Did Guantanamo Bay Turn A Detainee Into A Terrorist?

That’s what the Washington Post is claiming in this article headlined “From Captive To Suicide Bomber.”

A little more than two years after his release from the Guantanamo Bay military prison, Abdallah Saleh al-Ajmi knelt in front of a white wall, clutched the upturned barrel of an AK-47 rifle and delivered a message before a video camera.
The scraggly beard that his young son once loved to play with had been shaved off, leaving only an exiguous moustache. His curly, shoulder-length locks had been clipped down to a crew cut. Gone, too, were the crisp, white headdress he often wore and any semblance of the good humor once familiar to his family. He was sullen and angry — still bitter about being locked up for almost four years at the high-security U.S. detention center on the southeastern coast of Cuba.
“Praise be unto God, who evacuated me from Guantanamo prison and joined me with the Islamic State of Iraq,” he intoned. As the camera’s light cast an outsize shadow behind his head, he wagged his finger and issued a vow: “We are going, with permission from God, to God — glory be unto him. We will enter the nests of apostasy.”
At 6:15 a.m. on March 23, 2008, not long after making the video, Ajmi drove a pickup truck filled with 5,000 to 10,000 pounds of explosives, hidden in what appeared to be white flour sacks, onto an Iraqi army base outside Mosul. . . .
As President Obama takes the first tentative steps toward fulfilling his campaign promise to close Guantanamo, the case of Abdallah Ajmi has become a symbol of the vexing challenge his administration faces in adjudicating the fates of terrorism suspects held by the United States, a process that almost certainly will result in the release of additional detainees among the approximately 245 now in custody there.
What makes Ajmi’s journey from inmate to bomber so disturbing to top government officials is the fact that he never was deemed to be among the worst of the worst. He was not one of the former top al-Qaeda operatives considered “high value” detainees; nor was he regarded as someone who posed a significant, long-term threat to the United States.

The conclusion we’re supposed to draw, apparently, is that by detaining this guy we turned him into a monster. Which is a theory I’m sure the left, powered by an ardent desire to justify Obama’s decision to irresponsibly shut down Guantanamo Bay and release many of its detainees, will eat up without a second thought.
Yet is it true? In order for us to buy it, we have to buy into the idea that this guy wasn’t all that dangerous before he was sent to Guantanamo Bay. But if he wasn’t that dangerous, why was he in Guantanamo Bay to begin with?
Per Wikipedia, quoting the Summary of Evidence memo prepared for al-Ajmi’s military tribunal, it seems as if there were some darn good reasons for his detention.

A. Al Ajmi is a Taliban fighter:
Al Ajmi went AWOL from the Kuwaiti military in order to travel to Afghanistan participate in the Jihad.
Al Ajmi was issued an AK-47, ammunition and hand grenades by the Taliban.
B. Al Ajmi participated in military operations against the coalition.
Al Ajmi admitted he was in Afghanistan fighting with the Taliban in the Bagram area.
Al Ajmi was placed in a defensive position by the Taliban in order to block the Northern Alliance.
Al Ajmi admitted spending eight months on the front line at the Aiubi Center, Afghanistan.
Al Ajmi admitted engaging in two or three fire fights with the Northern Alliance.
Al Ajmi retreated to the Tora Bora region of Afghanistan and was later captured as he attempted to escape to Pakistan.
C. Al Ajmi is committed to jihad.
Al Ajmi went AWOL because he wanted to participate in the jihad in Afghanistan but could not get leave from the military.
In Aug 2004, Al Ajmi wanted to make sure that when the case goes before the Tribunal, they know that he now is a Jihadist, an enemy combatant, and that he will kill as many Americans as he possibly can.
D. Upon arrival at GTMO, Al Ajmi has been constantly in trouble. Al Ajmi’s overall behavior has been aggressive and non-compliant, and he has resided in GTMO’s disciplinary blocks throughout his detention.
E. Based upon a review of recommendations from U.S. agencies and classified and unclassified documents, Al Ajmi is regarded as a continued threat to the United States and its Allies.

Despite this grim assessment, al-Ajmi was released to his home country of Kuwait to stand trial where he was promptly acquitted due to a technicality that excluded his confessions while detained at Gitmo. He was released back into the world, and promptly fulfilled the assessment given to him by US authorities.
This guy never should have been released. He was detained because he was a threat to this country, and once released he fulfilled that threat.
We didn’t make him a terrorist. All we’re guilty of is allowing him to victimize us out of a misguided notion of political correctness and “justice.”