The chaplain of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s field artillery regiment said there is no excuse for the Democratic VP pick to have abandoned his National Guard unit before a critical deployment — not even running for Congress.
“In our world, to drop out after a WARNORD [warning order] is issued is cowardly, especially for a senior enlisted guy,” retired Capt. Corey Bjertness, now a pastor in Horace, North Dakota, told The Post.
Bjertness, 61, was the chaplain for the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery, of which Walz was command sergeant major before retiring in 2005, two months before the unit deployed to Iraq. Walz has said he did so to run for Congress, and he was elected the next year.
“Running for Congress is not an excuse,” Bjertness said of Walz’s decision to quit. “I stopped everything and went to war. I left my wife with three teenagers and a 6-year-old and I was gone for 19 months.”
Thomas Behrends, the command sergeant major who replaced Walz, previously told The Post of the Minnesota governor: “He had the opportunity to serve his country, and said ‘Screw you’ to the United States.”
Bjertness added that leaving his troops at such a critical time was irresponsible of Walz, who served for more than two decades with the Army National Guard in Nebraska and Minnesota.
“That means that a new master sergeant needs to come in and to get to know everyone. Their task is to keep everyone safe and healthy,” the pastor said.
“I needed to hit the ground running and take care of the troops — and tell them we were going to war,” Behrends, a Minnesota farmer, previously told The Post of the 500 soldiers under his command. “For a guy in that position, to quit is cowardice.”
Veteran Tom Schilling agreed — and said that criticism of Walz’s retirement is “not a political thing. It’s a character thing.”
Schilling, 67, had already served in the National Guard for 16 years when he re-enlisted after 9/11. He deployed with Walz’s unit to Iraq in 2005.
Bjertness stressed that “Gov. Walz should receive the full honors due him for his 24 years of service as a guardsman. However, the other allegations, which the National Guard members I have visited with believe to be absolutely true, make me believe we have yet another politician who has a very loose commitment to the truth.”
Some veterans have long been upset that Walz, the two-term governor of Minnesota, for years publicly identified himself as a retired command master sergeant — despite having been demoted when he retired before completing the two-year commitment required for that rank.
On Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign updated Walz’s online biography, removing a reference to him as “retired command sergeant major.” It now says the 60-year-old once served at the command sergeant major rank.
“He used stolen valor for personal gain,” Schilling told The Post. “It’s bad in the eyes of the soldiers, especially now if he is one step away from commander-in-chief and doesn’t step up to lead.”
Walz’s old unit, whose main job was running security for US convoys in Iraq, suffered three casualties during the deployment he missed — including Kyle Miller, 19, who joined the National Guard while still in high school, and David Berry, 37.
Schilling said he knew both men, and still spends time with their families to honor their deaths every year.
“He was a good kid, really upbeat and positive,” Schilling said of Miller. “He was the first guy to volunteer to ride in the back of the Humvee — the most dangerous part of the transport.” Miller died when his vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb in June 2006. Berry was killed several months later in a blast that critically wounded other guardsmen.
Miller’s mother told the Daily Mail this week that Walz had taken “the coward’s way out” by retiring before deployment.
“These kids, they put their life on hold for two years. Many of these kids had businesses that failed when they came back and they were newly married and the divorce rate went through the roof,” said Schilling. “They made the ultimate sacrifice.”
Schilling said he and his family are proud of his service, and that the soldiers he served with were likely better off with Behrends — whom he described as a “true leader” — than Walz.
“Honestly, I think we lucked out when we got Command Sergeant Behrends,” he said of the CMS who took over after Walz retired. “Maybe Walz resigned because he knew he wasn’t up to the job, that he didn’t have the confidence to lead.”
Behrends, who is from Brewster, Minn., called the Democratic vice presidential candidate “a traitor” for the timing of his retirement.
“When your country calls, you are supposed to run into battle — not the other way,” the retired command sergeant major told The Post Tuesday. “He ran away. It’s sad.”
