Several Republicans have spoken out against the deal, warning that it set a worrying precedent and amounted to negotiating with terrorists.The thing is, if they didn't make the deal, and it got out, you just know - I mean really know - that the republicans would've come out swinging at the administration for "abandoning" a soldier to the enemy.
Mr McCain said the Taliban released were "possibly responsible for the deaths of thousands" and may have "the ability to re-enter the fight", in comments to CBS TV.
Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee, Mike Rogers, told CNN that Washington had "now set a price" for al-Qaeda ransom threats.
Chuck Hagel: "No shots were fired - it went as well as it could have"
Questions were raised over the legality of the deal, after the Obama administration did not give Congress sufficient notice about the transfer of the Taliban detainees.
But US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel, who is currently in Afghanistan, dismissed the criticism saying the military had to act quickly "to essentially save his life".
"We didn't negotiate with terrorists. Sergeant Bergdahl was a prisoner of war. That's a normal process in getting your prisoners back," he told NBC TV.
US National Security Adviser Susan Rice said Sgt Bergdahl's failing health had created an "acute urgency", making it "necessary and appropriate" not to adhere to the 30-day notification requirement.
Meanwhile, Whiny McBitchypants, AKA Hamid Karzai, is whining up a storm that he was cut out the dealmaking over the prisoner exchange, which likely contributed to its success.
The Afghan president is angry at being kept in the dark over a deal to free five Taliban leaders in exchange for a captured U.S. soldier, and accuses Washington of failing to back a peace plan for the war-torn country, a senior source said on Monday.
The five prisoners were flown to Qatar on Sunday as part of a secret agreement to release Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, who left Afghanistan for Germany on the same day.
The only known U.S. prisoner of war in Afghanistan, Bergdahl had been held captive for five years.
"The president is now even more distrustful of U.S. intentions in the country," said the source at President Hamid Karzai's palace in Kabul, who declined to be identified.
"He is asking: How come the prisoner exchange worked out so well, when the Afghan peace process failed to make any significant progress?"
Maybe if he hadn't been an obstructionist asshole for 10 years, we'd be more willing to work with him.
Maybe if he hadn't torpedoed the peace process several times...
Maybe if he hadn't used NATO troops as his personal hit squad.
Maybe if he hadn't objected to the successful village defense forces program.
Perhaps if he hadn't stifled free political speech that was publicly encouraging him to do something he was going to do anyway.
Or if he hadn't bragged openly about how he "stuck it" to the US on a security deal.
Or was insulting us as we're trying to save his country.
It's not like he's got a great track record of not being a dick.
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Is there any way we can give that Karzai asshole back? Would anyone actually take him?
Longest damn war we've ever fought and pretty much the entire time we've had to put up with him.
"The thing is, if they didn't make the deal, and it got out, you just know - I mean really know - that the republicans would've come out swinging at the administration for "abandoning" a soldier to the enemy."
Where exactly has any republican or anybody else been complaining about Obama abandoning not doing him PRIOR to this happening? Besides the fact that Obama broke the law in not giving Congress notice.
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