Prison City, USA.  That's us. 

Or, as we ghost it via the marketing mavens... "The Great Escape."

Every now and then I want to dig up those long-dead deciders-in-chief  and tar and feather their bones and ride 'em out of town on a rail and dump 'em in the Missouri.   We have some history with dumping unpopular people in the river...  and some tar and feathering, too.

But man, have we got places to store miscreants. Seven of them.

Yep.  seven places to warehouse inmates, counting federal, state, local, and private.   We have the big Federal Penitentiary and associated Prison Camp. We have the military Disciplinary Barracks and they’re building a Regional Confinement Facility here at the Fort in addition to that prison. The distinction is that the DB is medium/maximum security for inmates with sentences that are longer than five years and the RCF is for inmates with lesser sentences.  We have the state Lansing Correctional Facility (just south of Leavenworth). We used to have a women’s prison, but the overcrowding in the men’s prison led them to move the women out to expand the men’s prison capacity. We have the County Jail. And we have the Leavenworth Detention Center, a rent-a-prison operated by CCA.

So, indeed, we know prisons around here, and are relatively comfortable with them.  That doesn’t mean we don’t have some real impacts, such as providing services to inmate families that come here, giving us a very skewed poverty segment for the county, just as one example.

Fort Leavenworth is oft cited as a logical location for a place to bring the Gitmo detainees, mainly because of the Disciplinary Barracks. Ever wary of the pernicious aspects of reflexive NIMBY-thought (yeah, that’s a great idea, but Not In My Back Yard – NIMBY) I too looked at it as, well, okay, we’ll have to make some significant changes to the Disciplinary Barracks, certainly, but – why not?

And lots of other people thought so, too. Especially ones that don’t live here, I would note. So, you do a little digging, and you find that, huh, the Fort doesn’t really want the mission, and for good reasons. The City and County have objections, and the Governor and Congressional Delegation all stand against it.

And, they get slammed for it – as by Barbara Shelly, a Kansas City Star columnist, who referred to the wide yellow stripe they all share. Of course, it’s not really going into her backyard, either. I was going to do up a post, but my buddy, retired SF soldier, and retired after 25 years in the job director of the Leavenworth Chamber of Commerce, Charlie Gregor, did a better job than I would have – so I’m going to publish his thoughts on the subject here.  The "Times" he refers to is the Leavenworth Times, our local paper that has a smaller circulation than I have a blog readership.


 

GITMO DETAINEES & LEAVENWORTH
 

I read the Times editorial page in the last weekend edition. There were three articles dealing with the possibility of moving the Guantanamo detainees to Leavenworth. One was an editorial, one a column and one a letter to the editor. All writers seemed to think the idea was at least OK if not good. I was appalled, both at the conclusions of each and the utter lack of knowledge and facts reflected in such “thoughtful” advocacy prose.

Please allow me to present some arguments and supporting points that the Times and other supporters of moving the detainees here have completely missed. I will look at the issue from four perspectives: The nature of the detainees; the vulnerabilities of the community; the impact on Fort Leavenworth; and the local economic impact of such a decision. The last two points are inseparable and will be mixed together.

Nature of the Detainees: The nature of the detainees is completely different from any prisoner or prisoners we have ever confined. They have no fear of death and welcome it if it damages the “Great Satan” United States. More importantly, their followers and supporters fall into the same category. With regular prisoners, however evil and repugnant the crimes committed, the worst impact on the community is having their deprived and ill-prepared families move into the area. The biggest negative impact is on our schools, housing and social service agencies.

We won’t see that with detainees. No families. They will be followed by suicide bombers and skilled fighters that are well trained, well armed and equipped and motivated to die for their cause. They couldn’t get to Guantanamo. They can get here. Our borders, both north and south, are incredibly porous and open. They will be assisted by confederates, “true believers”, already living in this country. Fort Leavenworth and the city of Leavenworth are “target rich” and vulnerable to a terrorist group that wants to make a world-wide statement, take full political advantage of the controversy surrounding the detainees, enhance their own reputation, widen their support base, and demonstrate dramatically that the Great Satan is vulnerable.

Vulnerabilities of the Community: Fort Leavenworth is difficult to secure. It is only about 8 square miles in size and is secured by a chain link fence that covers only about half of its perimeter. A railroad track that carries hundreds of freight cars pulled by approximately 60 trains cuts through the post every day. All pass within a couple of hundred yards from the USDB, Fort Leavenworth schools, housing areas and other population heavy facilities. It is an easy entry method for terrorists. The Missouri River borders the post. There is no fence. The east side of the post is primarily in the flood plain, heavily wooded, and easily accessible from the river by several means. A brigade of infantry would have a difficult time securing the post, using the most advanced technology as well as troops standing shoulder to shoulder on the perimeter.

