thank her.
6
This story fills me with shame for how horribly we are and have treated people who are confined in Guantanamo and CIA black sites. Many who end up in such places are clearly innocent. After World War II, the USA was the champion of war crimes tribunals against Nazis.
If, by some means, another country was able to try the people responsible for the horrors described in this article and in other sources, many American officials would be found guilty. If such hypothetical prosecutions went up the chain of command far enough, it is likely to find both George W. Bush and Barrack Obama guilty. So much for the exceptionalism of this country.
4
Gitmo is a concentration camp which happens to have a kangaroo court. The people there who keep the light on, I guess it's a job for them. The Pentagon doesn't know what to do with it. The Obama administration considered it an embarrassment. I suspect the current administration feels the same even through they don't say it. Neither could nor can do anything about it. Ditto, for the next 5 administration to follow. Yes, Gitmo will be with us for a long, long long time to come.
2
For starters, introducing a term, "RT" without defining it leaves this reader scrambling to make sense of what should have been obvious. Is it the name of a Russian news channel? My best guess from the context. I would have looked it up but it is a trivial point that should have been explicit. The theme here is not trivial but bemoaning the injustice of Gitmo, and hammering home the idea that even those who may be associated with horrible crimes deserve perfect justice in a just society is too well worn to be presented poorly.
3
" ... She believes Americans don’t like to think about the fact that their country tortured people and put them in blindfolds and flew them to an island nation with which it had no diplomatic relations. ..."
In fact, if Americans would care, this kind of extraterritorial prison would not exist and the president who implemented it would spend the rest of his life in jail.
Plus, the president who came after and promised to close down Guantanamo would never had a chance for a second term.
No, this prison, together with all those black sites the US is running around the globe, is the reason why the US has lost any right to the moral high ground a long time ago.
The problem here is that the US has never had any plan to go against the real terrorists behind the 9/11 act as this would have meant to go against allies like Saudi Arabia.
So it opened a series of other cases which, not surprisingly as they are mostly PW stunts, will lead nowhere.
Which means that the US is running criminal cases without legal ground and that is what is called a Crime Against Humanity.
And that is a very good reason why the US has stood away from the International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague as it would immediately risk being accused of the crimes that are handled in this court.
Sorry, if these people are guilty, put the in a court of law and try them.
If not, it is time to admit to the error and make amends.
All else is just proof of the fact that the US is not a First World State of Law.
8
I guess someone has to defend the terrorists who plotted to bring down the United States of America. As far as I am concerned they do not deserve justice. I am sure most Americans feel the same way. If they don't, then they are fools. Thank you.
8
The issue you may have missed is whether they did the things of which they are accused. That's what trials are for, generally speaking.
4
You have decided they are all guilty when it is clear from the article that it is not certain that the featured defendant is guilty. All that is written about his guilt is from Terry McDermott's speculation and there is no confirmation of his speculation from other sources.
6
It's story like this which brings us human faith and makes us humble. Thank you Alka Pradhan and Jeremy Stern who brings us this story.
6
Ms. Alka Pradhan is a credit to her profession. I truly admire and respect her for taking the time to build relationships with detainees and for listening to their stories in an effort to give them a fair trial.
As I read the details of approved torture, my heart broke for the families who lost loved ones to terrorist attacks on US soil and for the families who lost loved ones to allegations of terrorist connections which are yet to be proven in a court of law.
In reading Ms. Pradhan’s relational approach, I have no doubt that she has a better chance of eliciting accurate intelligence than the “black ops site” interrogators did through their use of “enhanced” interrogation techniques. Evidence-based research has shown that harsh techniques do not produce accurate intelligence. Subjects produce any intelligence to stop pain and suffering during sessions.
What would happen if a new technique were introduced? If we were to utilize Ms. Pradhan’s culturally competent approach that incorporates empathy and listening presence, perhaps, we could cultivate more superior intelligence sources thereby reducing terrorism.
5
Finally, Baluchi saw a doctor approach. The doctor measured the swelling and approved Baluchi for more abuse.
The doctor lives in Arlington, VA.
