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U.S. Army charges Private Travis King with desertion over dash into North Korea

46 Comments
By Phil Stewart

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46 Comments
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Good job.

-2 ( +11 / -13 )

Military doesnt take kindly to people walking off the job.

17 ( +19 / -2 )

"The man I raised, the man I dropped off at boot camp, the man who spent the holidays with me before deploying did not drink," King's mother, Claudine Gates, said. 

Even teetotalers can desert their assignments, assault others, and solicit child pornography.

7 ( +11 / -4 )

Regardless of what really went down (sounds like he wasn't cut out for military service and had a meltdown...or had a superior he couldn't get along with), from here on out the US Army has a firmer control over the narrative and will likely largely determine the image the public has of him

4 ( +10 / -6 )

You know you're messed up when even North Korea doesn't want you.

18 ( +21 / -3 )

It just shows how incompetent the military is,

I think the true word is "desperate" not incompetent. The government and military are run by lying, corrupt, greedy warmongers who don't give an actual damn for their lives or anyone else's. Only the desperate and the foolish/deeply brainwashed sign up for the U.S. military, and that goes double for a Black person joining or even Asian or Native American. The U.S. government and military has been horrible to non-Whites and its contrition for the past has been empty tokens only.

People are wising up, as Mohammad Ali was wise when he refused the draft fo Vietnam. The U.S. imperial war gang is desperate for recruits, and so they take the incompetents out of desperation.

-16 ( +6 / -22 )

You know you're messed up when even North Korea doesn't want you.

A dumb thing to say. North Korea hardly has an open border policy or anything remotely like one.

Please employ logic centers before posting if you can muster it.

-18 ( +3 / -21 )

His mother’s words sound sincere. I believe her saying she knows her son as a mother. There maybe a setup. I hope the truth comes out.

-13 ( +3 / -16 )

JohnToday 01:45 pm JST

His mother’s words sound sincere. I believe her saying she knows her son as a mother. There maybe a setup. I hope the truth comes out.

You don't think 99% of criminals can get a positive statement out of their mothers?

11 ( +17 / -6 )

we need s court case to identify who or what he was a victim of.

-2 ( +4 / -6 )

A dumb thing to say. North Korea hardly has an open border policy or anything remotely like one.

They kept Jenkins for 40+ years.

2 ( +8 / -6 )

we need s court case to identify who or what he was a victim of.

Ahh the GOP, permanent self-victims.

2 ( +9 / -7 )

I hope he can redeem himself. Still very young.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

Lock him up.

-8 ( +2 / -10 )

Keepyer InternetpointsToday  01:41 pm JST

You know you're messed up when even North Korea doesn't want you.

A dumb thing to say. North Korea hardly has an open border policy or anything remotely like one.

Please employ logic centers before posting if you can muster it.

What do borders have to do with anything??!! Over 20 Americans have been held hostage by North Korea as bargaining chips often for extended time and in most cases, they entered North Korea illegally by themselves.

In this case, King was even utterly useless as a bargaining chip.

Your post was dumb and you need to employ your own logic if you can muster it which I doubt.

7 ( +9 / -2 )

His mother’s words sound sincere. I believe her saying she knows her son as a mother.

Words never uttered by any mother: "Oh my son is guilty of all charges and should be tossed in jail for the rest of his natural life!"

Dont be so naive and gullible!

5 ( +7 / -2 )

Ahh the GOP, permanent self-victims.

Come on, he is clearly the victim here.

-11 ( +3 / -14 )

In a statement provided by a family spokesperson, King's mother, Claudine Gates, expressed her unconditional love and asked that her son "be afforded the presumption of innocence."

Mom being Mom, and I feel for her, but I also think someone should educate her too about the fact that her son is going to probably go on trial in a military court and there is no presumption of innocence.

This may never even make it to trial, but with the lawyer he has, I am guessing he wants a trial where he can get a lot of free publicity.

He's obviously guilty of desertion, which in war time, just stating a fact, is punishable by death, not that he is going to get the death penalty, but it is a serious charge, and there is no way he is going to walk out a free man, not for at least a couple of decades, if not more, pending the outcome of the other charges!

