US, lawless rogue nation on world stage: Analyst

Press TV has conducted an interview with Rodney Martin, a former US congressional staffer in Los Angeles, to discuss recent remarks by US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter about half the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay.

What follows is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: What exactly does it mean that, as Mr. Carter has said, some of these prisoners need to be there for life and they have not even had trials? What is that saying?

Martin: Well, let’s understand that Secretary Carter is the Defense Secretary of President Obama and President Obama, as you stated, pledged to close Guantanamo when he was running for president the first time. He is now in the twilight of his second term and has made no progress in closing this.

Secretary Carter made some very schizophrenic and duplicitous statements in saying he would like to close it but it is really not practical to keep these prisoners for ever without charge, without trial and what he is basically admitting is what many of us have been stating for a long time… He has basically admitted the United States is a lawless, rogue nation on the international stage that can sustain itself because of its sheer military might and temporary economic might.

The United States first uses economic terrorism and when that is not successful, then unleashes its sheer military terrorism in the form of drones and air campaigns and such. But he has now admitted that they are going to basically keep prisoners locked up. Many of these were children, I mean young adolescents, 14- and 15-years-old, that have grown up in captivity. I would venture to say we do not even know who has actually been locked up, who has been declared enemy combatants.

The United States has a history of using clever terms going back to General Eisenhower in the aftermath of World War II to get around international conventions, international law to rob people of human rights and essential human dignity and we know the United States did that to the Germans and the Japanese but they have done it in the Middle East since the end of World War I.

So, this has got to stop. The international community has to come together and I dare say maybe Russia, India and China should come together and impose sanctions on United States. 

Press TV: Well, I was about to ask you because you said that it needs to come to an end. How is it going to come to an end? Who is going to initiate the checks and balances? You talked about for example China right now but we know the relationship is so interrelated economically. Is it likely that they will do this? Is it likely? Do you see that as a possibility in the near future countries like India and China and Russia and perhaps others actually putting sanctions on the United States?

Martin: Well, what has happened now with this development, with Secretary Carter stating that they are going to keep prisoners indefinitely for life without charge or trial, the United States can no longer get on its hypocritical soap box and preach about human rights and human dignity to the nations that actually have intricate and sophisticated judicial systems that the United States just does not approve of because they work contrary to the United States’ hypocritical and farcical system that it just changes the rules to suit itself.

So that is one thing that will work in the international community’s favor. China is sitting on an overwhelming amount of the United States’ debt that it can use to leverage the United States, to modify its behavior and I would hope that China will begin to call in a lot of the United States’ loans and basically tame this bully in the international schoolyard.

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