6
As I am from Baluchi family .I am saying to all who see him as a guilty OK go and march in front of the Whitehouse and hang Ammar KSM Ramzi and all Muslims terrorist in US jails and demand from the government to execute them. What left for Ammar ...a smashed brain and half paralyzed hands that hardly write to his mother I am OK don't worry. Why they been tortured for a years why until now the US justice not been done. Why ..can some one write to me why.!!!!! If they killed your people kill them.. Did they tortured your people did they ? By this policy you want to raise the hate and it is very bad
4
Balushi was declared an enemy combatant Aug 9, 2007, and thus under US law and international law of war may be held, with or without trail, until the end of hostilities. Since the Senate never ratified Protocol I of the 1949 Geneva Convention, unprivileged enemy combatants (not wearing a uniform, not bearing arms openly, hiding among civilians) may be charged with violations of the law of war such as murder of civilians, by a military tribunal. If Pradhan wishes US law to be subordinate to that of other nations' law of war, she is free to write the President to submit Protocol I and the full Torture Conventon for ratification. Obama did not.
5
This is an instructional film produced by the United States Air Force in 1943, "Interrogation of Enemy Airmen."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88HDpY8R1kg
The first instruction is to treat the captured enemy well -- so that the enemy will treat captured American prisoners well.
They say that threats and roughing up prisoners up doesn't work -- they don't even get to torture.
Then they demonstrate the effective methods of interrogation, which is to build up a rapport with the prisoner, and have a long, friendly conversation. This is in fact what the FBI and other competent interrogators did before the prisoners were turned over to the CIA.
The torturers ranged from incompetents who didn't know how to interrogate (and weren't smart enough to ask people who did,) to sadists who were just looking for an opportunity to torture.
Now that we've tortured Muslim prisoners, as the Air Force films warned, they will torture American prisoners. Why shouldn't they?
The Times had a story about Congressional hearings that released the U.S. torturers' handbook. Two incompetent psychologists who had never interviewed an enemy in their lives "reverse engineered" the methods that were used on American prisoners of war during the Korean war, to recommend that American interrogators use the *same* techniques that were used by Korean Communists during that war. So they turned America into a country with the worst practices of Communism.
26
From the Sixth Amendment to the US Constitution: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy trial".
17
I must quote Derrick Jensen, author of “Culture of Make Believe:”
“In order to maintain our way of life, we must lie to each other, and to ourselves. It is necessary to do so because without it, the most despicable acts would be impossible.”
We are living in Orwellian times. Aggression toward another country is labeled “preemptive strikes.” Our leaders lie about reasons for attacking another country. Our leaders secretly, and often not so secretly, overthrow governments who fail to align with our policies. And our mainstream news media largely collude with the lies to the public.
Most of us do not know our own history. There is outrage over Russia’s alleged attempts to influence our election, but neglect to mention our many documented attempts to “influence” other counties election. Textbook examples are the numerous times our government agents interfered in government throughout Central and South America to this very day -- Nicaragua, Guatemala, Panama, Venezuela, Honduras, Columbia, Chile -- and that is just the Western Hemisphere.
I sometimes think the American public has been as brainwashed through our educational system, entertainment, and news reporting as the German people were under the Nazi government. I shutter at the possibility that our leaders may have to face a future “Nuremberg Court” for the crimes that have been committed in our name. I wonder how they will plead?
14
My grasp of history is a bit clouded as I grow older, but didn't these guys contribute to the deaths of 3,000 innocent Americans? Gitmo sound about right.
3
Technically yes, but if you want too be technical we caused it far more than "contribute." We imposed governments on them that practiced torture on them routinely. And still do. We overthrew governments that were likely not to torture. We have ruled the middle east and its oil for over 100 years. So, bio, they don't deserve Gitmo. They deserve the freedom we have denied them for a century.
4
By that logic we should have freed Osama Bin Laden as well.
At the direction of our morally superior congress, there has yet to be a trial, there has yet to be an understanding of how to hold a trial. But according to Mr. Jabo these people are guilty. Make America great again...
Those are not contentions--that her client was tortured, that the torture continues, that his prosecution can not go forward--those are facts. Real facts, not Trumpian fake facts. Let's keep that line clear. Black and white facts matter.
