'A Cover Up Just Like Benghazi': Outraged Parents Of Officer Who Died Hunting For 'Deserter' POW Bergdahl Lash Out At Obama Over 'LIES' They Were Told About How Their Hero Son Died

Hero: Second Lieutenant Darryn Andrews died in a Taliban ambush on Sept 4, 2009, after he tried to save colleagues who had been injured in an IED explosion. Top brass had told his parents that he died searching a Taliban commander. Now former comrades have come forward to say they were really looking for Bergdahl

By Daniel Bates

The furious parents of an officer who they claim was killed while searching for freed Taliban prisoner Bowe Bergdahl today said that they have been lied to as part of a ‘cover up just like Benghazi’.

The mother and father of Second Lieutenant Darryn Andrews are angry that they have been told different stories about how their son died.

First his commanders said that their son was blown up while hunting a Taliban commander - but only now that Bergdahl has been freed after five years in captivity are they learning the truth.

Cover-up: Mr Andrews claimed soldiers said they had 'to sign a letter saying that they would not discuss this', but now they have approached the family to tell the 'truth'. He added: 'I have no way of proving that apart from what they said. We cannot tell you how devastated we are that the government would do this. They lied to us'

Fury: ‘It’s a big cover-up like Benghazi, just like everything Obama has done. We want the truth to come out’

Family man: At the time of his death Lt Andrews had a young son and his wife Julie gave birth to their daughter three months after the attack that took his life

Lt Andrews’ parents told MailOnline that their own son branded Bergdahl a ‘deserter’ before he was killed.

In an exclusive interview his father Andy Andrews told MailOnline: ‘For his family it’s good to get him back but we will never be able to get our son back because of the actions of this guy (Bergdahl).

‘I think people need to be aware that the guy was not a hero and American lives have been lost trying to save this deserter’.

Lt Andrews was one of six men who died while apparently searching for Bergdahl, who is said to have voluntarily left his post in Afghanistan on June 30, 2009.

His release was brokered with the Taliban in exchange for five Guantanamo detainees and has ignited fury among many whose lives were changed forever as a result. 

‘It’s a big cover-up like Benghazi, just like everything Obama has done. We want the truth to come out.'

- Andrew Andrews 

During the months-long hunt for him vital resources were re-deployed to help with the hunt and scarce surveillance drones and helicopters were assigned to the task instead of other duties. 

Former colleagues of Bergdahl claim that this put them at risk - and led to lives being lost. 

What is undisputed is that Lt Andrews, who was from Dallas, Texas, died at the age of 34 on September 4, 2009 while serving with the 25th Infantry Division on his second tour of Afghanistan. 

At the time his family say they were told that his men were hunting a Taliban commander and that the truck at the front of their group ended in a hole after being hit by an Improvised Explosive Device. 

As the men got out to try and move the truck, a Taliban fighter with a rocket propelled grenade emerged and fired at them.

Lt Andrews was the only one to see it and tackled three of his men to prevent them being hit. He took a direct hit and died.

Stretched: Sondra Andrews, 66, said that her son’s unit should have had 30 men at the time they were ambushed but only had 20 because they were stretched too thin with the search

Private First Class Matthew Michael Martinek, 20, also later died in hospital due to his injuries.

Lt Andrews was posthumously given a silver star for his bravery. At the time of his death his wife Julie, 30, had already given birth to their son, six. Their daughter was born three-and-a-half months later and is now four. 

Speaking to MailOnline from his home in Cameron, Texas, Mr Andrews said: ‘When my son was killed there was no mention of searching for this guy (Bergdahl) but once all this has come out we got several emails and calls from soldiers who were with him in Afghanistan. 

'The soldiers said they had to sign a letter saying that they wouldn't discuss this... We cannot tell you how devastated we are that the government would do this. They lied to us.'

‘They say their mission was to search for Bergdahl. He (Lt Andrews) was killed in the search. We have no documentation of that.

‘The soldiers said they had to sign a letter saying that they would not discuss this. I have no way of proving that apart from what they said. We cannot tell you how devastated we are that the government would do this. They lied to us.’

