Former CIA and National Security Agency Director Michael Hayden charged Tuesday that President Obama has no interest in using his wartime ability to detain and hold terrorist suspects, which is making it easy for him to proposing closing the facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
“One of the elements of making war is to actually capture people and hold them, not for the criminal justice system, but hold them under the laws of armed conflict,” the former adviser to President George W. Bush told host Fox News’ Neil Cavuto. “As part of this arrangement, I want our government to fully and publicly embrace we reserve the right to grab enemy combatants and hold them whether or not we ever intend to put them into court.”
Hayden blasted the Obama administration for not embracing this standard war practice. The military adviser also said he is less concerned about transferring the terrorist detainees to other prisons, and more concerned with the legal ramifications of making that move.
Hayden said his “core concern” about transferring 30 inmates from Guantanamo Bay overseas and another 60 detainees to U.S. prisons was about the additional rights and privileges they would receive in simply being transported to a new geographic location that has different laws for prisoners.
Hayden warned that a decision by Obama to go around Congress and close Guantanamo Bay through an executive order would have grave consequences for the country’s political process.
“I would really strongly prefer to do this without a constitutional crisis, I would rather do this by consensus,” Hayden said.
Hayden also shot down claims that the facility serves as a recruiting magnet for the Islamic State, and people would not stop lining up to join the terrorist organization because of the closure of a prison.
