BREAKING: U.S. Exchanges Gitmo Prisoners for U.S. Soldier Held by Taliban Since 2009

[bigtree]

Last edited Sat May 31, 2014, 05:51 PM - Edit history (6)

Washington Post ‏@washingtonpost 2m

#BREAKINGNEWS: Officials say U.S. soldier taken hostage by Taliban in 2009 was released in exchange for 5 Guantanamo detainees



Taliban associated video production group Manba al-Jihad December 7, 2010 photo of someone that appears to be US soldier Bowe Bergdahl, who has been held hostage by the Taliban since his disappearance from his unit on June 30, 2009 (AFP Photo / IntelCenter)

related:

Taliban will free US soldier if 5 'operatives' released from Gitmo - AP June 20, 2013
http://rt.com/news/taliban-us-soldier-gitmo-988/

The Associated Press ‏@AP 1m
MORE: U.S. officials say only American soldier held prisoner in Afghanistan has been freed and is in U.S. custody: http://apne.ws/1txlBM2
http://rt.com/news/taliban-us-soldier-gitmo-988/


http://t.co/v0jqdzi8dY

Zeke Miller ‏@ZekeJMiller 25m
Hagel: The US has coordinated closely w Qatar to ensure that security measures are in place & the NatSec of the US will not be compromised

Zeke Miller ‏@ZekeJMiller 26m
Hagel statement: today, I informed Congress of the decision to transfer five detainees from Guantánamo Bay to Qatar.



Robert Bergdahl ‏@bobbergdahl May 28
#BoweBergdahl 2014 NEVER GIVE UP! YOU ARE NOT FORGOTTEN! YOU WILL COME HOME! mom & dad

ABC News ‏@ABC 13m
Family: “We were so joyful and relieved when Pres. Obama called us today to give us the news that Bowe [Bergdahl] is finally coming home!"

Alex Fitzpatrick ‏@AlexJamesFitz 23m
MORE: The troops replied “yes, we’ve been looking for you for a long time,” at which point Berghdal broke down crying http://time.com/2803616/bowe-bergdahl-american-afghanistan-returned/ …

[JJChambers]

1. The first positive thing to come out of Gitmo?

I wonder if this will encourage future hostage taking..

[Leme]

3. yeah, I wonder too. nt

[Ballast_Point]

4. No wondering needed..

Absolutely...

[Cooley Hurd]

5. Not if we close GITMO altogether...

[Chan790]

17. Unfortunately...

for a number of detainees whose own countries will not allow them to be repatriated and who were unquestionably guilty of the crimes they were detained for, that's the worse option of two. They can stay in Gitmo or we can compel them onto their nations of origin who will most likely machine-gun them or torture them to death. They can't be turned over if we believe they will be summarily executed without adjudication...meaning we'd have to put them into a permanent detention facility...like Gitmo.

It's really a lovely boondoggle of a corner the Bush White House painted us into and which we're probably permanently stuck with now. Basically, we can no more close Guantanamo Bay ever than we can time-travel to prevent it opening in the first place.

The die is cast, so to speak.

Edit: To be clear, we can and should be emptying it as much as possible by releasing those we have no reason to detain and who can be released. There's just 15-20% we're just going to be stuck with detaining in Gitmo forever unless we shoot them or try them and move them to Florence ADX.

Edit 2: We're not going to shoot them and trying them is largely impossible...so

[Schema Thing]

15. Are you unaware that this is how wars end?

[2pooped2pop]

49. that's what I was thinking

that they are trying to wrap up this war, most likely to get involved in another?

[kelliekat44]

31. The GOP will not cooperate with BO on moving prisoners out so this is a good

move. I just hope everyone understands the reasons. Dem do a piss poor job of explaining anything. They always seem to allow the GOP and FOX to frame and define every issue.

[treestar]

54. This kind of thing has been done since there has been such a thing as war

And we want this one over and Gitmo closed.

Why would it encourage hostage taking any more than they are already motivated to do?

[The Blue Flower]

2. Too bad that's what it takes to release them

nt

[bigtree]

6. with republicans standing in the way of most transfers out of there

. . . deal-making by the WH with countries or groups abroad is one of the only ways these days.

