The release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in exchange for five Taliban detainees raises the question: What about Alan Gross, the State Department subcontractor who has languished nearly as long in a Cuban jail? 
 
 Don’t count me among those who pronounce with certitude on the wisdom — or folly — of the Bergdahl deal. It was an agonizingly hard call, one that requires more knowledge than is publicly available about the dangerousness of the five Taliban officials and the United States’ ability to keep tabs on them once released. 
 
 If pushed, I would come down, tentatively, against the swap. As much as I empathize with Bergdahl’s family and respect the “leave no soldier behind” ethos, I am swayed by the murky circumstances preceding his capture — was he intending to desert? — and the riskiness of the release. 
 
 What would the president say to the parents of a soldier killed in the hunt for Bergdahl — or, worse, to civilians murdered in a future terrorist plot masterminded by the detainees previously determined too dangerous to allow to leave Guantanamo? What makes that calculus suddenly safer for the United States? 
 
 But having made the Bergdahl deal, the president ought to consider: What is the justification for freeing these Taliban officials in exchange for Bergdahl and summarily rejecting the notion of a much more benign release in order to secure Gross’s release? 
 
 1 of 33 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × Taliban-held U.S. soldier released in exchange for Afghan detainees View Photos U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, the only U.S. service member known to be held hostage in Afghanistan, was handed over Saturday morning by members of the Taliban in exchange for five Afghan detainees held at the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, U.S. officials said. Caption U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was handed over May 31 by members of the Taliban. U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl is seen in this undated photo. Courtesy of Kim Harrison Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue. 
 
 To review: Gross is a civilian subcontractor for the State Department’s Agency for International Development who has been held for nearly five years in a Cuban prison. He was convicted and sentenced to 15 years for “acts against the . . . territorial integrity of the state” — bringing cellphones, personal computers and networking devices to help connect Cuba’s tiny Jewish community to the Internet as part of a democracy-promotion program. 
 
 This might have been a naive enterprise by a contractor in over his head (Gross was a fan of Cuban music, about the extent of his expertise) or more sinister than acknowledged (some of the equipment Gross was bringing to Cuba was awfully sophisticated). But it was done under the auspices of the U.S. government, in furtherance of a U.S. law, the 1996 Helms-Burton Act. 
 
 Any U.S. civilian unjustly imprisoned by another country deserves official attention. One held captive because he was working for his country demands special consideration. 
 
 The Cuban government has made clear that it is willing to negotiate Gross’s release, for an unsavory price: the release of three remaining members of the Cuban Five, intelligence officers convicted in Miami in 2001 of being foreign agents and of related offenses. The U.S. government has insisted there cannot be any linkage between Gross (not a spy) and the Cuban Five (actual spies). In earlier conversations with me, administration officials have suggested that the president’s options are also limited because the Cuban Five were duly convicted and are serving prison terms. 
 
 The president’s willingness to go to extraordinary lengths to secure Bergdahl’s freedom prompts this response to their claims of tied hands when it comes to Gross: Oh please. 
 
 First, the president wasn’t constrained by any niceties about soldier-for-soldier or spy-for-spy equivalences when it came to trading Bergdahl (soldier) for Taliban (enemy combatant). 
 
 Second, in Bergdahl’s case, Obama wasn’t stopped by the fact that a federal law requires that Congress be notified 30 days in advance about the release of any Guantanamo detainees. The president — appropriately, I believe — invoked his executive authority to act unilaterally. Surely, given that he has undoubted constitutional power to grant pardons or commute sentences, the fact that the Cuban Five have been convicted is an excuse, not a real stumbling block. 
 
 From U.S. Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl to Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit to the Cold War's "bridge of spies," here are five memorable swaps in the history of prisoner exchanges. (Jonathan Elker/The Washington Post) 
 
 Third, perhaps most important, the Cuban Five pose a distinctly smaller danger to U.S. citizens than do the freed Taliban officials. They are no heroes, as Cuba would have it; the worst of the remaining three was convicted of passing along information that resulted in the shooting down of two Brothers to the Rescue planes and the deaths of four U.S. citizens. 
 
 But their goal was to shore up the Castro regime, not to attack the United States. They have served significant sentences. Releasing them would be a political risk — sparking protests from Cuban American legislators such as Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) — not a national security one. 
 
 As with Bergdahl, Gross’s health is suffering. The 65-year-old went on a hunger strike this year and has said he cannot take captivity much longer. 
 
