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Tag: Guantanamo
A New Path Toward Closing Guantánamo
Language included in the 2015 Defense authorization bill approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee on May 22 may provide what Committee Chair Carl Levin (MI-D) termed “a path to close Guantánamo.” During his campaign for the presidency, and immediately after taking office in 2009, President Obama pledged to close the U.S. naval installation in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, which now holds 154 prisoners; however, Congress has thwarted his efforts to transfer the detainees to facilities in the United States. The committee’s action could represent a new opportunity for the President to fulfill his promise. The defense bill authorizes the transfer…
Obama Talks Terrorism, Drones, and Guantánamo in Major Speech
In a major address on national security and counterterrorism at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., last Thursday, President Barack Obama declared that America is at a crossroads and “this is the moment to ask ourselves hard questions — about the nature of today’s threats and how we should confront them.” He said that after the elimination of Osama bin Laden and other high-ranking leaders, al-Qaeda is on the path to defeat and its regional affiliates — in places like Iraq, Yemen, and North Africa — pose regional threats to U.S. interests abroad, not direct threats to the U.S….