“If we know Saddam Hussein has dangerous weapons today – and we do – does it make any sense for the world to wait to confront him as he grows even stronger and develops even more dangerous weapons?”   “America is a friend to the people of Iraq. Our demands are directed only at…

  In the early 1990s, with the arrival of thousands of Haitian immigrants, Guantánamo Bay served as one of the first sites of mass HIV testing for immigrants. Over 260 individuals tested positive and were segregated in Camp Bulkeley, a tent camp surrounded by barbed wire. Haitians reported limited mobility, poor sanitation, and insufficient and…

  While learning the history of the Guantánamo Naval base (GTMO), time and time again I’ve been struck by a sense of collective confusion and misinformation that has reappeared in the stories of people stationed at the base, as well as detainees and non-American workers who have lived there. The base has often been used…

2012: This week, the Pentagon set Khalid Sheik Mohammed’s long awaited trial in motion. He and four other Guantánamo Bay detainees, accused of orchestrating the September 11, 2001 attacks, will be tried at a military tribunal instead of a civilian court. They face the death penalty if convicted. These five men are charged with organizing…

“I don’t know if you should move to Arizona,” my grandpa warned me. “It’s too close to the border.” Drug wars. Gangs. I came to Arizona State anyway, starting my PhD in the fall of 2010. Honestly, I felt as safe in Tempe as my small hometown in northern Utah – until the night I…

    The role of Cuban workers on the Guantánamo Bay naval base has fluctuated over time. Those who work on the base, but return to homes in Cuba are referred to as “commuters.” In the 1950s, according to historian Jonathan Hansen, there were as many as 3,000 commuters. However, as the Cold War progressed…

Given a choice, I would choose to meet Bisher al-Rawi, who was detained at Guantánamo for four and a half years without charge and later released. Listening to his story, the statement that “Guantánamo is a place that makes people lose their minds” really struck me. Detainees, who are held indefinitely and without charge, must…

2012: Despite a recent plea deal, Omar Khadr – a former Al Qaeda “child soldier” – has not been returned to his native Canada. Khadr, now 25, was imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay naval base in 2002 after he was captured in Afghanistan. He was accused of throwing a hand grenade during a firefight, which killed…

  On October 22, 1962, Janet Miller received this one-page set of typewritten instructions for the evacuation of military dependents from Guantánamo Bay naval base (GTMO) in the midst of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Janet and her children, along with the other dependents living at GTMO at the time, were told by an unspecified “higher…

This photograph was captured on June 12, 1898, the moment when U.S. Marines deployed to Guantánamo Bay and hoisted an American flag sent over to their encampment by compatriots on the U.S.S. Marblehead. The brief, formal Spanish-American War moment illustrated here, with soldiers and sailors gathered in rank and file off to the right, has…