Gearing Up For Next Week

January 15, 2010  |  Posted by Danielle Belton

Veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanista will be traveling to Washington, DC on Jan. 21 to urge Congress to support the President and close the prison at Guantanamo Bay. VoteVets and New Security Action are working together to promote Gitmo's closure through a social networking campaign featuring musicians like R.E.M., Pearl Jam, Trent Reznor and groups like the ACLU, Amnesty International, Common Cause, Human Rights First, Human Rights Watch and many more. We're also working on a video featuring former interrogator Matt Alexander about why the prison needs to be closed.

The veterans visiting Congress will be delivering a letter many of you have signed. (If you haven't seen the letter yet, click here.) Here's a sample of what the letter says:

For too long the prison at Guantanamo Bay has remained a blight on the American conscience. Guantanamo is a recruiting tool for terrorists that undermines our troops and undermines our security. As veterans of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, we urge you to take immediate action to permanently close the prison at Guantanamo Bay.

General Colin Powell has said that if it were up to him, he would close Guantanamo Bay not tomorrow, but this afternoon. General David Petraeus made clear in testimony before Congress that he believes that Guantanamo Bay should be closed. Many other military leaders, both active and retired, have expressed this view. They know what is at stake for our men and women in uniform.

We stand with them.

Every day that the facility at Guantanamo Bay remains open and detainees are held there without trial is another day that terror networks have an effective recruiting poster – that the United States applies the laws to some, but is hypocritical when it comes to others. Guantanamo has been used in videos by senior al Qaeda leadership at least 32 times since 2001 and four times this year alone. Guantanamo is harmful to our national security and to the men and women in uniform who we have put into harm’s way.

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