Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl returned to
active duty at a Texas Army base, and former Army Sgt. Matt Vierkant, one of his former platoon mates, says he doesn't understand why the military made the decision to allow it.
"It's really confusing and perplexing to me, with the several different allegations against him," Vierkant told J.D. Hayworth and John Bachman on "America's Forum" on
Newsmax TV on Tuesday.
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Bergdahl returned to active duty Monday at the U.S. Army North at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, which is also the location of the hospital where he has been treated over the last couple of months.
Bergdahl was released from the Taliban in Afghanistan on May 31 where he was held captive since 2009 in exchange for five Taliban commanders who were imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
However, several of Bergdahl's platoon mates, including Vierkant, allege that he was not captured, but deserted his post.
"We know that he deserted," he said. "So I don’t really see with all the evidence against him . . . how they can just send him back to active duty like nothing's gone on and give him a desk job, like they said, and just let him walk around in the public after he deserted and left us, left his brothers-in-arms."
Vierkant said Bergdahl "was only in Afghanistan for a little over a month, went on several different missions, got ambushed in the mountains a couple of weeks previous before he walked off."
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The former Army sergeant says that one of the clues that made him think that Bergdahl intentionally deserted his post is because he "left his stuff."
"I thought maybe that was his plan because I wouldn’t know any other reason why you would leave your weapon and equipment behind and your brothers-in-arms to walk off in the middle of Afghanistan, for no other reason than to either link up with the Taliban or something to that respect," Vierkant said.
Even though Bergdahl has been put on active duty for now, Vierkant said that he does "have faith in the military that they will do what's right."
"There's overwhelming evidence to show his intent to desert, his intent to not return, and I'm sure there's other several classified documents, which we don't know about, whether he collaborated with the enemy or not, but I do have faith that they will do what's right and justice will be served," he said.
Vierkant told Newsmax in June that Bergdahl should be
court-martialed for deserting his platoon.
Vierkant said he is "absolutely furious" that Bergdahl would be traded for the Taliban leaders that were sent to Qatar in the exchange.
"Every veteran that I've talked to . . . they don’t understand it, we don't get it, it doesn't make sense to us" why the U.S. government traded these men for Bergdahl, Vierkant said.
"Not only are they Taliban commanders and terrorists, but they're murderers of women and children and just to let them go for someone who deserted and left us behind, it just doesn’t make sense any way you look at it," he added.
"Not to mention, he was being held by the Haqqani Network, which isn't Taliban, but more of a mafia entity that is money based," Vierkant explained.
"So I want to know what did the Haqqani Network get out of the release of it?" he asked. "They're not working with the Taliban commanders, those Taliban commanders.
"So were there millions of dollars exchanged?" he said. "There's a whole lot of questions that still aren't even answered."
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