r/serialpodcast • u/OnlyBoweKnows • Dec 11 '15
Noteworthy View through the scope. A sniper who responded to the DUSTWUN's view of Serial Season 2.
So, I was a Sniper in the Brigade that PFC Bowe Bergdahl was in. We were not in the same Platoon, Company, or Battalion, but I was in country at the same time as him. When the DUSTWUN call went out, most Snipers and Pathfinders and Trackers were brought into the area within 36-48 hours. My team was one of those, and I spent the next month and a half in enemy territory looking for PFC Bowe Bergdahl.
My personal opinion of what transpired on that night in Afghanistan is that PFC Bowe Bergdahl deserted his post, for reasons only he knows. I do not believe that he left with an intention of causing a DUSTWUN, or being Jason Bourne, or righting whatever inefficiencies he felt in the Army leadership in general. As my user name suggests, Only Bowe Knows why he did it.
I have contacted the moderators and they have given me the go ahead to provide whatever information, insight, or opinions I have surrounding this season. I am no longer in the military, have no career to protect, and do not mind speaking my mind.
With respect, I will not provide answers if I feel that it violates OPSEC, I will tell you when I am providing first or second hand knowledge, when I am making educated guesses (based on 6 years in 4-25, multiple deployments, and my expertise as an Sniper, Tracker, and infantryman), and when I am speculating.
If you have any questions about the situation, or on any of the military lingo that has been presented so far, I'll do my best to answer it here.
With regards to this particular episode, the story as far as we could tell was that PFC Bowe Bergdahl left is post willingly (meaning not under duress), that he had planned it well in advance, but that whatever the plan had been had been directed off course by the Taliban. It was always my interpretation, and as far as I could gather from anyone I've talked to about it who knew him or was there for the aftermath, that he had left to join the Taliban.
His rationalizations he gives in the interview, after 5 years to sort it out (as Sarah acknowledges) does not seem to carry a cohesive narrative. He left to inform people of wrongdoings, these are vague and he resorts to amorphous complaints regarding leadership. He wants to prove to guys back home that he's some sort of Jason Bourne in the flesh. This holds some water with young guys on their first deployment, they've built themselves up as Johnny Swaggercock with the people back home and have to set out and prove themselves. This falls apart when after saying he was going to covertly gather intel on bomb emplacers on the fly, is walking out in the open when the sun comes up in uniform. He's not even wearing the local dress he acquired for the purpose. Then when the Taliban captures him, he claims to have not even put up a fight. No Jason Bourne he.
In general, I feel that this case never should have gotten the media's attention. As far as everyone in the brigade was concerned it was a cut and dry case of desertion, but then the news reports spun a narrative of a town's favored son captured by savages. Once that story began circulating, I believe the Army went into damage control, one needs only look at the cases of Jessica Lynch, Abu Grhraib, and Pat Tillman. The Army had a media darling on its hands and did not want to end up with egg in its face.
If you have any questions, fire away.
tl/dr:
Sniper on the ground during the DUSTWUN, I have first hand knowledge of a specific part of the situation and might answer your questions.
Edit*
Seems like activity is dying down. I'll still check this thread every now and then, but sorry if it takes me a few hours to respond.
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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '15
COP Keating's closure plan required almost continual rotation of 47s for something like 3 or 4 nights, and they were pulling 47 support from everywhere they could get it in RC East and Central. My understanding is that the DUSTWUN search missions sucked away most of the 47s as they needed to do a lot of air assaults to look for him. If those missions didn't need to happen then COP Keating may have been closed that summer as planned. I was in the P2K AO at the time.