General: ‘Unrealistically idealistic’ Bowe Bergdahl does not deserve jail sentence
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JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO – FORT SAM HOUSTON, Tex. — The Army general who carried out an investigation last year into the alleged desertion of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl believes that a jail sentence would be “inappropriate,” despite the massive search caused by him walking away from his unit’s outpost in Afghanistan.
Maj. Gen. Kenneth Dahl testified Friday in Bergdahl’s case that he found the soldier “unrealistically idealistic” about other people and remorseful for the massive search his actions caused. He left his platoon’s outpost, Observation Post Mest in Paktika province, with plans to run 19 miles to the larger Forward Operating Base Sharana, cause a disruption and get the attention of a general.
“I do not believe that there is a jail sentence at the end of this process,” Dahl said.
Bergdahl, 29, faces charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy in the military’s most closely watched desertion case in decades. If convicted, he faces life in prison.
Dahl was ordered to investigate Bergdahl’s alleged desertion last year after he was recovered by U.S. Special Operations troops in Afghanistan as part of a controversial deal approved by the White House in which five Taliban officials were released from detention from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. They now live in Qatar.
The general interviewed Bergdahl for hours in August 2014, compiling a 371-page transcript of their conversation. The investigation itself lasted 59 days and found that Bergdahl left his platoon without his firearm, a 5.56mm squad automatic weapon, because he wanted to blend into his surroundings until he reached the larger base.
Dahl called Bergdahl “very bright and very well read” and fascinated by Samurai warrior culture. He knew he would get in trouble for running away from his base but told Dahl he felt compelled to do so at the time because he was concerned his platoon was in danger because of perceived poor leadership.
Bergdahl was deeply critical of many fellow soldiers, Dahl said. Despite being a low-ranking enlisted soldier, Bergdahl believed that he should have a larger role in targeting the Taliban. He considered taking a fellow soldier’s M9 pistol with him on his run to Sharana but likely decided against it because he didn’t want to get him in trouble.
“I think he actually believed that if five Taliban rolled up on him, he would have been able to dispose of them,” Dahl said.
Instead, Bergdahl was quickly captured and beaten in the process, Dahl said. He was shuttled between a number of insurgents that first day on motorcycles and in vehicles, while U.S. soldiers frantically searched for him.
“I got the impression they didn’t know what the heck to do with him,” Dahl said of the insurgents who captured Bergdahl.
Dahl attributed Bergdahl’s views in part to his unconventional upbringing “near the edge of the grid.” There is no evidence he was sympathetic to the Taliban, but he did have “outsize impressions of his capabilities,” Dahl testified.
Bergdahl saw problems with his leaders that other soldiers did not, Dahl said. In one example, Bergdahl’s battalion command sergeant major said in jest during a motivational speech that he liked to pillage and plunder while deployed, and Bergdahl took it to heart.
In another, Bergdahl witnessed his battalion commander, then-Lt. Col. Clinton Baker, launch a tirade at soldiers who were not wearing the correct uniform while in Afghanistan, Dahl said. Baker kicked rocks in the process, and Bergdahl believed he was disturbing graves in an Afghan cemetery by doing so, Dahl said.
“I think he absolutely believed that the things he perceived were absolutely true,” Dahl said of Bergdahl.
Bergdahl also found his pre-deployment training at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif., “lame,” and was surprised that he was told to lock his wall locker to protect his possessions on an Army post, Dahl said. Soldiers should be able to trust one another, Bergdahl reasoned.
Dahl had 22 members on his investigative team and interviewed 57 people, he said. Bergdahl’s interview came at the end.
Dan Lamothe covers national security for The Washington Post and anchors its military blog, Checkpoint.
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