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Find out foryourself. What bothers them the most about Bosecase?
They'llsay, I wish it hadn't gotten sopolitical.
Sucks that it got sopolitical.
And usually I just nodlike,yeah,politics.
This trade for Bose just one more thing for Democrats and Republicans to yell at each otherabout.
But then when I really looked atit, I waslike, wait aminute.
Was it inevitable that it got thiscombative?
Because maybe it could have gone anotherway.
From this American life and WBZChicago, it'sserial.
One story told week byweek.
I'm SarahCanig. The day of thetrade, President Obama makes this bigannouncement.
He's flanked by Bob and JanieBergdahl.
He hugsthem, kissesthem.
And even though the president never called BoaHero, he kept of announcing it at the White House in the RoseGarden, the pomp of it in front of all thosecameras, it felt like the president was communicating somethingheroic, atriumph.
Which if you're someone who's served in themilitary, maybe someone who went looking for Boasay, that message was badenough.
But then the very nextday, National Security Advisor Susan Rice went onTV.
She was on one of the Sunday newsshows.
And thehost, GeorgeStephanopoulos, asked her aboutBoa.
Finally on thispoint, SergeantBergdahl, there are a lot of questions about how he originally was captured and whether or not he haddeserted, had left hispost.
Is that going to beinvestigated?
And if it's found that he did indeed leave hispost, will he be disciplined or has already paid theprice?
Certainly anybody who's been held in those conditions and captivity for five years has paid an extraordinaryprice.
But that is really not thepoint.
The point is that he'sback.
He's going to be safely reunited with hisfamily.
He served the United States with honor anddistinction.
Andthat,yeah. Honor anddistinction.
To a lot of militarypeople, it was like the administration had reached out of their televisions and given them the finger right in their livingrooms.
And then it became thislike,oh, he's a hero who served with honor and distinction andblah,blah,blah.
It really made meangry.
It talkedabout, I served honor anddistinction.
That hit prettyhard. And the thing that I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, I waslike,oh, Do you want to go onTV?
Get a wider audience for what you want tosay?
Join me firsttonight, former Army Specialists Cody Ful and GeraldSutton.
Who are both at the end of theday?
First stop was FoxNews.
Cody, let me start withyou.
Do you believe that Bo Burgdaldeserted?
Yes, I do believe he deserted without a doubt in mymind.
The other guy on TV with Cody that day was GeraldSutton.
He was also in Bo'sPlatoon.
He was friends withBo. He told me Cody had contacted him andsaid, we got to dosomething.
Will you helpme? Yearsbefore, Gerald said he had tried to tell people what had gone down that Bo had walkedaway.
He wrote something on theinternet.
A few others hadto. But hesaid, nobody seemed to pay much attention backthen.
And he worried the same thing would happennow.
I didn't think anyone would actually take aseriously.
And,bliss. I guess the reason why we had some of the people behind us is that if one of us just came out and saidit, then people would just belike,oh, you're just a disgruntledperson.
So maybe if the entire Platoon came out andsaid,say, on ourend, that maybe it would be taken seriously foronce.
But we are joined now by six members of Bo Burgdal'sPlatoon.
Guys, thank you all so much for beinghere.
So the group gotbigger.
A few dayslater, Foxagain, this time a panel of Platoonmates, soldiers made other TVappearances.
CNN,ABC,MSNBC, we're hearing a lot about him from his fellow Platoon members who served withhim.
And fromthe, what you like to see a dishonorable discharge forhim?
Yes,yes, he needs to be held100% accountable for what hedid.
Soldiers who served with him in Afghanistan have challenged hisaccount.
The fact of the matteris, is he deserted us in the middle of Afghanistan to go and find theTaliban.
Among theladies, they were a lot more like eloquent with what they had tosay.
That's Gerald Suttonagain.
And moreprecise. And they've seen more entertainingtoo.
More thanme. So I'm verybland.
Gerald didn't want to go on anymoreshows.
He knew hislimits. And he wanted to stick to thefacts.
Noopinion, nospeculation.
And I don't want to even know it's like 30 seconds snippets or whatever you're here inthere.
Like, I don't want someone just to belike,oh,look,look,look, this guy needs to shoveit.
So Isaid, but I had to sayit.
And that wasit. The problem was that maybe Gerald waslike,boh, a fact-baseddude.
But he was just no match for the juggernaut that was now up androlling.
Fox News especially was all overit.
Infact, just before they had that panel of six guys from Second Platoonon, they'd aired an exclusivereport.
Breakingtonight, we are learning exclusive and dramatic new details about Sergeant Bo Bergdahl's time incaptivity, including reports that he became a Muslim and at one point declared himself a warrior forIslam.
The story was basedon,frankly, bullshit intel from a discreditedsource.
But now it was out there and was repeated andrepeated.
Next, the politics of itall, that became thestory.
The Obama administration was using Bo's trade for politicalpurposes.
Note, the right was using this for politicalpurposes.
Using these former platoon mates for politicalpurposes.
