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America watched with a mix of joy and frustration last week when WNBA star Brittney Griner was exchanged for Russian terrorist Viktor Bout, AKA “The Merchant of Death.”
The joy was expressed by the many people who felt Griner had been unjustly imprisoned for almost a year in Russia.
Frustration was expressed by many who were upset that Griner had been exchanged for a convicted terrorist while a former marine Paul Whelan, who has incarcerated in Russia for over four years, was left behind.
For Brittney Griner, at least, her journey back to a normal life has only just begun.
ESPN reported on Monday that for the first time in 10 months, Griner was back on a basketball court.
Griner is still at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio — where she was taken after her release from a Russian prison last week — with no immediate plans to leave, Lindsay Kagawa Colas said. And despite the light workout, she said, the 32-year-old Griner isn’t ready to say when or if she plans to return to her WNBA career with the Phoenix Mercury.
“If she wants to play, it will be for her to share. She has the holidays to rest and decide what’s next without any pressure,” Colas said. “She’s doing really, really well. She seems to have endured this in pretty incredible ways.”
Someone who is familiar with what it is like to return from being held captive in a foreign country is Jessica Buchanan.
A decade ago, Buchanan was held hostage by Somalian pirates for 93 days before being rescued by Navy SEALs.
Speaking to the Washington Post, she explained, “When you’re watching these things play out and time drags on, you know exactly how that feels,” adding, “what happens is everyone thinks that everything’s going to be fine from now on, because you got through it; you survived. It’s the honeymoon phase. What sets in is what I call ‘surviving survival.’”
Meanwhile in Russia, “The Merchant of Death” Viktor Bout is already getting back to his life – one involving a Russian extremist group called the Kremlin-loyal ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR), according to Reuters.
The LDPR promotes a ultranationalist ideology which advocates monarchism and demands Russia conquer and reclaim the countries of the former Soviet Union such as what has been happening with Ukraine.