Friday, July 1, 2005

Gitmo or Chappaqua

AP reports:

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Military authorities have previously disclosed some incidents of guard retaliation at Guantanamo Bay, which resulted in mostly minor disciplinary proceedings. What emerges from 278 pages of documents obtained by The Associated Press is the degree of defiance by the terrorism suspects at Guantanamo.

The prisoners banged on their cells to protest the heat. They doused guards with whatever liquid was handy — from spit to urine. Sometimes they struck their jailers, one swinging a steel chair at a military police officer.

And the American MPs at times retaliated with force — punches, pepper spray and a splash of cleaning fluid in the face, according to the newly released documents that detail military investigations and eyewitness accounts of alleged abuse.

...The documents, obtained under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by AP, are far from a comprehensive look at Guantanamo and do not provide full details about each incident.

Names and some other identifying details have been blacked out by military censors. Handwriting at times isn't legible and pages appear to be missing or out of sequence. In some cases, it is not possible to decipher who did what to whom. Disciplinary measures against the troops were either relatively minor or unclear in some reports.

The internal investigative reports do, however, provide a snapshot of life behind the wire at Guantanamo, depicting a tense, hostile and sometimes chaotic place.

What a load!

AP is digging through documents they obtained under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. What are they hoping to find? Evidence that Gitmo is a gulag?

Imagine that. A facility holding suspected TERRORISTS is a "tense, hostile and sometimes chaotic place."

Does that surprise you? Do you feel more informed now?

I always did picture Gitmo to be a little different from the place Martha Stewart did her time or the average Kindergarten classroom.

When I think of a tense, hostile, and chaotic environment, for some reason Chappaqua comes to mind.

Anyway, thank God for the Freedom of Information Act.

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