Afterall, RickGrinnell, the media guy helpingthem, he was a big Republicanstrategist.
Again, for guys likeGerald, none of that was thepoint.
They weren't trying to attack thepresident.
They weren't even trying to attackBo.
Even CodyFul, who's spoken early and often on the topic ofBo, he testified at a congressionalhearing, saying he wanted to make sure Bo was held accountable for what hedid.
But even he resisted Obama baiting by a Republicancongressman.
If you could say anything to President Obama regarding thistrade, what would yousay?
I'm not going to answerthat.
Fairenough,Mr.Waltz, you're four warned samequestions.
What would yousay? At that samehearing, Mike Waltz alsotestified.
He told the committee he was there beforethem, in part because of the RoseGarden.
Mike's a lieutenant colonel in the Armyreserves, a former GreenBeret.
He'd been commander of Army SpecialForces, that he said went on lots of missions looking forBo.
Beforethat, he worked in the Bush White House as a Special Advisor to Dick Cheney on South Asiancounterterrorism.
When I read Mike's testimony andCody's, I waslike, all this is because of a five-minute ceremony in the RoseGarden, just because of how itlooked.
I asked Mike aboutthat, and he kind of schooledme.
Are you sayinglike, none of us would even be talking about this ifbasically, youknow, the president hadn't done that Rose Gardenthing.
And then tried to politicizeit?
I'llanswer.Well,yeah, Imean, is this all about the optics in otherwords?
Or is thislike, you know what Imean?
Are you just sayinglike, I wouldn't evenbe, I wouldn't gotten mylike, feathers ruffled about this if there hadn't beenany.
I don'tthink, I don't want to speak for anyoneelse.
I don't believe that I would have been asvocal.
That was just an incredibly tone-deaf move on the part of the WhiteHouse.
I think it shows how disconnected they are from both the Pentagon and I think and is truly lacking understanding of the militaryculture.
And when you have the National SecurityAdvisor, youknow, in a civil militarysystem, where the military has to listento, essentially knife-handing on nationaltelevision, sending the signal that this man washonorable, youknow, I was afraid that it would allbe, youknow, a forgotten and that this was going to be politically swept under thecarpet.
To Mike and to a lot of people watching and listening to the president thatday, it wasn't just what hesaid.
We're glad Bo isback. We're committed to ending thiswar.
We supportreconciliation.
We're committed to closingGitmo.
It's not just that he said all ofthat.
It's what the president didn'tsay.
That's what wasglaring.
No recognition or even mentionof, we understand there were some irregularities or some question about hisdisappearance.
And I want to assure allveterans, all former POWs and everyone involved with a search that we will objectively and fairly get to the bottom of whathappened.
Da-da-da-da-da. Youknow, I felt that justice was not going to even be attempted to beserved.
I've asked manypeople, low these many months in other parts ofgovernment, what was a White Housethinking?
Why'd they doit? And everyone I'veasked, they'relike,yeah, I don't know what happened over there thatday, but I'm sure they regret itnow.
Well, they do regretit.
Because this Rose Garden event that kicked up so much anger andresentment, evidently it was put together kind of spur of themoment.
One of those things where you'relike, Iknow, let's have aparty.
It'll begreat. Except big fatmistake.
None ofit. The president'sspeech, thepodium, the RoseGarden.
None of it was the original plan for how to announce thistrade.
The original plan was a much quieteraffair.
No one would talk to me on tape aboutthis, but offtape, I talked to several people who worked in the White House at thetime.
They all told very similar stories about what happened thatday.
So, this is theirversion.
Heregoes. Rose Rescue Operation was touch and go for severaldays.
Remember the C-17 sitting and sitting atGuantanamo?
It washigh-wire, the wholething.
And it all went smoothly in theend, but leading up toit, you don't know if the special operationsguys, if they'rehelicopters, going tocrash, or if they're going to get into afirefight, you don't know if Bose is going to get hurt or killed during therescue.
And it had to be stone secret the wholetime.
The Qataris had made itclear.
If even a word of this gets outbeforehand, the deal isoff.
And people in the White House thought this might be the last real chance to get bowback.
It wasstressful. For much of the week before the trade inside the White House and the National Securityoffices, they'd been working around theclock.
If I see the scene in amovie, what does it looklike?
Mostly, I was sleeping under my desk for four days up untilrecovery.
Icouldn't. That's JeffEggers.
He was a special assistant to the President for National SecurityAffairs.
He's also a retired NavySEAL.
He deployed toIraq. He'd worked inAfghanistan.
He'd been helping coordinate Bose recovery with the DOD and the StateDepartment.
Because it started to gain momentum that week and itwas...
Are you beingeuphemistic?
You were sleeping under yourdesk?
Or you were actually sleeping under yourdesk?
No, I was actually sleeping under mydesk.
Well,actually, it was next to mydesk.
For fourdays? Ithink. That was also the week that the President made some significant announcements about troop decisions inAfghanistan.
So it was actually a bigweek.
Was the timing of that justcoincidental?
Those twothings? Purelycoincidental.
