Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AP) -- CIA officers are asking people to mark the 10th anniversary of the death of the first American killed in the Afghan war by donating to help the children of their fellow fallen. Since the death in 2001 of CIA officer Mike Spann, a total of 23 stars have been added to the wall at the CIA's Langley, Va., headquarters that honors CIA operatives lost. Many were killed in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

He's a gentle man, lean and soft-spoken, careful to begin his lecture with an explanation of principles like the right to counsel. The passion in Frank Lindh builds only when he describes the details of what happened to his son, John Walker Lindh, the bearded young man who was tagged as the American Taliban. In the waning days of George Bush's administration, the senior Lindh is asking the president to commute the rest of his son's 20-year sentence, now seven years along. It's almost certainly a hopeless quest. Bush is not a man prone to second-guess himself. ... In retrospect,...

The father of John Walker Lindh, who has spent nearly seven years in federal prison for serving in an Afghan army, told a room full of law students at University of San Francisco on Wednesday his son has been used as a scapegoat for the faults of the U.S. government. Frank Lindh of Marin County spoke for the fourth consecutive year about how he believes U.S. troops in northern Afghanistan in 2001 illegitimately captured his son, known as an "American Taliban," for fighting as a Taliban soldier just after the Sept. 11 attacks. Frank Lindh said he believes his son...

<p>It should be obvious, now, that the young man was a dreamer, a kid with a hole in his heart, searching, a boy trying on various costumes, poses and attitudes.</p> <p>He was looking for that place--perhaps you looked for it too, once--where he could exchange himself, and give himself up to a challenge demanding sterner stuff.</p> <p>It was about great absolutes, apparently, like it is with many intelligent kids, undisciplined, self-centered characters in their own movies, uncertain about what they might become in the future.</p> <p>Some seek to confront that ambiguity with order, finding it in the U.S. military.</p>

Frank Lindh, the gay father of John Walker Lindh, dubbed the "American Taliban" after being found in Afghanistan in late 2001, lashed out at the mainstream media and politicians on both sides of the aisle in Washington during a fiery, and at times, emotional speech before the Commonwealth Club last week. Breaking a self-imposed silence about his son's case, Lindh gave the speech in order to reach out to the American public, which he said has been brainwashed by lawmakers, government officials, and sensational news coverage into thinking his son is a traitor to his country and an ally of...

A 20-year-old American who fought with the Taliban and survived a bloody prison uprising near Mazar-i-Sharif last week has been taken into custody by U.S. special forces troops, Newsweek magazine said on its Web site on Sunday. A spokesman for U.S. Central Command, which is running the military campaign on Afghanistan , confirmed that a man claiming to be an American was in the control of U.S. military forces. ``Military forces in Afghanistan do have in their control a man who calls himself a U.S. citizen,'' Marine Maj. Brad Lowell, a Central Command spokesman, said. ``He was among the al ...