On June 30, Bowe Bergdahl will have been held captive by the Taliban for 3 years. Bergdahl, born in a small Idaho town, joined the Army at age 22. His father told Time, Berghdal “saw Afghanistan as a humanitarian mission" that “was the highest ground for an American soldier.”
But an in-depth profile by Rolling Stone reveals that soon after his deployment, the young soldier soon fell into a chaotic unit, devoid of leadership, where soldiers broke "even the most basic rules of combat, like wearing baseball caps on patrol instead of helmets."
Growing increasingly frustrated, the Bergdahl family broke its silence in May and revealed their son had been part of prisoner swap talks between the White House and the Taliban.
The Rolling Stone profile shows that even before his capture, Bergdahl himself had grown frustrated with the Army and his mission. After the first casualty in his battalion, Bergdahl wrote to his parents:
The future is too good to waste on lies. And life is way too short to care for the damnation of others, as well as to spend it helping fools with their ideas that are wrong. I have seen their ideas and I am ashamed to even be american. The horror of the self-righteous arrogance that they thrive in. It is all revolting.
Bob Bergdahl, Bowe's father addressed his son directly at the annual Rolling Thunder rally in Washington, D.C.'s National Mall on May 27, telling him, "You will come home. We will not leave you behind."
Yet as negotiations with the Taliban fail to succeed, no clear sign has indicated that Bergdahl will see Idaho's mountains any time soon.