President Obama had already done a more solemn Rose Garden event thatweek.
May27,2014. He announced a big drawdown of troops by the end of the year and a plan to get out of Afghanistan fully by the end of2016.
Quote, Americans have learned it is harder to end wars than it is to beginthem, hesaid.
And now a few dayslater, May31, they just gottenword.
The operation to rescue Bose hadworked.
He wasalive. He wassafe.
The national security folks and the White House press folks knew it was going to be lumpy thisnews.
That trading five Taliban was going to becontroversial.
That the circumstances of Bose capture were going to be atopic.
Theyknew. The people I talked to in the White House weren't strangers to militaryculture.
Some of the people who worked on this exchange had been in themilitary, such as JeffEggers, or had worked closely with themilitary, had worked in warzones.
They thought it was important that the President own the decision to make thistrade, and that he explained the policy behindit.
So the original plan for how to announceit, release a written statement from thePresident.
The Pentagon would also release a written statement at the sametime.
Done. Butthen, while Bob and Jenny Bergdahl happened to be intown, they'd come to DC for some meetings that had been scheduled long before with theadministration.
No one told them this was about to takeplace.
Their visit to DC was not planned to coincide with Bosereturn.
They're in a park playing with somefriends' little children when they got thecall.
And it seemed to makesense.
They're in townalready.
Instead of just a phonecall, the President will see them inperson.
Andnow, here's where I'dargue, there was a blind spot about how all this wouldlook, and that no one in the White House seemed to catchit.
Some of the people on staff had been working on this foryears.
First, the talks with theTaliban, then the operation to getBo.
They'd met with Bose parents before some ofthem.
Andso, what people told me is that forthem, it's not that they wereoblivious.
It's just thatday, thatmoment, they felt sohappy.
They'd been on tenter hooks fordays, weekseven.
And now this horrible saga had come to anend.
No one had gottenhurt. And you've got both parents rightthere.
You can see theirfaces, theircrying.
It'saffecting.Meanwhile, there are some very good reporters inWashington.
And atGuantanamo, as I'vementioned.
And a few of them had known this was going to godown, but had held off reportingit.
And sonow, the White House press peoplethought,well, we need to placate them to pleasethem.
Because if we have the burglars here with thepresident, and we don't let some photographers catch thatscene, give them what's called cameraspray, they're going to bepissed.
So maybe let's arrange at least forthat.
Maybe a shot of the president walking and talking with theburglars, forinstance.
Andthen,well, it was such a sunnyday.
It was such good news foronce.
Why not just do the whole thing in the RoseGarden?
So in the space of a fewhours, it went from a simple statement to a Rose Gardenceremony.
And the idea of Bose parents talking at all from thepodium, much less Bob speaking some words in Pashto andArabic, those utterlyimpromptu.
As for the Susan Ricething, Ambassador Rice politely declined to talk to me for thisstory.
But the White House people I talked to told me they cringed when she saidit.
They said talking to the press is not herforte.
She got a littledefensive.
And this cliche tumbledout.
Honor anddistinction.
A few dayslater, Rice explained herself saying she just meant that volunteering to serve his country in a time of war was an honorable thing todo.
But bythen, honor and distinction was already caught inamber.
There wasn't going to be any shaking atloose.
You're pretty isolated when you work in the WestWing.
That's a one person who used to work there toldme.
You're pretty cut off from the normal work of dayworld.
And it's easy to forget how iconic it allis.
Thecolumns, the podium with the presidentialseal.
They told me there wasn't a concerted effort to make Boba dull into ahero, to whitewash what happened inAfghanistan.
They said they know it looks thatway, but there really wasn't a grand politicalcalculus.
They said they were just tired and abuzz withrelief.
And they thought everyone will feel thisjoy,right?
They got carriedaway. Inhindsight, one former staffer told me we should have thought about itmore.
That there were other audiences who arewatching.
People who'vesuffered.
Quote, the Rose Garden put a target on ourback.
The thingis, and this is metalking, I think it also put a target on Bo'sback.
I'm not going totalk. Just walk with menow.
Along this path from the WhiteHouse, up the streetaways to CapitolHill.
I swear we won't stay there toolong.
But this is the next place where the politics of this trade hardened andintensified.
And I getit, it'sCongress.
They're in a constant state of readiness to hate anything President Obama comes upwith.
But thistime,well,no, firstoff, no one from the White House or DOD or the StateDepartment, no one told Congress this trade was about to godown.
So members heard about it on thenews,basically, like everyoneelse.
Bylaw, the administration was supposed to notify Congress 30 days before any detainee was transferred out ofGuantanamo.
But thistime, theydidn't.
And that was onpurpose.
The White House didn't want members to get mad and to try to stop the deal from taking place by leaking it to thepress, forinstance.
Why did they think Congress would getmad?
Well, because the administration already knew that Congress thought it'd stunk thisdeal.
Back in2012, when the trade was still linked to peace talks with theTaliban, and it really seemed like it might goforward.
The White House had arranged some classified briefings in special rooms on CapitolHill, where this stuffhappens,apparently.