‘It’s a big cover-up like Benghazi, just like everything Obama has done. We want the truth to come out.’ 

Sondra Andrews, 66, said that her son’s unit should have had 30 men at the time they were ambushed but only had 20 because they were stretched too thin with the search.

She said: ‘We want the truth to come out for the sake of our family...He (Bergdahl) in effect kept the men from their primary duties’.

In the wake of their son’s death, a number of his colleagues spoke with Mr and Mrs Andrews - and allegedly lied to their faces with the official story.

Mrs Andrews said that she excused them, but not their superiors.

She said: ‘When he was buried, soldiers from his outfit came down and that’s the story they told us. They are the same people now telling us something else.

‘I think it needs to be noted how duty driven they young men are. There’s an amount of respect they deserve for that. I resent the commanding officers and not the troops’.

Mr Andrews, 68, who served in the US Navy between 1968 and 1972, added: ‘I resent the men that gave the order (to search for Bergdahl) but not the men who got it’.

Lt Andrews graduated from Cameron Yoe High School in Dallas where he was a offensive and defensive lineman on the football team.

His twin brother Jarrett was quarterback.

Lt Andrews was inspired to join the military by his grandfather John E. Brown who was a prisoner of war in Germany during the Second World War.

Both Mr and Mrs Andrews told MailOnline that they condemned the decision to strike a deal with the Taliban to free Bergdahl.

Mrs Andrews said: ‘I have a long history with the military and it’s not done. You don’t negotiate with the enemy.

‘The Taliban prisoners are going to reintegrate and come back against the U.S. I feel like we have wasted too many lives.’

Mr Andrews added that he was stunned and that he could not ‘believe they have done this’.

He said: ‘There was a two to three month gap between Bergdahl disappearing and my son being killed and I spoke to him about it.

‘He said that he was a deserter. I resent him (being) pushed as a hero. For his family it’s good to have him back but we will never be able to get our son back because of the actions of this guy.’

Anger has been mounting against Bergdahl since his release and the Facebook page 'Bowe Bergdahl is NOT a hero!' has 5,400 members and bears pictures of all six paratroopers who lost their lives while looking for their captured comrade.

'I have a long history with the military and it’s not done. You don’t negotiate with the enemy. The Taliban prisoners are going to reintegrate and come back against the U.S. I feel like we have wasted too many lives.'

A White House petition to punish Bergdahl for being absent without leave (AWOL) also has nearly 2,000 online signatures. 

The other men who are said to have died looking for Bergdahl are: Staff Sergeant Clayton Bowen, 29, and Private First Class Morris Walker, 23, who were killed in an IED explosion on August 18, 2009.

Staff Sergeant Kurt Curtiss, a 27-year-old father of two, who died in a firefighter on August 26, 2009.

Staff Sergeant Michael Murphrey, 25, was killed in an IED blast on September 5, 2009.

'Bowe Bergdahl deserted during a time of war and his fellow Americans lost their lives searching for him,' former Sergeant Matt Vierkant told CNN.

Good for them: Andy Andrews told MailOnline that he felt relief for Bob Jani Bergdahl. But he added: 'We will never be able to get our son back... I think people need to be aware that they guy was not a hero and American lives have been lost trying to save this deserter.'

Anger: Andy Andrews added that he was against the deal Obama (pictured with Bergdahl's parents at the White House this weekend) made to bring the prisoner home. He said: 'I have a long history with the military and it’s not done. You don’t negotiate with the enemy'

'I was pissed off then and I am even more so now with everything going on,' Mr Vierkant said.

A former superior of the 28-year-old soldier, Greg Leatherman, said he hopes the military investigates Bergdahl and questions whether he did, indeed, desert his post in Afghanistan on June 30, 2009.

Most members of the military community voice support for Bergdahl, however.

