Erman, this is the best assessment I've seen of this. What do you think should have been done?
The "mission" was to bring back a live combatant. He is alive. Mission accomplished. They should be debriefed, intel taken from observers and then the combatant interrogated for whatever information he can give for as long as he is useful.
His capture should have never been made public.
He then should be....... gone. By releasing him to a friendly country that understands the importance of counter terrorism and owes us a debt and is able to discretely help us get rid of this problem.
As far as the men are concerned I have been ,in the distant past ,involved in a small groups and have friends and a father that were involved in Marine Corps and Navy snatch and grab missions.
The important and top most concern was the mission.... coming back with what you grabbed and getting everybody back safe and sound. I seem to remember when there were bones broken, jaws dislocated, teeth missing, possibly the loss of some vision, but if the target was placed in the cage and able to answer questions it was assumed that anything up to and including anything short of killing or disabling the combatant in order for him not to answer questions was understandable in an environment that placed your team in the middle of a situation where everybody involved will die in a most gruesome way.
These SEALs returned home, they have their man and either somebody's knickers were twisted and he was trying to make a "point" by coming down on these three or four SEALs or there is an active component of the military judicial corps that is trying to destroy morale and the effort in counter insurgency.
Intel is the key. Always has been, always will be. Know your enemy, destroy his financing, shelter, supply and manpower. It's a 24/7/365 job that means killing and destroying EVERYBODY that sympathizes, aids or finances these animals.
That's why anybody that really KNOWS what is going on knows that Afghanistan and the "exit" strategy argument is pure unadulterated cr#p. We are in a world wide guerilla war against Islamo-facist that is an amalgamation of different groups using the United States/Capitalism/Christianity as the focus of attack on all fronts. There is no "country" there is only the "movement" of a world wide Jihad to advance a fascist and criminal thugs to power.
Of course I may be wrong and your mileage may differ, but I don't think so.
I know that captain's mast isn't a joke in the SEALs, I'm sure that they wouldn't fight it if they were thinking they were wrong... but their honor is the only thing that is really important to men like those. You have only your word in the SEAL community and it trumps rank, medals and badges. Anybody who is going to war with other men wants to know that that man will cover his flank during an assault, will get to an assigned rendezvous on time, will be on the roof doing over watch with NO EXCUSES and NO CONCERN about his safety but only the safety of his brother SEALs.
That is why they are going to court martial. Will they "get off"? Depends on what the commander in charge and the politicians want. Now that it's public, either way it's going to be long and their careers are over if they were ever hoping for officer rank or command. They're done. Now it comes down to honor.
I personally would make sure that every swinging d#ck that made this public and brought charge without handling it within the unit would be assigned recon duty and infiltration exercises in Cape Krusenstern in the winter and Brooke's Point in the summer...for the rest of their miserable career.