And members had made themselves pretty clear at thetime.
Their reactions to a proposed trade of five Taliban guys ranged from skeptical tohorrified.
Forinstance, then Senator SaxbyChambliss, Republican fromGeorgia, at a briefing of the Senate Intelligence Committee on January of2012, almost two and a half years before it actually tookplace, talking about trading these Taliban guys forboth.
I want to state publicly as strongly as I can that we should not transfer these detainees fromGuantanamo.
So the administrationworried,understandably, that if they brought it upagain, it'd getcrushed.
And they might not be able to get bowback atall.
The decision wasmade. Don't sayanything.
So by2014, a lot of people in Congress assumed the deal wasdead, which was a reasonable thing tothink, because that's more or less what they'd been told over theyears.
You can see in State Departmentmemos, in January and February of2014, even as the administration was working to revive thedeal.
Officials called around to certain offices on Capitol Hill to update certain members of Congress about the Burglowsituation.
And the call endedwith,quote, we told them we would keep them updated and continue to consult before taking anyaction,unquote.
But they didn't consultCongress, because here Congress was hearing it on thenews.
All of that was asurprise.
Just howblatant.Yeah, how blatant and intentional misleading Congress was as part ofthis.
That's MacThornberry, TexasRepublican.
At the time of thetrade, he was a member of the House Armed ServicesCommittee, known asHask.
Now he's thechairman. Hask oversees the Department ofDefense.
And Hask staffers on the Republican side told me that that relationship with DOD has traditionally been prettysolid, it'scooperative,straightforward.
Now they realized DOD had been the lead on hammering out this final Burglow deal and had told themnothing.
Forinstance, just three and a half months before the tradehappened, the Washington Post published astory, quoting unnamedsources.
He talked about the five Taliban going toDoha.
It was prettydetailed.
And so some Haskstaff, they say they asked the DOD aboutit.
Hey, is there anything tothis?
And they say they weretold,nope.
It'spossible,probable,actually, that the person they called wasn'tlying.
They just weren't in theknow.
Meanwhile, emails are zinging among all these other government officials who are in theknow.
Quote, who's leaking this very accurateinfo?
These leaks are killingus.
We need to talk about getting controlback.
Tony Blinken at the White House sent one around about his dismay and discussed over the leaks since it could derail thedeal.
Quote simplyput, whoever is responsible should look him or herself in the mirror andask, by what right did I jeopardize the life of a fellowAmerican?
Here's Thornberryagain.
We had specificquestions.
Youknow, are these press reportsright?
They deniedit. And lookingback, now we know that in someinstances, they were too cute by half bysaying,well, we're not in negotiations today when the guy was about to get on a plane and go to the mid-east to have negotiationstomorrow.
What he's talking about is a congressional hearing in lateApril, just a month before thetrade.
A State Department official was asked about efforts to recoverBo.
And he gives this kind of crypticupdate.
He says that agencies across the government were striving in themost,quote, energetic and creative ways we candevise,unquote, to secure Bo'srelease.
Unfortunately, the Taliban broke off direct contact with us in January of2012.
We would very much like to return to direct contact withthem.
And if wedo, at the top of ouragenda, we'll be SergeantBergdahl.
It is certainly not thecase, as wasreported, that somehow theTaliban, the KaniNetwork, are seeking to release him and that interagency squabbles within the United States government are preventing or delayingthat.
Mr.Long, thank you verymuch.
I continue to be impressed with theinterview.
That same guy was in Doha by the next day for a meeting about the Bergdahltrade.
Soyeah, the administration wasn't exactly forthcoming withCongress.
On the otherhand, it wasn't openhearing.
And he's talking about a deal so fragilestill.
He doesn't know if it's going to fallapart, like the others beforeit.
Regardless, once Hask staffers on the Republican side went back and traced exactly what they were and weren'ttold, once they investigated the wholetrade, issued a strongly worded report aboutit, that report then entered the politicalfray.
Democrats called it an expression of shrilldemigogory, accused the Republicans of using the trade to push their national securityagenda.
Republicans accused Democrats of exactly the samething.
I talked to some Haskstaffers,again, on the Republican side about this wholething.
And they sounded tome,surprisingly, genuinely upset by what had happened to their once collegial relationship withDoD.
If that's going to be the relationship goingforward, then there isnothing.
What can we rely upon that they are telling us about any givenissue?
Like you just feel like you don't trust those guysanymore.
Yeah. Is this abiggie? Like is this the biggie that you've seen where you're justlike, I cannot believe how this wentdown?
Or is this justlike, oh mygod, there'slike, this happens like three times a year on differentthings.
We view this asunprecedented.
This staffer said we're not just foot stomping here that you guys didn't tellus.
It's actually a profound concern about national securityrisk.
And the risk toour, inparticular, notexclusively, but inparticular, our forces deployed overseas and inAfghanistan.
And so we'reworried. She's talking about the Talibanfive.
They felt like the president and the DoD had done an end run around the approval process for Gitmotransfers.
And so youknow, who are these five Taliban guysanyway?
