The Guantánamo Lawyers: Inside a Prison Outside the Law

Timeline: Guantánamo and the “War on Terror”

405 Timeline: Guantánamo and the “War on Terror” 2001 September 11, 2001: The terrorist organization al Qaeda hijacks four commercial passenger airplanes and intentionally crashes them into targets in the United States, killing more than 3,000 people. September 14, 2001: Congress passes the Authorization for Use of Military Force. The resolution states that “the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations , or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September, 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons.” October 7, 2001: Operation Enduring Freedom commences in Afghanistan. November 13, 2001: President Bush issues an order establishing the first military commissions since World War II. The order fails to guarantee due process protections or judicial review. December 27, 2001: Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announces that Taliban and al Qaeda suspects captured abroad will be relocated to the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base. The following day, a secret memorandum by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel advises that U.S. courts have no jurisdiction to review the detention and treatment of foreign prisoners held at Guantánamo. 2002 January 11, 2002: Guantánamo receives its first twenty detainees. The detainees are housed in open-air cages at Camp X-Ray. January 27, 2002: Vice President Cheney calls the detainees at Guant ánamo “the worst of a very bad lot.” 406 Timeline February 7, 2002: The White House announces that all Taliban and al Qaeda detainees are “unlawful combatants” and therefore do not qualify for any protections under the Geneva Conventions. February 19, 2002: The first habeas corpus petition on behalf of a Guant ánamo detainee is filed in federal court in Washington, D.C. February 27, 2002: Approximately two-thirds of the detainees at Guant ánamo go on a hunger strike to protest their mistreatment. April 28, 2002: Camp X-Ray is closed and replaced by Camp Delta, a more permanent detention facility. There are more than 300 detainees at Camp Delta. May 8, 2002: Jose Padilla is arrested by the FBI at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport . One month later, President Bush designates Padilla, an American citizen, an “enemy combatant” and transfers him to the U.S. Navy brig in South Carolina, where he is held incommunicado and without charges. August 1, 2002: John Yoo and Jay S. Bybee of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel author a memo finding that interrogation techniques do not constitute torture unless they result in “death, organ failure, or serious impairment of bodily functions.” The memo also states that, as commander in chief, the president can legally authorize torture. September 2002: The CIA produces an internal report stating that many detainees held at Guantánamo are either low-level recruits of the Taliban or innocent persons captured in the fog of war. December 2002: Defense Secretary Rumsfeld approves a memo calling for the use of harsh interrogation techniques and military trainers travel to Guantánamo to provide instruction in the use of those techniques. 2003 March 11, 2003: A federal appeals court rules that Guantánamo detainees have no right to seek habeas corpus relief in federal courts. March 19, 2003: The U.S. invasion of Iraq commences. May 1, 2003: President Bush delivers the “Mission Accomplished” speech in a military flight-suit uniform aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. May 9, 2003: Guantánamo reaches its peak population of 680. In total, approximately 770 prisoners will be held at Guantánamo. Timeline 407 June 23, 2003: President Bush declares Ali Saleh Kalah al-Marri an “enemy combatant.” Al-Marri, a legal resident, had been in federal custody since December 2001 pending trial on criminal charges. He is the second person in the United States declared an “enemy combatant ” and is transferred to the South Carolina Navy brig. July 3, 2003: President Bush designates six individuals eligible for trial before military commissions. November 10, 2003: The Supreme Court agrees to hear the first Guant ánamo detainee case. November 25, 2003: Lord Johan Steyn, one of England’s top jurists, condemns Guantánamo as “a monstrous failure of justice” and “a legal black hole.” December 3, 2003: David Hicks becomes the first Guantánamo detainee to be given a lawyer when he is assigned military counsel in his military commission proceeding. 2004 April 28, 2004: The Supreme Court hears oral argument in the case of...