Well, I have read Luttrell's book, was in Afghanistan at the time, played a very small role in his recovery and have read most of the AAR's, etc. That said, the events that day cannot be singly traced to the decision to let the goatherders go - there were other factors at play which I won't get into. The point being, it wasn't ultimately a simplistic question of "kill the civilians, save the Americans" vs "let the civilians go, let the Americans die." What happened with Operation Redwing was a wake-up call to many and served as the catalyst for a variety of changes at various levels of command. And so I agree completely with the others in here who warn of monday morning QB'ing that one decision and the danger of what amounts to murdering unarmed civilians. Besides the legal and ethical considerations, there are practical ones as well including ramifications. For example, would the friendly villagers have taken Luttrell in, protected him, and contacted US forces for him had he killed the civilians? Probably not.

BTW, Luttrell's target, Mullah Ismail, aka Mullah Ahmad Shah, was killed in Pakistan about two weeks ago when he tried to run a Pakistani Police checkpoint in the NWFP after kidnapping some poor Afghan refugee.