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Not a happy case: Military Times paints a fairly damning picture of USMC Major Joshua Mast, who is pictured as adopting an Afghan baby illicitly. The article is hardly impartial, painting the Major in an extremely\u00a0 bad light, so keep that in mind while reading. In short:<\/p>\n
\nMast became enchanted with the child while on temporary assignment in Afghanistan in late 2019. Just a few months old, the infant had survived a Special Operations raid that killed her parents and five siblings, according to court records.<\/p>\n
As she recovered from injuries in a U.S. military hospital, the Afghan government and the International Committee of the Red Cross identified her relatives (Ed -The child\u2019s cousin and his wife \u2014 young newlyweds without children yet of their own) , and through meetings with the State Department, arranged for their reunification.<\/p>\n
Nonetheless, Mast \u2014 in spite of orders from military officials to stop intervening \u2014 was determined to take her home to the United States. He used his status in the military, appealed to political connections in the Trump administration and convinced the small-town Virginia court to skip some of the usual safeguards that govern international adoptions.<\/p>\n
Finally, when the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan in summer 2021, he helped the family get to the United States. After they arrived, they say, he took their baby from them at the Fort Pickett Virginia Army National Guard base. They haven\u2019t seen her since and are suing to get her back.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
This has involved the US and Afghan governments, the Red Cross, and worked its way through four different courts at various levels. The little girl is now 3 1\/2 years old.<\/p>\n
The toddler\u2019s future is now set to be decided in a sealed, secret court case in rural Virginia \u2014 in the same courthouse that granted Mast custody. The federal government has described that custody order as \u201cunlawful,\u201d \u201cimproper\u201d and \u201cdeeply flawed and incorrect\u201d because it was based on a promise that Afghanistan would waive jurisdiction over the child, which never happened.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n