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Bowe Bergdahl: America's Last Prisoner of War by Michael Hastings | Politics News | ... Page 10 of 14. unable to make such a bargain, and no deal was struck. Instead, the Army ordered all units stationed in the eastern half of Afghanistan - known as RC East, in military jargon -- to join the search for Bowe. On July 4th, the search effort got a break: Bowe was spotted in a village in Ghazni, about 15 miles across the mountains to the west. He was wearing khaki, with a bag covering his head, and he was being driven in a black Toyota Corolla, escorted by three to five motorcycles. But by the time troops arrived to investigate, it was too late. That was the last time that Bowe would be seen until the first propaganda video, released later that month. Over the next few months, Bowe's unit would be consumed with trying to find him. When Fancey. Bowe's former platoon leader, heard the news at the base where he had been reassigned, he couldn't believe what had happened to his former private. "I was like, 'What? You're joking, right?' The next. few weeks, it was like we were in a movie. It was like, this shouldn't be real.". ack in Idaho, on the afternoon of June 30th, Bowe's mother, Jani, heard her dog Rufus barking. The gate to the driveway was closed. On the other side stood a pickup truck flanked by three. men in Army uniforms. They were from the Idaho National Guard, and they'd driven down from Boise. "Oh," she thought. "Why are they standing there?" Then the panic struck. "No, no, no," she thought.. "He just got there." Jani approached the men. "What do you want?" she asked.. 'Is your husband home?" they replied. "Do you have anybody home with you?" She asked what they wanted. "We can't tell you," they said. She told them her husband didn't have a cellphone, so she called UPS, where Bob has worked for 28 years. Then UPS texted him on their internal message system. Bob met Jani and the three officers in the parking lot of the UPS depot, about 10 miles from the Bergdahls' home. 'It's not the worst news," an officer told the couple. "As of this morning, they told me your son has been listed as DUSTwUN. There was a 100 percent accountability muster this morning. Your son is. off post. He's missing." Bob got back in his truck and finished his UPS route. It was only another couple of hours, he said, and there was no one around to replace him.. During the first week of Bowe's capture, his parents believed he would be rescued. "We thought they'd get him quickly," Jani recalls. His name hadn't been released publicly, and the couple had only. told their close family about his disappearance. At their daughter's Fourth of July party a few days later, they told their friends that Bowe was missing and that it was about to come out in the media. On July 7th, after Bowe's name was officially released, the national press descended on Hailey, gathering at Zaney's, the coffee shop where Bowe had worked.. It wasn't long, though, before his parents began to grow frustrated by how the government was treating them in the midst of the ordeal. The Army, they felt, was subtly pressuring them not to speak to the press, and they were required to sign a nondisclosure agreement with the National Security http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/americas-last-prisoner-of-war-20120607?print--t... 8/8/2013