How can we trust you that they're safe torelease?
That they won't rejoin thebattle?
Who signed off onthis? This part of the fight over Bo'strade.
I just want to talk about it for a minute because it mirrors a deeper bare knuckled fight overGuantanamo.
The president wants to closeGuantanamo.
Most Republicans inCongress, even though President Bush wanted to close ittoo, they've opposed the idea since Obama tookoffice.
And one of the arguments they make is that some of the prisoners we've released from Gitmo have rejoined thefight.
And that'strue. Mosthaven, but somehave.
So it's a fairquestion,right?
What about these five Talibanguys?
Were they safe to release fromGuantanamo?
There's probablynobody, including themilitary, who knows the ins and outs of Gitmo better than Carol Rosenberg from the MiamiHerald.
I've actually asked military people questions aboutGuantanamo.
And they've referred me to CarolRosenberg.
Carol explained that these five guys were what's known down there as foreverprisoners.
They hadn't been cleared forrelease, and they hadn't been and wouldn't be charged withcrimes.
But they also weren't going through the administration's new reviewprocess.
An interagency board meant to assess each detainee who was still down there and figure out whether they could be cleared for transfer or should still beheld.
By allaccounts, this review process is a much more rigorous and more rational look at the intelligence than has been done in thepast.
Butagain, these five guys weren't on the list forreview.
Here'sCarol. Three of these guys got there on the firstday.
You would have thought that they'd get the firstreviews.
But theydidn't. And I'm watching through theyears.
Why aren't they reviewing theseguys?
Why aren't they reviewing theseguys?
Imean, I started asking questions reallyearly.
Why aren't these guysbeing...
Because my instinctwas, my thought was we know that they're trying totrade.
Wouldn't you think they're trying to push them through the board to get them inposition?
And then they'renot. They'renot.
And I'mlike, I wonder if they think thatthey...
Intelligence people won't clearthem.
Right. Gotit?Right. If you have it onpaper, then it would look even worse for thepresident,right?
Yeah. Imagine if they'd been rejected for release by theboard.
And the US had traded themanyway.
Since there wasn't areview, we don't have in any publicway, atleast, a recent intelligent assessment on these fiveguys.
However, I talked to someone who shouldknow.
That guyNathan, not his realname, you heard him back in episodefive.
He's the guy who was close to the recovery effort forBo, and worked with Bo'sparents.
Nathan is not alefty. He's formermilitary, and he was an intel analyst atGitmo.
His specialty wasAfghanistan,Pakistan.
He did two stints at Guantanamo for a total of threeyears, ending in2013.
So he knew all about these Talibanguys.
His office at Gitmo was a stone-strow from where they were beingheld.
Nathan readily admits that he'sbiased, and so far as he wanted Bo to comehome, and he was working toward that verygoal.
But he was not happy about thistrade.
He doesn't hateit, like a lot of his peers in the analystworld.
He just wishes it hadn't come tothat.
But the only option left for the president was this Gitmooption.
There wasn't the political will to do anythingelse.
But he also thinks these fiveguys, they were okay torelease.
They're being watched closely inQatar.
They'rehigh-profile, so they can'thide.
Everyone knows who they are and what they looklike.
Nathan says there's just not much they'd be able to pulloff, even if they wantedto.
Their value to the Taliban inAfghanistan, hesaid, is pretty much limited to a rallyingcry.
Yeah, I was very familiar withthem.
Andhonestly, I didn't feel that it was that big of a danger torelease.
Even theguys, Norey andFazel, who were the biggestfish, it seemslike.
Yeah,definitely. They're not going to bethat.
They're not going to betrouble.
If they're ending up beingtrouble, it's because we let them betrouble, because we drop the ball on keeping eye onthem,or...
Do you feel like you guys hadcleared, or I know it's not your job to clear someone forrelease, but had recommendedrelease, or had seen people released who were on par with theseguys?
Sure,sure.Yeah. And we've released guys that we probably shouldn'thave.
We didn't even know who theywere.
Butyeah,definitely. We've definitely released some not-so-good guys that were pretty close tothese, in-level with theseguys.
Yeah.Right, so it's like you didn't see the names and just like freakout.
Like, I can'twhat? There's only like one or two people that getmolded, would freak me out ifwe...
LikeKSM, if you were on thelist, that might beright.
That's going to be aproblem.
That's definitely going to be aproblem.
Oh,really? But you're beingserious.
Like, they're really only a few who just areokay.
Yeah, andfrankly, we got to do something withKSM.
Them leavingKSM, they would have leftanyway.
At least we made use ofthem.
So the hot reaction to thistrade, Nathan says he understandsit.
But he also says it's not exactly based on thefacts.
The anger overreleasing those guys comes down to a lot of the same reasons why people are still mad at Beau for walking out thebase.
Like, it's a very personalthing.
Like, youdon't... They feel very strongly about what these guys havedone.
And what kind of people theyare.
And you don'tnegotiate.
You don't maketrades. So they're wrapped up in a larger moralquestion.
So Obama released these fiveguys.
