"Five years ago, I was getting emails from folks who knew what happened in the Bergdahl incident.
Folks from around the US in positions that would have first hand knowledge as well as people who were in Afghanistan.
I made the decision that I wouldn’t say a disparaging word about what folks were telling me.
Unlike Bergdahl, apparently, I knew that once the Taliban or Haqqani thought that he had no value to them, he would be a headless body in a shallow grave, irrespective of the actions that led to his capture.
So, for five years, I kept my mouth shut.
Now some of the people who served with Bergdahl are coming out with their stories.
Like Nathan Bradley Bethea in the pages of the Daily Beast;
"Our battalion suffered six fatalities in a three-week period.
On August 18, an IED killed Private First Class Morris Walker and Staff Sergeant Clayton Bowen during a reconnaissance mission.
On August 26, while conducting a search for a Taliban shadow sub-governor supposedly affiliated with Bergdahl’s captors, Staff Sergeant Kurt Curtiss was shot in the face and killed.
On September 4, during a patrol to a village near the area in which Bergdahl vanished, an insurgent ambush killed Second Lieutenant Darryn Andrews and gravely wounded Private First Class Matthew Martinek, who died of his wounds a week later.
On September 5, while conducting a foot movement toward a village also thought affiliated with Bergdahl’s captors, Staff Sergeant Michael Murphrey stepped on an improvised land mine.
He died the next day."
It is important to name all these names.
For the veterans of the units that lost these men, Bergdahl’s capture and the subsequent hunt for him will forever tie to their memories, and to a time in their lives that will define them as people. He has finally returned.
Those men will never have the opportunity.
Now we read that the Taliban and Haqqani are doing their happy dance.
From AFP;
Folks from around the US in positions that would have first hand knowledge as well as people who were in Afghanistan.
I made the decision that I wouldn’t say a disparaging word about what folks were telling me.
Unlike Bergdahl, apparently, I knew that once the Taliban or Haqqani thought that he had no value to them, he would be a headless body in a shallow grave, irrespective of the actions that led to his capture.
So, for five years, I kept my mouth shut. Now some of the people who served with Bergdahl are coming out with their stories.
Like Nathan Bradley Bethea in the pages of the Daily Beast;
"Our battalion suffered six fatalities in a three-week period.
On August 18, an IED killed Private First Class Morris Walker and Staff Sergeant Clayton Bowen during a reconnaissance mission.
On August 26, while conducting a search for a Taliban shadow sub-governor supposedly affiliated with Bergdahl’s captors, Staff Sergeant Kurt Curtiss was shot in the face and killed.
On September 4, during a patrol to a village near the area in which Bergdahl vanished, an insurgent ambush killed Second Lieutenant Darryn Andrews and gravely wounded Private First Class Matthew Martinek, who died of his wounds a week later.
On September 5, while conducting a foot movement toward a village also thought affiliated with Bergdahl’s captors, Staff Sergeant Michael Murphrey stepped on an improvised land mine.
He died the next day."
It is important to name all these names.
For the veterans of the units that lost these men, Bergdahl’s capture and the subsequent hunt for him will forever tie to their memories, and to a time in their lives that will define them as people. He has finally returned.
Those men will never have the opportunity.
Now we read that the Taliban and Haqqani are doing their happy dance.
From AFP;
Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar Sunday hailed the release of five senior insurgents in exchange for US soldier Bowe Bergdahl as a “big victory”.“I extend my heartfelt congratulations to the entire Afghan Muslim nation, all the mujahideen and to the families and relatives of the prisoners for this big victory regarding the release of five Taliban leaders from Guantanamo prison,” he said in a rare statement.
I can only hope that the folks who do that stuff put GPS trackers up each of their asses and as soon as they’re released, the GPS trackers are replaced by Hellfire missiles.
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