 Unlike with Bergdahl, Gross’s president does not seem to be moved to take the steps necessary, however distasteful, to free him. 
 
 Read more from Ruth Marcus’s archive, follow her on Twitter or subscribe to her updates on Facebook. ||||| HAVANA (AP) — The exchange of five Taliban detainees at Guantanamo for a U.S. Army soldier held captive in Afghanistan could set a precedent for a similar swap with Cuba, a Cuban intelligence agent who spent years imprisoned in the United States said Monday. 
 
 Cuban intelligence agent Fernando Gonzalez, known as one of the "Cuban Five," speaks during a press conference in Havana, Cuba, Monday, June 2, 2014. Gonzalez who spent years in jail in the United States... (Associated Press) 
 
 Cuban intelligence agent Fernando Gonzalez, known as one of the "Cuban Five," arrives for a press conference in Havana, Cuba, Monday, June 2, 2014. Gonzalez who spent years in jail in the United States... (Associated Press) 
 
 Fernando Gonzalez, who returned to the island in February after serving more than 15 years behind bars in the United States, said the deal to secure the release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl has a clear parallel to the cases of Alan Gross, a civilian U.S. government subcontractor, and three Cuban agents still imprisoned in the United States. 
 
 "It is obvious that the only thing needed is the will on the part of the U.S. government to bring about that swap or exchange," Gonzalez said in his first news conference back in Havana. "This latest development makes that clear." 
 
 U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Washington remains committed to winning release for any American citizens held overseas, but suggested that Gross' case is not comparable to that of a uniformed soldier captured in a war zone. U.S. officials have publicly been cool to the idea of a swap involving the Cuban agents for Gross. 
 
 "Nothing has changed in that case now," Psaki said. 
 
 Gross was arrested in Cuba in 2009 while working to set up hard-to-detect Internet networks for the island's tiny Jewish community as part of a U.S. government development contract. He says his actions posed no threat to the Cuban state. But Havana considers such programs to be an affront to its sovereignty, and he was sentenced to 15 years. 
 
 Havana has said repeatedly it wants to sit down with Washington to negotiate the fate of Gross and the three members of the so-called Cuban Five who remain imprisoned in the United States. The agents were arrested in 1998 and convicted on charges including espionage, although Cuba argues that they were only keeping tabs on militant exile groups blamed for terror attacks on the island. 
 
 "On this side there is nothing standing in the way" of an exchange, Gonzalez said. "On this side we have transparently and with clarity shown an intention for this situation to be resolved and for humanitarian concerns to be taken into account on both sides." 
 
 Gross, a 65-year-old Maryland native, suffers from various health problems. His U.S. lawyer said in April that he is determined to go home within the next year, either alive or dead. 
 
 Rene Gonzalez, who is not related to Fernando Gonzalez, was the first of the Cuban agents to walk free and returned to Cuba in 2013. Antonio Guerrero is the next one scheduled to be released, in 2017. 
 
 The cases of Gross and the Cuban Five have been a major sticking point for Cold War foes Havana and Washington, which have not had formal relations for more than five decades. 
 
 Bergdahl was released over the weekend after five years in Taliban captivity, stirring debate in Washington over whether the exchange could put other Americans at greater risk of being taken as bargaining chips. 
 
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 AP diplomatic writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report. 
 
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 Andrea Rodriguez on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ARodriguezAP
– Regardless of where you stand on the controversy surrounding Bowe Bergdahl's release—Ruth Marcus calls herself "tentatively against the (prisoner) swap"—it serves as an argument for aiding another captive American. Alan Gross, a state department subcontractor, has been in a Cuban prison for almost five years. The 65-year-old was imprisoned for bringing communications gear into the country "under the auspices of the US government," Marcus writes in the Washington Post. His goal was, reportedly, to link Cuban Jews to the Internet to help boost democracy. Cuban officials have suggested they'd let him go in exchange for three Cuban intelligence officers convicted in Miami of spying in 2001. But the US says it won't make a link between actual spies and Gross, who wasn't one. Marcus' response: "Oh, please." Unlike the Taliban figures released for Bergdahl, the Cuban agents—members of the so-called Cuban Five—wouldn't pose much of a national security risk to the US; the danger in releasing them is only political. () Incidentally, an already-released Cuban agent has also called for such a release following the Bergdahl exchange, the AP reports. (Click to read about another American seeking freedom abroad.)