by hilzoy
There are dark plots afoot at Guantanamo Bay, and not the usual kind:
“Guards at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp found two prisoners sporting unauthorized underwear, and the U.S. military is investigating to determine how they got the contraband.
Both prisoners were caught wearing Under Armour briefs and one also had on a Speedo bathing suit, items the military said were not issued by Guantanamo personnel or sent through the regular mail, according to a Defense Department letter obtained Friday by The Associated Press. (…)
The letter, sent last month by the Office of the Navy Judge Advocate General to a lawyer for one of the prisoners involved noted both detainees are represented by the British human rights group Reprieve and suggested attorneys might have “surreptitiously” provided the garments.
“We are investigating this matter to determine the origins of the above contraband and ensure that parties who may have been involved understand the seriousness of this transgression,” said the letter, which was provided to AP by one of the attorneys, Clive Stafford Smith.
Stafford Smith called the suggestion that he or the other lawyer, Zachary Katznelson, smuggled underwear to prisoners “patently absurd.”
“Neither I, nor Mr. Katznelson, nor anyone else associated with us has had anything to do with smuggling ‘unmentionables’ into these men, nor would we ever do so,” he wrote in response the letter. (…)
He said Under Armour briefs are popular with members of the military and suggested investigators check to see if the offending underwear was purchased at the U.S. Navy base where the prison is housed.”
On another matter: everyone should read Ezra Klein’s marvelous takedown of a recent book by Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s pollster and eminence grise.
Consider this an open thread.
This is obviously an al-Qaeda conspiracy to attack the government. They plan to build up a mass of contraband underwear, which they EXPECT to be confiscated and taken back to Washington for analysis, but, unbeknownst to their ignorant American jailers, they have already laced the underwear with tiny amounts of plutonium. When enough underwear is collected together as evidence, the plutonium will reach critical mass and blow up Washington DC.
Those fiendish terrorists!
Erasmussimo: I think you’re wrong. They knew the underwear would be confiscated, but not before the terrorists in detention had had a chance to read the messages encoded in tiny raised stitches with their specially trained and extra-sensitive equally unmentionables.
That’s my theory, and I’m sticking to it.
Perhaps we should sic some of the 9/11 Truthers onto this. I bet they could come up with much better theories than either of us.
By the way, I’d like to express my appreciation for all the hard work you put into this blog. I get a lot of useful information from it. I seldom comment, because I don’t have much to add.
He said Under Armour briefs are popular with members of the military and suggested investigators check to see if the offending underwear was purchased at the U.S. Navy base where the prison is housed.
But did the prisoners pay full price for the underwear, or did they receive a special terrorist discount?
Hi,
Spartikus here. I’m a loyal Obsidian Wings reader and occasional commentator. I work for the Vancouver Public Library and since late July we have been on strike – the first strike in our 77 year unionized history. Our most important issue is pay equity. Library workers have been predominantly female throughout modern history and today the workforce of our library remains 85% female. And as a female predominant workforce librarians have been, and this is a hard comment to make in the 21st century, undervalued and under compensated. Librarians in the Vancouver system require at a minimum a Masters degree (with quite a few Ph.D’s in the ranks). Yet in Vancouver they are not compensated on the same scale as others of equal education and responsibility in traditionally male dominated professions within the workforce of the City of Vancouver, in Canadian university libraries, in library systems in other provinces, and indeed in librarian positions in the private sector. In fact manual labourer positions with our city, that only require a high school degree, are compensated at higher level than starting positions at the Library.
A detailed case for Pay Equity in regards to local conditions in Vancouver is made here. An interesting factoid: In 1998 the average Canadian woman earned 72.8% of the average Canadian man. In 2003 this has dropped to 71%. The free market does not seem to be correcting this historical wrong of it’s own accord.
I should note I am not a librarian. (I’m a graphic designer and as such am likely not to see any financial benefit from a pay equity agreement.) Yet I accept intellectually the strong case made for our issues, and on an emotional level will stand with my co-workers and friends. This is, quite frankly, a good cause. It’s fair, and would not be onerous on the Vancouver taxpayer.
