Voice of America: Obama Announces Changes to US Hostage Policy
President Barack Obama has ordered an extensive reform of U.S. policies about dealing with hostage-takers, and he pledged the government will use "all instruments of national power" to recover Americans being held prisoner abroad by terrorists.
The government will no longer threaten to prosecute families who try to negotiate with kidnappers, or pay ransom to win their relatives' release, Obama said Wednesday at the White House.
WNU Editor: After opening the door with the negotiated release of Sgt. Bergdahl from his Taliban captors .... how could the White House then say no to these families.
More News On The U.S. Changing Its Hostage Policies
Obama allows US hostage families to pay ransoms -- BBC
Families negotiating ransom for U.S. hostages won't be prosecuted, Obama says -- AP
In new hostage policy, U.S. will not prosecute families for paying ransom -- Reuters
White House OKs discussions with terror groups holding U.S. hostages -- CNN
White House unveils hostage policy review, takes heat for opening door to terror ransoms -- FOX News
Lawmakers Blast Obama's Hostage Policy Reforms -- NBC
4 comments:
Governance by trial and error.
Hard to say what kind of difference this will make. Some have said this will only encourage more hostage taking. Maybe they are right.
I'm pretty sure this sort of thing already happens where families negotiate for the release of their loved ones and the government simply looks the other way. As such, this probably does not represent a change in the actual substance of the policy.
There probably are times and places where negotiation might be the best approach and times and places where it would be in the national interest not to do so. By keeping quiet officially and simply looking the other way as families negotiated this allowed for some ambiguity meaning the enemy might not always know what to expect keeping them off balance.
On balance I don't think this is a good policy by the Administration nor was the negotiation for Mr. Bergdahl a good policy decision either. We give up 5 Taliban officials and get a probable deserter in return.
It's hard to imagine a situation where this would have been a good trade. Could it be that the government and other high ranking officials are sympathetic to followers of Islam? (I think the answer is likely "yes.") Would the government have negotiated for the release of white Christian in the same manner? (Probably not.) Even if they did, would it have been sound policy to trade an infantry person for 5 Taliban leaders regardless of their religious beliefs or their service record. (Probably not.)
On your last point B. I think someone saw an opportunity to reduce the overall GITMO prisoner issue with the trade and depending on the outcome, perhaps a way to resolve the issue altogether. Giving up five for one means they didn't get much on the trade, but if it results in a process to expedite the closure of that prison everyone will be better off.
I'm not so sure that closing the GITMO prison will make everyone "better off." While this is an article of faith within the news media that this is so, I'm not so reality agrees.
The prisoners there currently would be "better off" if the prison is closed. They'd be free to resume their war effort against America. Given the fact that most, if not all, of the prisoners still there represent some of the most dangerous enemies America has ever faced. It'd be likely only a matter of time before some of them carried out attacks on the US mainland very likely involving the use of "dirty bombs" or perhaps suitcase nuclear weapons.
Even if such a scenario could be prevented as a condition of their release, they'd have to be monitored closely. Can we trust foreign governments to do this? Do our own agents have the ability to do this and if they did could they expect the type of cooperation necessary from foreign governments in this regard? The likely answer is a resounding no to all of these questions. Even if the answer is yes to all of these questions, these people get out of prison. As such, America's enemies would seem to be much "better off" with the closure of the Gitmo facility.
Would the American people be "better off?" While there would likely be a very brief and very minor uptick in America's world wide image, this would likely only be fleeting at best. Americans might be "better off" in this regard but the closure of the facility would likely result in some of America's most dangerous enemies being freed to harm Americans again. Additionally the closure of the facility would likely be seen as a huge victory for Islamic terrorists and the states who support them likely resulting in huge increases in recruits coming in and huge increases in money flowing to the enemy as well.
When the facility is closed, perhaps these prisoners could be tried in American courts. With the resources these people would have at their disposal they would likely make a complete mockery out of the US criminal justice system. This situation would likely more than outweigh any small uptick in America's image that would briefly result from closing the prison.
On balance, the American people would not seem to be "better off" by closing the facility. It's kind of a catch-22 so to speak. Darned if you do darned if you don't. Having the facility likely leads to increased anti-Americanism. Closing the facility would likely only lead to even more anti-Americanism as America's enemies would likely view it as a great victory and would push for even more.
Actually I think American officials are going to close the facility no matter what and are determined to do so to such an extent they have not seriously weighed the costs and benefits. Even if American officials "dug in their heels" so to speak and tried to keep it open, it seems unlikely they could as the world simply would not allow it.
Since the facility probably has to be closed, there may be some alternatives unfortunately they are unpleasant to contemplate and it seems unlikely we'd be able to pull them off as we generally don't seem to have the capabilities to carry out assanations around the world by sending in small teams and getting them out without assistance from local authorities and if we did the media would never allow it to happen as they'd expose instantly expose the operations.
There likely are ways to plan for the inevitable closure of the Gitmo facility in such a way as to minimize the downside to America. This assumes some level of planning for this by US officials. Unfortunately said officials seem determined to close the facility at any costs and on any terms. There really seems no good options for us here. Unfortunately a lack of proper planning would likely only serve to make things even worse.
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