Ben Roberts-Smith has disclosed that he considered taking his own life for several months while facing war crimes allegations, saying his children ultimately gave him a reason to keep going.
Australia’s most decorated living soldier said the unrelenting media scrutiny placed him under immense psychological strain and, at his lowest point, led him to believe his family might be better off without him.
“When that flood of media and allegations came, it was relentless,” Roberts-Smith told NewsCorp.
“From the perspective of someone sitting there going, ‘What is going on? I don’t understand where it’s coming from. I don’t know why that’s being said.’”
“Psychologically, that takes a toll.”
“And there were many times in that period that I thought it might be a better option for my family if I just took my own life and let it go.”
“At that point, which probably played out over about three to six months of thinking about that every day, that’s rock bottom.”
Roberts-Smith said his children helped him find the strength to continue. He also feared his death would be portrayed as an admission that the allegations against him were true.
Ben Roberts-Smith says he contemplated suicide for months while facing war crimes allegations and that his children helped him through his darkest period
Roberts-Smith has rejected claims of a “cowboy culture” within the Australian Defence Force and said Australian soldiers can no longer behave as larrikins
“What got me off rock bottom was the kids, but it was also the fact that if I took my own life, they’d win,” Roberts-Smith said.
“They would be able to say I did it because I was guilty, and my family would have to live with that shame.”
Speaking to 2GB host Ben Fordham, Roberts-Smith denied shooting prisoners or seeing fellow Australian soldiers shoot them. He also said he would not change any part of his military career.
He maintained that he had never breached the rules of engagement during his service in Afghanistan.
The 47-year-old received Australia’s highest military honour, the Victoria Cross, for his service in Afghanistan. He now faces accusations that he murdered five unarmed detainees during his deployment.
Roberts-Smith has denied all of the allegations.
Asked if he had shot prisoners, he answered: “No.”
When asked whether he had witnessed anyone else shooting prisoners, he replied: “No, I did not.”
Ben Roberts-Smith has denied shooting prisoners or witnessing fellow Australian soldiers do so and says he would not alter any part of his military career
Roberts-Smith was charged with five counts of murder over alleged incidents in Afghanistan between April 2009 and October 2012
‘I didn’t bloody murder anyone,’ he said.
Roberts-Smith said he understood why the questions had to be asked, despite finding them hurtful.
‘Yeah, I’m not going to say I enjoy it, but I told you that I would accept the fact they have to be asked, and I don’t like it. I’ll put myself in this position because I want the facts out there as best I can put them. So I accept it needs to be done.’
Roberts-Smith also described Australian soldiers drinking from a dead Afghan man’s prosthetic leg as a form of ‘dark humor’, while insisting he never drank from it himself.
‘All I’ll say about that was, I had no part of it,’ he said.
He said people did not understand the pressures soldiers faced.
‘People don’t understand the level of stress that guys go through, and to many people, that will seem grotesque.’
He described the leg as a symbol of a successful raid and linked its use to soldiers decompressing after battle.
Roberts-Smith poses for the cameras in front of his Victoria Cross at the Australian War Memorial in 2011
‘Decompressing after battles and having a unified object, if you want to call it that, that signified a successful raid on a day where Australian forces had been engaged for hours prior to us even getting there.’
Fordham also questioned him about ‘throwdowns’ – weapons placed on dead bodies to make those killed appear to have been armed.
Roberts-Smith said military leadership had instructed soldiers to gather weapons and equipment with bodies for intelligence photographs.
‘But the interesting part of that question is that we were told to put weapons on the bodies for the photographs because they wanted it all in one photo, so we could send it back.
‘It was actually a directive, right, from the leadership that if you had an engagement and you needed to take a photo of it for intelligence purposes, put their equipment together, put the weapon on the body, you know, and then that was sent back because that was just the process of the day.’
The allegation is that some soldiers packed weapons specifically to plant on dead civilians and portray them as enemy fighters, which carries the implication of premeditated murder.
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Several SAS witnesses testified during the defamation trial that soldiers carried ‘throwdown’ items, including folding-stock AK-47s, Russian grenades, spare webbing and handheld radios, in their patrol gear.
Two witnesses at the defamation trial testified that Roberts-Smith himself instructed others in the practice.
