Jacob Prall
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There are many cries from both sides in the fight for the survival of the United States’ most notorious prison. I’m here to say, Guantánamo Bay Prison must die.

There has always been a steady stream of support for Guantánamo Bay, and the stream has become a torrent since President Obama’s efforts have redoubled to close the facility. Those who wish to see it remain open have had a difficult couple of years: massive data leaks have revealed the inhumane practices and lack of actual evidence involved in the detainment of prisoners at Guantánamo.

National security is important. It is a natural and just priority for any nation-state. What Guantánamo Bay represents is the ideas of national security in the hands of the world’s most powerful nation. The result is an affront to humanity.

The arguments for its continuance are pervasive, if not entirely founded. Reminding citizenry that closure of Gitmo may lead to prisoners there being brought to the States generates a visceral reaction of fear. Calling into question what the prisoners were there for is to decide they are there for acts of terror that exempt the detained from humane treatment. But those aren’t the facts at this point in time.

The Wikileaks scandal revealed that at the time, 95 percent of detainees in Gitmo were not being held on charges. The prisoners there are held without evidence and with no chance of trial. According to a Senate report released in December 2014, torture has not yielded any information that has ever saved a single U.S. citizen. With the revelations of torture being used on detainees, and the lack of information gained from these techniques, it has become clear that Gitmo doesn’t serve a justifiable purpose and serves as a monument for U.S. abuses of human rights.

The U.S. policy at Gitmo is in violation of the U.N. Convention Against Torture, signed by the United States in 1988. Some detainees were abducted from their homes in countries invaded by the United States. It is both a soldier’s and civilian’s right to oppose invasion by a foreign country. The use of Gitmo has degraded the international standing of the United States as a country that stands for liberty. Its very existence is confirmation of the abandonment of civil liberty and moral justification under the pretenses of fear and hatred. No country should have the capabilities Guantánamo affords the United States.

Imagine if the UK had a prison in the Falkland Islands, where, after kidnapping U.S. citizens suspected of leanings against England, were taken to and tortured. This would never stand. Because it is the U.S., and because the victims are by and large not “Westerners,” the Western world has turned a blind eye to the morally bankrupt Gitmo.

President Obama pledged to close Gitmo. Now is the time for him to keep his promise. Future generations will see the move as economically, militarily, and most importantly, morally justified. The continuance of the U.S. as a nation that boasts democracy, human rights, and civil liberties is dependent on the ending of policies like Guantánamo Bay.