Why is letting traitors free such a trend in the US these days? First it was Bradley/Chelsea/Whatevs Manning who skipped away from Leavenworth in 2017. Now, on Thursday, the American Taliban — John Walker Lindh — will leave federal prison in Indiana. Moreover, he’s getting out early, having served 17 years of a 20-year sentence. Mind you, though, it’s for good behavior, and he’s on probation anyway, so it’s all good, right?

Let’s review what this dirtbag did that got him in the slammer in the first place.

Lindh was captured by US troops during the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan. He was a bearded, filthy, 20-year-old American who had converted to Islam, left his home in California at 17, and became an al-Qaeda volunteer in Afghanistan. After US troops caught up with Lindh, and CIA officer Johnny Micheal Spann interrogated him, he and other Taliban detainees held a prison revolt, killing Spann. Spann became the first US combat casualty of the Afghanistan War.

Spann gravesite in Arlington. Credit: Something Original @ Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 3.0. 

Yet this American Taliban will shortly go free.

Gail Spann, Michael Spann’s mother, had this to say in March, when the release was announced:

“John Walker Lindh had the opportunity to tell Mike right there, ‘You’re an American, I’m an American. … We’ve got weapons in this building and we’re going to overtake this fort. He chose not to because he was a Taliban. He’s a traitor to our country.”

Moreover, Alison Spann, Spann’s now-27 year old daughter, calls Lindh’s release “a slap in the face.”

“I’ve spent 18 years without my dad. It never crossed my mind that the United States would let someone like this out early. Lindh is a traitor, and I think his early release is a slap in the face.”

She also wrote a letter to the President, telling him that the American Taliban continues to “advocate for global jihad.”

The Spann family are not the only ones who oppose Lindh’s release. The biggest question is this: did prison time change Lindh’s radicalism?

Seamus Hughes, the deputy director of George Washington University’s program on extremism, doesn’t think so:

“From all I’m hearing inside of government, he is still as radical as he went in.”

Documents obtained in 2017 by Foreign Policy also echo Hughes’s concern. According to the National Counterterrorism Center:

“As of May 2016, John Walker Lindh (USPER) — who is scheduled to be released in May 2019 after being convicted of supporting the Taliban — continued to advocate for global jihad and to write and translate violent extremist texts.”

Furthermore, Lindh’s lawyer also dropped him after he made pro-ISIS statements, according to his father. I guess for some defense attorneys there is a bridge too far.

But never mind that — according to Lindh’s father the American Taliban doesn’t care about “renouncing my beliefs or issuing condemnations.”

And, while Lindh acquired Irish citizenship while he was in prison (thanks, Ireland!), because of the travel ban he can’t move there.

Well, isn’t that great. But not to worry — the judge in the case has “imposed sweeping restrictions,” according to the New York Times. Lind will be on probation and won’t be allowed to access the internet. And if he does get permission to own a smart phone or tablet, he can only use English to communicate. Plus, authorities will be monitoring his communications.

Right. And bears don’t. . . well, you know.

Meanwhile, CIA officer Mike Spann lies in a grave in Arlington National Cemetery. Just ponder that.

Featured image: cropped/pixabay/pixabay license.