Guantanamo: Oscillating Between the Desirable and the Feasible

The Guantanamo camps and the military commissions that tried detainees allegedly connected with the September 2001 terrorist attacks were part of the antiterrorist strategy implemented by the United States and are a matter of the utmost importance to the new administration. Guillermo Gutiérrez Nieto looks at how this facility came into being, how it evolved into what it is today, the trial of alleged terrorists and the restrictions imposed on the Bush administration by Congress and the Supreme Court of Justice. The issue of the Guantanamo detention camps hit the headlines in early 2009 when President Barack Obama announced their closure before the year was out and in May of that same year, it became a thorny political matter when the president declared he was reconsidering his strategy. Consequently, the future of the prisoners held here, how they will be tried and where those found guilty of breaking us and international law will serve out their sentences is presently unclear. Solutions are limited and involve the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, but there are other actors with an influence on domestic policy seeking to have their demands met. Whatever strategy is finally decided upon, it must necessarily take into account intelligence, defense and foreign policy aspects, and while President Obama has made great progress as far as respecting the law and human rights go, he now finds himself mired down in a political dispute that makes it hard to envisage what course his administration will take vis-à-vis Guantanamo.