The nation with the most experience dealing with terrorism is Israel. They have one of the most right wing national governments at this time. The people of Israel have suffered at the hands of external suicide bombers to an extend unequalled anywhere. And what is the policy of Israel if an Israeli soldier is held by these terrorists? Recently Israel traded one thousand prisoners and sent them back to Hamas for a single Israeli soldier. Of those traded nearly 300 were serving life sentences in Israel for directly being responsible for the deaths of nearly 570 Israeli citizens. This is only the most recent of many exchanges between Israel and those who are or have in the past expressed a desire to destroy that nation. Israel has even several times exchanged high level prisoners for known dead soldiers.
List of Israeli prisoner exchanges - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
So now the US has had to give up 5 high value terrorists for a captured American. Whether he abandoned his post or not, we, like the Israelis are committed to the return to our side of our soldiers (should they want to be returned). The feelings of his military comrades as to how he came to be captured are important. The deaths of those who sought to rescue him are important. But those deaths are meaningless if you now say he doesn't deserve to come home, he should have been left there. You can be sure that there will be big time hearings criticizing the administration as there is for everything. But until the facts, not a news report or a book or a quote from someone who served and is guessing what happened, we bring back our servicemen and women. Only one person knows how this soldier happened to be caught and we haven't heard from him yet. I am glad he is on his way home. For those criticizing this action, what do you believe would have been the reaction if Bergdahl had died in captivity and word got out that the Taliban had offered to trade him for five prisoners and Obama had refused. Don't tell me you don't know how that would get spun. Please give me the list of those national leaders who have before this exchange happened publicly stated that the US should not be trying to get this soldier home and he should be left to rot in Taliban captivity. Crickets?