John Walker Lindh the "American Taliban" struck a deal with the government and received a 20 year sentence. Was that fair? Was he "brainwashed"? What do you think should have happened to Lindh? Life in prison, or some consideration as a kind of "cult member" that was somehow manipulated through undue influence? Was he a fanatic and terrorist or a brainwashed cultist?

I think he joined Islam of his own free will. Jihad is a central belief in Islam although he took it to mean overthrowing America.
Personally, I think a just punishment might have been to deport him to a Moslem county (of course, then he might have done more terroristic activities but I don't think so - I think he'd flounder overseas).

I think, judging from what I read about him that he was searching for spiritual truth. He got in with the wrong people, was moved out of his homeland and environment and without his realizing it was not brainwashed, but put under mind control.

I do not think that he intended to become what he ended up becoming. He did not start out with any intention of the sort. Therefore, when A goes to C, one must find out what "B" is. I think for John, it was not something that he intended to do, but something he got into without enough information to make an informed choice.

John Walker Lindh was a traitor to America. He deserved a far worse punishment than what he's getting now.

He was a traitor. Nothing more. Don't glorify him by saying he was searching for anything spiritual. He's evil, and a traitor. He should have gotten the death penalty.

"was not brainwashed, but put under mind control"

please define the difference you give to these, to my mind, pretty much identical, concepts.

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rrmoderator
Was he a fanatic and terrorist or a brainwashed cultist?

He seemed to smoke a lot of hashish.

I'm amazed about the general ignorance here concerning John Walker Lindh. 'Apparently he smoked a lot of hashish'... huh? Let's get a couple of facts straight. JWL's family situation was unusual, he was a bright but shy kid, and he was drawn to religion (in his case, Islam) as a teenager. In this sense he was a typical drifting youth on a voyage of 'self discovery', and thus vulnerable to questionable influences in the same manner.

Some (but not all) of these influences were no doubt of the extremist, cultic variety, and the latter may have got the upper hand once he was studying in the madrassas of Yemen. What is certain however is that the focus of the cult JWL fell in with was myopically obsessed with puritanical Islamist orthodoxy, rather than 'war with America'. Thus at some point in the late 1990s, he volunteered to go fight for the Taleban in Afghanistan's civil war against the (then) 'Northern Alliance'. It is important to realise that at this time, there were NO hostilities between the US and any of the various murderous factions within Afghanistan (with the exception of Bin Laden's tiny group, who were all foreigners). Indeed, the CIA had in fact happily assisted all of the above in rocketing the country back to the Stone Age, during the halcyon days of their 1980s proxy war against the Soviets. (Remember that old 1980s Rambo film where those cute proto-Talebans were portrayed as freedom loving 'good guys', huh? Of course, maybe JWL watched it too.) So, at the very moment when JWL crossed the border from Pakistan and first took up an AK47, the Clinton administration was cosied up back in the US of A with a Taleban delegation regarding the construction of a major oil pipeline through central Asia (this jolly party being discontinued only when US womens' organisations got wind about it and expressed their outrage). So much for JWL's 'treachery' so far, guys!

According to JWL's testimony, he certainly encountered the al Qaida cult while he was in Afghanistan and was even cajoled to 'get involved', but it is also quite evident that he declined. His enthusiasm remained fixed on the Taleban's austere vision for Afghan society. Even in this role, nonetheless, it is evident that he was only a footsoldier; he held no position of rank. Had he been left to his own devices, therefore, it is quite probable that in time he would have become disillusioned with extremist utopianism and drifted back to the United States. Unfortunately for him, however, his world blew apart on the 11th of September, 2001. Before he could get a proper handle on the situation (note: in a closed society with next to zero communication technology), the Taleban's Northern Alliance enemies fell into league with his own countrymen, and attacked the squalid regime he had given his all to defend. As it happened he never fired a shot against US troops, and was initially captured and imprisoned by the Northern Alliance. In the wake of an abortive jail rebellion and massacre where the Northern Alliance called up US support (during which JWL simply cowered in his cell), he was finally exposed to the sensation hungry media as the 'American Taleban'.

So let's get real about JWL the 'traitor'. Such emotive, irrational labels serve no logical purpose whatsoever. JWL was simply a drifting, aimless youth who got involved in a fringe religious/ political cult and found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time - period. This cult (the Taleban) was, in fact, either on friendly terms with, or ignored by, the US administration right up until the al Qaida (note: not Taleban) attack on New York forced a sudden re-alignment. Given the rapid sequence of events and JWL's social and physical isolation in the backwoods of beyond, to expect him to do anything other than what he did under the circumstances is totally unreasonable. He was captured early on in the conflict, and never fired a shot against US troops. He avoided the 'opportunity' of involvement with al Qaida. These are indisputable facts. To bay for his blood as a 'traitor' is not only unjust and absurd, but it also echoes the howls of yet another closed cult tripped out on power and doctrinal inflexibility... and I'll leave you to work out which one that is.