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John Ripley is a former journalist and a retired U.S. Navy public affairs officer. He lives in South Portland.
Imagine a nation’s president, blinded by perceived grievances, freeing dozens of criminals who had committed murderous crimes against not only his own citizenry, but the very foundation of his government’s reason for existing.
Consider cases like: Habibulla Abdul Hady, a member of the Taliban, who placed improvised explosive devices (IEDs) used in attacks against allied forces in Kandahar. Mohammaed Saqiq, a Taliban sub-commander who also placed IEDs used to kill members of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) and the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). Or Nek Mohammad, an expert in rocket attacks and money transfers, allegedly responsible for untold deaths.
These guys are a sampling of the more than 65 terrorists, identified by allied intelligence and confirmed through biometric evidence, who killed not only Western forces but their fellow Afghans during the 20-year war there, and who were sent home from prison by Afghan President Hamid Karzai, to carry on their campaigns of terror in 2013-2014.
These were not peaceful protestors.
They killed Americans.
They slaughtered their own.
They tried to smother a Republic in its infancy; in the end, they succeeded.
If that story echoes for you, it did for me as well when President Donald Trump recently pardoned those who attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
As a U.S. Navy public affairs officer assigned to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from 2013-2014, I played a small role in trying to inform the world media that the Afghan president, Karzai, was planning to open the prison gates and let these terrorists back onto the streets.
Of course, it didn’t matter because a Republic is only as strong as its public.
Like Karzai’s jail break, the release of the U.S. Jan. 6 insurrectionists ultimately thumped impotently against a hollow wall of moral indifference.
War is the agonizing and humbling reminder that enemies are rarely bested and that allies are seldom trusted.
For the United States, despite the sentiment literally being in our charter, we still often struggle to define the difference between enemies foreign or domestic.
I clearly remember watching a live drone feed in 2014 of the Taliban attempting to overrun a local election office.
From the relative safety of my desk in Kabul I watched Afghans shooting Afghans at the local Election Office, one challenging the other’s new right to hold a free, fair, and open election. During that season, thousands of Afghans, their index fingers proudly stained with purple ink to prove they voted, were dismissively slaughtered.
They died doing something Americans would do on their lunchbreak — before grabbing a sandwich and heading back to work.
Back then, I was curious how such a thing could happen, even in an ancient civilization still finding its way as a youthful Republic.
Back then, with some level of arrogance, I felt grateful that’d never happen in my country, a youthful civilization but an established Republic.
I was so naïve.
Like the 60-plus Taliban set free by President Karzai, many of those who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 also are now on the streets, rebranded from traitors to freedom fighters.
They include people like:
Kelly Meggs: Convicted of seditious conspiracy, obstructing an official proceeding, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, conspiracy to prevent an officer from discharging their duties, and tampering with documents. Sentenced to 12 years in prison.
Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the far-right Proud Boys, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to 22 years in prison.
Devlyn Thompson, who hit a police officer with a metal baton, and Robert Palmer, a Florida man who attacked police with a fire extinguisher, a wooden plank and a pole.
I’m sure there are debatable differences between President Karzai’s release of Taliban terrorists and President Trump’s pardon and release of our American insurrectionists, but, at the moment, all I can see is a lesson not yet learned.
When I consider both groups, I think: These weren’t peaceful protestors. They killed Americans. They slaughtered their own.
Like their Taliban compatriots, the Jan. 6 insurrectionists tried to smother a Republic; whether they succeed is up to us.
