Originally Posted by Wednighter When Ben said that we had a surgeon, it made me think back to when Mr Linus said that he found out about his tumor and then a spinal surgeon fell from the sky... We'll if he already had a surgeon why did he need Jack... I know we kill Ethan, but why couldn't have Ethan fixed him then and he had someone else go investigate the crash site???? I mean really its his own fault his surgeon got killed being that he was attacking the losties right??

Of course I am suspicious of everything Ben says. Every word that comes out of his mouth is a tool of manipulation. So I am not positive that Ethan was a surgeon with the type of ability to do a complicated spinal surgery. For all we know he was a veteranarian and did surgery on Polar Bears..... However in the Maternity Leave Episode when Claire remembers her time in captivity. Tom confronts
Ethan for kidnapping Claire, stating he was only supposed to be making a list. Ethan defends himself, stating that they had a flight manifest and he had to change plans. So Ben may not have expected Ethan to run into any real danger.