Posted on 05/31/2014 2:48:30 PM PDT by jazusamo
Top Republicans on the Senate and House Armed Services Committee criticized President Obama on Saturday for negotiating with the Taliban in releasing five Guantanamo Bay prisoners for the release of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.
"Trading five senior Taliban leaders from detention in Guantanamo Bay for Berghdal's release may have consequences for the rest of our forces and all Americans," said Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.), the Senate Armed Services ranking member and House Armed Services chairman, respectively, in a joint statement.
A senior White House official said the U.S. transferred five Afghan Guantanamo detainees to Qatar as part of a "broader reconciliation framework" was part of "successful indirect talks with the Taliban's political commission." "The five detainees transferred are in the custody and of Qatar and will be subject to restrictions on their movement and activities," the senior official said.
"As the Administration has repeatedly affirmed, we will not transfer any detainee from Guantanamo unless the threat the detainee may pose to the United States can be sufficiently mitigated and only when consistent with our humane treatment policy," the official said.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said in a statement that he was "eager to learn what precise steps are being taken to ensure that these vicious and violent Taliban extremists" do not return in fighting against the U.S. or its allies.
"These particular individuals are hardened terrorists who have the blood of Americans and countless Afghans on their hands," McCain said
Earlier Saturday, White House officials announced that the Taliban released Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, held captive for nearly five years. Then came multiple reports that U.S. officials released five Taliban members from Guantanamo Bay. Those members are: Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah Norullah Nori, Abdul Haq Wasiq and Mohammad Nabi Omari, according to multiple reports.
According to CNN: Khairkhwa was believed to be "directly associated" with Osama Bin Laden, as well as a "drug lord" and a friend of former Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai; Fazi, Normi and Wasiq were top Taliban military officials, while Omari is the Taliban's former chief of communications.
Inhofe and McKeon said that Obama "clearly violated laws which require him to notify Congress thirty days before any transfer of terrorists from Guantanamo Bay."
"Our joy at Sergeant Berghdal's release is tempered by the fact that President Obama chose to ignore the law -- not to mention sound policy -- to achieve it," they said in their statement.
Inhofe and McKeon also said that Taliban terrorists will now have a "strong incentive to capture Americans," arguing that Obama's actions set a precedent where terrorists will think the administration will trade prisoners to release others.
This story was updated at 5:14 p.m.
So you think that Obama doesn't have to follow the law and notify Congress beforehand or that there should be some mechanism that ensures that there is some oversight as to which prisoners are released?
We really don't know yet if Obama did the right thing. What happens if the Taliban take some more US hostages from the Embassy for example and demand more releases of prisoners? What would be your reaction of the five who are released get involved again in terrorism and take more American and Afghan lives? It will be months or years before we can ascertain if Obama did the right thing.
I’m not sure if the guy was even a “captive.” I have heard and read too many things to wonder what the heck was really going on with him, and to top it off, his father spoke Arabic today, at the White House, in some secret message to someone. What the heck is going on, ignoring the Gitmo release, what is up with this “captive”?
Obama could care less about Bergdahl. This event was designed to defend Obama and Hillary. They’ve been cutting deals with Al Qaeda.....dirty deals.....treasonous deals. This is a preemptive strike to give them an excuse.
“Look at what we did with Bergdahl. We negotiated with Al Qaeda there and nobody talked about treason. So we gave aid and comfort to Al Qaeda. That doesn’t make us traitors....just negotiators.”
Hillary and Obama are up to their eyeballs in s**t. They are using every trick that their Democrat brain trust can come up with to keep from being charged with treason.
America will always be a target for terrorism. Nothing will change that, ever. We tell our armed forces to never fear. We’ll bring you home. You’d leave a soldier behind, because what might happen in the future? Or because of conceived political wrongs or outright stupidity?
I agree PB, there’s alot more about this story. CBS ran this back in March...
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/is-sgt-bowe-bergdahl-a-hero-or-a-deserter/
You should read the tweet sent out by Bowe’s father..creepy to say the least..he wants the release of ALL Gitmo prisoners..says God will repay for all the Afghan children
Someone might have hacked his account because I don’t see this on his account but will have to look further into this
This release did come at a convenient time for both 0bama and Hillary, whatever else comes up tends to take some of the heat off of them.
soetoro did it from a position of weakness after surrendering with an eye toward appeasement.
Thank you. I saw that. It is disturbing. Maybe the father is trying to manipulate the enemy, but he has kept it up for years, apparently. I wonder if we have “rescued” a new John Walker Lindh?
As someone who served 8 years in the military including a year in Vietnam and 28 years in the Foreign Service including a posting in Tehran when our Embassy was first overrun on February 14, 1979, I am well acquainted with the military ethos and terrorism.
Of course I don't want to leave anyone behind (although we probably did in Vietnam) and I am happy for Bergdahl and his family. Five years being held by the Taliban is a terrible thing. But you must consider the price we paid to get one man home. If our position is that we will give the enemy anything he wants just to get one of our own back, then we leave ourselves open to similar situations in the future. When you reward something, you get more of it.
We have been negotiating with the Taliban for some time over Bergdahl. The question remains, did we give too much to get him back? I can't answer that now. We will have to wait some time to see how it all plays out.
I am most concerned that Obama did not follow the law and consult Congress before agreeing to the exchange. Why didn't he? I suspect he knew that there would be some blowback on who was released. I would like to know if the intelligence community and DOD were consulted and what were their recommendations. Who signed off on it within the Executive Branch? These are important questions that need answers.
Obama and Dems often use emotion to sway the public and some Freepers I gather. Obama did the same thing with his backdoor amnesty for over 1.8 million "Dreamers." 500,000 have already received legalization, SSNs, and work permits--all without Congressional approval. He should be impeached for that alone.
No doubt Obama will declare anyone who even questions what he did as being hard-hearted and not patriotic. The VA scandal has certainly cast the Administration in a bad light. What better way to burnish Obama's image as someone who cares about the military than to get the lone US POW released a day after Shinseki resigned. A coincidence? I think not.
O’Bozo isn’t negotiating with them.
He is one of them.
I didnt want to post the exact tweet since I wasn’t sure if it was really him(you know how twitter is) I went back to May 28th when the tweet was supposedly sent but couldn’t find the post, maybe its a fake not sure.
Check out this guy’s twitter feed, he is tweeting Jake Tapper and claims to have been in Afghanistan when this all went down
https://twitter.com/CodyFNfootball
Why didn’t he try the Hash Tag (#) thing first? It worked so well for Moochelle and the Kidnapped African Girls.
On the flip side, we get bragging rights because one of our guys is worth 5 of their senior leaders......
I’m beginning to think both odumbo and hitlary are PART of the Taliban.
Prescient.
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