I’ve long been a frustrated film maker, and have made a series of videos on our issues and experiences: The Read In; The Black Out Week; The Rally; Grandeur on Georgia; The Buttoneers; and The Flying Bike Brigade.
One of my hobbies is still photography, and I have a flickr gallery here.
A colleague has also made a number of videos: Pay Equity: Recipe for Disaster; Auxiliaries: The Gentle Sherpas of the Public Library; Wage and Term: It’s the Amount That Counts.
Though my spouse is also with the Library (thus we’ve lost both incomes) I am not asking for anything other than a few moments of your time, and perhaps a word or note to your local librarian. It’s my belief that pressure within the professional librarian community is just as effective as local political pressure.
And, I hope, you will be entertained.
I can’t believe no one’s said this yet (probably I should check some other blogs), but obviously it’s the Al Qaeda Underpants Gnomes, whose plan is:
1. Collect underpants (leaving unauthorized replacements.
2. ?
3. Bring death to America!
Another theory: the underpants were those put on the interrogatees heads and forgotten to remove when they were sent back to their cages. Since those people prefer towels* for their head and panties for their bowels, they simply switched. All of this would of course not have happened at all, if they would have been kept naked all the time like in Abu Ghraib.
*from their refreshing waterboarding sessions
I think they’re actually quite sensible in being concerned about this. Underwear may be trivial, but a demonstration that prisoners in a high security facility have a conduit for unapproved items is not. Depending on the nature of that conduit, it might carry far more significant items. Perhaps even weaponry.
They’d be fools if they weren’t very worried about this discovery.
If they were truly concerned, they should have been able to make a much more accurate determination of who the underwear was from rather than making what seems to be a knee jerk accusation against the lawyers.
Depending on the nature of that conduit, it might carry far more significant items. Perhaps even weaponry.
If I were in Guantanemo and had access to a conduit that could supply me with underwear and weaponry, I don’t think I’d’ve revealed that ability by flaunting unauthorized underwear when I could simply get a weapon or several and start shooting…On the other hand, if said conduit could only provide underwear, I’d probably wear the underwear just to make the guards worry about this very thing…
On another note, has anyone seen this yet?
A few points:
1) I think the explanation is much simpler. This is simply a literal application of the J. Gordon Liddy Doctrine (“when you’ve got them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow”). I doubt Liddy meant that literally, but Bushies and members of the Cheney Branch will apparently apply any Nixonian doctrine without a second thought. Perhaps, we should be encouraged that the administration is now seeing the need to win over hearts and minds.
2) Does this make Fruit-of-the-Loom a terrorist organization?
3) Now, if only there was as much interest in investigating cases of detainee abuse as there was in investigating the presence of rogue undergarments…
Why do you assume that? Because underwear has individual serial numbers woven into the fabric, and is registered to the original purchaser? How do you suppose they’re going to identify the source so expediently? It seems obvious they’re not running 24/7 recorded surveillance of the entire facility, or they’d just KNOW the source, period.
And the lawyers are the obvious suspects, just exactly because they DO get to be alone with the prisoners without being under observation.
LP, the lawyers are the obvious suspects because everybody else involved is in the military. All of those people took their oaths, and so it’s resaonable to ask them whether they were involved and believe their answers. They’re honorable servicemen after all.
But the lawyers — everybody knows how honorable lawyers are.
Ever seen “Mr. Bean” change out of slacks into a bathing suit with full modesty. That’s how the lawyers did it (in reverse). From now on the lawyers should have to check their underwear at the gate.
Since when are lawyers allowed with Guantanamo inmates without permanent supervision? No barrier between them?
Historically it has been impossible to prevent the in and out-smuggling of conterband even in high security prisons. After the execution of the Nuremberg defendants in almost all cells* such items were found (but only Göring used those for suicide**. He also left a letter telling where two more cyanide capsules were hidden). The RAF terrorists in Stammheim committed suicide with pistols despite regular cell searches and body searches of the lawyers.
*searched once a week during the trials
**he brought them in himself without help as far as could be told
Dianne: yes, I saw it, and have been meaning to check out the methodology etc.
