David McBride (whistleblower)

David William McBride (born 1963 or 1964) is an Australian whistleblower and former British Army major and Australian Army lawyer who from 2014 to 2016 made information (the "Afghan Files") on war crimes committed by Australian soldiers in Afghanistan available to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, who broadcast details in 2017. In 2018, he was charged with several related offences, and as of November 2020 is awaiting trial. The allegations were reviewed in the Brereton Report.
Early life.
McBride was born in 1963 or 1964 to William McBride, an obstetrician in Sydney. He has three siblings.
He graduated in law at the Sydney University and then obtained a scholarship to take a second degree in the same subject at Oxford University.
Career.
McBride joined the British Army and served in Germany before training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and then commanding a Blues and Royals platoon in Northern Ireland. He left the army after failing to complete the entry requirements for the Special Air Service.
After a period in civilian life, including security work in Rwanda and Zaire, a stint as a "tracker" on the 1990s British reality-style television game show, "Wanted", as security adviser to the series "Journeys to the Ends of the Earth", and an unsuccessful 2003 attempt to win a New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat representing Coogee, for the Liberal Party, he enrolled in the Australian Army as a lawyer.
He then served two tours of duty in Afghanistan in 2011 and 2013, for which he received a combat services medal. He was medically discharged with post-traumatic stress disorder in 2017.
War crimes leak.
McBride made internal allegations of war crimes committed by Australian forces in Afghanistan, then subsequently supplied classified information about these allegations to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. An investigation by Major General Justice Paul Brereton, which began in May 2016 and whose results were made public in November 2020, found "credible information" that war crimes were committed by Australians.
In September 2018, McBride was charged with the theft of Commonwealth property contrary to s 131(1) of the Criminal Code Act 1995; in March 2019 he was charged with a further four offences: three of breaching s 73A(1) of the Defence Act 1903; and another of "unlawfully disclosing a Commonwealth document contrary to s 70(1) of the Crimes Act 1914". , McBride, who pleaded not guilty to each of the charges at a 30 May 2019 preliminary hearing, is awaiting trial. His legal team includes Nick Xenophon and Mark Davis.
Personal life.
McBride has two daughters from a former marriage, to Sarah (née Green). The couple separated in 2016.