Congress didn't likeit.
And to beclear, Congress doesn't get a vote on individual getmo transfers likethis.
They're just supposed to benotified.
Right after thetrade, the White House explained that the Secretary of Defense had followed all the requirements for the detaineetransfers.
That the 30-day notice could have endangered Beau'slife.
And that they believed the president had the constitutional authority to make thisdecision.
But it was agreed all around Republicans andDemocrats.
The administration had pulled a fast one by not giving the 30-daynotice.
And the government accountabilityoffice, which isnonpartisan, found that the DOD broke the law by doing the transfer the way itdid.
Which, that happenssometimes.
President Obama is definitely not the first to claim executive power in order to make a move likethis.
But when a president doesthat, a rankled Congress tends to push back with whatever power ithas.
In thiscase, one way to dothat, getmolegislation.
And so here's a fairly tangible effect of the trade forBeau.
There's this massive annual defense bill that's put together by the House and Senate Armed Servicescommittees.
And tucked inside it for the past fiveyears, is language specifying what the Secretary of Defense has to do before he can sign off on any foreign transfers of getmodetainees.
After the Burggdahltrade, Republicans decided to change that language to make it harder to transferanyone.
AdamSmith, a Democrat from WashingtonState, was one of four lawmakers trying to come to final agreement on that bill lastyear.
I talked to him over the summer when he was still in the thick of arguing with Republicans over the harsher transferlanguage.
Smith has been a big proponent of shutting downgetmo.
He and I were both on the phone when I asked him aboutit.
Both of us traveling incars,actually, so the tape isn'tgreat.
How much is the Burggdahl trade for theTaliban, those five Talibanguys?
Is that a shadow over what you guys are doing rightnow,like,or, and how big ashadow?
It's a pretty darn bigshadow.
Absentthat? I don't think we would be having the discussion of further foreign transferrestrictions.
Really?Well,yeah.Well, we'd be having thediscussion, but I'd be winningit.
Andyeah, RepublicanMcThornberry, who was also one of the four lawmakers negotiating thatbill,said, it'strue.
The Burggdahl thing wascorrosive.
They were not going to budge on that stricter standard for letting people out ofgetmo.
Oh, there's noquestion.
Imean, it was a direct result of the Burggdahl trade and the not telling Congress thetruth.
Anotherresult, lesstangible,maybe, was that outrage and suspicion over the trade spilled over onto Bohimself.
June11,2014, the House Armed Services Committee held a packed hearing on the Burggdahltrade.
At the start of thishearing, I'm pleased to welcome members of the public who have such an interest in theseproceedings.
The chairman opened bysaying, we are not going to talk about Burggdahlpersonally.
Let me be clear up on the focus of today'shearing.
It is not my intention to dive into the circumstances of the disappearance of SergeantO'Horstead.
Then, ofcourse, it cameup.
Testifying before the committee was Defense Secretary ChuckHagel.
He had to answer all the who knew what-when questions that were pissing Congressoff.
Representative JeffMiller,Republican, took a turn at themic.
Did you or did you not notify Congress within the 30-day time frameyesterday?
No.Okay. What I was not certainyesterday.
Allright.No. Does the administration intend to violate the noticerequired?
Then, Miller started asking questions aboutBo.
That's what he returnshome.
Why were we hearing fromhim?
Why was he still at an American military hospital inGermany?
And what we were doing is we were allowing— Saywhat,Mr.
Secretary. Thedoctors.
Saywhat?No,Mr.Secretary.
Wait aminute. Wait aminute.
Mr.Secretary, I think you're going to have aquestion.
He's been returned to the UnitedStates.
We have seriously wounded soldiers that are returned to the United States almost immediately after they arestabilized.
How long did Jessica Lynch wait before she was returned to the UnitedStates?
You're trying to tell me that he's being held atLahnstool, Germany because of his medicalcondition?
Congressman, I hope you're not implying anything other thanthat.
The fact that you asked me— I'm going to ask thequestion,Mr.
Secretary. I'm going to go on ananswer,too.
And I don't like the implication of thequestion.
Answerit. Theimplication, Ithink, was that maybe something fishy was going on withBo.
Something embarrassing to theArmy.
That maybe this BergdahlFellow, an American soldier whom we had just brought home at enormouscost, had walked off to join theTaliban.
And now they were hiding him away inGermany.
Pagel fended all of thisoff.
This isn't just about a physicalsituation,Congressman.
This guy was held for almost fiveyears.
In God knows what kind of conditions we do know some of the conditions from our intelligencecommunity, notfrom, by theway,Bergdahl.
This is not just about Kenny Get on his feet and walk and get to aplane.
So you're telling me— You may not be questioned because of hiscondition.
I'm telling you is that the medical professionals that rely on their judgment for hishelp.
So what was going on in Germany at an Army hospital inLahnstool?
Bo was undergoing this really pretty profoundtransition.
The official word for it isreintegration.
Atfirst, as you canimagine, every single thing is weird forhim.
He can't talkreally. He's blinking andsquinting.