[geek tragedy]

7. so it would have been better that the US soldier remained a captive?

seems self-evident that if the Taliban wanted these guys released, they're probably not the best examples of wrongfully detained individuals

[bigtree]

8. I don't think anyone here has said that

. . . wanting him home doesn't eliminate the potential consequences. It's a risk the President obviously took after almost 4 years of mulling the offer over.

[Comrade Grumpy]

10. Potential consequences? They'll go back home and do their thing.

These are Taliban guys, not Al Qaeda.

[bigtree]

11. I say, who the **** knows?

. . . good to have him back.

Zeke Miller ‏@ZekeJMiller 25m
Hagel: The US has coordinated closely w Qatar to ensure that security measures are in place & the NatSec of the US will not be compromised

[bigtree]

9. update: WH statement

@WhiteHouse

"Today the American people are pleased that we will be able to welcome home Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl." —Obama: http://t.co/6uay3DMmZB

[bigtree]

12. kick

[msanthrope]

13. Holy Shit!!!! It was a RW meme that BHO didn't care about this guy......

and I'm damn glad he's coming home.

[buzzcola]

14. Time to close Gitmo prison. Many there have not even been charged with any crime.

[bigtree]

16. yeah, well

. . . republicans still block efforts to transfer the prisoners considered most dangerous, as well as blocking many efforts to repatriate some.

Paging GOP . . .

[Shrike47]

18. Good news all around.

[JaneyVee]

19. Great news!

[Blue_In_AK]

20. This is good news.

He was based out of Ft. Richardson here.

[Jake Stern]

21. Wonder how long it'll take for the GOP to start

Screeching about Obama trading GITMO prisoners for this guy?

[summerschild]

23. Less than two hours.

John McCain is already mullygrubbing about it. God he makes me so tired!

[bigtree]

26. they don't know what they want. Duncan Hunter was griping about his captivity earlier in the year

. . . I'm sure if the military thought he could be Rambo-rescued they would have done so.

I wonder what sort of deal the US made to get McCain's sorry ass out of captivity when he was a POW?

besides . . .

from April:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said that when the Obama administration initially proposed the swap, it wanted to release the Taliban prisoners first as a confidence-building measure.

"I said that was insane ... to do that," he told the AP. "Then it was the swap for Bergdahl. I said, 'OK, fine. How are you going to do that?' They never explained anything to anybody about how it would be done. ... How can you get him back if you are totally disorganized?"

[Ballast_Point]

41. You have no idea what you are talking about and it shows...

McCain was offered an early release when it was discovered who his father was and he turned it down.

First in... first out...

In mid-1968, John S. McCain, Jr. was named commander of all U.S. forces in the Vietnam theater, and the North Vietnamese offered McCain early release[44] because they wanted to appear merciful for propaganda purposes,[45] and also to show other POWs that elite prisoners were willing to be treated preferentially.[44] McCain turned down the offer; he would only accept repatriation if every man taken in before him was released as well. Such early release was prohibited by the POW's interpretation of the military Code of Conduct: To prevent the enemy from using prisoners for propaganda, officers were to agree to be released in the order in which they were captured.[34]"

[bigtree]

44. ha, Ha, HA!

. . . going ballistic defending that shithole.

He was released in a PRISONER EXCHANGE at the end of combat operations. . . same as in this case.

[Ballast_Point]

46. Ignorance shouldn't be an excuse...

It's obvious that you are not aware of how serious a subject it is and whatever else you think of him, he did the right thing in that case.

[bigtree]

48. no one except you is debating whether he 'did the right thing'

. . . but he didn't get home on his own.

The Paris Peace Accords of 1973 included provisions for exchanging prisoners of war. The plan to bring American prisoners home was called OPERATION HOMECOMING. Prisoners were to be returned to U.S. control during February and March 1973, with the longest-held generally returning first.

OPERATION HOMECOMING returned 591 POWs: 325 Air Force personnel, 77 Army, 138 Navy, 26 Marines and 25 civilians. Those who were not freed at Hanoi--POWs held in South Vietnam by the Viet Cong, mostly Army and civilians--left from Loc Ninh, the scene of the North Vietnam-South Vietnam prisoner exchange.