5 ( +7 / -2 )

Military doesnt take kindly to people walking off the job.

Needless to say he will face harsh punishment

4 ( +4 / -0 )

He probably just wanted out (of the US Army), but just wasn't smart enough to find a plausible exit; the long and winding road through North Korea wasn't the way.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Time for the US Army to take out the trash.

0 ( +3 / -3 )

Think it was bad being Active Duty in Korea ? (supposed to be a CAKE Assignment, from all the people I have spoken to over the past several years)

....Just wait 'til you get to the BRIG....you're going to LOVE it.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Oh...and he's VERY LUCKY he didn't get SHOT by the North Koreans when he pulled this stunt.

Quite surprising indeed.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

He was being sent to the US to face a pending criminal matter. If that were a civilian he would not have been free to leave an airport. Next time put the guy on an C-130.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Well, the US got him back... Now the US military can finish giving him his dishonorable discharge, and penalties for whatever they had on him. There are others in the US military station in SK who never would try to do what he did, so something is wrong with him.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

His new address is likely to be Fort Leavenworth, KS. His Court Martial will be conducted professionally IAW the UCMJ and it will be fair. His problem is that the facts will support the charge of desertion and numerous lesser charges. I suspect he's looking at no less than 25 years of hard labor and a dishonorable discharge.

0 ( +4 / -4 )

I don't think he will get more than five years imprisonment.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

It all goes to the state of mind when he fled to NK.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

I don't think he will get more than five years imprisonment.

What he did was an act of treason and then on top of that having a record of numerous charges and failing to follow commend, I think he will get more than 5 years. I don't have any sympathy for this guy, don't vare the reason that was an idiotic thing to do.

He should pay.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

They kept Jenkins for 40+ years.

You are constantly playing insane mix and match games with people's words.

Charles Jenkins was one man. Allowing one man to stay does NOT prove an open border policy. Edward Snowden is allowed to stay in Russia. Does this mean Russia has an open border policy? Of course it damn well doesn't!

Please employ logic centers before posting if you can muster it. Your logic failures are as tired as they are easy to avoid.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

What do borders have to do with anything??!!

When one says "even X doesn't want you" the meaning is clear that almost anybody will be taken in and accepted. That is indication of an open border policy.

Well 20 U.S. soldiers are NOT just anybody. This is a finite number of people with specialized training and information. One man out of 20 is not nearly exceptional enough for your statement to make any sense.

In this case, King was even utterly useless as a bargaining chip.

LOL! You don't know if he was or he wasn't! You think the news prints everything just to keep you informed?? You think the government tells the press everything??

Get real.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

His release by North Korea in September followed weeks of behind-the-scenes negotiations that led the Swedish government to retrieve King in North Korea and bring him across the border into China for a handoff to the U.S. ambassador.

They should have kept him, he sounds like a real keeper...

3 ( +3 / -0 )

You have to be a real screw up to only be an E-2 after two years.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

YubaruOct. 20  12:57 pm JST

Military doesnt take kindly to people walking off the job.

Never. I knew a few who did and the repercussions are harsh.

> Asiaman7Oct. 20  01:13 pm JST

"The man I raised, the man I dropped off at boot camp, the man who spent the holidays with me before deploying did not drink," King's mother, Claudine Gates, said. 

Even teetotalers can desert their assignments, assault others, and solicit child pornography.

Desertion is a no-no in the UCMJ. Assaulting other people (and hate crimes, he lipped off about Koreans and he was jailed by local Korean authorities) make a bad representation of the US military and Americans in general. And kiddie porn is verboten practically everywhere. No bones about it.

konjo4uOct. 20  07:54 pm JST

He was being sent to the US to face a pending criminal matter. If that were a civilian he would not have been free to leave an airport. Next time put the guy on an C-130.

He already had been court-martialed and sentenced to be discharged, dishonorable or at least Bad Conduct. That was written in stone. He defected figuring 'what did he have to lose'? Well guess what? NK didn't want him so he's going to have to face the consequences of his actions. He did this to himself.

HonestDictatorOct. 20  08:00 pm JST

Well, the US got him back... Now the US military can finish giving him his dishonorable discharge, and penalties for whatever they had on him. There are others in the US military station in SK who never would try to do what he did, so something is wrong with him.

