Leading article: From Guantanamo to Forest Gate

After the initial horror — 9/11, Madrid, 7 July

The purpose of terrorism is not only to cause bloodshed, but also to spray psychological shrapnel across the societies it attacks and seeks to subvert. After the initial horror — 9/11, Madrid, 7 July — the strategic objective is to force democracies, in their rage and panic, to make mistakes, to falter, and to resort to internal squabbling. Action is supplanted by introspection.

It is this that links the botched police raid in Forest Gate, east London, on 2 June with the suicide of three inmates at Guantanamo Bay, who were discovered hanged in their cells on 10 June. The next day, Colleen Graffy, a US deputy assistant secretary of state, dismissed the suicides as ‘a good PR move’. Small wonder that the State Department and White House moved so quickly to distance themselves from this remark. Not only was it in deplorable taste: it also drew attention to the fact that, since it opened, the US base has been a PR disaster.