Reid’s Suggestion that Bergdahl Was at Death’s Door Turns Out to be Completely False
New reports from a private intelligence company suggest that Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was healthy enough to play soccer and participate in target practice while being held prisoner by the Taliban.
If that’s the case, why did Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid suggest to the Washington Post that Bergdahl had to be freed as soon as possible, because his life was in some sort of imminent danger?
From Newsmax.com:
Fox News obtained secret documents based on an eyewitness account of at least part of Bergdahl’s five-year captivity that began when he reportedly walked off his base in June 2009.
The documents show that Bergdahl’s relationship with his captors changed over time. He at one time was held in a cage after being recaptured after he had escaped. But at other times he had a seemingly friendly relationship with his captors, playing soccer and frequently using the work “salaam” – Arabic for “peace.”
He also participated in target practice with his captors and was allowed to carry a gun, according to the reports.
The documents were generated by the Eclipse Group, Fox reports. Eclipse is a private intelligence agency founded for former CIA officer Duane “Dewey” Clarridge.
Then there’s this from Fox News:
Clarridge told Fox News his group enjoyed a subcontract through the assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict from November 2009 through May 31, 2010, and that after the contract was terminated, he invested some $50,000 of his own money to maintain the elaborate network of informants and handlers that had yielded such detailed accounts of Bergdahl’s status.
Clarridge further told Fox News that by the end of 2010, he had furnished at least 13 of these detailed SITREPs, or situation reports, that his network generated about Bergdahl to Brig. Gen. Robert P. Ashley Jr., who in April 2010 was named director of intelligence, at the J-2 level, at U.S. Central Command, or CENTCOM, headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida.
Some will argue that Bergdahl may have been brainwashed by his captors, or that he simply did what he had to do to survive. Either or both of those scenarios could prove to be true.
But the fact is that the U.S. Army had been receiving regular reports about Bergdahl’s condition, and should have known that he was at least healthy enough to run around playing soccer and participate in target practice.
Just the fact that he was allowed to carry a gun should have suggested that he was in no imminent danger.
If the Army should have known, the White House and its congressional allies should have known.
Given that, was there really any pressing reason to get him out as soon as possible, particularly when it meant releasing five very dangerous terrorists?
Yet Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told the Washington Post, “Every day he was there was a day closer to his dying.”
That was obviously not the case.
If the major objective behind the prisoner swap was to save Bergdahl’s life, we got snookered. He seemed to be doing just fine. If the White House and Reid were doing their homework, and checking the intelligence reports the government paid for, they would have known that.
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