When a discussion on the Facebook page of his battalion filled up with negative comments, a moderator chimed in: 'I challenge any one of you who label him a traitor to spend 5 years in captivity with the Taliban or Haqqani, then come back and accuse him again. Whatever his intent when he walked away or was captured, he has more than paid for it.'

Stories from the soldiers in Bergdahl's unit have begun to emerge of a young man whose mind had begun to wander.

Mr Leatherman said Bergdahl 'always looked at the mountains in the distance and talked of "seeing what's on the other side."'

Rolling Stone magazine also quoted emails Bergdahl is said to have sent to his parents that suggest he was disillusioned with America's mission in Afghanistan, had lost faith in the U.S. Army's mission there and was considering desertion.

Bergdahl told his parents he was 'ashamed to even be American'.

'Wasted lives': Lt Andrews' father hit out at the lives that have been sacrificed in Afghanistan and added that he was angry the deal has been done with terrorists who will just start attacking the US again. Pictured are Lt Andrews' wife and two children who he will never see grow up

Valor: Lt Andrews was posthumously awarded a silver star for his actions. He served two tours in Afghanistan

Bergdahl, who mailed home boxes containing his uniform and books, also wrote: '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.'

The military seems to tacitly acknowledge that Bergdahl violated military regulations of some kind. However, officials also say he's unlikely to be disciplined for it.

One source told CNN: 'Five years is enough.'

Soldiers described a massive effort by the U.S. Army to recover Bergdahl after he was taken captive - one in which soldiers were ordered to go on patrols and take risks in ways they never would otherwise.

Twitter user Cody, who claims he served with Bergdahl, said the search left Bergdahl's comrades vulnerable.

'While searching for him, ambushes and IEDs picked up tremendously. Enemy knew we would be coming,' he wrote. 

'So without (Bergdahl) going missing we wouldn't have been in certain places.'

Furthermore, drones, planes, helicopters, soldiers and even food were diverted to the mission. CNN reports that the lack of resources led to a delay in the military closing Combat Outpost Keating. On October 3, Taliban insurgents overran the base and killed eight American soldiers.

Former Private First Class Jose Baggett, 27, who served in Bergdahl's company, told CNN that he lost two friends in the search for the captured soldier. And he blames Bergdahl for the deaths.

He said: 'He walked off. He left his guard post. Nobody knows if he defected or he's a traitor or he was kidnapped.

'What I do know is he was there to protect us and instead he decided to defer from America and go and do his own thing.

'I don't know why he decided to do that, but we spend so much of our resources and some of those resources were soldiers' lives.


UPDATE:

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Pentagon investigation concluded in 2010 that Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl walked away from his unit, and after an initial flurry of searching the military decided not to exert extraordinary efforts to rescue him, according to a former senior defense official who was involved in the matter.

Instead, the U.S. government pursued negotiations to get him back over the following five years of his captivity — a track that led to his release over the weekend.

Bergdahl was being checked and treated Monday at a U.S. military hospital in Germany as questions mounted at home over the swap that resulted in his freedom in exchange for the release of five detainees who were sent to Qatar from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo, Cuba.

Even in the first hours of Bergdahl’s handoff to U.S. special forces in eastern Afghanistan, it was clear this would not be an uncomplicated yellow-ribbon celebration. Five terrorist suspects also walked free, stirring a debate over whether the exchange would heighten the risk of other Americans being snatched as bargaining chips and whether the released detainees — several senior Taliban figures among them — would find their way back to the fight. [...]

Questions persisted, too, about the circumstances of Bergdahl’s 2009 capture. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel declined to comment on earlier reports that the sergeant had walked away from his unit, disillusioned with the war. Such matters “will be dealt with later,” Hagel said. 

But the former Pentagon official said it was “incontrovertible” that he walked away from his unit. 

The military investigation was broader than a criminal inquiry, this official said, and it didn’t formally accuse Bergdahl of desertion. In interviews, members of his unit portrayed him as a naive, “delusional” person who thought he could help the Afghan people by leaving his army post, the official said.

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Was Bowe Bergdahl A 'POW' Or A 'Deserter'? Does It Matter? Should It?