It is the city of Leavenworth that is most vulnerable and the most likely terrorist target. In Leavenworth, within about 300 yards from the front gate to the post is Patton Middle School. It is one of many easy “soft” potential targets. That school, or any other in Leavenworth, could be easily seized by terrorists who will then make demands known. They will demand release of the detainees and other requirements. They know that won’t happen. They know they will die and are happy to do so. They will take with them several hundred children and adults, as well as any security forces they can reach. If this seems far-fetched, I refer you to the Chechen Muslim terrorists that seized a school in Russia to make their demands known to the world. And the entire world watched on television. Over 200 children and another hundred or so adults died as the terrorists happily passed to Paradise to make their point. The then-president of Russia, now Prime Minister Putin, linked the terrorists to Al-Qaida.

If you think this is fantasy, think again. The terrorists held in Guantanamo are the ultimate heroes of the terrorist movement. They cannot be reached now and there is no easy target that is tailor-made to remind the world of the global struggle, of their dedication, their valor and their sacrifice. Move them to the central United States and all that changes. If you deny that we are at war, deny the reality of 9-11, deny thousands of suicide bombers and attacks on innocent civilians around the world, deny we are facing a motivated and well equipped enemy who will gladly make any sacrifice to destroy us, and deny the reality of the costs and casualties we suffer daily, you can relax. But if there are enough of us who deny reality, one day our relaxation will be sadly and violently interrupted. We are very vulnerable.

Fort Leavenworth and Economic Realities: Fort Leavenworth is the education and intellectual center of the U. S. Army. It is world famous and for good reason. It produces the best officers and leaders of any army in the world. A major part of the educational experience is having daily contact and learning with international officers both in and outside the classroom. As our officers learn they also forge fast friendships with officers from more than 90 countries around the world.

These international officers, the best their countries have to offer, are welcomed in military and civilian homes as a result of the sponsorship programs developed by the communities in the Leavenworth-Lansing area and in Kansas City. When they leave they carry with them a true appreciation of life in America and usually refer to Leavenworth as their “second home.” More than half of them make general officer in their armies and many become chiefs of staff of their armies, ministers in their governments, and even heads of state. There are many instances where a U.S. officer has found his mission in a foreign country greatly facilitated because he is working with a fellow CGSC graduate. Recently this has been of great benefit in the Middle East, an area obviously crucial to U.S. interests.

Much of this will stop if the Guantanamo detainees come here. Several countries have indicated that they will not send officers to the place where those detainees are held. I would anticipate that no Muslim or Arab countries will send officers here. Other countries, for a variety of reasons, will probably acknowledge their support of those countries by also refusing to send their officers to a place where the controversial detainees are held.

The impact of such a loss of international officers would be considerable. The CGSC experience will become considerably less beneficial to U. S. officers, the Army and the Nation. We would lose meaningful contact with the future leaders of other countries. The value of the Fort Leavenworth education will be diminished considerably.

I would also consider that many U.S. officers assigned as students will seriously reconsider moving their families to Leavenworth. Most of these officers have had 2 or 3 tours in Iraq and/or Afghanistan. Some will, I am sure, consider that their families are better off staying where they are and come here as geographical bachelors. This decision will be based on a refusal to expose their families to pickets, protesters, anti-military demonstrations, and the threat of physical harm, something that will become an almost daily occurrence in our fair city as we assume the role of Guantanamo and all that such identification will bring.

This will have a terrible impact on the local economy. Loss of international officers and loss of at least some, if not many, families of officers assigned here will be damaging. But it is minor when compared to the fact that the identification of Fort Leavenworth as the confinement center of the Department of Defense, as opposed to the intellectual and education center it is now, begins to cause a reevaluation of the post and its mission.

Given the negatives that I have outlined, I would predict that the Command & General Staff College and related educational schools and programs on Fort Leavenworth will eventually be moved, possibly soon and probably to Carlisle Barracks, but there are many other options. This is not an unrealistic projection. It was seriously considered in the recent Base Realignment and Closing Project (BRAC) and we (the Kansas Governor’s Strategic Military Advisory Commission) countered by suggesting the U.S. Army War College at Carlisle come here, along with the Army’s Sergeants Major Academy and other important Army education programs. This would be consistent with the Fort Leavenworth mission and reputation as the intellectual and education center of the U.S. Army. Some of that is still on the table today but not if we become the primary confinement center for the Department of Defense and the mission and character of Fort Leavenworth is irrevocably changed.

Now we have real economic impact. All negative. Other than additional security troops on post, we have gained nothing. The post will be locked down. We will lose our municipal airport [The Fort allows the city to operate an FOB at Sherman Army Airfield]. We will have lost virtually everything that makes Fort Leavenworth such a great neighbor and valuable contributor to our economic base. We won’t make it up through a bunch of ACLU lawyers in our motels. It is akin to the old tale about the city of Leavenworth, in its wisdom, choosing to take the prison as opposed to the university that eventually settled in Lawrence. That is the kind of wisdom and foresight the advocates of bringing the Guantanamo detainees here are exercising.

We had better start thinking this issue through in real terms, based on real facts and probabilities, instead of taking heady idealistic and totally unrealistic points of view that utterly obscure reality.

Charlie Gregor