Full circle – Johnny “Mike” Spann’s daughter, the Bergdahl swap, and an Afghan warlord

Full circle – Johnny “Mike” Spann’s daughter, the Bergdahl swap, and an Afghan warlord

The other day we noted how the father of Johnny “Mike” Spann reacted with dismay to the Taliban-Bowe Bergdahl swap.

Mike Spann, a CIA officer and former Marine, was the first American killed in the Afghanistan war, during an uprising of prisoners in Northern Afghanistan. We have covered the story many times over the years. It is one of heroism, of small groups of special forces and CIA officers who operated in conjunction with Northern Afghanistan ethnic warlords to rout the Taliban long before there was a sizable U.S. ground presence.

One of those warlords was Uzbek General Abdul Rashid Dostum, who wrote a memorial to Spann and erected a monument (featured image). General Dostum is back in the news as he’s running for Vice President of Afghanistan [the runoff election is today], and as ethnic warlords once again are seen as the key to fighting the Taliban as the U.S. winds down. Oh, and General Dostum is on Twitter.

The uprising that led to Spann’s death included not only so-called American Taliban John Walker Lindh (now in prison in the U.S.), but also one of the 5 Taliban leaders exchanged for Bergdahl.

We’ve previously featured Spann’s daughter Alison, and all her great accomplishments.

Alison was recently interviewed on Fox News (via Instapundit) and echoed her grandfather’s dismay at the swap:

Alison Spann was just 9 when she learned her father, a U.S. Marine turned CIA operative, had become the first American killed in the war in Afghanistan. Thirteen years later, she found out her country had freed the Taliban leader behind his death.

… But nothing prepared Alison Spann for news that Mullah Mohammad Fazi, the unquestioned leader of the prisoners at the compound where her father was killed, had been traded along with four cohorts held at Guantanamo Bay for U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who had been held by the Taliban for nearly five years.

“My initial reaction was shock. I was shocked that our president would release five of the most high-risk prisoners being held in Guantanamo in exchange for one American,” she told FoxNews.com. “As a whole, my family was extremely upset and saddened that our government would do something like this, especially in light of the fact that it seems that people in the intelligence community are fairly united in their belief that these terrorists are likely to seek to further harm Americans in the future.”

The Taliban is back in the news, as are the warlords. And so is Mike Spann’s family.

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