12
After reading the obituaries for months and months, here in the Times, the humanizing of every victim of the Sept 11 attacks, I find it difficult to care for the human rights of anyone associated with the killings.
6
Terrorists have to go to Bermuda? BOO HOO!
2
Really, NYTimes? The week before Christmas?
Do you have any idea how incredibly painful the holidays are for so many 9/11 familes?
GTMO is complicated. How people got there is complicated. This is all true.
My brother, the father of Andrea, age 25, killed in WTC1, 92nd Flr. on her first ever business trip to anywhere ... was in NY, for all of 12 hours before her excruciating death with all 91 of her Carr Futures co-workers, only 2 or 3 who she even knew as she was just there from her home base/office in Chicago.
My brother and sister-in-law, Andrea's forever grieving parents, have been to GTMO, to a hearing. Would go again. While they were there, they witnessed much.
Mostly:"The Five" are unrepentant.
This has dragged on long enough. There needs to be justice and accountability if not in our lifetimes, in the lifetime of Andrea's only sibling, her beautiful younger sister.
I am deeply frustrated with the slow pace of the endless legal mechanics on both sides. 15 years of MOTIONS. For God's sake. We need to move this along.
When do the 2,996 victims of that day get THEIR day in court? When are they heard and fully represented?
Defense attys have fought vigorously against, and refused all but, literally, a handful of victim statements by family members or survivors, on the basis that they could influence the outcome.
Meanwhile, parents, survivors, victim advocates are getting older and dying.
And if anyone deserves the heaviest punishment, it's "The Five."
12
What the Muslims that your government killed in Iraq Afghanistan Syria ......and more. The US terror on Muslim is along long list .consider 11\9 is a reaction for your government action. Then you can feel the Muslims feeling whom been victim of your government terror. Please be fear and open your eyes and minds look with humanity's eyes the Muslims how much they are suffering. Every where we see our brothers and sisters Muslims blood why can you answer me why . you have right to terror Muslims but have no right to answer or let the nation listen to their voice. 11/9is a drop of a sea that your government sink Muslims in. We don't hate western people and we hope one day they will awake and know the truth.
5
Jazz One's frustations are legitimate as is his desire for justice and accountability. It is one thing for a relative serving in the armed forces to be killed in a legitimate war. It is an entirely different thing when innocent people lose their lives for reasons they had nothing to do with.
Nevertheless, this is not black and white. Tens of thousands of innocents have been killed by the U.S. in Iraq, Syria, VietNam under extraordinarily false pretexts. There will never be justice for them. One cannot distinguish between loss, pain, anguish at a personal level but overlook such emotions suffered by those who were victims of an abstract government policy of preemption and who are dismissed as nothing but collateral damage. Furthermore, while there is no moral or ethical justification for the 9/11 attack, both the public and private sectors in the U.S. have for decades been provoking animosity around the world with sponsored coups, economic manipulation, wars, and the invasion of Western culture into the personal fabric of other nations. The long and short of it is that everyone is losing. Everyone.
5
The fact that these lawyers use RT to defame the US government seems to suggest Russian sponsorship of the program.
The question is not about Whether Mr. Baluchi is guilty, probably he is. The question is whether we make him stand trial to prove his crime. If we don’t prove one’s crime before punishing, can we remain a law abiding country? If terror suspects can be punished or kept without trial, what about other criminals? Should we apply the same rule and keep them behind bars without feeling the need to prove their crime? And where does it end? Ms. Pradhan is doing her job. Something that she is trained to do by our justice system, backed by our constitution. She is neither a hero nor a villain. She is just following the law of our country. Fulfilling a duty as an American.
18
Fighting for “truth, justice and the American way”. Propagated by a newspaper that cheerlead us into the Iraq way, arguably the greatest foreign policy disaster in American history. There are a lot of things to fight for in the world, I have a long list in front of me, the American conscience isn’t one of them. Because on the one hand we are willing participants in our numerous corrupt institutions. The kangaroo court in Gitmo, case in point. On the other hand we’ll illegally invade Iraq, then engineer a civil war that has killed over a million people in that country. Then we’ll conveniently overthrow and/or destabilize governments in Libya and Syria. And to top it all off, feed arms and logistical support to militants in Syria who are part of the same organization that attacked us on 9/11. How ironic! And to what end? To prop up our belief that we are ‘exceptional’, to defend a dying petrodollar and the empire that supports it.
