Necessary Roughness

AP reports that Guantanamo Bay prisoners have been doing some nasty things to the guards.

Nicolucci said one of the most serious incidents occurred this May, too recent to be recorded in the Pentagon’s released reports. A prisoner staged an apparent suicide attempt while his inmates slicked the floors with human waste, seeking to overpower guards when they slipped, he said.

“We provide fans in order to keep them cool,” Nicolucci recalled. “And they were using the basket, or the grate of the fan as a shield, the blades as machetes, the pole as a battering ram.”

That disturbance was turned back in a few minutes with some guards and prisoners sustaining minor injuries, he said.

These are the people that Senator Murtha, Senator Kennedy, and the UN are advocates for. Could we not rush to grant these guys the rights of civilized men when they are willing to perform these kinds of behaviors?

It’s also telling that the Pentagon had to be forced to release this information through the Freedom of Information Act. Was it a matter of pride that this wasn’t reported before? Were they afraid of giving ideas to future prisoners? Or, most deviously, someone in the Pentagon was trying to cover this up to portray these guys as innocents?