how do Americans feel about Guantanamo Bay?

Question

i am from australia and it has been a big deal here because of the David Hick's situation, i'm curious as to what you Americans understand about guantanamo and how you feel about it and what you have been told

Answer 1

It's a disgrace.

Answer 2

IMO Guantanamo and all the US's _other_ "dark prisons" should be closed. The fact that the US now depends on and encourages this leftover from medieval times (in the dungeon forever or until death, whichever comes first) shows an appalling lack of leadership. Considering that the majority of Guantanamo prisoners have never been convicted of ANYTHING, it kind of makes a mockery of our "land of the free" idea. I'm not saying all prisoners should be freed; I'm saying the secrecy should be abolished, and these prisoners should be tried -- either convicted or let go. Indefinite detention is horrible, and degrading to the US.

Answer 3

I do not know the reality of what Americans feel about Guantanamo Bay. But I think they do not agree with what is happening in there

Answer 4

It is a US naval base on Cuban soil. It has the facilities to hold prisoners that were captured around the world, but mainly in Iraq and Afghanistan. The prisoners are interrogated and, as I understand it, valuable information has been extracted which has saved lives and prevented attacks. There are two sides in this argument as to whether we are using torture to gain this information or not. The ABSOLUTE AND TRUE CONTENTION TO THIS ARGUMENT WOULD DEPEND ON WHAT ONES INTERPRETATION OF TORTURE IS. No one,other than the people that are there and the high ranking officials in the US secret services and our navy, know the TECHNIQUES that are used. People WILL believe what they want. Their regard for the USA becomes obvious when you find out what side of the argument they take. I, for one, believe that these people that were captured on the battle field trying to kill our troops should have NO RIGHTS. No Geneva convention and certainly no rights that an american citizen enjoys. These people are in the band of thugs that are sworn to destroy the western nations and their way of life. They kill INNOCENT women and children as a matter of their policy. They behead people on TV and actually brainwash children to destroy themselves with concealed bombs just to kill other innocent people. The ONLY thing that these thugs understand is FORCE and PERSEVERENCE, some traits that many people that will be victims of these thugs, if the thugs have their way, do not understand.

Answer 5

I am also Australian

From some of the answers here you are assuming because thy are at Guantanamo Bay they are guilty of terrorism, that has not been the case in many incidences.

Answer 6

i'm also from Australia.

one thing i have noticed is that a lot of Americans seem to think that because its in Cuba that it's not technically American soil and therefore not actually covered by US jurisdiction.

BUT

it's a military base and is legal sovereign territory of the US. in other words, when you step off the street and onto the base you cross a US/Cuban border.

i don't really get why there would be confusion though. how could so many US citizens not realise that the Guantanamo Bay base is US soil?

Answer 7

Not a lot probably. Firstly about 60% will not even realise the locaion of Guantanamo Bay and another 10% will think it is a holiday retreat.
Insularity dominates the US to the extent that the people do not even realise the fact.

Answer 8

As an American and a veteran I will tell you that I believe that it was both a stupid and an evil action.

The concept is in violation of international law and the stated concept of American "fair play"

The method of getting military information has been shown over and over to be unworkable.

And most of all - It is just wrong

Answer 9

I'm sure you heard of Count Dracula. But do you know the history? The king of Romania was able to keep the Turks out through fear by having the locals say he was an insane demon.

Guantanamo is more legand than fact in order to scare the terrorists. The terrorists are more scared of that place than anything else on Earth including dieing and being overrun by Jews. In reality it's nothing more than what the U.S. calls a supermax prison.

Answer 10

Our enemies MUTILATE, BEHEAD, BURN, AND HANG ALL WHILE VIDEOTAPING THE EVENT. In at least on case the had a 12* YEAR OLD BOY BEHEAD A PRISONER.

The prisoners are well fed, get to excersize, get their religous time, their special religous food, and SPECIAL MUSLIM CIVILIAN contractors who hand them their Koran because THEY CLAIM THAT OUR SOLDIERS ARE UNCLEAN* EVEN WHEN WEARING LATEX GLOVES.

The prisoners at Gitmo are treated much better than any other prisoners of war have ever been in the history of warcraft.

A few isolated incidents of alleged torture have been used as proaganda to make us look bad. please refer to the first paragraph that I wrote.

Gitmo is a necessity, Unfortunately because of political correctness it is no longer a jail for terrorists...it is a break from the front line until they are released to terrorize again.

Answer 11

Most of us are appalled at the abuse but we also understand that this is not play time. Terrorists are not playing nice and there's no Geneva convention of rules to govern the terrorists and it's hard to apply that standard in our response to terrorism. Traditional intel will not provide answers, therefore, we may need to use torture to get knowledge of where the bad guys are. We're not happy, we're not proud but there is a certain understanding that this is war and war is ugly. Aussies and Brits in particular should know that well.