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applegrove

(118,023 posts)
Tue Jun 3, 2014, 08:39 PM Jun 2014

"Does Bowe Bergdahl's release signal an end to the 'war on terror'?"

Does Bowe Bergdahl's release signal an end to the 'war on terror'?

by Mary Dejevsky at the Guardian

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/02/bowe-bergdahl-release-war-on-terror-taliban-barack-obama

"SNIP.......................


Difficult though Bergdahl's reintegration into the western world will doubtless be, though, the politics threaten to be many times more complicated. Sparks of controversy flew as soon as his liberation was announced – for the return of this American prodigal son (some reports suggest he deserted) was the product of a deal; a prisoner exchange, no less, which may make it unprecedented in recent American diplomacy. And to say that it was not universally welcomed is to put it mildly.

It is not that the US has refused to deal with dubious characters and groups in the recent past. It may have done, but deniability was always enshrined in the terms. Here we have a deal, sanctioned by President Obama, under which one US soldier has been officially released in exchange for the five most senior Taliban prisoners at Guantánamo Bay.

This goes far beyond talking to the Taliban – itself hugely controversial in the US throughout the war in Afghanistan. For senior Republicans, including Senator John McCain – but not just for them – this amounts to treating with terrorists, even betraying the sacred memory of those killed on 9/11. It is something the United States did not, and would not, do.



.....................SNIP"
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