Close Guantanamo, Mr. Obama

by The Editorial Board

Sunday November 16, 2008, 9:20 AM

The detention center in Cuba has become symbolic of America's worst instincts

When, not if, President-elect Barack Obama orders that the prisoners of America's global war on terror be transferred to the United States from the Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, it won't mark a dramatic new statement of policy. After all, President George W. Bush himself said two years ago he wanted to close Guantanamo, but added, "I also recognize that we're holding some people that are darn dangerous."

But Obama could not send a clearer, more important signal to the world that the United States will no longer adopt the worst behaviors of its enemies. By shuttering the prison operations at Guantanamo, he would signal in dramatic fashion that this country will no longer construct elaborate legal fantasies about who is not a prisoner of war, won't deny captives the humane treatment they are entitled to under the international rules of warfare, and will dispose of their cases as fairly and speedily as it can, by conducting trials for some and releasing others to their home countries. 

The use of Guantanamo as a purgatory for prisoners and the abuse of Islamic captives at Abu Ghraib were the two chapters of American policy that most turned world opinion against the United States, so soon after the global outpouring of support following 9/11. As details emerged about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, they also horrified Americans who had gone along with the administration's arguments about the need to take extreme measures against adversaries in a new kind of war.

At least Abu Ghraib might be imagined to be primarily the work of a pack of ne'er-do-well, low-level guards who were inadequately supervised in a prison that was overflowing with captured Iraqis. But the administration, especially then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, proved itself unwilling to take responsibility. Its reflexive defensiveness was enormously costly to the Bush administration's influence, both at home and abroad.

Yet Guantanamo stands alone as an ugly symbol of American policy gone astray. Its use as an offshore prisoner detention center was entirely conceived and approved at the highest levels of government, along with secret renditions involving third countries and legal justifications for the use of torture against prisoners. Even a sympathetic Supreme Court couldn't go along with the administration's arguments about its handling of its cases -- or its failure to pursue cases -- against the captured.

This is not the United States that existed before Bush took office. Fortunately, his departure gives Obama the opportunity to make it clear that the last seven years were an aberration and that, now, America will return to its historical standards of justice.

Murderous people who want nothing more than to damage America will continue to threaten us. They will not change their attitudes because the United States has a new president. American military forces will continue to pursue, capture or neutralize them. In many cases, the world will be a safer place because they are in prison or dead.

But it is necessary to close the book on Guantanamo, which has so deeply stained America's reputation and, consequently, its effectiveness around the world. President Obama must show that his administration will no longer break the traditional rules of imprisonment, interrogation and courtroom justice. Closing Guantanamo would be a meaningful way to make that clear. 
Jan. 20 wouldn't be too soon.