Rescue expert Bryan Stern launches mission to find missing American Austin Tice in Syria

Grey Bull Rescue Founder Bryan Stern has launched another rescue operation in a dangerous area, this time to rescue freelance journalist and former Marine Austin Tice, who experts believe has been held in Syria since 2012. 

His family's website says that Tice was last seen in August of 2012, shortly after celebrating his 31st birthday in Syria. He was in the country to report on Syria's civil war that had begun in 2011. Shortly after his disappearance a video was sent to his family that showed masked gunmen holding the former Marine at gun point, but that was the last time the world saw him alive.

Tice is an award winning journalist, the recipient of the 2012 George Polk Award for War Reporting, the 2012 McClatchy Newspapers President’s Award, the 2015 National Press Club John Aubuchon Freedom of the Press Award, the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service Centennial Honor, and the James A. Baker III Prize for Excellence in Leadership. He is a veteran Captain in the United States Marine Corps, graduate of Georgetown University, National Merit Finalist and an Eagle Scout.

Stern, who spoke to Just the News virtually this week from the border of Syria, said he has hope that American forces will find Tice alive, but has cautioned that time is of the essence now that a new regime has taken power. "The biggest thing that's noteworthy is how fluid the situation [in Syria] is," Stern said in a Zoom call. "I wouldn't call it volatile; it's fluid. It's the situation and everything changes about every 12 to 18 hours. So you know what's true today is not true tomorrow." 

Rebel forces in Syria stormed the Syrian capital of Damascus last weekend and took control of the country's government. The new regime is considered by many to be a step up from former dictator Bashar Assad.

Not the first group to be looking for Tice

Stern said the new regime has not hindered his efforts to find Tice so far, but other things also pose a danger to the missing American, including the possibility that he is hidden in a backroom somewhere and the only people who know where he is are no longer in the area. 

"There's a few real big threats," Stern said. "One is he's found by bad guys, and bad guys take him hostage again ... Another very real possibility is he's been alive all these years, and he's starving to death as we talk, and by the time somebody finds him in a room, within the room, we find a pile of bones."

Grey Bull Rescue is not the first group to be looking for Tice over the past 12 years. The U.S. military has tried to negotiate for his release, despite the former Syrian regime denying his capture, and other organizations have conducted operations for years with no luck.

Stern, who has completed at least 720 unclassified rescue operations in various parts of the world so far, said his group has some areas that they believe Tice could be hidden away in, which they are investigating. But they are also using classic investigative techniques like talking to people on the streets about whether they have seen him and working off of various tips and leads.

One former Syrian prisoner recently told news outlets that he has seen Tice in a Syrian jail as recently as July of 2022. 

Stern believes Tice is alive

"There's a lot of people looking for him, but there's been a lot of people looking for him for a long time," Stern said. "If you say that it is more likely than not that he's alive, and you operate under that assumption, recognize that the entire world right now was looking for this guy. The jails are liberated and largely empty, and he's still not found."

Stern, who is an Army and Navy veteran, said he also has been in contact with the U.S. government, including the State Department, FBI, and Department of Defense, who have been on the same page when it comes to rescuing Tice. 

The veteran said he still believes the missing American is alive, because it makes more logical sense to keep Tice alive than to kill him, and that it was not uncommon for the Syrian government to hold prisoners for decades.

"Don't give up hope"

"The West will say, well we haven't seen him in 12 years. There's been no proof of life," Stern said. "Surely, you know, if they had him, they would use him as leverage or something. But that's a very Western way of thinking. That's an incredibly American way of thinking. In this part of the world, people get locked up and they get forgotten about in an Oubliette for 20 years." 

He also said its clear that the former Syrian government is the one that has held him captive for more than a decade because the video that was released in 2012 was "completely and totally" faked to make it seem like ISIS was responsible.

Regardless of Tice's outcome, Stern said that family members of other American hostages should hold onto hope that their loved one is still alive unless proven otherwise. 

"Don't give up hope. Every single hostage I've ever gotten out was hard, and every single hostage that I've ever gotten out [people believed] couldn't be done, or the person was going to die," Stern said. "So until you have ... confirmation of death, you gotta keep hope and keep the faith that they'll come out somehow."

Stern's nonprofit Grey Bull Rescue is funded through donations on its website.

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just the News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.