Ziemba: How to treat a traitor

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January 31, 2006

By Craig Ziemba / columnist The Meridian Star Tue Jan 31, 2006, 10:09 AM CST

In a prime example of not leaving well enough alone, the father of John Walker Lindh has now publicly asked President Bush to grant his son clemency.

John Walker, you may recall, was the American citizen captured while fighting alongside Taliban forces against our troops in Afghanistan.

Rather than taking a bullet to the chest or being beheaded (as Islamic jihadists do when they capture Westerners), John Walker Lindh plea bargained a sentence of 20 years in a medium-security prison. Now his father says that sentence was too harsh.

In a speech to the Commonwealth Club last week, Frank Lindh talked of his son's conversion to Islam and journey that led him to Yemen, Pakistan and eventually to Osama Bin Laden's band of merry men. While choking back tears, he said, “In simple terms, this is the story of a decent and honorable young man embarking on a spiritual quest.” He also showed baby pictures of his boy, said he was proud of him, and asserted that he did no wrong. Frank Lindh furthermore complained that the American troops who captured his son treated him badly by cuffing him with plastic ties and leaving him stripped naked with all of the other Taliban prisoners.

I seriously doubt that another father named Johnny Spann was moved. His son Michael was a Central Intelligence Agency officer who was killed by Taliban prisoners during the uprising at Mazar-e-Sharif shortly after interviewing the Taliban traitor John Walker Lindh. That deadly revolt was the reason prisoners had to be strip-searched and restrained.

The difference between Michael Spann and John Walker Lindh couldn't be more dramatic. One loved America enough to travel halfway around the world to give his life in her defense while the other hated our country and our way of life so much that he wound up on the same battlefield working with those who declared holy war against the United States.

Contrary to Frank Lindh's recent assertions, our constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion doesn't include the right to bear arms against your countrymen in war. If some jihad-preaching cleric promised John Walker Lindh 72 virgins in paradise for killing Americans, he shouldn't try to hide behind his American citizenship when it didn't work out.

Decisions have consequences. John Walker Lindh made his choice when he became an enemy combatant, and he should stick with it. If he feels Allah is calling him to fight with those who have vowed to destroy America, then perhaps he should ask Allah - and not President Bush - for help.

Those who hate America's freedom, democracy and Judeo-Christian heritage are free to leave. But I suggest that those who join the battle against our troops not ask for mercy when they lose.

Breathes there the man with soul so dead

Who never to himself hath said,

This is my own, my native land S

If such there breathe, go, mark him well

For him no minstrel raptures swell S

Living shall forfeit fair renown,

And, doubly dying, shall go down

To the vile dust from whence he sprung,

Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.

- Sir Walter Scott

Craig Ziemba is a military pilot who lives in Meridian. His second book will be available next month at Meridian Bible Bookstores.

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