It happened that I heard the news of Bowe Bergdahl's release from television, bit by bit as they like to release news on those shows.
"What's that? A captive soldier released? Oh, that sounds like a good thing, I wonder how he got away," I mused.
But then came the bad news ... he didn't escape, he was rescued, at rather major risk and cost ... hmm. Well, we've rescued other captives in fancy, designed-for-the-movies operations, so why not ...
Oops! Well, not so much rescued, really, as traded him for five captive terrorists? Wait, what about that thing we always say, no dealing with terrorists..?
Wait, more news .. this is the guy who "wandered away from his post?" So being a captive in the first place was his own damn fault? What could possibly justify going out of our way to rescue this guy?
Wow. Well, at this point I guess it need not be said that from my perspective as an army brat and a veteran, I'm one of those who is outraged at this whole operation. It appears to break every rule in the book.
Funny, the Obama administration's excuse that "we never leave Americans behind" rings hollow to me. In part because we left a lot of Americans behind in Vietnam, as Memorial Day and Rolling Thunder recently reminded us. And in part because this is a principle we seldom or never heard until we turned our military services from a conscript force into an "all-volunteer" "professional" force.
Bergdahl's case reminds us what we have lost by doing that. We might forgive a draftee for walking away from his duty, but we should not forgive a professional for doing so, any more than we should excuse a lawyer who colludes in miscarriage of justice, or a physician who purposely kills her patient. Nowadays, we call our servicemembers warriors (a term we did not use in the conscript army) but Bergdahl's action gives them a bad rap by suggesting they (or he, at least) have more in common with retail clerks.
So, OK, we don't know the full story of Bergdahl. Let's find out. The only justifiable reason for the risks and costs of bringing him home is to investigate and court martial him, which will help us to uncover the truth. I expect to hear a DoD announcement on that very, very soon.