Spinning to their Graves

 

The three recent suicides by detainees at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, referred to as “the gulag of our times” by Amnesty International, are apparently not what they would seem. Administration officials rejected suggestions the three had killed themselves out of despair at their indefinite confinement. “It does sound like this is part of a strategy in that they don’t value their own lives … they certainly don't value ours and they use suicide bombings as a tactic,” Colleen Graffy, the deputy assistant secretary of state for public diplomacy, told the BBC on Sunday. “Taking their own lives was not necessary, but it certainly is a good PR move to draw attention.” The camp's commander, Rear Admiral Harry B. Harris, Jr., said the suicides were an al-Qaeda tactic. “They have no regard for life, neither ours nor their own,” he said. “I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us.”