Brett: yes, I think they’re right to be concerned about any contraband. I also think that the assumption that it’s the lawyers, as opposed to the guards, is unwarranted: it’s not as though guards in prisons have never been known to sell things to prisoners.
But mostly I just liked the headline, and needed an open thread.
I suspect the prisoner named al-Hogan is behind it all.
Somewhere on Gitmo is a sergeant saying “I know nothing…”.
Thanks –
Brett — The lawyers hadn’t visited one of the prisoners in more than a year. They are searched quite often, and so unless someone was sloppy enough to be seriously disciplined, the underwear is of more recent vintage. I think it’s quite likely that an interrogator or guard got a little out of his/her lane, hoping to gain some favor. Maybe the person who did it is too embarrassed to admit it or, more likely, he/she is gone already. Gitmo is unlike a normal prison, in that the guards rotate in and out, rather than staying for a career. This makes a huge difference in maintaining discipline on the government side.
Lawyers are not alone with prisoners without observation. There are cameras that they showed us on the first day — stressing that they turned the volume off, so they wouldn’t be able to hear us.
Hartmut — There’s no barrier between prisoners and lawyers in any of the prison interview facilities I’ve been in. (I haven’t been to Iguana, but it wouldn’t have barriers. The unnamed place where the high value guys are may or may not have barriers.) We all sit on plastic chairs, separated from the prisoner by a small (.7m square) table. He’s shackled to the floor, but could stand up, if there was room enough. The interview rooms in V and VI are very small. Two lawyers, a translator, and a client, and pretty much no one can move. In one of the rooms in VI (there are two), the AC doesn’t work very well if at all — no one’s favorite destination.
There are some basic errors in Klein’s account, e.g. in statistics and the lefties argument, but the book doesn’t sound like it’s very good. I’m not sure about the correlation between writing a bad book and being a bad adviser, though.
Incidentally, I didn’t understand his scorn of “Soccer mom”.
CC: “This makes a huge difference in maintaining discipline on the government side.”
Naively I would think that fresh soldiers would have better discipline. I can’t see being a prison guard, esp. in Gitmo, as an easy career.
RF, there are a number of skills involved in being a prison guard, including the ability to read the prisoners and the ability to remain stoic in the face of provocation. I’m sure that many of the guards have done fine, in their short careers. Some, though, haven’t responded as well in particular circumstances as a seasoned veteran would.
I heard a story recently — an ex-guard was in a shopping center in Bahrain, and heard someone calling her number. (Gitmo guards don’t have nametags, just serial number tags). She was apprehensive, but then relieved to find that the former prisoner who recognized her thought she had been fair and decent. I’ve heard other stories about a guard with a minor muscle sprain — or something like that — getting sincere and helpful advice from prisoners on how to treat it. These accounts have not come to me from prisoners or lawyers, but from military contacts.
hey hil:
any thoughts on wes clark’s endorsement of hillary clinton?
i remember you were a strong backer of clark in earlier cycles, and wondered your thoughts on his move this time.
no pressure, just curious what you think.
As someone whose first choice would have been Clark, this doesn’t affect my thoughts on weighing the leading candidates, since I think they’d all be ok – Clark is a long-time Clinton ally, and she’s likely to win, so I don’t know that there’s a lot of information here for me from him. (A Clark fan who dislikes HRC probably does learn something here.) If HRC announced he’d be her VP I would consider that a plus for her.
kid bitzer: I’m curiously unmoved, for someone who really respects Clark. I mean: I know the Clark and the Clintons were allies, as rilkefan said, and I think people he’s close to are with her (iirc, Holbrooke and Albright?), but on the other hand I’ve formed my own opinion of her, especially on foreign policy, and am underwhelmed, so … ?
“so … ?”
So do you uprate Clinton on foreign policy or downrate Clark’s judgment or principles, is probably the question.
spartikus: have forwarded your solidarity bleg to my mom (who is a librarian in the Ontario Catholic School Board and fairly active on both listservs and within CUPE). Have also posted your bleg to bastard.logic.