Should the US be trading Terrorists for Deserters?

First of all, bad idea to ask this kind of question. It may start a large political dispute.

But here's my opinion...

He's a deserter, when you don that uniform, the army owns you. He swore to an oath! He shouldn't have left. We are giving up fairly caught terrorists for a deserter who deserves to sit in a 6x8 cell. This man doesn't deserve to be free, and neither do the terrorists

Five middle aged guys won't make a difference at this point, and who knows if maybe at least one of them is now a double agent. Basically this war is over, so a prisoner exchange has to be arranged anyway. None of the released prisoners of war were ever convicted of a crime, so we can't hold them forever.....also we don't know the entire story and we probably won't.

this sets 2 presidents. now kidnapping is a viable option for getting what you want, second it proves again what a week leader obama is. not that it was in doubt

He was still one of your soldiers, at the end of the day.

Maybe we traded them back with tracking devices implanted..... unbeknownst to them of course.

It reminds me of the 1980's when several Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon. Reagan refused to negotiate with the hostage takers. Many were held for several years. Once they realized that they were not going to get anything for them, they were released, and the kidnappings stopped.

First, we have to establish that he was a deserter. Now that he is back in American hands, we may be able to find out for sure. Second, I don't believe it was very smart trade. For one, we have legitimized a terrorist organization by granting them the same privileges we do to legitimate pows. These men are NOT soldiers of a foreign power,and thus do not deserve those privileges. And now we will have to wait several years to see how many more Americans will pay the price for his release, whether in the form of being taken hostage, or of being killed.