John Walker Lindh grew up in a middle-class Catholic family in the town of Mill Valley, north of San Francisco. However, he is known worldwide as the “American Taliban.”
Lindh was the first detainee with US citizenship after the start of the so-called “war on terrorism” announced by President George W. Bush after the attacks of the 11 September 2001.
His capture in Pakistan, where he was part of a military unit in which there was 75 foreigners fighting in the ranks of the Taliban, caused a stir and the Images of that apparently disoriented bearded young man went around the world.
“ I plead guilty. I served as a soldier to the Taliban last year from August to December. As I did so, I carried a rifle and two grenades. I did it voluntarily and knowing it was illegal, ”Lindh said in July of 2002, following an agreement with the Prosecutor’s Office that allowed him to avoid life imprisonment and instead be sentenced to 20 years in prison.
But how did this young Californian become a jihadist and train in military camps financed by Osama bin Laden?
Between Malcolm X and Osama bin Laden
Despite his Catholic upbringing, Lindh began to being drawn to Islam in early adolescence.
According to his father, Frank Lindh, the young man was very impressed when the 12 years I saw or in the film Malcolm X, by Spike Lee, the images of the pilgrims who came to Mecca.
From there, a search process began which years later would culminate in his becoming a Muslim.
“He was at a crossroads at that time. He wasn’t sure where to go in this world. It seemed that Islam and religion were a way for me to achieve spiritual fulfillment, “said Abdullah Nana, Imam of the Mill Valley Islamic Center, in an interview with the BBC in 2011.
Nana explained that the young man approached that institution and that shortly after he converted to i slam and decided to learn Arabic and memorize the Quran.
Thus, to the 17 years, Lindh obtained permission from her parents to travel to Yemen to study Arabic.
Linsh is believed to have become radicalized while studying at a Koranic school in Pakistan. He then returned to California, where he stayed for a few months before deciding to return to Yemen. From there his father wrote to ask if he could go to Pakistan to continue his studies.
“ I trust your judgment and I hope you have a wonderful adventure “, his father replied back.
In Pakistan, Lindh enrolled in a religious school in the town of Bannu, in the Northwest Frontier province, where his position apparently became more radical.
Unbeknownst to his parents, in June 2002 Lindh decided cross into Afghanistan.
With the help of a militant group, received two months of military training there in the al-Farouq training camp that was funded by Osama bin Laden .
During that summer, he met twice with the al Qaeda leader, although according to his father the young man had nothing to do with terrorism.
“He was one of the thousands of young Muslims who Over the years they offered their services in Afghanistan against the Russian-backed warlords ”(of the Northern Alliance), Frank Lindh told the BBC in an interview on 2011.
However, Michael Chertoff, who was assistant attorney general during the trial against Lindh, did not believe that the young man was so clearly detached from terrorism.
“ He went to fight for a regime that was hostile to the United States and that supported the attacks of the 11 – S. It’s not exactly treason, but I would say it’s a close cousin to treason, ”Chertoff told the BBC in 2011.
The first charges brought against Lindh indicated that al Qaeda He proposed to carry out an attack against the United States or Israel but that the young man refused.
The impact of the 11 – S
At the beginning of September 2001, Lindh was part of a military unit of 75 non-Afghan soldiers in the Tahar region of the northeast of the country.
That was when everything changed.
After the attacks of the 11 -Yes, the United States decided to invade Afghanistan and overthrow the Taliban regime.
In a matter of weeks the bombings began over the country and Lindh’s unit was forced to retreat , walking across the desert to Kunnduz, where they surrendered to the Northern Alliance.
They were transferred to the Qala-i-Jangi fortress on the outskirts of Mazar-e Sarif, which was controlled by General Abdul Rashid Dostum, an Afghan warlord.
There would take place one of the bloodiest battles of the war in Afghanistan, which began with an uprising of the Taliban prisoners and ended with the death of hundreds of them, as well as one of the agents of the CIA who were assisting the Northern Alliance against the Taliban regime.
Lindh was wounded in one leg and took refuge with many o other survivors in a basement .
According to his account of the events, while there the forces of Dostum threw grenades through the air ducts and pumped ice water to try to drown them. Many more prisoners died.
With shrapnel wounds and suffering from hypothermia, Lindh made it to the surface and on December 1, 2001 was taken into custody of the forces
“The American Taliban”
Shortly after the news of his arrest would go around the world and he would begin to be known as the “American Taliban”.
It would also be then when, after seven months without hearing from him, his parents would recognize his image in the news.
Lindh was brought to Camp Rhino, a US base located about 190 kilometers southwest of Kandahar. There, according to his father’s account, “they left him in a completely naked metal container for two days during his nights in the Afghan desert” and without having treated his wounds.
Meanwhile, in the United States, what her mother, Marilyn Walker, described as an unstoppable “tide” of negative media coverage had risen.
Attorney General John Ashcroft described Lindh as “ a terrorist trained by to l Qaeda who conspired with the Taliban to kill his fellow citizens “.
“That image was etched in the minds of people when they were heartbroken and grieving after the 11 – S ” Frank Lindh told him to the BBC.
In that context, it might seem almost a miracle that Lindh was able to avoid the life sentence that anticipated the filing of charges
But, apparently, what favored him were some images that were taken after his arrest and that showed the treatment he received from the US forces.
Those photographs —some of which illustrate this note— have just seen the light of day in the recently published book First Casualty : The Untold Story of the CIA Mission to Avenge 9 / , written by Toby Harnden, which tells the story of the first CIA mission in Afghanistan after the 11 – Yes and how Lindh was captured.
From prison to probation
In accordance with the Harnden’s account, reviewed by the British newspaper Daily Mail , the first US agents in Afghanistan referred to Lindh as the “Irishman” because, although he refused to speak to them, another prisoner had told them that he claimed to come from that country.
It would not have been until after the failed Qala-i Jangim uprising that Lindh told a doctor that he was American.
After that revelation, the “American Taliban” was born and Lindh became a sort of trophy for US agents.
Thus, when they were going to transfer him from From Mazar-e Sarif to Camp Rhino, a team of US agents decided to blindfold him – on top of which they placed an adhesive tape with the inscription s hithead (jerk) – and take a photo next to him.
That image, along with many others that supposedly show the mistreatment to which he was subjected, was compiled by the Lindh’s attorneys before trial and have now been published in Harnden’s book.
Other photographs taken at Camp Rhino show Lindh naked on a stretcher blindfolded and handcuffed.
Lindh’s defense used that set of images to plead that the young man had suffered ill-treatment and to request that the statements he had made during interrogations at Camp Rhino be dismissed as having been made under pressure.
From agree with e In Harnden’s book, there Lindh would have confessed to the FBI that during the summer had learned on a basis of to l Qaeda who had sent suicide bombers to the United States (those who carried out the attacks on 11 – S).
These elements, however, were left aside when Lindh reached an agreement with the Prosecutor’s Office that forced her to declare herself c liable to only two counts – which would carry a sentence of 17 years in prison— and to renounce to initiate any type of complaint for abuse or wrongdoing deals against the US agents who took him into custody.
Although at the time of his sentence in October 2002, Lindh claimed that he condemned “terrorism at every level, unequivocally” and that he had been wrong to join the Taliban, press reports published in recent years indicate that apparently he was still embracing radical postures.
This was an element that caused controversy in 2019, when after 17 years in prison it was learned that Lind h would receive the benefit of parole.
Mid-May 2019, Lindh was released from prison, although with some restrictions such as a ban on connecting to the internet and a travel ban.
It is not known where he currently resides.
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