5
"her conversations with her client often have less to do with proving his innocence than with what has happened to him since his suspected crimes. "
How convenient.
Very dismayed at the lack of background on what her client may have actually DONE! Instead we get a bait and switch about how she met an obviously innocent boy with strange hair. Fine. But is she truly defending a monster?
Is her ire at all "those white guys" and an obviously broken system getting in the way of true discerning whether her client is guilty? Seems so. "I don't care what they did...."
The Times doesn't go near the fact that the "Strong, Brown Woman of Power" might be getting played by her client precisely because she is that. And because, yes, maybe women are more empathetic. It's enough for them that she is what she is for their true angle on the story. They go into her "Browness" in detail.
Of course I don't agree with torture. it's atrocious to read. But the way in which this article comes out of the gate in it's "humanizing" of the detainees is very one sided.
I was there. People I knew died. Where was she? In college? Canada?
Sure, call out the system. Don't loose sight of the guilt.
10
Her job is protect her client's interests as best she can. There are prosecutors whose job it is to secure her client's conviction if that is justified. That's how the criminal justice system is supposed to work.
And irrespective of whether her client did the things of which he stands accused, is he not a human?
5
Still. Once we tortured them, justice was never going to happen.
2
If the author's intent was to engender sympathy for Baluchi, it failed miserably in our house. Although I am an attorney and am fair, I have absolutely no sympathy for Baluchi. While his attorney believes that there is reasonable doubt about whether Baluchi entered into the 9/11 conspiracy, which resulted in the butchering of nearly 3,000 innocent Americans, the evidence appears overwhelming. Among other matters, Baluchi wired hundreds of thousands of dollars to the terrorists who hijacked the four aircraft, which was a critical overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy. More importantly, I don't care what has happened to this man, even though he has been obviously tortured and held under conditions that undoubtedly at times violated the Eighth Amendment. Baluchi and his co-defendants don't deserve anything more than a speedy trial, where they may present evidence and cross-examine witnesses. In 1942, eight German saboteurs were tried and six electrocuted less than eight weeks after their capture. We should try these people this year and end this endless procedural journey to no end.
8
If they deserve a speedy trial, they never got it.
There's also a legitimate question of whether somebody who is routinely involved in transferring money for innocuous purposes, like buying a sports car, is criminally responsible when he transfers money that is used for terrorist activities without his knowledge. Does he have an obligation of due dilligence before he transfers money?
Osama bin Laden said that the reason he attacked the World Trade Center was in retaliation for the American support of the Israeli bombing of Lebanon.
Israel has committed many violations of international law, including murders by the IDF. This has been documented for example in the Goldstone Report (such as deliberately shooting 4-year-old children), and in Amnesty International reports. If Americans give financial support to Israel, and Israelis commit crimes with that money, are those Americans criminally responsible too? Especially if they knew that they were supporting criminal activity?
What crime is Ammar Al-Baluchi accused of committing that Sheldon Adelson didn't commit?
5
No one discusses why the United States of America did nothing in the 1980s and '90s when these so-called 'jihadist' plots were being concocted. As of today, there is not one single official account of what really happened on 9/11. Given the length of time that this situation has been in the making, it shouldn't surprise anyone that it has come to this extent of just having to let out one's frustrations and hatreds on other human beings, in the absence of any real information. Now trials without end are used for therapy to keep the dead alive, and the truth is being buried for one generation. After one generation, obviously, there won't be many of us left to ask the hard questions. So 9/11 will be resolved by genocide of the public's right to know and of groups of arab and asian ethnicities ? I couldn't imagine anything less democratic, or even Republican, than that !
2
It is very obvious Alka Pradhan is very unhappy in the job she was thrust into. Extremely unfortunate for her.
If war criminals who plotted to kill thousands of innocent civilians deserve this sort of treatment, then there's a long list of Bush administration officials who should be lining up for a couple-decade stay in Guantanamo!
