The Panopticon

The means of defense against
foreign danger have been always
the instruments of tyranny at home
--James Madison
_____________

Dear Abby,

"What is the difference between a prison, a detention center and a camp?"

Being as we are playing out summer and the last of the marshmallow roasts at Camp Kookamunga will soon come, the news of the closing of Baghdad's Camp Cropper brought the question to mind.

The Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) has muddled the meanings of many words, including terrorist, insurgent, militant and prisoner of war. A camp could also be a euphemistic term for an internment camp, where people are confined sans the niceties of trials.

The AP reported "[T]he U.S. handed over the last detention facility under its control to Iraqi authorities" July 16, 2010. A detention center conjures images of people in transit, being temporarily housed, but many of those at Camp Cropper have been there since the facility's inception. The Iraqis will rename the facility, the al Karkh prison.

At the request of the Iraqi authorities, U.S. wardens will continue to guard around 200 of Cropper's 1,500 detainees, including al Qaeda militants and henchmen of ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.

. . .

Neither [Major General Jerry] Cannon [deputy U.S. commander of detainee operations in Iraq] nor Iraqi Justice Minister Dara Nur Addin provided an explanation for why the 200 had been singled out (US Hands Over Last Iraq Jail but Keeps 200 Inmates).

Are these 200 people detainees or prisoners? Are they both? What legal definition applies, or do we even care about the legality of these undefinable locations?

--Signed, Bewildered, perplexed and confused

Devil's Island

--I'm gonna escape and come back
--Escape and come back . . . ?
--Ah, yes--escape, come back,
wipe this place off the face of the earth,
obliterate it . . . and you with it
--The Prisoner (1967)

It is not necessary to accept everything as true,
one must only accept it as necessary
--The Trial, Franz Kafka
________________

It is good news that the U.S. is handing over to the Iraqis Camp Cropper, the last prison under its control (US hands over last Iraqi prison under its Control). Good, because the U.S. military should not be in the prison business. But there's bad with the good:

"The US transferred the last detention camp under its control in Iraq today as it continues to wind down its military presence in the country.

"Iraqi authorities are to rename Camp Cropper Karkh prison.

"Major General Jerry Cannon, the head of US detention facilities in Iraq, said the US would continue holding 200 detainees – out of 1,500 prisoners – including eight former regime members. They will be held in a separate area of the prison known as compound five."

"Major General Jerry Cannon, the head of US detention facilities in Iraq, said the US would continue holding 200 detainees – out of 1,500 prisoners – including eight former regime members. They will be held in a separate area of the prison known as compound five."

Why will the U.S. keep 200 prisoners, and where is "Compound Five"? Upon what legal authority does the U.S. imprison anyone at the behest of the Iraqi government? This is not the way justice is served in a democracy -- trials and Geneva Conventions are the order of that day. We are becoming what we ostensibly set out to destroy: An arbitrary dictatorial power.

George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are gone, but their policies live on: We still throw people in jail without trials or end dates. Callousness is not the sole domain of the Republican party.

Reuters reported, "Neither [Major General Jerry] Cannon [deputy U.S. commander of detainee operations in Iraq] nor Iraqi Justice Minister Dara Nur Addin provided an explanation for why the 200 had been singled out."

"Those who stayed with the U.S. forces might be handed over to us. Maybe they want to see the formation of a new government, maybe they will be handed over within days," Addin said at the handover ceremony. "The issue is not clear yet."

If the issue is not clear after seven years, when will it be?

No prisoner is so dangerous or important that we should suborn our values to slap them away in unending incarceration.