Captive

Now it's recording.

And here we have, uh...

Oh, no! What in the world's that?

Martin was just so awesome.

I mean, he was always considerate.

He loved to prank people and play jokes on people.

He was just a good person.

Hey, this is kind of fun.

Gracia, she had a great desire to share her faith with people.

She was always a very giving person. Everybody loved her.

I looked up to her a lot.

So, this is a day before your anniversary, too, isn't it?

May 27th.

It was their 17th wedding anniversary,

and I just would have never given a second thought

to not being safe.

We were waging a religious war.

Foreign tourists were considered to be enemies by the Abu Sayyaf.

Tourists will be among the victims

and millions of dollars will come to the group,

for the creation of independent Islamic state.

This is jihad.

When I heard the phone, I looked over at my clock

and it was about 3:30 in the morning.

We don't get calls at 3:30.

I ran down the hall, and before I got to the phone,

I could hear the machine kick on and I could hear my dad's voice,

and I knew that that meant it was something bad.

I got the phone, and he told me that Martin and Gracia had been kidnapped.

I went into a tunnel.

You know, your life just kind of collapses right around you.

Dos Palmas, one of the Philippines' most exclusive resorts,

until it became a terrorist target.

Muslim extremists called Abu Sayyaf broke into bungalows

kidnapping guests, including three Americans.

Father of four Guillermo Sobero, from Corona, California.

Martin and Gracia Burnham, missionaries from Rose Hill, Kansas.

Taking their hostages to the southern island of Basilan,

stronghold for the group's war of independence.

They had been missionaries in the Philippines for 16 years.

Martin flew a plane.

He would deliver food and goods that the missionaries there needed,

and Gracia worked the radio.

They had a really nice, peaceful life there.

I started searching for anything about this group of people who had taken them,

what they had done with people before...

And every single article I read,

these people, the Abu Sayyaf, kidnap people for ransom money,

strike fear into people to be obedient by beheading.

Thinking about Martin and Gracia being in that situation...

it made me feel sick inside.

Martin Burnham, one of the three American hostages,

flew to the resort Saturday together with his wife Gracia...

...has been allowed to broadcast an appeal

for the government in Manila to negotiate his release.

I, Martin Burnham, and my wife Gracia,

both U.S. citizens, were taken as captives on May 27th, 2001,

at the Dos Palmas beach resort in Palawan.

We are safe. We are unharmed. Our needs are being met.

And we would like to appeal to all for reasonable and safe negotiations.

Thank you.

The FBI brought the recording out to us,

and he sounded strong.

Martin is our oldest and, um...

you hate to see your children go through all of those things.

Other missionaries had been captured before,

and they usually got out fairly quickly.

So, we figured there would be something worked out,

knowing that it would be scary for him,

and a hardship for him, and dangerous.

We just hoped that it would turn out that Martin would come home.

Even though these situations are complicated and dangerous,

it's something that's very familiar to us.

We were perceived as the experts

when it came to those particular types of situations.

You can influence these people.

People that may likely do the most horrible of things.

You know, terrorist hostage takers

threatening to chop off individuals' heads.

You can intervene.

We had an incredible success rate, particularly in international incidents.

So in May of 2001,

it was, from our perspective...

just another international kidnapping case.

I remember landing in Manila,

I mean, it was very much in the news,

and the government there was really hot over it.

There were continual gun battles

between the Abu Sayyaf and the armed forces of the Philippines.

The terrorists shall not be allowed

to get away with this.

We shall not stop until the Abu Sayyaf is finished.

Even with all the high tensions, we still had great confidence

um, in our ability to influence the situation

with the Filipino authorities, with the Abu Sayyaf.

We already had a negotiator who had developed influence with them.

We felt pretty good.

It was a very, very complicated situation.

The Abu Sayyaf, they have transformed something

into some sort of a religious war.

I have seen army officers get hacked, get killed.

It's because, you know,

once they say, "Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar,"

then, uh, you know, they don't think about themselves anymore.

This is our religious obligation as a Muslim.

To defend the homeland, to defend the people.

We were not afraid to die for Islam.

The day of running battles in the streets of the town of Lamitan.

Troops of the Philippine Army using helicopters and tanks

against a group of Islamic rebels holed up in a local hospital.

They reported that most of the group seized from the beach resort

were inside the hospital, being held...

A week into this situation,

we heard that Gracia and Martin and all the hostages

were completely surrounded by the military.

There was no way that they could get out.

This is it. It's over.

It only lasted a week. They're gonna get them out.

This isn't gonna be a problem. A huge sigh of relief on my part.

Where are the rebels?

Over here, there.

When that story broke, I was able to get to the area first.

There were members of the Scout Rangers and of the Philippine Army

that were already there,

plus members of the local police.

The Abu Sayyaf Group were supposed to be pinned down,

but because they have the hostages, they have the upper hand.

When it ended up a hostage barricade situation,

that's a good thing for us,

because what we were waiting for is an opportunity to say,

"Hey, look...

here's an option for you.

Why don't we communicate with them?"

Unfortunately, the Philippine authorities didn't agree with that approach.

They were intent on pursuing and eliminating the Abu Sayyaf,

hostages or no hostages.

I covered a lot of hostage crises in the past,

but that day, my mindset changed.

For the first time, I got scared. We were actually being shot at.

Pretty quickly we began to see

we weren't able to gain the influence with the Filipino authorities

that we thought we might be able to do.

The aftermath of fighting between Abu Sayyaf rebels

and government troops in the town of Lamitan.

It's reported that the rebels used hostages as human shields to escape.

The military said 12 soldiers had been killed during the fighting,

with dozens wounded.

You know, here in the Philippines,

we have very, very limited resources.

Without enough troops, without proper planning...

The Abu Sayyaf, they've got their tentacles all over the place,

and they were able to get support from the local populous.

They...

guided the Abu Sayyaf and the hostages where to escape...

out there in the jungle.

The Abu Sayyaf got away.

We didn't expect that, but...

you don't have control.

That was the turning point for me.

That's when I really became very angry

about the situation and the lack of control that we had,

and I...

It was devastating, emotionally, for that to happen.

Now they would go deeper and deeper into the jungle

where there was no one, nothing.

We were looking to develop intelligence

so that we could learn more about the Abu Sayyaf.

There were certain members of the group

that were kind of what people would refer to as "true believers,"

but that wasn't largely the group.

Abu Sabaya, one of the senior leaders of the Abu Sayyaf,

more of a criminal than a jihadist.

He looked the part. He made sure he wore the right shades,

he wore the right bandanna.

He wore attire that says, "You should be scared of me."

Our Muslim brothers feel they were marginalized.

I understand them.

But for Abu Sabaya...

uh, it's, uh...

he just pretends to be a revolutionary.

He just pretends to be a revolutionary, yeah.

He tries to portray that they are fighting for the Muslim people.

At the end of the day, he is more concerned about... money.

We were always told, "If you die for Islam, you go to heaven."

I was really aspiring to become a good mujahid,

and if possible, I will die for the cause of religion.

But, uh, when the group started to be influenced

by people like Abu Sabaya,

it became different.

There was a ransom demand played on the radio

for the Burnhams and Guillermo Sobero of $2 million.

So we knew we had to implement a strategy that would, um,

lower the expectations of the Abu Sayyaf of receiving anything for the hostages.

The party line in the United States

is that we do not give ransoms to terrorists,

that we should not offer them anything.

We should, you know, take a firm stand.

But that's just not how it's done in other parts of the world.

I know you are frustrated, Abu Sabaya,

but it's hard for me to convince them about the money.