Former Marine Paul Whelan said he was shocked when Biden administration officials told him that while WNBA basketball player Brittney Griner was released from Russian custody after nine months, he was not. spoke.
“It was shocking,” said Whelan, who was imprisoned in Russia for more than five years before being released, in his first interview with NBC News since returning to the United States.
When a Homeland Security official broke the news over the phone, he realized the United States had abandoned its negotiating position. The official said that to free Greiner, the United States traded convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout for the release of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s famous athlete. Whelan replied: What’s next?
Immediately after the phone call, Whelan said he went to the prison’s control room, surrounded by Russian FSB Security Service agents who had been eavesdropping, and called his parents to tell them the shocking news. He wanted to reassure them that the United States would do everything possible to get him back.
“It was tough,” he said. “I didn’t lose confidence that they would have me back, but I didn’t know when I would be back.”
In April 2022, Whelan was left stranded again when another former Marine, Trevor Reed, was released in a prisoner swap with Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian pilot convicted in the United States for drug smuggling. . Reed served nearly three years in a forced labor camp.
Throughout his ordeal, Whelan said he lifted his spirits by singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” every morning for five years. Now that he’s back home in Michigan, he continues that ritual.
Whelan, 54, was released in August in the largest prisoner exchange since the Cold War, which led to the death of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other journalists critical of the Kremlin. Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian-British dual citizen, was also born. , and Russian-American reporter Ars Kurmasheva of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Of the four, Whelan was held by the Russians the longest. He was arrested in 2018 after attending a wedding in Moscow and was convicted of espionage, a charge he has steadfastly and repeatedly denied and which Secretary of State Antony Blinken has called a “phony.” I called.
Whelan was born in Canada to British parents and was a Michigan police officer before joining the Marines in 1994. He ended up serving multiple tours in Iraq, said his twin brother, David Whelan.
Mr Whelan said he thought it was a joke when officers from the Russian intelligence agency FSB, formerly known as the KGB, burst into his hotel room and arrested him in 2018. He soon realized that this was not the time to be transferred to the notorious Lefortovo prison, and they began to press him to confess to crimes he did not commit.
“They said, ‘If you confess, we can end this,'” Whelan said. “It was fake.”
When Whelan refused, he said he was placed in a cell with the lights on 24 hours a day. “This is light torture,” he said.
Whelan said the FSB tried to force him to confess five more times, but each time he refused. After sentencing him to 16 years of forced labor, a Russian judge said he would likely be released within two weeks. Whelan said he never expected the situation to last for years.
Whelan said he obtained an “emergency phone” that he used to contact State Department representatives, and that FSB officers regularly visited the camp to check on survivors.
He said the guards were not physically abusive, but that they were corrupt and prisoners had to grease their palms to get good food brought into the prison from outside. said.
“Russian food is generally not very good,” says Whelan. “Prison food is even worse.”
They survived on tea, bread, watery soup and “the kind of fish that only Russians eat,” Whelan said. It was pretty bad,” he said.
Whelan said what happened to him underscores the need for tough diplomacy against “rogue state” leaders like Putin.
“Our president, he needs to be strong, she needs to be strong,” Whelan, 54, said as the presidential election between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump enters its final weeks. There is,” he said.
The only way the U.S. could remove Putin is if he had a “heart attack,” Whelan said.
Asked about Trump’s claim that if re-elected he could free American prisoners from Russia because of his good relationship with Putin, Whelan said: “Every president deals with rogue leaders like Putin. That would be difficult.”
They were supposed to be isolated from the rest of the world, but Whelan said they and their fellow inmates soon learned that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny had died in prison earlier this year. spoke.
“We were told he died of natural causes,” Whelan said. “So when Russians say natural causes, they mean either someone hit the guy or he committed suicide, just like when someone fell out of a window in Moscow.”
When asked if she had ever thought about ending her life, Whelan said: “I fought too much,” he said. “I wasn’t going to give them satisfaction by killing myself. Every day I tried to hold them to that.”
Whelan said at one point he contracted what appeared to be the coronavirus and was on the brink of death for two weeks. But his lowest point psychologically came when he learned that Flora, a 15-year-old golden retriever from Michigan, had died.
“That means when you come home, it’s a different house than when you left,” he says.
Whelan said he knew his ordeal might be nearing an end when two FSB agents showed up at the camp in July and asked him to fill out and sign an amnesty application. spoke. A State Department official said he complied and was taken to a prison in Moscow, where he was kept in solitary confinement for five days.
Then, on August 1, Whelan said he was put on a plane and flown to Turkey, accompanied by an FSB “guard”. There, waiting on the tarmac, he saw Gershković.
“We got off the plane and got on the bus,” Whelan said.
The FSB monitors left quickly, and Whelan said the “friendly faces” of the CIA officers on board gave him confidence that they would return to the United States.
“I didn’t know we were flying.” [Joint Base] I was going to see Andrews and the president,” Whelan said, adding that he suddenly felt self-conscious because he hadn’t showered or shaved in two weeks and his clothes were dirty.
Mr Whelan said he was told: “You were held the longest. You should get off the plane first.”
Weak and malnourished, he said his first thought as he disembarked was “I don’t want to fall down the stairs.”
He said he was moved when Biden pinned the national flag pin he wore on his chest to the prisoner’s clothing. When he sat down with Andrea Mitchell, Whelan was wearing it on his suit jacket and said he would “keep it clean and keep it forever.”
When asked how he was readjusting to normal life, Whelan said he had some minor medical and dental issues to deal with. He said he believed he was suffering from lingering post-traumatic stress disorder. And while people have helped him get back on his feet, especially in his hometown of Manchester, Michigan, he said he worries he won’t be able to find another job.
“At this age, it’s difficult,” he said. “Maybe you need to find something new and reinvent yourself.”
