Was John McCain a traitor?
You also do not negotiate with terrorists and I think that is the greater danger...to the country and to our soldiers, current and future.
Obviously referring to Prisoners of war.
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Except deserters...they can rot in hell.
They're not deserters until tried and convicted. Until then they deserve the benefit of the doubt. Bring him home and let the military justice system determine his guilt and, if necessary, his punishment.
There are limits to everything of course but we should do everything within reason to bring all our people home - whether dead or alive. We owe them that much. 5 of theirs for 1 of ours is a no brainer for me. Hell the Israelis have released hundreds to get back one of their own. In that we should emulate them.
what about traitors or deserters?
Absolute nonsense. You don't leave POWs behind, you do what it takes to go in and get them. For crying out loud, they're American fighting men, your buddies, fathers, brothers, children, what are you going to do, just forget about them, go home and have a beer while the enemy tortures and kills them?
I don't know if it's true, but I am hearing the Taliban threatened to kill him.
I understand, I retired from the army in 1986 and I can’t fathom what John McCain went through as a POW, none of any POW in any war either. That is something one must experience to really have an understanding of it. Knock McCain all you want for his job as a senator and for his political beliefs. That is fair game and expected. There is way too much of the politics of personal destruction to suit my fancy today. I firmly believe a campaign should be about ideas, visions, and solutions to problems, not what someone did 30 years or more years ago.
It is just someone saying McCain was a traitor, that just rubbed me the wrong way. So I took a break and put on a Barney Miller DVD, I own all eight seasons and that put me back into the proper mood. I usually do not let anything said on DP bother me, most of the things said here just roll off my back. But for some reason I just thought that went too far in ones attempt to defend Bergdahl and the swap. Attack or challenge McCain on his statements on the swaps all one wants, I am not sure whether he is for or against it myself, maybe he isn’t sure himself. But that is fair game, that is politics, that is what should be done. Not to go back to his POW days and say he was a traitor just because one holds a different political view. Anyway, that is my opinion.
Thanks for the calming post. I appreciate it.
They're not deserters until tried and convicted. Until then they deserve the benefit of the doubt. Bring him home and let the military justice system determine his guilt and, if necessary, his punishment.
There are limits to everything of course but we should do everything within reason to bring all our people home - whether dead or alive. We owe them that much. 5 of theirs for 1 of ours is a no brainer for me. Hell the Israelis have released hundreds to get back one of their own. In that we should emulate them.
It doesn't obviously refer to prisononers of war to me, though. To me, it applies to every soldier in trouble. Injured on the battlefield? We won't leave you, buddy. We're here. Helicopter shot down behind enemy lines? We won't leave you, buddy. We're coming.
In fact, as I think about it, it hardly applies to prisoners of war.
I would say generally it applies to non-criminal US citizens. If you go into England and murder someone, sorry buddy, you rot in a prison your whole life long. But if you are just a regular American citizen, down in Colombia digging wells for poor villages and FARC nabs you? Well, I would say FARC should suddenly have a SEAL problem.
However, it's not an absolute concept. We do not do anything to get anyone back. Legitimate criminals (I'm sure FARC would accuse their hostages of Crimes Against The People or some such) can be left behind unless the cost of getting them back is low and the convenience for doing so is high, and we do not negotiate with terrorists because that encourages the targeting of US persons. Frankly, if I was captured by some Islamist nutjobbery organization, I would rather they simply drop as many bombs of the largest size they have lying around on my position, and kill me and every one of my captors, than leave me to be tortured / cost others their lives / have my head hacked off on television.
We knew where POWs were held in Viet Nam, in Korea in WWI and II. We got them back at the end of the war, I think. I don't think there were "rescue missions" -- if I'm wrong, my bad.
Who went to get John McCain?
I don't think you can force a soldier to fight for a war he cannot support.
Gosh. Good thin we have an all-volunteer military, then, huh?
I don't think you can force a soldier to fight for a war he cannot support.
Maybe the enthusiasm he had when he volunteered disappearedwhen he faced the cruel reality of what was going on in Afghanistan.
Obviously referring to Prisoners of war.
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- Disagree
- Other
I don't know about your history or experience Pete, but I've been on actual missions where we went in and got a guy out of terrorist hands by force, and none of those missions required giving up terrorists. It has been released by the DOD that they had "eyes on" this soldier for weeks leading up to the trade. If they knew where he was, they could have sent guys in to get him. I want to know - why not? Maybe it's because an AWOL soldier wasn't worth putting special operator's lives in danger for Obama? Maybe it was because Obama planned on giving these guys up all along and this gave them a chance to get Bergdahl back at the same time? Who knows??? I sure don't, but I damn sure want to know.
We went in and got Noriega, after we sent SOF in to get a CIA operative out of his hands on the very first day of that conflict. We went in and got two of our guys in Somalia that were being held by Al Qaeda. We went in and got Jessica Lynch in Iran. Hell, we even went into another sovereign nation (a military invasion by international law) that was supposedly an ally and got Bin Laden, without giving up anyone.
No, we don't leave anyone behind, if we can. There are guys that walked off their posts in Vietnam and are still there today. There are guys that walked off their post in many conflicts, and this guys wasn't the first. However, this is the first time this country traded high ranking terrorists for anyone... not just a soldier that went AWOL.
This action by the Obama Administration has put every US citizen abroad in danger of being grabbed to use as ransom for a trade to get more terrorists released.
For all US citizens that are overseas, the world just became a much, MUCH, more dangerous place. All US citizens, not just those in the military.
What about Robert Levinson in Iran? He's a CIA operative who has now reached the dubious distinction of being the longest held hostage in US history. Why have we left him behind, now that the government has admitted he was working for them? Why??? Because it doesn't work out that we can get them back, that's why. You don't give up our sovereign security to get anyone back... never.
Saying we leave no man behind is great. And, when at all possible, it's true. But, it doesn't always work out that way.
You also do not negotiate with terrorists and I think that is the greater danger...to the country and to our soldiers, current and future.
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