Richard Littlejohn: Thank God for Camp X-Ray

The Sun [UK] ^ | March 9, 2004 | Richard Littlejohn

[quidnunc]

What on earth is Terry Waite doing campaigning for the release of the British prisoners at Guantanamo Bay?

These are the same kind of people who kept the former church envoy chained to a radiator in Beirut for five years.

I know Waite is one those who believes you should love your enemy. But you can take forgiveness too far.

At long last the Americans have broken their silence and revealed details of exactly why four of the British detainees should not be freed.

They all trained at al-Qa’ida camps in Afghanistan, learning bomb making, assassination and urban warfare.

They received instruction in chemicals and explosives, fought alongside the Taliban against British and American troops. One of them was picked up at the home of Abu Zubaida, Osama Bin Laden’s operations chief.

In short, they are in Donald Rumsfeld’s words among “the worst of the worst”.

Yet these hardened terrorists are the very people Waite and the usual stage army of useful idiots, US haters and Left-wing lawyers want to bring home and release on to the streets of Britain without charge.

Five other suspects arrested in Afghanistan are being flown home this week after the Americans tired of all the carping about their human rights.

On the one hand, Tony Blair makes a magnificent speech spelling out the compelling and unarguable case for the war on terror.

On the other, he caves in to pressure and sentiment and presses Bush to bring “Our Boys” home.

The five may be back as early as tonight. The Americans say they expect us to deal with them. They will be taken to Paddington Green high security nick and interviewed but the odds are that they will be freed within a couple of days.

We are told that there is nothing we can charge them with in Britain and that, anyway, too much time has elapsed since the US took them into custody.

So what was all that emergency legislation rushed through after 9/11 in aid of, then?

Does anybody actually believe the fairy stories these terror suspects trot out in their defence? Who in their right mind goes backpacking in Afghanistan, then run by one of the most brutal regimes in the world?

How many other people from Tipton have flown halfway round the world into a war zone to take a computer course?

Of course, the families of these men are distressed and convinced of their innocence. That’s only natural.

But is anyone else actually relishing the prospect of them being freed to walk the streets of Britain? What if they decide to take out their frustration at being held in a prison camp for two years by driving a truck bomb into the Bullring shopping centre or detonating a Semtex waistcoat in Selfridges?

We can only trust that the Funny People keep them on a short leash.

Their supporters portray the five as victims. They aren’t. They put themselves on offer by volunteering for holy war against civilisation.

The real victims are those who died in New York, Washington, Bali, Istanbul and everywhere else al-Qa’ida has either struck or is planning to strike.

Security chiefs think it is only a matter of time before there is an atrocity here. We know al-Qa’ida cells are beavering away in Britain.

Some soft-headed people still refuse to accept there’s a war on. It’s not a conventional war, but it’s a war nonetheless. And there are different rules in wartime.

To those wittering on about the “human rights” of the Guantanamo Bay detainees, one senior Bush official had this to say: “If the British government had captured Luftwaffe pilots bombing London during the middle of World War Two, they would not have given them lawyers to argue they were innocent and ought to be released.”

Precisely.

If Michael Mansfield QC had been around in 1944, does anyone think the Germans would have allowed him access to the chaps in Colditz?

Actually, he’d have been more likely making himself busy trying to get Churchill prosecuted for war crimes.

The Americans are said to be irritated that they have been left to become the world’s jailer and are taking international flak for the Guantanamo camp.

But thank God they are. The alternative, freeing these maniacs to murder and maim, is frightening.

Nothing’s changed since George W Bush said you’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists.

It looks like Terry Waite is with the terrorists.

-snip-

[Bosco]

"I know Waite is one those who believes you should love your enemy. But you can take forgiveness too far."

1) What would the loving thing to do with these terrorists at Camp X-Ray? A reasoned presentation of the Gospel (Christian, folks) would be a good start.
2) Here's how forgiveness works: It's freely extended to those who ask for it. Has um... anyone in X-Ray... um... asked for it?