Unlike at Guantánamo, non-Afghan detainees at Bagram enjoy no recognized legal right to challenge their detention. They do not see lawyers. The human rights observers who shuttle to and from Guantánamo, munching on fried pickles at the Irish pub at the naval station, never shuttle to Bagram. Only the ICRC ever visits the detainees at Bagram and it insists on secrecy to ensure access.

Almost nothing about the residual non-Afghan population at Bagram is public. A military review board assesses the worthiness of their continued detention, similar to ones at Guantánamo. Releases, such as several that have occurred last fall and in May, occurred without fanfare, despite reducing the non-Afghan population by nearly half. While the Obama administration has not added to the Guantánamo population, it has added to the non-Afghan population at Bagram, in the aftermath of special-operations raids.

Even a report to Congress listing the names of the residual detainees, required under the last year's defense bill, is classified.