Most Guantanamo detainees pose no threat: NY Times

Contrary to the repeated assertions of senior administration officials, none of the detainees at the US naval base in Cuba ranked as leaders or senior operatives of al-Qaeda, the newspaper reported, citing interviews with high-level military, intelligence and law-enforcement officials in the United States, Europe and the Middle East.

About 595 foreign nationals, designated "enemy combatants," are being held at the base. Most were seized during the US-led campaign against the Taliban government in Afghanistan and against Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

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The newspaper said only a relative handful of detainees at Guantanamo were sworn al-Qaeda members or other militants able to elucidate the organization's inner workings.

While some Guantanamo intelligence has aided terrorism investigations, it has not enabled intelligence or law-enforcement services to foil imminent attacks, the newspaper said, citing unnamed officials.

"When you have the overall mosaic of all the intelligence picked up all over the world, Guantanamo provided a very small piece of that mosaic," the newspaper quoted a senior US official as saying. "It's been helpful and valuable in certain areas. Was it the mother lode of intelligence? No."

The paper said other officials, in on-the-record interviews, had defended the intelligence-gathering effort at the base and said it continued to produce useful information.