An article in the Washington Examiner reported this week that Military Commanders in Afghanistan have ordered our armed forces serving there to “catch and release” hundreds of captured Taliban fighters.

The Examiner reports that the rules of engagement now imposed on our young men and women serving in Afghanistan require them to release hundreds of enemy combatants captured in battle. Over 700 Taliban and other terrorists have been released in recent days and that doesn’t begin to scratch the surface of the extent to which the policy is spreading across the country.

This order comes on the heals of the Karzai government initiating an amnesty program for Taliban fighters who voluntarily surrender their arms to the government. In the midst of this program U.S. forces are finding that Taliban soldiers who are captured in battle are now demanding that they be allowed to voluntarily surrender and receive amnesty, even though they were taken prisoner in combat operations while fighting Americans or NATO forces. Our troops have been ordered to release hundreds of them.

How could our government do this to our young men and women fighting to protect us? How could they put them in such a dangerous position? The normal rules of engagement in Afghanistan are bad enough. Those rules severely limit the circumstances under which our forces can attack or fight the enemy. Those rules have significantly contributed to the dramatic increase in U.S. casualties. This new one makes a bad situation worse.

The article reports that most of these prisoners of war are being released because someone paid a bribe to Hamid Karzai’s government to buy their freedom. Many others are released because their village elders are friendly to the Taliban.

Last week, in my home town, Army Sgt. David Luff Jr. was buried in Hamilton, Ohio. He was killed while serving in Afghanistan. He and hundreds of thousands of others like him who answer the call of duty should not have to worry about rules of engagement that increase their risk of death or being wounded.

These rules put every son and daughter serving in the Afghanistan war zone at greater risk. Imagine someone suggesting such an insane practice during World War II. At minimum they would have jailed and they may have even been shot as a traitor.

I cannot imagine being a parent of a son or daughter serving in Afghanistan knowing that their children are ordered not to shoot at the enemy unless the enemy shoots first or aims a gun at them and being required to release enemy prisoners that they know will be back on the battlefield as soon as they are released trying to kill them another day. This is asking too much.

We owe it to our forces to give them everything they need to defeat the enemy in battle, win the war and keep our service men and women alive to return home to their loved ones. If we cannot let our fighting men and women do everything they need to do to win the war and stay safe then we should not send them into battle to begin with.

Thank God there are those who do answer the call of duty, those who are willing to serve under the most difficult of circumstances. We are all deeply indebted to them. Our hearts go out to Army Sgt. David J. Luff Jr. his family, and others like him. We are safer because of their service and sacrifice.

A report released by the National Director of Intelligence on former Guantanamo prisoners this week concluded that of those released from captivity 25% have been documented returning to the battlefield against America.

This number does not count those who after release join militant movements to inflame Islamist believers against the West and encourage their comrades to join the war against America. How many of those caught and released in battle in Afghanistan do you think go back to killing Americans?

It’s just wrong that while our young men and women suffer injuries and death in combat every day all over the world that our government imposes policies and orders that give the enemy even more chances to kill them. There is no room for political correctness in war. Maybe if we write our Congressman, Senators, and contact the White House we can help change this dumb and dangerous policy.


Michael A. Fox