According to the United States Department of Defense, it held more than two hundred Afghan detainees in Guantanamo prior to May 15, 2006. They had been captured and classified as enemy combatants in warfare following the US and allies' invasion of Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban and disrupt terrorist networks. Originally, the US held such prisoners in sites in Afghanistan, but needed a facility to detain them where they could be interrogated. It opened the Guantanamo Bay detention camp on January 11, 2002, and transported the enemy combatants there.