13
I don't think Dick Cheney or John Yoo deserve lawyers or due process. They admitted what they did. Lock 'em up!
4
And you can throw in a long list of Obama administration officials with them. For THEIR wars against Libya and Syria.
2
Novelist Alexander Solzenitsyn, a victim of the Soviet Gulag system, once wrote a novella where a Soviet bureaucrat said, "we never make mistakes." The United States, after spending half a century opposing the Soviet Union, is slipping ever more toward becoming that type of authoritarian state.
The whole point of having trials and hearings is to determine who is actually guilty and what crimes the person is actually guilty of. If this article is correct, the indefinite detention of suspected terrorists is based on a kind of "we never make mistakes" logic. The lawyers seem invested, but this article seems to suggest they are investing their energy into what would ultimately be a mere formality. Is al-Baluchi guilty of everything is accused of? Are his defense theories mere nonsense? Perhaps. But let's have that decided by our constitutionally mandated system. "National security" is sometimes a real concern, but it is also a stone's throw from becoming a blanket authoritarian excuse like "Interests of The State."
22
The court system is intended for US citizens and legitimate US residents, not war criminals.
3
You are incorrect. In the case of Almeida-Sanchez v. United States, the US Supreme Court ruled that all the right associated with criminal charges, including right to trial, applies to non-US nationals of any kind.
4
Are you talking about Almeida-Sanchez v. United States, 413 U.S. 266 (1973)? That case says nothing, literally not one word, about the trial rights of non-U.S. nationals. The court (unsurprisingly) applied the 4th Amendment warrant requirement to police action on U.S. soil.
The extent to which the U.S. Constitution applies to detained enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay, land technically subject to the sovereignty of Cuba and not the U.S., is a complicated question. The Supreme Court has held they have certain habeas corpus rights, but I'm not aware of a case affording them all rights associated with a criminal trial.
For a (lengthy) discussion about the nature of Guantanamo and what rights are afforded the detainees, I suggest reading Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S.723 (2008).
1
Human rights are a nebulous concept with many different interpretations around the world. In America, most would probably agree that overt torture crosses a line. Jihadists, after all, are humans to.
The NYT, with the excellent piece, really illuminates a contentious political issue through Ms. Pradhan’s story. Yet her connection with Baluchi belies her core paradigm.
Gitmo is not merely a disagreement on justice, legal process or even treatment of detainees. Rather Ms. Pradhan sees Gitmo as a concrete manifestation of America’s racist ethos.
I hope the NYT continues producing excellent narrative journalism. Great work.
10
"The prosecution’s case against Baluchi starts in early 2000, when his uncle, Khalid Sheikh Muhammad"....strike one. "Altogether, he wired about $150,000 to people involved in the plot all around the world". Strike nine. You don't casually and unknowingly wire $150,000. Perhaps Ms. Pradhan should consider devoting her time to providing legal services to the families of those who died in the atrocity. Self-righteous grandstanding on behalf of a mass murderer is not exactly endearing.
23
Well, crud, if I read it on the internet, it must be true. Are you even slightly curious what evidence the prosecution has to back up those allegations? Traditionally, that's what trials are for. But I guess why bother with jury trials when we can just read it on the internet?
But should we at least have a Facebook poll before deciding whether someone is guilty?
5
You're saying that the fact that he's Khalid Sheikh Muhammad's nephew is enough reason to convict him.
So when somebody commits a crime, you want to hold his whole family responsible.
Can someone tell me which provision of the Constitution that would violate?
3
$150,000 is nothing, if you have already transferred $300,000 to a young friend who wants a spectaculor ride while in college here. At some points amounts become meaningless. It’s the ability to transfer & have it get where you want it to go. I agree, if that’s all you have on him, then the banks who did the actual transferring should be closed, all employees jailed as terrorists. Can’t take one part, & leave the other out. It’s all or nothing. Oh, in another post I said Grandfather, it’s Uncle but the same thing applies. Your elder says jump, you jump. Used to be that way here. Those were the good old days. Now you want to kill off the elders as useless. So are babies. Lets get rid of them first.