Yes there is. He's immature and irresponsible.

bass4funkOct. 20  08:43 pm JST

His new address is likely to be Fort Leavenworth, KS. His Court Martial will be conducted professionally IAW the UCMJ and it will be fair. His problem is that the facts will support the charge of desertion and numerous lesser charges. I suspect he's looking at no less than 25 years of hard labor and a dishonorable discharge.

Fort Leavenworth for sure. His court-martial is already a done deal, he was set to go the pen and then get the boot. You could wonder why the Army is even bothering with another court-martial over a new charge like desertion but then again, that would probably add more years in the Federal can on top of what was already sentenced to him before he pulled little DMZ-crossing stunt.

He thought he'd get away from his justice by rushing into Kimmy's Commie land. He guessed wrong.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Keepyer InternetpointsOct. 20 09:29 pm JST

Charles Jenkins was one man. Allowing one man to stay does NOT prove an open border policy. Edward Snowden is allowed to stay in Russia. Does this mean Russia has an open border policy? Of course it damn well doesn't!

Torturing people to the point where they don't even remember their earlier lives is not exactly "allowing" people to stay. And it IS an open border policy for Americans when both NK and Russia have a policy of vacuuming up everyone they can get their hands on for torture and bargaining.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

He made his choice. He is of little use to the USA. Don't know what to do with him. Ship him somewhere else, a place of his selection and have him agree to give up his citizenship, never to return.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

"The man I raised, the man I dropped off at boot camp, the man who spent the holidays with me before deploying did not drink," King's mother, Claudine Gates, said. 

Even teetotalers can desert their assignments, assault others, and solicit child pornography.

I was going to say he wouldn't be the first mild mannered momma's boy to join the military and, um, grow up fast.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

He already had been court-martialed and sentenced to be discharged, dishonorable or at least Bad Conduct. That was written in stone. 

So the term "dishonorable discharge" is obsolete, replaced by the term "bad conduct discharge" or BCD. It is the equivalent of a felony conviction and whether you believe it or not is not something the military likes to subject their members to. It destroys the rest of their lives. More often than not the military would rather offer the member a General Discharge and ask them to just go away. That hasn't always worked out either as former service members so discharged sometimes return to civilian life and commit more crimes when they probably should have been given time in the brig and a BCD.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

What he did was an act of treason 

Not true. Please read Article III, Section 3 of the US Constitution. Treason is the only crime defined by the Constitution. It is defined extremely narrowly so some future authoritarian could not charge political opposition as treason.

Section 3 Treason

Clause 1 Meaning

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

Clause 2 Punishment

The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

I think the true word is "desperate" not incompetent. The government and military are run by lying, corrupt, greedy warmongers who don't give an actual damn for their lives or anyone else's. Only the desperate and the foolish/deeply brainwashed sign up for the U.S. military, and that goes double for a Black person joining or even Asian or Native American. The U.S. government and military has been horrible to non-Whites and its contrition for the past has been empty tokens only.

Sigh. Only someone who never themselves served in the US military could write something like that. It is the place where I learned that if you take care of your people they will take care of you, something you seldom see in private enterprise. Retaining good people is one of the most important things the US military leadership does. It is also one of the few places that takes people from all walks of life and molds them into a team teaching them both technical skills and life skills they will take with them the rest of their lives.

0 ( +3 / -3 )

Treason for reasons whats believing we will never know! Theres two side to a story lets hear his side also.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

He committed mutiny.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

Let's not forget that anyone under 18 is considered a child. With him being a private (E1?, age 18/19), he might have asked his girlfriend (age 17) for a nude or partially nude photo. Let's get all the details and let the jury decide, not the media or social media.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Not saying legal or not (not familiar enough with American laws), just saying a possible mitigation.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Desert Tortoise knows what he’s talking about. If you haven’t been in the military, you really don’t understand how the system works. It builds character and enlisted people can succeed even after a minor USMJ Article 15 early in their career.

The mettle of the person is if they learn from it and change. The officer ranks are harder, since everyone has to walk on water now.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

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