There has been a lot of angst in the US, generated by those who want to discredit anything that president Obama does, about whether exchanging US serviceman Bowe Bergdahl for five prisoners being held in Guantanamo was a good trade for the US. Cartoonist Ted Rall suggests that we should not ignore the possibility that a similar debate may be going on amongst the people in Afghanistan as to whether they were the ones who got a raw deal.
Mano Singham
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I suspect that the average citizen of Afghanistan doesn’t give a damn about any of the five or what was traded. Living day to day is too much of a struggle to worry about such trivialities.
I doubt the Taliban, no matter how they might spin it, think they got any great bargain.
Then there is the matter of conspiracy theories being the regional pastime of the area. They know the US is devilishly clever in hiding tracking and listening devices smaller than a grain of sand. Possible implanted in teeth or bones.
What if one or more of the five has been converted into a programmed killer or spy, they might not even know. We saw that in “The Manchurian Candidate” back in the 60s. Think of what subtle and diabolical methods they might have now.
There isn’t any need to include them. They are over ten years out of date in Taliban operations and politics. Most of the leaders they knew are dead, captured or retired. there is a new generation of leaders running things. I doubt any of the five will ever be trusted with anything important ever again.
You do know that the Manchurian Candidate is fiction, right?