Permanent detention was feasible, however, only if Guantánamo Bay was indeed foreign. Was it? Lawyers representing the detainees tested the matter. They filed a writ of habeas corpus, arguing that the base was a “fully American enclave,” with a shopping mall, a McDonald’s, a Baskin-Robbins, a Boy Scout contingent, and a Star Trek fan club. The idea that Cuba retained sovereignty was, they maintained, a fiction. They noted that Fidel Castro refused to recognize the lease (he made a point of never cashing the annual $4,085 checks that the United States sent) and insisted repeatedly that the navy
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