It is encouraging to know that people like Alka Pradhan still exist. Her true humanity should be an inspiration to all.
Reading this story causes me to wonder, is this protracted, quasi legal quagmire a genuine attempt to deliver justice, or is it a proving ground for our new justice system?
For the past year we have seen repeated attacks on on judicial system by the trump administration. Could we all face protacted detention for protests against an increasingly authoritarian government?
17
Now who is the terrorist who hit at once or who hit persistently. We Muslims our faith in God justice is very strong . One day Muslims will get their rights.
may Allah bless Alka in rising the truth.
3
I'm always fascinated how people see what they want to. Baluchi is a war criminal and as such will be dealt with from a military point of view. The Military Justice System plays by entirely different rules than our civil and criminal system. As far as I am aware, Pakistani citizens, especially those linked to terrorist attacks don't have the protection of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights.
If Baluchi is such an 'intelligent' individual and has direct knowledge of family members participating in terrorist activities against the US, why wouldn't he question the suspicious directives given to him by an Uncle who clearly has very sketchy habits and behaviors? While I am certainly not a proponent of inhumane treatment of prisoners of war, I do believe that those involved in cowardly and despicable acts such as that propagated upon the World Trade Center and the thousands of innocent civilians should be dealt with in a harsh manner that will prevent their accomplices from carrying out further attacks. When you live by the sword you die by the sword.
The piece of this story that is not told is what information that was obtained through interrogation of these Gitmo detainees was helpful in capturing the leadership of Al Queda and preventing further attempts or attacks of US interests and citizens? I think Pradhan should go visit the 911 memorial or watch the unfolding footage of 9/11/2001 to refresh her memory. Better yet, perhaps choose a more sympathetic audience.
17
Among your many mistakes, I'll just pick one, which is the factual claim that torture gained useful information.
It's well-established that the torture of 9/11 prisoners gained no useful information.
First, many prisoners who were tortured actually turned out to be clearly innocent, such as the taxi driver in Zero Dark Thirty. Since they didn't know anything useful, they couldn't reveal anything useful.
Second, when the prisoners were tortured, many of them would tell the torturers anything they thought the torturers wanted to hear, true or false, just to stop the torture.
Third, the real experts on interrogation said that torture doesn't work. Those who interrogated enemy prisoners during WWII described their methods, and all agreed that hostility (much less torture) stops prisoners from giving truthful information. Furthermore, the psychologists who developed the Bush Administration's torture techniques had no knowledge or experience in interrogations, and have been unanimously discredited by professional psychologists.
And yes, I visited the 9/11 memorial. I got a tour by the widow of a fireman who died on 9/11. I asked her how she felt about the attackers who flew the plain into the buildings. She said she was sorry about their deaths too. She said, "They have mothers too." She was a Christian.
I am not a Christian but I was so inspired by her that I vowed to follow her example. Therefore, I am not speaking badly of you.
27
Well, we've been dealing with them harshly for 15 years and it hasn't seemed to do a single thing to stop terrorism - if anything, it's only made it worse by making the US look unjust and abusive against Muslims.
Torture is completely worthless as an interrogation technique. It's decent at getting suspects to talk, but not good at getting useful intelligence: under torture, the victims mostly tell the interrogator what they think the interrogator wants to hear, whether it's true or not. The article even mentions that many of the plots and schemes that another detainee told CIA interrogators about turned out to be fake or nonexistent - he was just making stuff up to please interrogators who insisted that he tell them about plans whether he had any or not!
7
It was also established that many of Gitmo prisoners were sold to American military - bounty money for turning in "terrorists". No proof needed. One 14 yr. old boy ended up in Gitmo; he had nothing to do with anything.
11
I'm not American but I'm still ashamed.
7
Did he think “human” when he did what he did?? No. So why expect that.
5
Did those who dropped the 2 nuclear bombs on Japan think ‘human’ when they did what they did? No. So why expect that? War by any other name, like terrorism, is the same thing.
This just one more Republican stink hole. This issue should be pursued in the world courts as a war crime. As a nation we are not observing any thing close to what we agreed to do in times of war. Just because the boundaries are not clear, it is never the less war.