Ben Roberts-Smith at commemorative service recognising the 25th anniversary of Australian service in Afghanistan, at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra earlier this month
Roberts-Smith and partner Sarah Matulin
Roberts-Smith also denied there was a practice of ‘blooding’ inexperienced soldiers by encouraging them to make their first kill.
He agreed that loyalty to fellow soldiers could not override the laws of armed conflict and that shooting a prisoner was a war crime.
Asked what should happen to a soldier who murdered a prisoner, he said: ‘If you murder a prisoner, then you’re going to be charged and go through the process.’
He said soldiers who witnessed such conduct were obliged to report it.
‘Well, immediately you have to report it. So it’s not something that you can ignore. That’s for sure.’
Asked whether he had reported unlawful conduct by fellow soldiers, Roberts-Smith said: ‘I didn’t witness any unlawful conduct by any of my fellow soldiers.’
He also rejected Fordham’s suggestion there had been a cowboy culture in the SAS, describing some behaviour as a way of letting off steam.
‘I don’t think that’s a fair assessment. You know, I’ve seen videos that have come out, things like that, and about people on the ground behaving in particular ways. Well, I think the guys let off steam and take the piss.
‘We’re Australian soldiers. You want to talk about being larrikins? I know that’s not accepted in the military anymore. You can’t be a larrikin, but the fact of the matter was, it’s just how blokes let off steam. But the one thing I do know is when it was game time, when it was actually happening, the majority of guys were the most professional soldiers you’ll ever meet.’
Ben Roberts-Smith has broken four years of silence
The interview also turned to his upbringing, with Fordham asking whether his parents had taught him right from wrong.
‘They did, mate. And that’s one of the sad parts of this whole experience for me, because I know that they know they instilled in me the values that they live by and the behaviours that are respected of a good Australian.’
He spoke about his father’s legal work and contribution to the Indigenous community.
‘My dad did it because he believed in it, and he did a lot of pro bono work. He did a lot for the Indigenous community. He founded Legal Aid in Western Australia. It was a big part of his life.’
Asked whether he regretted anything about his military career, Roberts-Smith said he remained certain he had done the right thing.
‘And the answer to that question is no. I wouldn’t change a single thing. I would do it all exactly the same way because I know that I did the right thing.
‘I know that I was prepared to die for this country every time I went outside the wire, and I know I did whatever I could to keep my mates alive. But I never broke the rules of engagement, and I get up every day and am able to fight this fight and live a normal life because in here I know that to be true.’
Roberts-Smith said the first rumours about him centred on whether he deserved his military awards, rather than allegations of war crimes.
‘It was actually, you know, people say you don’t deserve your rewards, and I was like, OK, fair enough. Do I think a lot of other people should have got more rewards? Absolutely,’ he said. ‘When it started, it had nothing to do with war crimes.
‘For some reason, it’s always coming from people who think they’ve been deliberately missed or haven’t had enough acknowledgement,’ he said.
He said he first learnt of a war crime allegation when a journalist contacted him about bullying, before raising a claim that he had killed a child in Afghanistan in 2006.
‘That particular allegation was the start of all of this, and that allegation, funnily enough, was one of the ones that was completely disproven during the defamation, and is not even on the table anymore because it wasn’t – it was just completely fabricated and false,’ he said.
Roberts-Smith also revealed that fellow soldiers nicknamed him ‘Front Dagger’, saying it reflected his willingness to confront people directly.
‘Because I don’t stab people on the back. I just give it to them straight in the chest,’ he said.
Roberts-Smith said he had been naive about the civil legal system before losing his defamation case against Nine’s newspapers in 2023, when Justice Anthony Besanko found allegations that he committed or was complicit in the murders of four Afghan men were substantially true on the balance of probabilities.
‘I accept that I lost the defamation. I’m man enough to sit here and say, ‘Yeah, I didn’t win, but I didn’t because I didn’t understand that game.
‘I didn’t lose the defamation because I’m guilty. I can tell you that much.’
He contacted his father, Len Roberts-Smith, a former Western Australian Supreme Court judge, shortly after the ruling.
‘His response, or lack of because of his shock, was probably the hardest bit,’ Roberts-Smith told Fordham.
‘He just could not believe that that had happened. It was shock. Without going to specifics, the reality for him was he lost a bit of faith that day, I think in the system.’