Posted on 06/07/2014 1:38:06 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
On Saturday, Bowe Bergdahl was a hero, and the five members of the Taliban being freed in exchange for him were the worst of the worst.
By the end of the week, it seemed that neither is actually true. The parade in Bergdahl’s Idaho hometown was canceled. Four of the five aren’t nice guys, but they aren’t war criminals, either.
As for Bergdahl, I don’t pretend to know whether he deserted his unit. That is a question that can only be answered in a properly and fairly conducted court-martial.
But the account that broke my heart was the interview with the widow who had only just learned that it was while he was out looking for Bergdahl that her husband was killed. She was pregnant with their second child at the time. I don’t know how you explain that to your kids, especially when they are old enough to understand.
And of course, what made it so much worse is that we really wanted a happy ending to this story. I was watching the coverage on Saturday in the green room at Fox, and Tammy Bruce reminded me of all the questions that had been raised in the past about Bergdahl’s disappearance. Jake Tapper had already tweeted about it. It was there. And if you listened to the coverage clearly or read the whole story, it was there: the continued uncertainty as to how it was that Bergdahl was seized. But who listened so closely? The army promoted him twice. They must know. Besides, I wanted to be happy for Jani and Bob.
Saturday belonged to Bowe’s parents. They lived through every parent’s nightmare, and then after years of pain and grief, they got the call. Their son was coming home. I defy you to find a mother who did not relate to Jani Bergdahl, who did not want to share her joy. To a mother, it’s worth five of the worst of the worst or, as John McCain put it, “the hardest and toughest of all.”
Well, maybe not so hard and tough. Three of the five, it is now being reported, were political officials during the period that the Taliban ruled and were thought to be among the moderates in the Taliban government; one of them was a student working for a relative, who offered to help the United States after we came in, and we arrested him instead. Another was a midlevel police official.
One, the former army chief of staff, looks to be among the worst and is accused of war crimes. But in terms of his likely role in the Taliban today, even he is more than a decade out of date, and as some of the experts have not so charitably put it, all of these guys are old, at least in terrorist terms.
So should the administration have done the swap?
Probably. But like so much of our politics today, the answer isn’t very satisfying.
It’s important to send the message to our soldiers that we leave no one behind. Bergdahl deserves his day in court, at least, and until proved guilty, he is an American soldier whom we are all bound to support.
But my heart still goes out to the widow who is wondering exactly why her husband was out searching for this guy.
On the bad guys, the hardest question, as to four of the five, is not whether we are endangered by their release, but whether this is whom we have been keeping Guantanamo open to detain. Why?
As to the fifth, the really bad guy, my assumption, which the reports seem to confirm, is that he was the price of the deal. You want to get your soldiers home? You give up bad guys. Ask Israel. War is an ugly business. Not much to be happy about. The left and right can scream at each other, but neither side has great answers. It is what it is.
So in other words, what difference does it make...
Moderate Islam is like a mild case of rabies.
Just because many of them drive in the middle of the road doesn’t make them moderates.
I can't imagine any liberal America-hater saying the same thing with a name that lacks leftist credentials. "George Zimmerman deserves his day in court, at least, and until proved guilty, he is an American whom we are all bound to support?" No, the people who reflexively defend Obama are hypocrites, as we have all known for years. They know that only liberals are bound to support someone simply because Obama does. Decent people look at the facts. Zimmerman? Self-defense. Support him. Bergdahl? Desertion on the battlefield in time of war. No support from those who love America.
These people like SE think they are just so much smarter than everyone else yet they show an ignorance level concerning reality which rings right off the charts!
So glad this mindless moron is no longer a regular agitator on Fox news. Between her voice and over stretched face, it was more than a person could handle.
The List?
Moderate Taliban
Taliban Moderate = Gentleman who will only slightly kill you.
Moderate Mohammedans is a contradiction in terms. What does t mean? Do they kill their enemies with rubber weapons? Do they eat pork sometimes and drink wine on holidays?
Reminds me of a story I once heard about the differences in Jewish branches: Orthodox go to temple, Conservative go to synagogue and Reformed go to church.
Mohammedism is a cult of hate started by a camel-humping pedophile. Islam is a Mohammedan word; don’t use their words.
Good point. Very good point.
Why does the press only key on the numbers 1 and 5? Our government has illegally (in my opinion) released five potential murderers back into society. Are we to assume they are reformed after years of abusing guards and plotting revenge? How many people will die as a result of this action? To me this act of stupidity should have criminal consequences should future lives be lost.
The only person on the planet with a more agony inducing voice than SE is Shillary.
Oh it was allll a big mistaaaaaake, to think there was anything wrong with this trade. How good of them to parrot the White House official excuses and let us know!
Only ....I guess they had nothing to say about the president of the United States breaking the law to do this, hmmmmm???????
They rinse off the knife before they cut your head off.....
She’s the one who thought Mike “Tank Commander” Dukakis was a tough guy so, yeah, I trust her opinion.
A moderate Tollyban will stop cutting just before hitting the jugular vein.
The big question to be answered is who were the five terror types from gitmo traded for Bowe Bergdahl. That may be the story that the regime is trying their best to cover up by featuring Bowe and his father in the limelight all the time.
If we keep concentrating on Bowe and his father we will forget about the very dangerous five that are now free to undo all the good we did in Afghanistan which may have been the regimes real mission.
One is a heroin trafficker the other hates Shites in Afghistan heres a clip:
..............While not as well known as Guantanamo inmates like 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Taliban 5 were some of the worst outlaws in the U.S. war on terror. And their release will end up replenishing the diminished leadership ranks of the Afghan Taliban at a moment when the United States is winding down the war there...........
“They are undoubtedly among the most dangerous Taliban commanders held at Guantanamo,” said Thomas Joscelyn, a senior editor at the Long War Journal who keeps a close watch on developments concerning the detainees left at the Guantanamo Bay prison.
Fazl, for example, was the Taliban’s former deputy defense minister and is wanted by the United Nations for his role in massacres targeting Afghan’s Shi’ite Muslim population.
According to the 2008 Pentagon’s dossier on Fazl disclosed by Wikileaks (PDF), Noori also was a senior Taliban military figure and, according to his Pentagon dossier, was asked personally in 1995 by Osama bin Laden (PDF) to participate in an offensive against northern alliance warlord Rashid Dostum.
............Wasiq, a former deputy minister of intelligence, at one point tried to cooperate with U.S. forces in Afghanistan and asked for a GPS system as well as a special radio to communicate with the U.S. military after the U.S. invasion in 2001. His dossier (PDF) says that he was a crucial liaison between the Taliban and other Islamic fundamentalist groups while he was deputy intelligence minister. But the 2008 report also said he was holding out information he had on other top al Qaeda and Taliban leaders during interrogations..........
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