Today: You want the truth son? You can't handle the truth.

I first became aware of Guantanamo Bay in the film 'A Few Good Men'. It won me a pub quiz once, the fact that Jack Nicholson's scenery devouring General (you could say that Nicholson's performance was an extraordinary rendition of the script) was in charge of the place.

The attitude of machismo displayed by him, that in order to protect freedom the forces of protection must be allowed to act outside the law, is pretty familiar. In the past week, this is the basic argument that I've heard put forward by various spokesmen, when asked whether the UN are right to suggest that Camp Xray be closed.

Major Jessep, of course was both fictional and a marine. Perhaps he has an argument. After all, we send soldiers out to kill and maim people on our behalf. We don't like to think it, but we ask them to lose their humanity for us.

But the Guantanamo situation in real life is different. All the while various Pentagon people and Senators are out in the world justifying the detention without trial of 'suspects', they are undermining the very freedom that they wish to defend. It doesn't play well in the rest of the world that The U.S. is seen to blatantly disregard human rights, and more importantly, what appears to be right.

They can play all the linguistic tricks they like, but not putting the detainees on trial sends a clear message that U.S. policy makers are willing to mirror the behaviour of the very people they seek to destroy. Justice is paramount if you are going to win moral arguments. The Guantanamo prisoners are the fly in the ointment of every argument that places western democracy as more desirable than religious theocracy. Those who are looking for an excuse to hate America keep getting handed their reasons on a plate.

It appears to me that the policy just wasn't thought out very well. I can understand the desperation of the administration to appear to be strong after 9/11, but they messed up. They didn't think it through. In fact this seems to be the overarching modus operandi of the current US government. They appear blithely and childishly unaware of the long game. They went into Iraq without a clear exit strategy, leaked the name of Valerie Plame for no real reason and a lot of payback, slashed taxes and ballooned the deficit and set up wiretaps. This was all done in haste, believing that they were immune to the consequences. As for Fema. Well what did they think would happen if they put a pony club administrator in charge?

Guantanamo is such a mistake. My overiding impression is that noboby really thought five years ahead. The prisoners may well be horrid terrorists and evil people who deserve to be locked away. But without trials we will never know. It is about time the White House showed some leadership and ordered the remaining men tried. Not only is it currently a simple tap-in for America's opponents throughout the world, but keeping them there is the classic behaviour of a bully, mistaking weakness of purpose and action for strength.