Jack Bauer before Day 1

Jack Bauer was active in law enforcement well before the events of Day 1.

At some point prior to the events of Day 1, Jack built a case against three federal agents who were accepting bribes (two of whom were Christopher Henderson and Seth Campbell) and had them arrested and charged. After turning in the guilty agents, only his closest associates would trust him.

Personal

 * Age (on Day 1): 36
 * Birthplace: Santa Monica, California
 * Wife: Teri Bauer
 * Daughter: Kim Bauer

Education

 * Los Angeles Sheriff's Department - Basic SWAT School
 * Master of Science, Criminology and Law, University of California (Berkeley)
 * Bachelor of Arts, English Literature, University of California (Los Angeles)
 * Special Forces Operations Training Course

Counter Terrorist Unit

 * Special Agent in Charge, CTU Los Angeles
 * Team Leader, Operation Proteus (2000)
 * Section Captain, Hotel Los Angeles attack (1998)

Other

 * Special Weapons and Tactics Team, Los Angeles Police Department

Military Experience
Classified information in italics


 * Captain, U.S. Army First Special Forces Operational Detachment, Delta
 * Instructor, U.S. Army "Q" Course Phase III Training
 * Instructor, U.S. Army Special Forces Robin Sage Exercises
 * First Lieutenant, U.S. Army Combat Applications Group
 * Graduate, John F. Kennedy School of Special Warfare

Delta Missions
All Delta missions are classified


 * Operation Nightfall, Kosovo (date and details classified)
 * Operation Collegiate, Belgrade
 * Operation Downtown, Pristina (Special Commendation)
 * Operation Lost Paradise, Chechnya
 * Operation Closed Coffin, Hac

Expertise
From Jack Bauer's classified Delta file


 * High Altitude, Low Opening (HALO)
 * Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape (SERE)
 * Psychological Operations (PSYOPS)
 * Direct Action (DA)
 * Civic Action (CA)
 * Counterproliferation/Nuclear (CP/N)

Honors
Classified information in italics


 * Purple Heart
 * Silver Star

Operation Albatross
On Jack's first day at CTU Los Angeles, his first mission was to protect the recently-defected IRA member Moira O'Neal from attack by her former associates. Four agents died when Tim McGinnis' crew of hitmen attacked the safe house in Arizona where O'Neal was being held. Jack managed to escape to safety with O'Neal, and later killed McGinnis' group before they could get to her.

Operation Nightfall
Two years before the events of Day 1, while in the Delta Force, Jack led a mission to assassinate Serbian war criminal Victor Drazen. Operation Nightfall was authorized by a Senate committee headed by David Palmer; however, Jack and David did not meet or even know of each other's involvement until Day 1. Because of their involvement in the mission, Jack and David were targeted for revenge by Drazen's sons.

Jack's team destroyed the house where Drazen was believed to be hiding. Unfortunately, Drazen was not in the building at the time, but his wife and daughter were killed. Jack's entire team was slaughtered by Drazen's men, who used the Delta Team's supposedly scrambled radio frequency to track them. In his testimony to the House Special Subcommittee, Jack accused the Army of setting up the mission for failure; however an Army representative denied the charge.

Unknown at the time, one member of the Delta Force team, an MI6 agent named Stephen Saunders, was not actually killed in the blast, but was captured and tortured by Serbian Forces for two years. Saunders returned for revenge in Day 3.

Operation Hell Gate
Jack had recently become Special Agent in Charge of CTU and the consequences of his blowing the whistle on the three agents, including Christopher Henderson, were still being felt. Jack teamed up with Caitlin O'Connor as well as CTU to take down the imminent threat of an act of coordinated terrorism and an attempted pandemic of the 1918 Influenza Strain over New York City. Over 100,000,000 Americans would have died, but Jack Bauer and CTU were able to thwart both plans.