The naval officer who commanded the USS Cole when it was hit by terrorists says he doesn't agree with a recent congressional "compromise" on how to try terrorist suspects now being house at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba.
Congressional negotiators unveiled the compromise Wednesday that would continue allowing prisoners at "Gitmo" to be transferred to United States to face trial. Under the plan, detainees could not be released into the U.S. and could not serve sentences in U.S. prisons. The move sets up a clash with Republicans and a potentially difficult vote for dozens of House Democrats. Only last week the House approved a GOP plan to block any transfer of Gitmo detainees into the U.S. Cdr. Kirk Lippold (USN-Ret.), senior military fellow at Military Families United, has serious doubts about the agreement. "What country in the world is going to want to take a known, convicted, hardened terrorist?" he asks. "We can't keep them locked up -- so guess where they're going to end up? They're probably going to end up walking our streets amongst our people. It doesn't make any sense." Lippold does not think President Obama is going to change his mind about closing Gitmo in January. "Sometimes change means having the moral courage to stand up and saying 'Now that I understand the situation better, I believe this is the new direction to go,'" he suggests. "[But] I do not believe the president is going to do this." Instead, says Lippold, he expects the president to "adhere to the old politics of business as usual-- and consequently we going to be stuck with living with these terrorists in our prisons."
Congressional negotiators unveiled the compromise Wednesday that would continue allowing prisoners at "Gitmo" to be transferred to United States to face trial. Under the plan, detainees could not be released into the U.S. and could not serve sentences in U.S. prisons. The move sets up a clash with Republicans and a potentially difficult vote for dozens of House Democrats. Only last week the House approved a GOP plan to block any transfer of Gitmo detainees into the U.S. Cdr. Kirk Lippold (USN-Ret.), senior military fellow at Military Families United, has serious doubts about the agreement.
"What country in the world is going to want to take a known, convicted, hardened terrorist?" he asks. "We can't keep them locked up -- so guess where they're going to end up? They're probably going to end up walking our streets amongst our people. It doesn't make any sense." Lippold does not think President Obama is going to change his mind about closing Gitmo in January. "Sometimes change means having the moral courage to stand up and saying 'Now that I understand the situation better, I believe this is the new direction to go,'" he suggests. "[But] I do not believe the president is going to do this." Instead, says Lippold, he expects the president to "adhere to the old politics of business as usual-- and consequently we going to be stuck with living with these terrorists in our prisons."
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