4
Extremely well-written article. I really appreciated you covering this.
7
Guantanamo is a stain on America which will never be erased.
11
Shameful that Obama didn’t release this wrongly accused prisoner. A horrible stain on his legacy.
5
Was there a country ready to accept him? No releases could be made for prisoners who had no place to go. Our prisons did not want to accept Gitmo prisoners. They couldn't be released into the general population without trials and proof of innocence. The military tribunals did not work. New York Courts were willing to hold trials; they were refused.
2
I practiced law for 20 years. All of my clients accused of criminal offenses were innocent. Do you think that is true or am I biased in favor of my clients?
6
Were any of your clients sold to investigators? Were any of them international clients? Or, were you a member of the bar which waited for the Court to assign them cases?
1
Until my government takes responsibility for the absolutely inhumane and uncivilized treatment of these detainees, it has lost its moral authority. And - yes - I understand many of them are guilty of plotting the deaths of thousands of Americans, for which they should be tried and - if found guilty - imprisoned, just as those who authorized or participated in torture also should be. The US was the beacon of hope and liberty for much of the world not because we always acted beyond moral reproach, but because we were accountable when we fell short.
13
I grew up with the notion, reinforced by movies tv books etc., that good triumphs over evil. The lines between them are neatly delineated. As i got older, i found that life is not that simple. It is often messy, complicated lines get blurred or even erased. The torture of human beings is repulsive. Simple enough. Waterboarding, used in the Spanish Inquisition, by the US in the Philippines early in the c20th century, by the Japanese and Germans in WWII, by the French in Algeria and many many other times in other places,,is reprehensible. The fact that Guantanamo had so many innocent men swept up by dubious intelligence, unfettered by law and decency , is a stain , again, on the American soul. Yet, yet, does time erase the crime committed? The hatred that was unleashed by the Attacks that morning are still resounding, both in the Middle east and right here.There is of course that hidden question that no one wants to ask, lest one be identified with thugs and torturers . It is the question at the heart of the entire enterprise: Are you willing to let someone go free who will possibly, possibly,commit an act of terror against the US. On this hypothesis rests all. Intellectually, it is an easy,almost simple answer. When your children or friends and neighbors are directly at risk, it gets, if not murkier, then certainly more difficult.It was much simpler when I was a child...
4
I'm willing to let them rot in jail.
They're not innocent.
14
Really? How do you know?
7
This is totalitarianism at is most Kafkaesque and sadistic.
12
Very moving article and admire Ms Pradhan's dedication. It is a very well written piece, delving into her rich tradition handed down over generations and that unmistakable bond between her and Baluchi. And, yes, Baluchi, is much more urbane than he lets on. Nobody wires $100,000 without questioning what it is for. Even shades of the "Stockholm Syndrome" (in reverse?) in their relationship
4
There is no doubt that the darkest page in our history is Guantanamo. It is the product of fear and injustice instead of courage and Justice.
23
Nah. It’s still slavery. Always slavery.
7
Darker than the World Trade Center crashing to the ground? A gross overstatement.
9
Saudis took down the Towers. Saudis trained by Americans. They flew from Afghanistan. We knew who they were. Bush got all Saudis out of the country from Florida, after all flights were cancelled. Saudi Arabia was never punished, as Germany was in Nuremburg. They have never been punished for the murder of thousands in NYC and the Pentagon. There would have been more if two heroic men had not taken down a plane in PA. They are now exporting a violent form of Wahabism in Africa: Boko Haram. Trump likes the Saudis; "W" liked the Saudis.
3
“perpetual detention with the patina of a court process.”
Better than what you may see in many countries around the world, but far from fair and just. It is particularly striking to learn how the CIA decided to torture Baluchi despite acknowledging that he was cooperating and being forthcoming.
20
"Better than what you may see in many countries around the world"
Very bad excuse!
2
Proud to know American women like Alka Pradhan exist in this world and what it indicates for fairness and equality and due process. We all were gutted when 9/11 took place but without due process, are we as civilized as the terrorists? "Are we really civilized? Who are we to judge?"
