NY Times reported claim that 61 Guantánamo detainees have “returned to the fight” without noting DOD made different claim in January
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on February 8th, 2009 5:39 am by HL
A February 7 New York Times article uncritically reported that “the Pentagon delayed making public its latest report on the released Guantánamo detainees it classifies as having ‘returned to the fight’ ” and added that “[o]n Friday, Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, put the number at 61, but said that the Defense Department was still struggling to provide names and specific examples without compromising intelligence-gathering sources.” However, the Times did not note that Morrell previously stated that the Department has confirmed that 18 have “returned to the fight,” with another 43 merely suspected of having done so.
As Media Matters for America noted, during a January 13 press conference, Morrell stated: “The new numbers are, we believe, 18 confirmed and 43 suspected of returning to the fight. So 61 in all former Guantánamo detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight.” Further, according to a January 23 American Forces Press Service article, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman stated, “Of the more than 500 detainees who have been transferred from Defense Department custody, 18 allegedly have resumed terrorist activities and another 43 former detainees are suspected of having resumed their former lives.” The Times gave no indication of whether Morrell has stated that the Department of Defense has subsequently confirmed that more than 18 detainees have “returned to the fight.”
Moreover, even the Pentagon’s claim that it has confirmed that 18 former Guantánamo detainees have “return[ed] to the fight” has been questioned by experts. CNN national security analyst Peter Bergen stated on the January 23 edition of CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 that “returning to the fight, in Pentagon terms, could be engaging in anti-American propaganda, something that’s not entirely surprising if you have been locked up in a prison camp for several years without charge.” Bergen further stated: “[W]hen you really boil it down, the actual number of people whose names we know are about eight out of the 520 that have been released [from Guantánamo], so a little above 1 percent, that we can actually say with certainty have engaged in anti-American terrorism or insurgence activities since they have been released. … If the Pentagon releases more information about specific people, I think it would be possible to — to potentially agree with them. But, right now, that information isn’t out there.”
Additionally, as Media Matters has noted, Seton Hall University School of Law professor Mark Denbeaux — who has written several reports about Guantánamo detainees, including some challenging the Pentagon’s definition of “battlefield” capture and published detainee recidivism rates — has disputed the Pentagon’s figures, asserting: “[The Defense Department’s most recent] attempt to enumerate the number of detainees who have returned to the battlefield is false by the Department of Defense’s own data and prior reports.”
From the February 7 Times article:
The president spoke for about 10 minutes before taking questions and talking individually with the participants, many of whom brought pictures of their loved ones who were killed in the attacks. The meeting was closed; participants described it as intense but civil.
Although some of the family members have disagreed openly with the president’s decision to close the prison at Guantánamo, participants said there was no hostility at the meeting.
“It went far better than I had imagined,” Kirk Lippold, a retired Navy commander who is a senior military fellow at Military Families United and was the commanding officer of the Cole at the time of the attack in 2000, said Friday evening.
Commander Lippold had been critical of the president’s decision to close the prison, but after the meeting said he was pleased with what he called Mr. Obama’s commitment to bringing the suspects to justice.
John Clodfelter of Mechanicsville, Va., whose son was among the 17 sailors killed in the Cole bombing, said he arrived at the meeting with apprehension over the decision to close the prison. But after listening to the president and being assured that the terrorism suspects would not be released, Mr. Clodfelter said his opinion changed.
“I did not vote for the man,” Mr. Clodfelter said, “but the way he talks to you, you can’t help but believe in him. He left me with a very positive feeling that he’s going to get this done right.”
Mr. Obama’s outreach to the families came as the Pentagon delayed making public its latest report on the released Guantánamo detainees it classifies as having “returned to the fight.” On Friday, Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, put the number at 61, but said that the Defense Department was still struggling to provide names and specific examples without compromising intelligence-gathering sources.
Mr. Morrell said there had been no concern from the White House about releasing a report that could undermine its argument for closing the prison.
“There is no pressure at all,” he said. “This is our own internal process that we are working through as we always do.”
