Defense

Bergdahl details failed attempts to escape Taliban

by Elliot Smilowitz - 12/25/15 10:32 AM ET

Bowe Bergdahl details failed attempts to escape his captors after the Taliban abducted him in 2009, in the latest episode of the podcast “Serial.”

In interviews with filmmaker Mark Boal that were played on the podcast, Bergdahl discussed an opportunity he had when a delivery of water distracted his captors.

{mosads}He said he was able to slip his limbs out of loose chains and unlatch his cell door when no one was looking, the New York Post reported.

He spent about 15 minutes on the run, covering himself with mud on a building’s roof to try to hide, before he was caught and whipped with a rubber hose.

After that, Bergdahl said, he was moved to a much more difficult living arrangement.

“In the new place, they put me on an Afghan bed and they chained my feet to the ends of the bed and chained my hands to the tops of the bed so that basically I was spread-eagle on the bed and blindfolded. And that’s how I spent the majority of the next three months,” he said.

“The time deprivation, too much light or too much darkness and too much randomness, it just wears away at you and drives your nerves into the ground. The constant worry ‘Am I going to die today?’ or is something worse going to happen?” he added.

Bergdahl said guards who were assigned to watch him were often bored by the job, and would pass the time by interrogating him with absurd questions.

“They ask you, is Obama gay and sleeps with men?” he said.

The guards would also make videos of him and shave his beard into amusing shapes, Bergdahl added.

He was later moved to a cell with a window, where he hatched his next escape plan.

In the middle of the night, Bergdahl used bedding and chains to climb down the window to the street. He took off on foot, but accidentally stepped off a cliff in the darkness and badly injured his side.

Bergdahl spent a week crawling, eating grass and drinking dirty water off the ground to survive.

When the Taliban found him after eight days, they did not even beat him as punishment, due to his poor condition.

“That escape was the last time I saw stars since until the night Special Forces picked me up,” Bergdahl said.

Tags Bowe Bergdahl Taliban