The anonymous accuser of Guantanamo

Have you heard of Matthew Alexander? Unless you follow the debate over terrorist suspects and "enhanced interrogation techniques" very closely, the answer is probably no. Yet Alexander is one of the most influential voices in the deliberations over what to do with the U.S. terrorist detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

"Major Matthew Alexander, who has actually interrogated al Qaeda suspects in Iraq, attributes half of the deaths of Americans in Iraq to the detention abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo," Democratic Sen. Richard Durbin said on "Meet the Press" Sunday. "Continuing Guantanamo, unfortunately, makes our troops less safe."

A moment later, moderator David Gregory asked Durbin for evidence to support President Obama's assertion that "the existence of Guantanamo likely created more terrorists around the world than it ever detained." Durbin's answer? "I just gave it to you: Major Matthew Alexander."

It is widely asserted that Guantanamo has been a key recruiting tool for terrorists around the world. Indeed, it has been asserted so often that the assertion has become conventional wisdom. But what is the source of the conventional wisdom? To hear Sen. Durbin and some of his allies in the Guantanamo debate tell it, the source is Matthew Alexander.

Here's the interesting part: Nobody knows who he is...


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