Sergeant Bergdahl is a Traitor because 'he read too much and didn’t drink enough beer'

[MADem]

48. Not if he was incompetent to serve in the first place, and that was missed both

at MEPS and in boot camp.

Then his enlistment, essentially, is null and void. It's faulty. It's a "get out for free" card as a consequence of "diminished capacity." He can't display intent to leave and never come back, because he wasn't of sufficiently sound mind to so do.

I can guarantee you they aren't going to do a show trial on this guy. He's got to meet ALL criteria to be charged as a deserter, and so long as there is any doubt as to how long he intended to be gone (he might have been on his way back to base when he was captured--that's what I'd tell him to say), or if he had capacity to form intent, that one just isn't going to fly.

If they insist it is necessary to punish him and don't just administratively discharge him, the easiest solution is to do an ART 15. CMs are judicial proceedings, "office hours" or "Captain's Masts" or Art. 15 hearings are not. They're "non-judicial" punishment. Now, the accused can refuse NJP and demand a CM--but I doubt he would. He'll pretty much know what he's getting going in, and the proceedings would be PRIVATE. No press, no nosy bystanders, it can be as private as whoever is conducting it wants it to be. He could get anything from a dismissal with or without a warning to a reduction in rank and a fine and a brief period of barracks confinement/extra duty.

He needs to be discharged, but that won't happen until he is fit for duty. That will take a while, too. He's malnourished and mentally a mess. These wingers wanting to kick him while he's down just aren't going to get their way.