III. The History

The legal cases brought by individuals imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay find their origins in a series of historical events beginning before the United States' official birth as a nation-state.  From the American acquisition of Guantanamo to the establishment of military tribunals during the Civil War, events seemingly unrelated to the War on Terror were instrumental to its inception. 

Notably, Americans' first encounter with Muslims as a racial group began not after September 11, 2001, but in the 1600s when Western Powers forcefully transported people from West Africa, many of them Muslim, and then forced them into slavery or indentured servitude.  More recently, the "Iranian hostage crisis", as it is most often called, was a transformative moment with regard to American foreign policy in the Middle East and the expansion of the American empire throughout the region.