Report: Closing Guantanamo could cost $600 million

Closing the military detention facility at Guantanamo Bay could cost as much as $600 million, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday night.

The high figure is what caused President Obama to delay announcing his plan to close the facility as he asked the Pentagon to revise the cost, according to the report.

{mosads}Citing unnamed Pentagon officials, The Journal reported the $600 million figure includes a one-time cost of up to $350 million for construction of either a new facility or renovation of an existing facility. After that, it would cost less than $300 million to run.

Guantanamo’s annual operating cost right now stands at about $400 million.

In the second week of November, Pentagon officials had said a plan to close the facility would be released as soon as that week. But the timeline passed without an announcement.

Publicly, Obama has continued to vow to close the facility, saying this week that he would fight to close it “until my very last day as president.”

It remains illegal to transfer Guantanamo detainees to the United States. In signing a defense policy bill that reestablished that ban, Obama hinted he would use executive action to close the facility.

“The executive branch must have the flexibility, with regard to the detainees who remain at Guantanamo, to determine when and where to prosecute them, based on the facts and circumstances of each case and our national security interests, and when and where to transfer them consistent with our national security and our humane treatment policy,” Obama said in a signing statement.

In response to The Journal article, Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said closing Guantanamo would be neither safe nor cost effective.

“The president and his supporters have argued for years that closing GTMO will make us safer and it will save us money,” Thornberry said in a written statement. “No one really believes that bringing terrorists to our shores would make Americans any safer. Now we know that the president’s claims of saving us money aren’t true either.

 “The president was right to reject the plan on the basis of cost, but he was absolutely wrong to direct the Pentagon to cut corners and bring him a cheaper option. If the President is determined to bring these terrorists to the United States, he can’t do it with cut-rate security. He owes the troops who would guard these detainees, not to mention the Americans who suddenly find al Qaeda terrorists held in their backyards, far more.”