For fiveyears, he'd had only a few things—abowl, ablanket, a waterbottle.
He says his mind had adapted to the simplicity ofthat.
Andnow, all of asudden, there are all thesepeople.
He's got to interact withthem.
There's all this stuff around furniture he's not usedto.
Forinstance, one of the first things that happens is they bring him into this room and they're chairs and sofa and they tell him wherever you want to sit down isfine.
Youknow, I heard the wordfit.
Basically, I justthought, because that's what I was used todoing, squatted down and then plopped down in the Indian cross-legged style onto thefloor.
Yeah. And so all thesecommanders, they followsuit.
Everybody was sitting down on the floor and we're talking like captains or talking to theguys.
I think there's like a general there or a colonel orsomething.
This—not that I thinkabout, it's kind offunny.
For the SEARcommunity, that's the military'ssurvival,evasion,resistance, and escapetraining.
Forthem, thismoment, getting back a POW who'd been held for thatlong,alone, andsurvived, it washuge.
It hadn't happened sinceVietnam.
The military had been practicing for Bose return formonths, foryears,really.
They'd cleared out two entire wings of launchtolforum.
And one wing would be bow and a few seerfolks.
And the otherwing, all theintel, the administrativepeople, thecommanders,computers, bow is interacting with just a smallteam.
But everyone involved was sooverexcited, Iguess.
All these commanders and psychs who are supposed to take over when bow gets to SanAntonio, they all showed up inGermany.
And then they just hangout, sit around in the hospital wing with nothing todo.
Apparently, one psychologist from Europe arrived on his owndime, offering hisservices, they set the poor guyaway.
One person who was on the Germany team told me that all thesepeople, it was like they wanted to be holdbow, to meethim, like they wanted to touch thestone.
I've spoken to several people who were involved with Bose reintegration anddebriefing, and they told me it was all planned down to the smallestdetail.
How to walk bow from the plane to the bus that would take him to thehospital.
How to speak tohim, they'd explain exactly how the day was going togo.
Food will come at10, there's a strategic debriefing at1.
Is thatokay? If it's notokay, we don't have to doit.
You want your food at11?
That's okaytoo. They're trying to remove the helpless feeling by giving me complete control overeverything, asking meeverything, even if they were going to move us stock off thebed, they'd ask me if it was okay to move the stock off thebed.
And they askedhim, are you comfortable sleeping in thebed?
Bo couldn't really talkyet, but he had to let themknow, he was not comfortable sleeping on thebed.
His body was inpain, especially the spots that had been in contact with the floor for solong, but somehow he couldn't deal with the softness of the bedeither.
Plus, the hospital bed was out in theopen, open on all sides in theroom.
Somebody could very easily get tome, so it was like this very uneasyfeeling.
So what I had to do was add and move over by thebathroom, where there was a littlehallway.
And the sleep on the first night I slept in the bathroom because there's adoor, I slept in thebathroom, I shut the door so Icould, youknow, there's also a distance between the door to the room and the bathroom so I knew that there is that allowed me to cure footstepscoming.
Bo didn't end up being a modelsoldier, but he'd been by all accounts a modelPOW.
And now a modelattorney,cooperative, eager to be helpful to the CIRteam, to the Inteldebriefers, he participated in debriefs forweeks.
His progress was being watchedvery, very closely by lots ofpeople, especially at thePentagon.
Everyday, all thequestions, all the follow-upquestions, the Intel people were askinghim, they had to clearthem, all the way up through the joint chiefs and then all the way back downagain.
The team is updating all these MucketyMucks, socalm, sentcalm,JPRA, by video everyday.
And the Muckety Mucks areasking, is Bo telling thetruth?
Does he have Stockholmsyndrome?
Is he really trying to helpus?
All reasonablequestions.
Butagain, it seemed as if the people dealing with Bo in a daily way had such adifferent, such a softer view of him than the higher upsdid.
At onepoint, forinstance, someone gave him acompass, but it always kept a compassbefore.
And one person told me that when the Army Chief of Staff foundout, hewent,quote, fuckingballistic.
Why would you give a deserter acompass?
They had to take itaway.
About a week and a half after Bo came toGermany, at the same time that members of Congress made itclear,publicly, in that hearing with ChuckHagel, that they're also watching this process veryclosely.
Wait aminute. Why hasn't he been returned to the UnitedStates?
Word comes down at launchstool.
They got to speed itup. Move it along to SanAntonio.
The Army wanted himback, wanted more command and control over theirsoldier.
This still unknown entity who was in oceanaway.
This was communicated rather forcefully to the reintegration experts in launchstool.
We werelike, wait asecond.
MichaelValdivinos. He's a former Air Force seerpsychologist.
He was in charge of the psych team for part of Bo'sreintegration.
Youknow, it really started feeling like it wasn't about the reintegration personanymore.
Youknow, it wasn't about his overallwell-being.
It was muchmore, it started becoming really political andadministrative.
It just felt likewrong, youknow?
And we would have liked to have maybe had him stay a little bitlonger, but there were other competinginterests.
