Beaudry Robert "Bowe" Bergdahl (born March 28, 1986) is a former United States Army soldier who was held captive from 2009 to 2014 by the Taliban-aligned Haqqani network in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Bergdahl was captured after leaving his post on June 30, 2009. The circumstances under which Bergdahl went missing and how he was captured by the Taliban have since become subjects of intense media scrutiny. He was released on May 31, 2014, as part of a prisoner exchange for five high ranking Taliban members who were being held at the detention center at Guantanamo Bay.
Bergdahl was tried by general court-martial on charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy, and on October 16, 2017, he entered a guilty plea before a military judge at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. On November 3, 2017, he was sentenced to be dishonorably discharged, reduced in rank to private and fined $1,000 per month from his pay for ten months, with no prison time. The fine and reduction in rank took effect immediately, while the discharge was stayed pending appeals to the Army Court of Criminal Appeals and later to the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, which affirmed the sentence on August 27, 2020. Bergdahl then filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia to have a U.S. federal judge review his sentence. On July 25, 2023, the judge issued a ruling that voided his 2017 court-martial conviction.
Early life and education Bergdahl was born on March 28, 1986, in Sun Valley, Idaho. He is of Norwegian and Swedish ancestry. He has an older sister. Both Bergdahl and his sister were home schooled by their mother in Hailey, Idaho. The family attended Sovereign Redeemer Presbyterian Church, an Orthodox Presbyterian Church.
Bergdahl received a GED certificate through the College of Southern Idaho. As an adult, Bergdahl studied and practiced fencing and martial arts before changing to ballet classes at the Sun Valley Ballet School in Ketchum, Idaho. He spent time in a Buddhist monastery between 2007 and 2008.
Military career In 2006, Bergdahl entered basic training in the United States Coast Guard but was discharged after twenty-six days for psychological reasons, receiving an "uncharacterized discharge" as an entry-level separation.
In 2008, Bergdahl enlisted in the United States Army and graduated from the Infantry School, Alpha Company, 2-58 at Fort Benning, Georgia. He was then assigned to the 1st Battalion, 501st Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, based at Fort Richardson, Alaska.
According to a fellow soldier, Specialist Jason Fry, Bergdahl, whom Fry described as a loner but "focused and well-behaved", told him before deploying to Afghanistan: "If this deployment is lame, I'm just going to walk off into the mountains of Pakistan." Instead of socializing with his comrades during Thanksgiving, he studied maps of Afghanistan.
Bergdahl's unit deployed to outpost Mest-Malak in May 2009, where they conducted counterinsurgency operations. Bergdahl began learning to speak Pashto and, according to Fry, "to gravitate away from his unit [spending] more time with the Afghans than he did with his platoon". Bergdahl's father described his son to military investigators as "psychologically isolated".
Before capture On June 25, 2009, Bergdahl's battalion suffered its first casualty: First Lieutenant Brian Bradshaw was killed by a roadside bomb near the village of Yaya Kheyl, not far from Bergdahl's outpost. Bergdahl's father believes that Bradshaw and Bergdahl had grown close at the National Training Center and that Bradshaw's death darkened Bergdahl's mood.
Last e-mail to parents On June 27, 2009, Bergdahl sent an e-mail to his parents before he was captured:
Bob Bergdahl responded to his son's final message not long after he received it:
Last communication with platoon A former senior military officer briefed on the investigation into Bergdahl's disappearance stated that on the night he went missing, Bergdahl left a note. The existence of such a note was disputed by the Obama administration during a meeting with Congress on the release of Bergdahl, according to Senator Saxby Chambliss.White House defends prisoner swap in tense Hill meeting, Politico
In his sworn statement, Bergdahl denied leaving a note. Investigating officer Major General Kenneth Dahl acknowledged that there was no evidence of him leaving a note.
Captivity
Circumstances of Bergdahl's disappearance
Bergdahl walked away from his battalion on the night of June 30, 2009, at observation post (OP) Mest near the town of Yahya Kheyl in Paktika Province. Accounts of his capture differ. In a video, Bergdahl said he was captured when he fell behind on a patrol. Taliban sources allege he was ambushed after becoming drunk off base; U.S. military sources deny that claim, stating, "The Taliban are known for lying and what they are claiming [is] not true." A Department of Defense spokesperson said, "I'm glad to see he appears unharmed, but again, this is a Taliban propaganda video. They are exploiting the soldier in violation of international law."
Other sources said Bergdahl walked off base after his shift or that he was grabbed from a latrine. In 2009, the U.S. Department of Defense attributed his disappearance to "walking off his base in eastern Afghanistan with three Afghan counterparts and was believed to have been taken prisoner".
General Nabi Mullakheil of the Afghan National Police said the capture occurred in Paktika Province. Other sources say that he was captured by a Taliban group led by Mullah Sangeen Zadran, who moved him to Ghazni Province. He was held by the Haqqani network, an insurgent group affiliated with the Taliban, probably somewhere in Pakistan.
