Marine officer who blasted top military leaders over Afghanistan failures is being released from jail

• A Marine officer who bashed senior military leaders over Afghanistan is being released from the brig.
• Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller Jr. was a battalion commander who was relieved of his command and jailed after several social media posts.
• He was released from confinement pending court martial, Insider learned.

A Marine officer who was jailed after he publicly criticized senior military leaders in a social media video over failures in Afghanistan is being released, according to the Marine Corps.

"Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller Jr. is being released from confinement today, Oct. 5, 2021, as a result of a mutual agreement between Lt. Col. Scheller, his defense counsel, and the commanding general, training command," Marine Corps Training and Education Command said in a statement.

A person familiar with the situation told Insider that prior to a hearing originally scheduled for Tuesday afternoon that has since been cancelled, the Marine Corps agreed to release Scheller pending possible trial by court-martial.

Scheller has requested that the secretary of the Navy accept a resignation of his commission in lieu of a trial, Insider has learned.

Scheller, formerly the commander of the Advanced Infantry Training Battalion and a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, gained notoriety on August 26, the same day a suicide bomber killed 13 US troops in Afghanistan, when he put his 17-year career in the Marine Corps on the line to "ask some questions to some of my senior leaders" in a video addressing failures in Afghanistan.

Scheller said in a video critical of the secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, among others, that "people are upset because their senior leaders let them down and none of them are raising their hands and accepting accountability or saying 'we messed this up.'"

Both the Trump and Biden administration have faced an uproar for their roles in the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, which saw the Afghan military and government crumble, Taliban retake control of the country after two decades of war, scenes of chaos and death at the airport, and partners left behind.

Other related social media posts and videos followed the lieutenant colonel's first video post, including one in which Scheller said that he had been relieved of his command. Amid the fallout, Scheller attempted to resign and leave the Marine Corps but was unable to do so.

Toward the end of September, the Marine Corps announced that Scheller was in pre-trial confinement in the Regional Brig for Marine Corps Installations East aboard Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune.

Task & Purpose reported at the time that Scheller was accused of the following Uniformed Code of Military Justice offenses: Article 88, contempt of officials; Article 90, willfully disobeying a superior commissioned officer; Article 92: failure to obey an order; and Article 133: engaging in conduct unbecoming of an officer.