The APA Wants Back into Gitmo - and the Pentagon's Good Graces

A trip to an American Psychological Association convention revealed an attempt to get back into Guantanamo Bay after a scandal with the CIA and Pentagon as well as a profession that is enamored with its own power. - SEE MY COMMENT -

OK, everybody keep their lab coats on, here. Sally Harvey is correct. It's about mental health care for detainees. Dear Michael, your vocabulary and hyperbole aside, you seek to pontificate and mislead here. From the lead photo to outright lies about International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) participation in the oversight of the mission at Guantanamo Bay. The photo shows various detainees, fresh off of a plane from Afghanistan, kneeling in gravel inside the holding area of Camp X-Ray, taken in January, 2002. Detainees are still wearing gloves from the cold trip over. Overcoats were cut off of them at the Leward airport after deplaning. The other garb, blackout goggles and earmuffs are sensory deprivation devices that keep the detainee calm, thereby avoiding any unnecessary excitement and keeping detainees and guards safer. The impression from this photo is that this is how we treated detainees 24/7/365, which couldn't be further from the truth. You betray your intentions in the piece by not crediting or explaining this photo. The detainees actually spent from five to forty-five minutes in this area, in this position before being in-processed, including a medical exam and cursory treatment of any injuries or illnesses - some were taken directly to the US Navy Fleet Hospital (think M*A*S*H unit, Navy style). They were observed and cared for in the holding area by US Marines who gave them water and spoke to them through interpreters to gauge their condition. Much of what you write is nonsense. As the ranking US Army Medical Department officer with the Joint Detainee Operations Group (JDOG), Joint Task Force 160, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from February to June, 2002, I worked with ICRC physicians there who told me, "No one does [detention operations] better than the US." ICRC were present during in-processing, interviewed detainees regularly, and met with my command group regularly to make comments and requests. The most serious request I remember coming from them was to please not take the candy from the military field rations (MRE's or Meals Ready-to-Eat), which we fed detainees and US personnel for the lunch meal at Camp X-Ray from January to April, 2002. Most detainees loved the sweets, but we were using the candy as a behavior modification reward, so we told the ICRC, thanks, but no thanks, and continued to hold the candy back from those who did not cooperate. I worked with psych nurses at Gitmo regarding daily medical reports I made to the JDOG command. In fact, I drove the HMMWV that delivered the very first repatriated detainee to his freedom bird, and spent several hours speaking with him prior to the plane's arrival with a psych nurse present and through an interpreter. Abdul Razaq, and Afghan national, said he was a heroin addict on the streets of Kandahar, and picked up an AK-47 from the Taliban who supported his habit. According to the psych nurse, Abdul was also a schizophrenic off his meds when we picked him off the battlefield. So, when Abdul came to us at Gitmo, he was a cold turkey heroin addict off of his psych meds. Bizarre behavior? To put it mildly. Abdul's nick-name in camp was "Wild Bill," among other names. He took literal bites out of his flip-flops. Yup, bit, chewed and swallowed. He hung things from his genitals. He consumed his own feces, and "splashed" guards with his bodily fluids. Every step of the way, military medical and psychological professionals cared for Abdul. Once his condition was certified he was deemed no longer a threat to the United States and no longer of any intelligence value, he was repatriated. NBC.com chronicled his story and his peaceful return to Afghanistan in an online article. That's actually how we learned of his fate, after being lied to by CIA folks at Gitmo, who told us Abdul had been shot dead upon arrival in Afghanistan. Detainees were treated with dignity and respect at Gitmo, and receive world class medical care, including dental, vision, specialty and psychiatric treatment as indicated. 731 detainees have been RELEASED from Gitmo since 2002, and NONE were executed, beheaded, blown up, hacked to death, dragged naked and lifeless through the streets, drowned or burned alive, all things our enemies have done to us and/or our allies. Gitmo is the finest military detention ever. There is no moral comparison between Gitmo and how our enemies treat captives. In fact, the Islamist equivalent to Gitmo is a pile of heads. The American Psychological Association made a critical and selfish mistake in their decision to ban members from performing services at Gitmo. Everyone should have access to psychiatric services, even those such as unlawful combatant Islamists who want to kill us. Gitmo is not perfect, but it is not and never has been the gulag you want to make it out to be. Only a handful of detainees experienced Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EIT), including waterboarding, which were lawful and approved when performed at Gitmo by the CIA, which yielded important information that saved many lives, perhaps even your own. No one was ever tortured at Gitmo, and certainly not by any DoD personnel, who are not trained in EIT or any other physical, mental or emotional techniques. Maybe you should do a little more research before pretending you know about something you clearly do not. Sincerely, Montgomery J. Granger, Major, US Army, Retired, author: "Saving Grace at Guantanamo Bay: A Memoir of a Citizen Warrior."