http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/02/us/bow...html?hpt=hp_t1
So yeah this guy......
I would say more but, 6 deaths says it all.....
Bergdahl...
http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/02/us/bow...html?hpt=hp_t1
So yeah this guy......
I would say more but, 6 deaths says it all.....
Do we really want to get into the business of calculating different prices for the lives of different soldiers? If the guy deserted (or simply got drunk), punish him through the proper channels.
The other question is whether one soldier is worth the lives of 5 mid-to-top ranking Taliban officials. That's a harder case to make. I think Obama is figuring our troops are leaving Afghanistan soon enough, so who cares if these guys get to make trouble back home. I doubt they have any motivation to strike at the US anywhere outside of Afghanistan.
Hope is the denial of reality
I don't know whether the guy deserted or not but I think he volunteered for the military and went overseas for his country and if he did while over there then after so many years of captivity he's probably suffered enough already.
Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer
yeah well 6 people looking for him paid the ultimate price.. So there should be an investigation. Especially if he walked off which his unit is saying he did.
I agree, and I think Obama should be careful about milking political advantage out of this because there now has to be more of an investigation about what the heck happened to him.
I worry a bit about whether this makes Americans vulnerable to future hostage-taking, though I think this is a fairly exceptional case.
Is that really relevant? Say two druggies go missing near a river. For whatever a reason, a search party looking for one of them dies in the river. Should that somehow affect that person's punishment?
Because America's enemies already didn't have a very damn good incentive to capture US troops?
Edit: some interesting tidbids from a NY Times story:
"Sometime after midnight on June 30, 2009, Pfc. Bowe Bergdahl left behind a note in his tent saying he had become disillusioned with the Army, did not support the American mission in Afghanistan and was leaving to start a new life. He slipped off the remote military outpost in Paktika Province on the border with Pakistan and took with him a soft backpack, water, knives, a notebook and writing materials, but left behind his body armor and weapons — startling, given the hostile environment around his outpost."
"A review of the database of casualties in the Afghan war suggests that Sergeant Bergdahl’s critics appear to be blaming him for every American soldier killed in Paktika Province in the four-month period that followed his disappearance."
"Rear Adm. John F. Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, said that there was a larger matter at play: The American military does not leave soldiers behind. “When you’re in the Navy, and you go overboard, it doesn’t matter if you were pushed, fell or jumped,” he said. “We’re going to turn the ship around and pick you up.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/us...t.html?hp&_r=0
Last edited by Loki; 06-03-2014 at 01:59 PM.
Hope is the denial of reality
compared to getting blown into a dozen pieces?
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
I think this is a bigger issue in Israel, where most young men serve in the military and are easy targets when they're not on their military base. There would be a similar problem with exchanging terrorists for American civilians (since that group is pretty vulnerable in many combat zones). But US soldiers? Who's not already trying to capture them?
Hope is the denial of reality
Israel does exchange though, right?I think this is a bigger issue in Israel, where most young men serve in the military and are easy targets when they're not on their military base. There would be a similar problem with exchanging terrorists for American civilians (since that group is pretty vulnerable in many combat zones). But US soldiers? Who's not already trying to capture them?
Also, am I the only one thinking of Homeland now?
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
Yes, they do. Ultimately, people care more about the lives of their soldiers than about the wrong-doings of terrorists.
I thought that, too.
Hope is the denial of reality
Btw, regardless of what you think about the guy and whether this swap was a good idea or not, the comments on fox about his parents are way out of line if you ask me.
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
Bring the soldier home. Assume he's a POW, and presume nothing else.
Yes, let's not look into things that might look bad.
We can do both, bring him home and confirm if he deserted his post or not.
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Yes, we can chew gum and walk at the same time.
So, you are walking back your prior post?
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What prior post do you mean?I think it's perfectly legitimate to bring one US POW home, in exchange for five POWs held captive in Gitmo for over a decade.
Assume and presume nothing else?
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They must've missed the difference between assume and PREsume.
The worst job in the world is better than being broke and homeless
Bergdahl, and his family, shouldn't be used as political tools.
Tell that to that administration, with its press conference in the bloody Rose Garden, and Susan Rice with her comments.
There are top Democrats that are pissed by this deal.
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Any politician pissed at this deal is a jerk who should spend some time on the front line let alone as a POW.
If he has deserted then there's a mechanism for trying that and punishing it - and that doesn't involve being left to rot as a Taliban prisoner.
Are you really invoking a No True Scotsman?
Look, I'm in agreement with Loki that any punishment needs to be dealt with via the MCOJ and not 'letting him rot'.
However, what we traded away, AND how it was done has ALOT of people upset. It's very possible that laws were broken (that from Sen Fienstien, Democrat Chair of the Intelligence Committee). This was another administration bungle that makes Carter look competent.
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Oliver north criticising the deal was funny though. Don't negotiate with enemies... Not exactly his forte. How do the Reagan loving republicans feel about it, now Obama acts more like Reagan?
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...ghanistan.html
"
“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.
"
There is a history in civilian court (no idea if there is one in the UCMJ) regarding situations where a crime you commit leads to worse situations and you have your punishment enhanced.
Ie - "I'm the getaway driver, my stupid buddy shoots the guy in the store, I'm also being sentenced to murder."
"I'm drinking and driving. If I run into someone I get a stronger punishment."
For better or worse the impact and result of a crime is highly factored in to the punishment phase. If the guy never deserted would the soldiers have still died? If the answer is no then he is culpable in someway.
Do we have a punishment called death by Taliban?
Hope is the denial of reality
I guess some people want to change that old American habit of not leaving behind any of their men. And let's assume this man hasn't always been behaving in a mint way during his tour of duty in Afghanistan, does that allow us to forget who put him in Afghanistan in the first place?
Congratulations America
He left his post in a combat zone, resulting in major resources being diverted to find his dumb ass. And if your joining the US Infantry your a $%^&ing retard if you don't think your going to Afghanistan or Iraq for that matter. No this man deserted his comrades at an outpost in a combat zone.
When they call DUSTWUN you stop everything your doing, everything. Even special operations changes, to find that person. They had to call it for a guy that was splatter across concrete barrier when I was there, they weren't sure it was him so four days a search was conducted, until they were able to identify him. IT held our unit up when we were transferring from KAF to what was suppose to be our home base..
A deserter is not worth 5 Taliban commanders, I have sympathy for his family, I really do but he deserted, textbook case of desertion you can't get much more walked off than that, at least he left his sensitive equipment...
Old Centcom command has said it best so far:
“Bottom line, we don’t leave people behind, that is the beginning and that is the end of what we stand for,” he said. ”We keep faith with the guys who sign on, and that is all there is to it.”
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
I agree we should of tried to get him out but not at the price of five terrorists. And I also think he should face punishment for what he did. Simply because something bad happens to you doesn't mean you get to avoid being punished. That's like saying if a rapist gets cancer we should him out of jail.
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