February 19, 2015, Ends with a whimper
My very first GTMO related interview was with Josh Dratel, nearly ten years ago. Josh was one of the civilian attorneys who represented "Australian Taliban" David HIcks, then held at Guantanamo, and subjected to charges and possible trial before a military commission. Hicks eventually pleaded guilty to "material support of terrorism" in exchange for immediate release to Australia, where he served out nine months pursuant to a plea deal-- but got himself out of GTMO.
Coming full circle, we give you this decision of the U.S. Court of Military Decision Review in the case of Hicks v United States" vacating Mr. Hicks' conviction on the grounds that the "war crime" he pleaded to (he contended under extreme duress)... was not a "war crime" at the time he took his plea.
Still 122 men at GTMO, ostensibly "the worst of the worst," with the promised "9-11 [show] trials" the centerpiece of the place. My college classmate Barack Obama promised to close the place, but has, at best, released only half the prisoners there (despite finding dozens more "cleared for release"), a mere ten dozen or so, in over six years, have been released by the Obama Administration, even as it has fought (tooth and nail) any and every effort to obtain habeas relief. Even as (like our economy, our culture, and certainly our moral authority) the military commissions continue imploding in front of us.
This long national nightmare is over thirteen years and counting, of detaining-- under the harshest of conditions-- dozens of men that the government itself says are completely innocent... with no particular end in sight.
Beyond this... I got nothin'...