Bergdahl was a Private First Class when captured; he was promoted in absentia to Specialist on June 19, 2010, and to Sergeant on June 17, 2011. According to soldiers in Bergdahl's platoon, the morning when Bergdahl was discovered to be missing, his equipment was found neatly stacked, with his compass missing.
A Pentagon investigation in 2010 concluded that Bergdahl walked away from his unit. Bergdahl had written (prior to his departure) e-mails to his parents in which he reported having become disillusioned with the war effort and bothered by the treatment of Afghans by American soldiers. He said in his e-mail he was ashamed to be American.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey said: "The questions about this particular soldier's conduct are separate from our effort to recover any U.S. service member in enemy captivity" and that the military will investigate how Bergdahl was captured. "Like any American, he is innocent until proven guilty. [...] Our Army's leaders will not look away from misconduct if it occurred. In the meantime, we will continue to care for him and his family."
Some soldiers who had served with Bergdahl have called him a deserter.
Nathan Bradley Bethea, a member of Bergdahl's battalion, wrote a Daily Beast article stating that there was no patrol the night that Bergdahl went missing and that Bergdahl had talked about his desire to walk to India. Bethea wrote that the brigade received an order not to discuss Bergdahl due to safety reasons, but since he had been found there was no need for further silence. Cody Full, a member of Bergdahl's platoon, said, "He knowingly deserted and put thousands of people in danger because he did. We swore to an oath and we upheld ours. He did not." Full said that Bergdahl had mailed his computer and other possessions home prior to his disappearance.Eric Schmitt; Helene Cooper; Charlie Savage (June 2, 2014) Bowe Bergdahl's Vanishing Before Capture Angered His Unit, The New York Times
Contacts by Taliban
On July 18, 2009, the Taliban released a video showing Bergdahl, who appeared downcast and frightened. A Department of Defense statement issued the following day confirmed that Bergdahl had been declared "missing/whereabouts unknown" on July1 and that his status had been changed to "missing/captured" on July 3.
In the twenty-eight–minute video, his captors held up his dog tags to establish that the captured man was Bergdahl. Bergdahl gave the date as July 14 and mentioned an attack that occurred that day.
On December 25, 2009, five months after Bergdahl's disappearance, the media arm of the Taliban released a video of "a U.S. soldier captured in Afghanistan" entitled "One of Their People Testified".
The Taliban did not name the American, but the only U.S. soldier known to be in captivity was Bergdahl. U.S. military officials had been searching for Bergdahl, but it was not publicly known whether he was being held in Afghanistan or in Pakistan. On December 25, another video was released showing Bergdahl wearing sunglasses, a combat uniform, and helmet.
The Taliban originally demanded the release of six Taliban prisoners. After Taliban commander Awal Gul died of a heart attack at Guantanamo Bay on February 2, 2011, the demand was reduced to five Taliban prisoners.
On April 7, 2010, the Taliban released a third video depicting Bergdahl, pleading for the release of Afghan prisoners held at Guantanamo and Bagram. In November 2010, Bergdahl appeared briefly in a fourth video. In May 2011, Bergdahl appeared briefly in a fifth video.
In June 2010, Bergdahl managed to escape his captors but was recaptured after less than nine days. In August 2010, it was reported that a Taliban commander named Haji Nadeem had claimed that Bergdahl was helping to train the Taliban in bomb-making and infantry tactics. The Pentagon dismissed the reports as Taliban propaganda.
In June 2013, Bergdahl's parents received a letter from him through the Red Cross.
In January 2014, the United States received another proof-of-life video dated December 14, 2013, in which Bergdahl mentioned the death of South African former president Nelson Mandela, indicating the video had been recorded after December 5.
In early 2014, it was suggested in some media that the United States government had attempted to secure the release of Bergdahl by paying a ransom and that the intermediary had absconded with the money. The Pentagon said no ransom was paid but that a payment had been made for intelligence that led to Bergdahl's release.
Search efforts After Bergdahl was confirmed as missing, the Army initiated a DUSTWUN search to find him. According to soldiers from his platoon, there was an increase in attacks against US forces in Paktika Province following his disappearance. Significant resources were deployed in an effort to find Bergdahl. Two Pashto-language leaflets were distributed by the U.S. military in seeking Bergdahl. One showed a smiling GI shaking hands with Afghan children, with a caption that called him a guest in Afghanistan. The other showed a door being broken down and threatened that those holding Bergdahl would be hunted down.
According to soldiers involved in the effort to find Bergdahl, at least six soldiers from his battalion were killed during the search. Retired general Michael Flynn also blamed their deaths on the search for him. National Guard Master Sgt. Mark Allen was on a mission to gather information about Bergdahl from two Afghan villages in July 2009 when his unit was ambushed by insurgents using small arms, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades. Allen, who was shot in the head, was permanently disabled from the wound, leaving him unable to walk or speak. He died on October 12, 2019.
Officers who served in Afghanistan during that time told CNN that diverting resources to find Bergdahl delayed the closing of Combat Outpost Keating, where eight American soldiers were killed on October 3, 2009, when 300 Taliban insurgents overran the base.
Torture in captivity