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet_print.asp?fsID=14412

[2pooped2pop]

50. u might need to read up a little more on McGramps n/t

[UtahLib]

22. So glad he's coming home. nt

[bigtree]

24. kick

[malaise]

25. Obama will spreak from the Rose Garden at 6.15pm

[bigtree]

27. thanks for the heads up, malaise

. . . terribly important.

[malaise]

28. You're welcome bigtree

[Egnever]

29. I am glad he is coming home..

Trading prisoners for him seems like a pretty bad idea though.

[bigtree]

30. I'll bet his family doesn't think so

Robert Bergdahl ‏@bobbergdahl 34m

To every single person who worked so hard to make this recovery possible, WE LOVE YOU! . . .

[Egnever]

32. I am sure they don't

And I don't blame them I would feel the same. I am not sure the next soldier who gets kidnapped will feel the same nor will his family since we now apparently negotiate.

Seems like a good way to put targets on kids backs to me.

Still happy for the young man and his family but worried what happens going forward.

[bigtree]

33. Prisoner swaps have always been risky at the end of military conflicts

At the end of the Korean War, for instance, prisoners of war were a big part of the peace negotiations, and a condition for signing the Armistice . . . this is in conjunction with the President's announcement that combat operations will cease this year in Afghanistan and certainly this prisoner swap was done in negotiations to that effect.


Korean War: Operation Big Switch, Prisoner of War Exchange
(77,000 Communists for 12,700 UN men, of whom 3,597 were Americans_)



Munsan, August-September 1953. This photo, taken by August "Gus" Firgau of the 712th Transportation Railway Operation Battalion (TROB), shows Communist prisoners of war detraining from a 765th Transportation Railway Shop Battalion (TRSB) hospital train that had transported them to the site of prisoner of war exchanges during Operation Big Switch from 5 August to 6 September 1953..

The 3rd Transportation Military Railway Service, which oversaw all rail movements during the Korean War, provided rail equipment and monitoring of transportation of Chinese and North Korean POWs to the exchange sites.

[Egnever]

40. Fair enough.

I am glad he is coming home

[malaise]

34. The prisoners were released to the Qatari government

not to the Afghan government.
I'm glad the kid is coming home to his family.

[Ohio Joe]

36. ummm... Would not 'the next one kidnapped' feel a bit safer knowing we would negotiate?

Are these kids supposed to want to die for the end of an unnecessary war?

Targets? These targets are not there anyway?

No... There are times when negotiation is not the wise thing to do but there are also times when it is... Not only do I have no problem with this, I think it the correct thing to do.

[2pooped2pop]

35. they wanna wrap up this war coz they got a new one to start?

n/t

[Cha]

42. No.

[Solly Mack]

37. K&R

[KittyWampus]

38. I hope prisoners on all sides receive help they need to readjust.

[bigtree]

39. that's up to Qatar

. . . I hope this young man isn't swamped by the politics surrounding his release.

[Cha]

43. Bless his heart.. Sgt Bowe Bergdahl

Vid and more pics at link..
TOD

mahalo bigtree~

[struggle4progress]

45. The Gitmo detainees swapped for Bergdahl: Who are they?

By CNN Staff
updated 7:55 PM EDT, Sat May 31, 2014

... A plane carrying the detainees left the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo, Cuba, after the announcement that Bergdahl, who was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2009, had been exchanged for the five men.

Saturday's transfer was brokered through the Qatari government, a senior Defense official said. According to senior administration officials, Qatar agreed to take custody of the detainees and provide assurances they would not pose a threat to the United States, including a one-year ban from travel out of Qatar.

Two senior administration officials confirmed the names of the five released detainees as Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah Norullah Nori, Abdul Haq Wasiq and Mohammad Nabi Omari.

They were mostly mid- to high-level officials in the Taliban regime and had been detained early in the war in Afghanistan, because of their positions within the Taliban, not because of ties to al Qaeda ...

http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/31/us/bergdahl-transferred-guantanamo-detainees/

[Terra Alta]

47. Great news!

Glad he is on his way home.

[steve2470]

51. great news ! nt

[bravenak]

52. I am glad he is home.

I think it's worth it to get our soldier back. Five years is a long time, too too long.

[bigtree]

53. it's certainly worth it

. . . said to be last prisoner of the two wars.

President Obama announced the end of combat operations later this year, so a prisoner exchange is very much in keeping with our country's tradition of reconciliation measures at the end of military conflicts.