The Cellar - Quick, everyone change positions.

He's a hero
He's not a hero
He's a murderer
He's a hero

Oh, the complexities of war.

The government keeps changing its position. What say the governed?

Quote:

Trump says he’ll review case of Matt Golsteyn, a Special Forces veteran who faces murder charge

… President Trump tweeted Sunday … “At the request of many, I will be reviewing the case of a ‘U.S. Military hero,’ Major Matt Golsteyn, who is charged with murder,” Trump tweeted. “He could face the death penalty from our own government after he admitted to killing a Terrorist bomb maker while overseas.”

Former Army Maj. Mathew L. Golsteyn was notified Thursday by the Army that he will face one charge of murder, his attorney and the Army said. The military has been investigating him since 2011, when Army officials said he confessed during a polygraph test as part of a CIA job interview to killing the suspected bombmaker in February 2010. …

… The service dropped its investigation in 2014 but reopened it in 2016, after Golsteyn said during a Fox News interview that he had killed a bombmaker who had been held as a detainee for fear that he would target Afghans helping U.S. troops if he were let go.

Golsteyn, a 2002 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., was lauded for his performance in Afghanistan as the commander of a team from 3rd Special Forces Group in the Battle of Marja. Some 15,000 coalition troops fought to take back a poppy-laden section of Helmand province that was controlled by the Taliban and laced with explosives.

On Feb. 20, 2010, Golsteyn repeatedly braved enemy fire after watching a Taliban sniper nearly hit a nearby Marine, launching a mission to kill the insurgent and coordinating numerous airstrikes, according to a military summary of his actions. He was later awarded the Silver Star for valor, and the Army was considering upgrading the award to the Distinguished Service Cross — one step down from the Medal of Honor — when the allegations against Golsteyn emerged.

The accusations center on actions two days earlier. Two Marines — Sgt. Jeremy R. McQueary, 27, and Lance Cpl. Larry M. Johnson, 19 — were killed and others were wounded by a garage door booby-trapped with explosives, prompting a search of nearby homes in which Golsteyn’s unit found bomb-making materials and a suspected bombmaker, according to results of an investigation released to The Washington Post through the Freedom of Information Act in 2015.

Golsteyn later recounted during his CIA job interview that the U.S. troops detained the man and brought him back to their base, who unexpectedly crossed paths with an Afghan tribal leader with whom Golsteyn’s team was working. When the leader expressed fear for his life, Golsteyn said he grew concerned about the consequences of letting the suspected insurgent go, Army documents said.

“CPT Golsteyn stated he had no qualms about what he did because he couldn’t have lived with himself if [the suspected bombmaker] killed another Soldier or Marine,” an Army investigator’s summary of Golsteyn’s polygraph test said.

The Army dropped Golsteyn from the Special Forces in 2015 and stripped him of the Silver Star, but ultimately dropped the criminal investigation against him and let him leave the service with military benefits. The service accused him in a June 2015 administrative hearing of violating the law of armed conflict, but a panel of officers determined that was unsubstantiated. It instead recommended separating him from the military for conduct unbecoming an officer with a general discharge under honorable conditions. ...