Someone else who was there in Germany toldme, they started seeing these charts aboutBo, with categories frommedical,psych, andintel.
And the charts hadcolors,red,yellow, orgreen.
Green meantcleared. And they got thepicture.
They had to showprogress.
They were supposed to set specific goals forBo, suchas, is Bergedol able to deal with negative mediaattention.
Every day at fouro'clock, they'd need to brief the commanders to report whether they were meeting theirtargets.
Everyday, more and more green boxes turned up on thecharts.
Ofcourse, part of bringing Bo back to the modern world was letting him know gently that he'd becomepopular.
Baldvino's has been in contact with Borecently.
They've talked aboutthis.
He didn't know that he was onTV.
He didn't know that thiswas, that he was the subject of nationalinterest.
He didn't know that his parents had beenon, had met thepresident.
God, it must be so weird to know notonly,like, does the whole country know aboutyou, butthen,yeah,like, it'snot,they're, they're aren't havingparades.
Yeah,no,he, itwas, it was reallyhard.
It was really hard because there were so much of it coming sofast, and it was allbad.
Like telling somebody that andjust, youknow, how do you prepare somebody that's gone through something like he did andlet, andthen, by theway, let himknow,hey,dude, you'rehome.
You can relaxnow. But as soon as you walk out thatdoor, get ready because there'sa, there's ashitstorm, youknow, and it's not going away anytimesoon.
Back to that congressional hearing with ChuckHagel, one lasttime.
Representative JimLangevin, aDemocrat, he agreed that questions about Sergeant Bergdahl's conduct should be addressed with due process at the appropriatetime.
But he askedHagel, could you at least answer this onething?
But could you settle one conflictingreport, atleast, in terms of regarding the number ofthe, the loss of soldiers who may have been involved in searches for SergeantBergdahl?
Hagel started by noting that any soldier who dies is a terrible loss to their family and to theircountry.
Then he got down tobusiness.
He knew this wascoming.
I've personally gone back and asked that question inside the Pentagon in the Army and all of ourreports.
I have seen no evidence that directly links any American combat death to the rescue or finding or search of SergeantBergdahl.
Hagel said itonce, then rightaway, he said itagain.
I've asked thequestion.
We've all asked thequestion.
I have seen noevidence, no facts presented to me when I asked thatquestion.
Hagel had to know that question was the consequential heart of bothstory.
Did anyone die looking forhim?
And I have to think Hagel also knew that his answer would not settle thisquestion, not by a longshot.
Doctors were talking aboutit.
Commanders like Mike Walts were talking aboutit.
We're testifying about it that people did die looking forBergdahl.
That's part of what was so galling to them about the Rose Garden in the firstplace.
Why weren't those families being recognized by thePresident?
I asked Mike Walts aboutit.
Why is the Army saying the opposite then of what you'resaying?
Why are they saying nobody died in thesearch?
I'm not sure who did the investigation and I haven't seen from you or any other journalist a real dig into how the Army came to thatconclusion.
What did they lookat? What was the basis of thatstatement?
I don'tknow. I can only speak to my ownexperience.
OK,then. Let's find ajournalist.
Oh,wait. We'rejournalists.
We put one of our staff Whitney Dangerfield on thisquestion.
Has there been an official investigation into whether people died looking forBo?
Is there a record of people who got injuries looking forBo?
He started with Army PublicAffairs.
And they told her to ask ForceCom, US Army ForcesCommand.
A guy there pointed her to the investigation by Army Major General KennethDahl.
But GeneralDahl, he didn't look into this question of whether people died or got hurt in thesearch.
That wasn't hismission.
A adhering on Bo's case inSeptember, Bo's attorney asked all aboutit.
And Dahl said he'd heard a lot of discussion about it in his own interviews and just in the press allegations one way oranother.
But he didn't pursueit.
He said he wastold,quote,no, you don't need to do that because Central Command is going to take care ofthat,unquote.
OK,interesting. SoWhitney, ourWhitney, went to CentralCommand, sentCom.
And sent Com wrote back toher,quote, there is no official report or investigation that we are awareof, directed or conducted by US sentCom.
I would direct you to the US Army for any records they mayhave,unquote.
So Army to ForceCom, to sentCom, which sent her back to theArmy, also known as SquareOne.
Unless we're missingsomething, the US military hasn't done an official investigation into whether any soldiers died because they were looking forBo.
Here's the other thing General Dahl said about this question when he was on the stand back inSeptember.
Hesaid,quote, I had asked the appointingauthority, youknow, should I investigatethis?
Becausereally, this is something that at the end of the day is going to have to beanswered.
Imean, if I was aparent, I would want toknow.
Everybody should want toknow.
We really ought to close thatout,unquote.
Yeah, Iagree. Next time oncereal.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
I'm going to be on the standback.
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It's certain there is no doubt in my mind that you the soldiers died looking for Boba orDog.
And this gassis, I won't let you know we're fixing to break thisstory.
People are going to gethurt.
People are going to getkilled.
And I just see the first truck justexplode.
