Good post, and makes perfect sense to me. FYI, though, and as you’ll hear when you listen, he’s not currently claiming that the only way to get to Shara a was to walk there; instead he says he thought that if he disappeared for a day then miraculously showed up at the FOB that he’d cause such a sensation that while he may get in trouble he’d also get a hearing with a general in which he could make his complaints known. Yeah…
Wow, no post yet on ep. 2?
Well, I’ll start just by saying that before hearing this episode I really didn’t understand all the hate and vitriol towards Bergdahl from his fellow soldiers and the media and everyone at the time he was brought back. I mean, yeah, I sympathized to an extent but it just all seemed a bit exaggerated, maybe a target for many to release frustrations about the war in Afghanistan, or for the right-wing media to use for criticizing Obama in typical fashion (not saying it wasn’t that as well), but this episode really gave me an appreciation for just how much trouble he really caused. If I was one of the soldiers in his battalion (or any battalion involved in the search and rescue efforts) I’d be filled with some serious anger and hate myself.
I’m not sure how I feel about what his punishment should ultimately be. He went through 5 years of hell that will be with him the rest of his life, as will his damaged reputation. And I do see it (at least at this time) as something a stupid, idealistic 23 year old with bad judgment does (I had some really fucked up ideas about how the world worked at that age, but my ideas were more rooted in hippy ideology and involved taking lots of psychedelic drugs). Just a shame that his misguided idealism had such serious consequences for so many.
I forgot the release schedule, so I haven’t listened yet! I did, however, re-listen to the first episode during a long car ride with a veteran who was in the war and was sputtering in disbelief at what Bergdahl did.
So a lot of news outlets have referred to “Duty Status - Whereabouts Unknown” (DUSTWUN) as the Army equivalent of a man overboard. It indeed is a huge mobilization of resources and if it’s being done by someone intentionally, that’s a pretty shitty thing.
I have a close friend who recently retired after over 25 years in the U.S. Navy, and one of his jobs for a time was being the guy who coordinate, planned for, and trained others in how to handle man overboard scenarios. He has a particularly shitty story from one time while serving on an aircraft carrier. So, (and I’ve never been on a naval ship so my memory/details may be slightly off) because falling off a big ship at sea is a really bad thing, the Navy tries to make it so you have as good a chance as possible of being spotted/noticed and rescued if this happens. There’s a common practice of making sure you have a type of strobe light on you, and I believe they’re commonly attached to Naval life jackets as well. The light can be the difference between life and death, because it makes you stand out in a dark night out on the water.
Well anyway, for something like a week on this air craft carrier, every single night, some shithead would activate/turn on one of these lights that you’d normally see a man overboard use, and drop it off the ship. When someone on deck would see the light floating out in the darkness, a man overboard situation was immediately started. This was a huge hassle for my friend since obviously he had to be involved in every one of these incidents. After the second night they pretty much knew this was just an asshat causing trouble. But the thing is, you can never just say “it’s just asshat again” and ignore that light in the dark sea, because that could be a crew member and you just cannot risk it. So for something like 7-10 days, because someone was a dick, they repeatedly went to rescue a light floating by itself out in the ocean. The guy was never caught–as it was explained to me, aircraft carriers are so big, so many people moving around constantly working that it’s basically impossible to catch someone in the act.
What Bergdahl did was quite similar to that–even in his telling of the story (which may be false), except he did it in a region of the world filled with hostile enemy combatants.
I agree. I understood to some extent those that were upset with him, and that he caused a lot of trouble, but to hear what it was like to search, and how long and continuously they had to do it, and that they had to check the women’s faces, and bust down doors at places the US hadn’t been before, it really puts things into perspective.
It seems like this story was picked because she can go specific into Bowe Bergdahl’s story and that should be interesting, but also with the bigger picture of the war and how we handled things.
I’d like to know more about what his issues were that he wanted to complain to a general to, and if others on his base had the same issues or not. And if he actually would have known about other avenues for complaints and if those avenues were actually clear and acceptable. I know in some companies that there is a complaint box or some way to make your issues known that in theory should work, but if anyone actually uses it then it backfires on them and their career. But I don’t know if the Army is like that, or his particular base.
I also don’t know how he should be punished. He did a really, really stupid thing, and I think at least some imprisonment would not be unreasonable, but I don’t know enough about his situation and about regulations in general to say how long he should be in prison.
My early read is that he did a really stupid thing, and is trying to put it in the best light to make it seem slightly less stupid. That said, 5 years as a Taliban prisoner is a pretty stiff sentence that he’s already served. I think I’d be ok with an agreement that he publicly apologizes, admits he did something incredibly stupid and gets some sort of slap on the wrist. I’m willing to change my mind based on what I hear later though.
His 5 years with the Taliban was obviously a terrible punishment for the stupid thing he did. And if a soldier in the future is thinking of pulling a similar stunt, it’s not like how much or little time that Bergdahl has to serve in military prison would affect their plans, they would just think that they would be smarter about doing it and avoiding the enemy. But I understand the need for the Army to have regulations, and appropriate consequences for either following or not following those regulations.
I agree that hearing more will probably affect my thoughts. Sarah Koenig is good at showing all the aspects of a story, and I’m sure there are some that make Bergdahl sound more reasonable in what he did, and some that make him sound stupid and/or crazy.
I’d like to know more about this also. I’ll be very disappointed if she never digs into that for the podcast. If she does dig into it, I wonder if it will shake up some people in the military to get things fixed. I don’t know much about the entire thing, but I think it does have a whiff of “get rid of the whistleblower” about it.
He is apparently refusing to take a deal so that he’s not misunderstood. So it seems he either had a legitimate grievance (or something that he thought was a legitimate grievance) that he couldn’t get heard (or didn’t think he could get heard). Because if he was actually goofing off and got captured, or just decided to desert and wander around for no reason, and then came up with his story afterwards, I’d think he would realize the state he’s in now and take a deal. Although maybe he is just foolish and arrogant, and he made up his story but thinks that he can use it and be convincing enough to not get prison time.
So did Season 2 crash and burn? I’ve listened to all the episodes so far, but I’m not exactly on the edge of my seat waiting for the next one.
Anyone else still listening?
Nah, she just switched to bi-weekly episodes. It kind of blows to do that mid-season. I guess more people called her to talk once it started going out, but it still sucks. i waited for four to air to begin listening and am disappointed it is slowing down.
Oh, it kind of sucks too. It’s not really boring, but not as interesting as last year.
There’s not nearly the nuance to it as season 1. It seems pretty clear that everyone agrees that this guy did something pretty stupid. The series seems to be trying to figure out exactly how stupid.
Regardless of how stupid, this guy was punished pretty badly already, and anything additional seems like severe overkill. I’d be fine with letting him go with time served (in horrid conditions held by the Taliban).
Me too. Dude was an idiot, but this is plenty. Let him go.
Given what we know, I don’t see how he can be charged with anything more serious than going AWOL. His leaving was an impulsive decision and he had no idea what to do next. It’s very likely that he would have turned himself in soon after.
There may be evidence that he was working with the Taliban, who then decided to hold him as a high-value hostage. Without strong evidence of such a scenario, AWOL is the only offense he committed.
Is a factor in this going to be whether they can establish if anyone died looking or him? If other soldiers died or were seriously injured looking for him, it seems like it would worsen the situation.
There seem to be a lot of right-wingers who want him shot for treason. I don’t see how that fits the crime at all.