Suicide is not asymmetrical warfare

Dear Editor,

When the commander of the Joint Task Force at Guantanamo, Rear Admiral Harry B. Harris, held a press conference at United States Southern Command in Miami this Saturday, he offered the following assessment of the suicides of three prisoners who were being held at Guantanamo: "I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us."

This perverse statement has not been as widely reported as it should be, and I suspect this is because the statement is not only a profound embarrassment to our military and our nation; it does not simply, as a New York Times editorial put it today, "reveal a profound disassociation from humanity."

If we live in an America that detains prisoners indefinitely without any semblance of due process, then calls their suicides an act of asymmetrical warfare against us, and then tolerates this statement as rational and reasonable, truly the terrorists have won. I urge you and your readers to denounce the statement by Rear Admiral Harris, call for a release of the full transcript of his Saturday press conference, demand that he account for his statement and urge the U.S. Army to review Harris' fitness for command.

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