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A graphic example of how our Government really does not believe in the system of "justice" it claims to believe in at home. You may not care about a suspected 9/11 terrorist, but understand what we do abroad is only one step away from being used at home.
The entire proceeding is in fact absurd and immoral.
42
after reading this article my take aways are: 1. Terrorists are human beings too 2. CIA were never good guys but to paraphrase Winston Churchill: rough men who are willing to visit violence upon those who wish the American people harm. sad to read something, so vividly, that we all intrinsically know. I also am reminded that even in this deeply flawed system of ours; a man who is believed to have participated in one of Americas biggest mass killings of civilians, is being provided adequate legal counsel, of the suspects own choosing, paid for by the very people he prepored to have wanted to kill. and it all gets covered by the NYT. i admit it's hard to see, but our institutions still hold.
28
He is "believed" to have participated. On what evidence? On what procedures to determine that evidence? You pat the system on the back for providing a patina of civilized behavior, even though the overwhelming evidence demonstrates that no such thing has been provided. What if he is quite innocent of these charges but neither he nor anyone else discovers it? It really seems that you believe in the illusion of justice in lieu of justice itself.
9
This comment assumes a fact not in evidence, as the lawyers say. We do not know that Baluchi knowingly sent money to the 9/11 plotters. On the other hand, we do know that some of the people held for years in Quantanamo were innocent. Our institutions are in tatters. USA should read Guantanamo Diary, by Mohamedou Ould Slahi.
7
"On what evidence" The article certainly doesn't care to go into that side of the story. And many are saying it's well written?
During Clinton’s presidency the decision was made to cut back on military spending where ‘feasible’. Unfortunately that meant that almost all of our expert military interrogators, especially interrogation instructors, and Area specialists were rigged out or retired.
Our interrogators were mostly poorly trained from that time onward, especially wrt to recognition and determination of guilt or innocence.
In Afghanistan our best interrogators have been national Guard police officers who often are excellent in questioning to determine guilt or innocence.
The relevance is: a roadside IED goes off and kills. Infantry or logistics soldiers naturally grab the nearby farmers. But the men who set and triggered it rarely are dumb. And they rarely are near enough to catch.
You do not get a confession from an innocent farmer. If you are a higher up you need results. And down the slippery road to torture and the installation of a serious misunderstanding of interrogation and ‘learned helplessness’. And the future torture of our pilots and soldiers captured.
Admiral and Senator McCain can and has tell us about that. No infantryman likes an enemy pilot. The last time a pilot took a prisoner was WW I!
My father and both grandfathers were lawyers. Dad was a federal prosecutor. Granddad was a police court judge, congressman, and senator. Other granddad was a defense lawyer with seven languages and three doctorates.
An atomic bomb set to go off. Maybe torture if very good. Maybe. But
There are better place to fight for human rights.
22
There are not better or worse places to fight for human rights.
7
The horrendous torture and violation of Baluchi and others has set in motion a vicious cycle of perpetual detainment that makes the closing of Guantanamo Bay impossible: We can't close Gitmo until we try the detainees, but we can't try the detainees because the very existence of Gitmo opposes due process. At the same time, I do feel for the CIA torturers, who have painted themselves into a terrible moral corner - they are as indoctrinated as the terrorists.
11
The guilty have the most to hide. Whether it’s our country or our president. I’m ashamed to read this. Yes, it’s racism, plain and simple.
17
Thank you, Alka Pradhan. You are a small light in the very dark story of American torture and Gitmo.
60
What a wonderful lawyer. If only there were more people like her! Thank you NY Time for bringing this great human story.
38
What if he's guilty? Then he's playing her.
They framed this article to warm hearts like yours.
I'm a bleeding liberal but I see her (rightful) indignation of Gitmo blinding her to the original sin that started all of this. Perhaps no coincidence that she was not a fully formed adult when 9/11 happened.
4
There is no rule of law without due process. All there is now is anarchy.
There is not even the appearance of rule of law, since there is not trial, but only arguments on how to run a trial, if there is even to be one. Furthermore the jailers know that they would lose any trial ( if there was any due process to speak of ) since rights have been trampled on since incarceration.
All there is are fences, walls and the slow passage of time until lives pass.
42