These were top officials in the Taliban regime: a provincial governor, a deputy defense minister, a deputy intelligence minister, a top arms smuggler, and a top Taliban military commander. Two of them are wanted by the United Nations for war crimes committed against Afghanistan’s Shiites.

Make no mistake about what these men are, and I will not, can not mince words here:  They are fucking savages.  They are the kind of people who stone others to death for not believing as they do; they are the kind of people who blow up innocents, who use human shields, who will kill children to make a political point.  They do not deserve to be released; what they deserve is a bullet to the head, preferably delivered by an American serviceman.  And the Gitmo Five are not just foot soldiers in the army of Islamist savagery; they are goddamn generals.

And we traded them for Bowe Bergdahl; a deserter.  He is a man who, not so very long ago, would have faced a firing squad for desertion in the face of the enemy.  Today?  He will probably walk.

Another perspective worth reading:  Don’t Like Dealing with Terrorists? Bring Them Down.  Excerpt:

Hostage negotiations between a Western democracy and a hostile totalitarian regime lopsidedly favor the evil regime.  Its leaders do not care about human life, while ours are often driven by concern over the fate of their citizens.  You can see that in the case of Israel, which releases hundreds of terrorists for a single Israeli hostage, and you can see it in those US/Iran/Israel negotiations back in ’85:  President Reagan was very passionate about saving our hostages, as Israeli prime ministers, including Begin and Netanyahu, have been about saving theirs.

And therein lies the difference between us and them, between the civilized and the savage; we value human life, and they do not.  We build schools that these assholes would kill girls for entering.

As I said, fucking savages.

And we let them go.