Bergdahl not responsible

originally posted by: Sremmos80
a reply to: deadeyedick



No he left and forced their hand to go get him. He has their blood on his hands, end of story imo.

He did not force anything other than critical thinking and they lost and caused the deaths of others. There should be accountability all the way up the chain.

a reply to: deadeyedick

So they would have gone on search missions for him if he wasn't missing?
Please explain.

originally posted by: deadeyedick

originally posted by: Sremmos80
a reply to: deadeyedick



No he left and forced their hand to go get him. He has their blood on his hands, end of story imo.

He did not force anything other than critical thinking and they lost and caused the deaths of others. There should be accountability all the way up the chain.

I can agree that the blame can go up the chain. I think it should. There were warning signs that this guy may do something like this, especially since he had done it before. The military does have a habit of ignoring some serious warning signs and I think that should definitely be addressed.

But I still think that the deaths of those soldiers should mainly fall on the deserter himself. I would not be able to ever sleep through the night again, had I done what he did and knew it had caused others an early death. Obviously that wasn't a top priority for him at the time and it should have been.

Even if he hated the military, hated the US, was disenfranchised, etc. that was not the fault of the guys that he was supposed to have their backs. In the end, they wound up paying the ultimate price for his unhappiness and that isn't fair or just for anybody.

a reply to: Sremmos80 The first reports were that he went awol. Walked off base and left a note. The order to pursure him was not the correct action. If those are fact then a look needs to be taken to find out at exactly at what point and who changed the facts that were being told. It has never been sop to go after deserters at the expense of other members unless their is an intelligence factor and then special ops would have gotten involved. Why they let these searches go on for six weeks is another good question. We are looking at a potential coverup of the source of all this. Why on earth would those around him need to sign disclosure agreements? He should have been shot in the back and would have been in any other war just for this reason.

a reply to: deadeyedick

Exactly, he left and forced the hand of the the command to then send rescue mission's.
I do agree the command holds some blame. Shoot they promoted him, twice.
But the root cause is still him leaving, so his fault.
Unless it comes out the command made him leave which I highly doubt

a reply to: Sremmos80


I think my biggest point is that some or all of those six would still be with us if there was someone able to give the proper order. I tend to not think that hardly any one who has ever been in charge of anything would have made the continued decision to pursue him for that long and with the amount of evidence unless given some type of backwards playbook by someone up higher. I contend that there is an american murderer on the loose that is unjustified and getting away with it.

originally posted by: Metallicus

originally posted by: symptomoftheuniverse
This man is a hero? And snowden a criminal?

You just crystallized how messed up this country is with that single comparison. A deserter/traitor is a "hero" and a whistle blower who outs illegal Government activities is a criminal. It would be laughably stupid if it weren't so damn sad.

And you just crystallized and demostrated why TIME is so important, of many things, within this issue, and where by a constant conundrum is created.

I agree, first, with the precept of Snowden a criminal, and this guy, a traitor.

I've posted on other threads about this and what this man was dealing with: First, Stockholm Syndrome. Does anyone understand that? Really?

second: he perhaps deserted, having lost faith in AMC and further…
you quesion why that may have happened on a website where we daily criticize why we're in those countries,etc…
really?

I am simply describing the current conundrum of this situation: it is significantly a SNAFU, of anything ever met that definition….

See my other posts for further analysis, or not…
Tetra

Cavtrooper (I believe) stated something about this in anther thread.

Bergdahl violated the UCMJ.
and
He took an oath and violated that.

We (who wore uniforms) all took the oath. We all followed the UCMJ.

Most take it seriously, some just *yawn* but the one thing in common is that WE FOLLOW IT!

Bergdahl failed in that. He violated his oath. He violated a trust that, all who wear/wore a uniform, live by.

There is no other debate.

The White House can paint this punk a hero. Sure. Easy for an administration that doesn't take THEIR own oath seriously.

But the rest of us know.

I don't see the point of an Oath. Who commits to blindly following something just to do it? The guy decided he didn't want to follow those rules anymore and left. They should have just let him go, he didn't have very sensitive intelligence from what I read/heard today so the risk was minimal.

When it comes to getting him back now... why not? He's still an American citizen, we've brought far more people back for similar things like draft dodging. One of them even became president.

Story You Haven't Heard About Bergdahls Desertion

When he deserted, the Army didn't go on a rescue mission.
They had orders to shoot him if they saw him.
That's how sure they were that he had defected and was aiding the enemy.

originally posted by: Aazadan
I don't see the point of an Oath. Who commits to blindly following something just to do it? The guy decided he didn't want to follow those rules anymore and left. They should have just let him go, he didn't have very sensitive intelligence from what I read/heard today so the risk was minimal.



When it comes to getting him back now... why not? He's still an American citizen, we've brought far more people back for similar things like draft dodging. One of them even became president.

