Security

When 9/11 proved that our national security was an illusion, we began to work harder to achieve as much security as we could for our country. It is much wiser to be cautious and safe, than to panic and live in fear, however, being cautious does not necessarily mean we have to be paranoid.

I don't believe many will argue that the whole Guantanamo Bay situation is a mess from start to finish, however, I also believe that all sides are to blame for the mess. An investigation, at this point, would be a waste of time and money. I blame the Bush administration for not being more discreet and promoting fear. I blame the Obama administration for making things worse by releasing memos that only prove transparency in government is a useful tool to distract the masses when you don't want them watching what you are doing, and I blame the media for having bad taste in promoting the whole sordid mess. I sincerely hope the courts have the good sense not to make pictures available to the public. No good can come from doing such a thing.

As much as I don't like the whole issue of waterboarding, the fact of the matter is that Al Jazeera, our enemies television station, broadcasts the beheading of their prisoners. I think we are by far the more civilized people and I find it very doubtful they don't already know we use waterboarding. Releasing the memos wasn't a matter of national security, it was simply a matter of poor taste.

The primary question we have to ask ourselves is do we want to wait for terrorists to come to us, or do we want to hunt them down?

If we wait for them to come to us, then we have a lot of work to do securing our borders. Just because one exercises patience doesn't mean they have a death wish. We already know what their intention is. It's up to us to prepare ourselves for their return.

If we hunt them down, then the second question becomes, what do we do with them when we catch them? The assumption is that we're hunting them, so we can find Osama Bin Laden, therefore, we kind of need to ask them what they know about him. We have to have someplace to ask our questions. Since it's not likely they want to talk to us, they might have to be our guests for awhile, unless of course we simply want to have a polite conversation and let them go on their merry way when they don't answer any of our questions or give us any useful information.

Now I admit, I'm not certain exactly what all the legal ramifications and responsibilities are in this situation, but I am fairly certain that we do have laws that only allow people in this country to be detained for questioning for a certain number of hours or days. These laws make it impossible for us to keep suspected terrorists in our police stations for any length of time, but I don't know if these laws necessarily have to apply to any of our military bases. I believe a military base of some kind is the appropriate place to put the people we catch. It isn't right to put anyone in prison that hasn't been convicted of a crime. I also think it wouldn't be a bad idea for the military to conduct terrorist trials. We all know how backed up our public courts already are. I don't believe the military has that problem.

As for which military base, I don't know. I'll leave that up to my elected officials, at least for now. I'm not sure there are many Americans who live on military bases that want the terrorists on their base, but I could be wrong. I know we have military bases in other countries, but I don't know if other countries will let us take our detainees there.

Yes, it is politically correct to use the term detainees, but the people we catch are really prisoners of war. We declared war on terrorism. We are fighting an army of terrorists. Did you really think we wouldn't take any prisoners? Do you really think using nicer words will make war more tolerable? Waterboarding may not be pretty, but think about what they do to their prisoners of war. I am by no means suggesting we stoop to their level. War will always be ugly. Deal with it. People choose to give up their civil/human rights when they choose to fly planes into buildings full of other people.

Copyright © 2009 Annette Fortunato

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