No, it doesn't. What part of "From accounts thus far," are you having difficulty with?
The assumption is that having an epiphany of conscience, morals or ethics, would necessarily prevent him from abandoning his platoon nor his terms of duty ... and that there could not be any circumstances, where what he did was valid based on his own conscience, morals or ethics ...
I'm not sure if that sentence even makes any sense. Seems to be a missing word on conjunction or something. But you are correct in that there could not be any circumstances where what he did was valid based on his own conscience, morals or ethics. Whatever the reasons he may have had, his actions were invalidated when he put other people in grave danger. Whatever his conscience or morals told him to do, acceptable ethics would dictate that he be true to his word and deal with his conscience and morals in the manner in which he agreed to participate, namely, by the proper channels and behavior. He did not do that.
That's certainly a viewpoint and a belief one can have and hold, but it isn't necessarily the only one possible - not by a long shot ...
The phrase "not by a long shot" implies there are many other possibilities, certainly more than one. I can't think of a single possibility in this scenario where such a disregard for honesty and commitment which results in grave risk to others, including the deaths of others, can be justified. Can you?
I actually have fairly high degree of certainty on it ... at any rate, it was a qualified statement ...
Actually, no, it wasn't qualified. The use of "may have an interest in" certainly is the attempt at qualifying it, but threw that attempt under the bus with "
Fact is, the
only people we've heard from after the fact..." It completely precludes the possibility of any of those "only people" not having an interest at all in portraying things in a less than accurate light, and absolutely removes the possibility of any of those same people having any interesting whatsoever in portraying things accurately. It's possible, plausible, even probable that some of those people we've heard from
might have an interest in lying, but it's also possible, plausible and even probable that at least a few of them might
not have an interest in lying at all.
You may very well have a high degree of certainty, or at least a high degree of belief (see
religiosity,
pious, sanctimonious), but it's not very likely that the political goals of the Administration, and the US military, and the media, and his captors, and those he served with are all such that they would independently or collectively have an interest in misrepresenting the truth, be it the same misrepresentations or varying self-serving misrepresentations. To dismiss the possibility that someone, anyone at all, even one person whom we've heard from thus far only has an interest in accurately portraying the truth, simply because you believe otherwise, is not only the bedrock of conspiracy theory, but a whopper of a logical fallacy (I believe it, therefor it is).