Very simple thought process goes into this answer. Walking away during war time puts lives in danger and forces others to make decisions that would not have to be made otherwise. it is like the enemy working from within. He joined a group of killers and was in no way led to believe otherwise. To trade 5 high level killers of amercans for one low level killer of americans is just more of the enemy working from within.

originally posted by: deadeyedick
Very simple thought process goes into this answer. Walking away during war time puts lives in danger and forces others to make decisions that would not have to be made otherwise. it is like the enemy working from within. He joined a group of killers and was in no way led to believe otherwise. To trade 5 high level killers of amercans for one low level killer of americans is just more of the enemy working from within.

Not doing your job in your unit also puts lives in danger. Having him desert is better than having him stand down in the middle of a fire fight.

I'm not saying he's a great guy but it's a volunteer army. To me that means you can quit at any moment. That's precisely what he did.

As far as the trade goes, prisoner exchanges are never equal and the point of it wasn't to get someone back. It was to provide an excuse to clear gitmo out a bit.

originally posted by: Aazadan
I'm not saying he's a great guy but it's a volunteer army. To me that means you can quit at any moment. .

No you can't quit at any moment. When you enlist, you sign a contract. You are legally bound to it. You must fill it. He did not. He broke his contract.

a reply to: Aazadan

I'm not saying he's a great guy but it's a volunteer army. To me that means you can quit at any moment. That's precisely what he did.

Shouldn't it make a difference here that it doesn't actually work that way? I mean, literally, it doesn't and cannot work that way. He willingly signed a contract when he joined and volunteered to become part of the Army which said he absolutely could't simply quit at any moment. Volunteer is about the fact he wasn't drafted or conscripted as many nations still do. (We still have the system to do it with Selective Service)

Should we be held to anything we agree to as people anymore?

a reply to: Wrabbit2000

I'm all for them bringing him back. I'm also all for a military court deciding if he should spend time in jail for what he did. I'm just saying that in the middle of a war if someone is going to stop fulfilling their commitment it's much better for them to desert than to shut down in an important moment. Accept it then, deal with the consequences later at a less crucial time, which is what's being done.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: Wrabbit2000



I'm all for them bringing him back. I'm also all for a military court deciding if he should spend time in jail for what he did. I'm just saying that in the middle of a war if someone is going to stop fulfilling their commitment it's much better for them to desert than to shut down in an important moment. Accept it then, deal with the consequences later at a less crucial time, which is what's being done.

No because as you can see dealing with the consequences later gave the enemy a huge advantage and that is exactly that it is an offense punishable by death. There are proper channels that one can go down when one gets to the point of laying down on the job. He created a mess and others perpetuated it. We would be viewing a different story right now if he stood up like a man to his platoon and declared that he could no longer function under those conditions. One problem i do see that seems to have effected the outcome is how orders are generated from a place far far from the action nowdays.

originally posted by: deadeyedick
]No because as you can see dealing with the consequences later gave the enemy a huge advantage and that is exactly that it is an offense punishable by death. There are proper channels that one can go down when one gets to the point of laying down on the job. He created a mess and others perpetuated it. We would be viewing a different story right now if he stood up like a man to his platoon and declared that he could no longer function under those conditions. One problem i do see that seems to have effected the outcome is how orders are generated from a place far far from the action nowdays.

Why does it matter what the enemy got? Prisoner exchanges are never about equality. Besides, everyone that we released was eventually going to be released anyways. We let 5 people go for 1 person. In the past we let 500 people go, and before that we gave away thousands of missiles.

The truth is that we negotiate with terrorists and we always have.

I seem to be in a minority on this but I don't have a problem with what we gave up, I see it as giving up something that we were eventually going to give up for no gain anyways. In exchange we got an american citizen back, so it's a great deal. Considering what he did to get captured in the first place... he's a citizen first so getting him back is important. The step after that is to let the military decide if he should or shouldn't be punished, and on that note none of us really have the complete picture to make a decision.

a reply to: Aazadan lol why does it matter what the enemy got? It is clear that you are not looking at all sides here. There is no explaination i can think of that would make up for that.

a reply to: deadeyedick
It seems that most people are taking only the talking points of the current-political-climate sensationalists.
Rolling Stone published a 7 page piece on this story two years ago... America's Last Prisoner of War.
The "5 Taliban prisoners -for- 1 U.S. POW" has been on the table for years. This is not new to anyone on Capitol Hill.
As you have said - Bowe Bergdahl made his choice, and will have to deal with the consequences.
One thing I did not see in the 7-page article was reference to any soldiers being killed in search &/or rescue efforts.
If you know where that information came from, I would appreciate knowing the source. Otherwise - guess I'll look for it, myself.
Thanks.

originally posted by: deadeyedick
a reply to: Aazadan lol why does it matter what the enemy got? It is clear that you are not looking at all sides here. There is no explaination i can think of that would make up for that.

In a deal you're concerned with what you get. We got rid of 5 people we were going to free anyways and we got an American PoW back as part of it. That's a very good deal. It's all about advancing national interests from an entirely pragmatic point of view. We did that. If the other party also advanced their interests then good for them, but the reality is what they got isn't of consequence.