Chapter 10
Do not touch anything unnecessarily. Beware of pretty girls in dance halls and parks who may be spies, as well as bicycles, revolvers, uniforms, arms, dead horses, and men lying on roads—there is nothing there accidentally.
—SOVIET INFANTRY MANUAL ISSUED IN THE 1930S
The Kuchi tribesman, with about twenty camels in tow, came over the horizon. As he got close, I could see his weathered face and long black beard. His thin frame was covered in layers of robes, and he had a sizable knife, curled at the end, wedged into his belt.
“This guy looks like an extra from Raiders of the Lost Ark,” I cracked.
Smitty called over the radio that through his binoculars he could see several large packs on one of the camels that appeared to be ammunition or mortar rounds. I didn’t see a weapon in the tribesman’s hands, but I knew the desert can play tricks on you. Hell, I had just seen a herd of camels that I took for enemy soldiers.
When the Kuchi saw the long line of trucks, he stopped, dropped his pack, and threw his hands in the air.
“I like this guy already,” Bill said over the radio.
Steve, Smitty, and their terp, Jerry, went to talk with the man. He told them that his herd was part of a dowry from his bride. Steve and Smitty searched him and then asked to see his cargo. Without hesitation, he pulled out his knife and cut the heavy packs off the camel. The woven cloth bags tumbled to the sand.
Smitty rifled through the packs while Steve watched with his rifle at the ready. The bags were full of scrap metal, mortar fins and munitions casings, which the tribesman said he had collected at the training camp we had found near the mountain about a week’s walk south. His story made sense. There was plenty at that camp to pick up. He smiled when Smitty offered him three bottles of water, glad to drink from our supply rather than his own. While he drank, Smitty took out a notebook and started asking questions. I stood off to the side by my truck.
“Seen anyone around here?” he asked, as Jerry translated.
“Several Hilux trucks.”
“In which direction?”
“From the south, toward Panjwayi,” the Kuchi responded, polishing off the last bottle.
No one innocent would cross this desert on a joy ride. I checked our position on my computer and GPS. We were almost out of the desert. I watched the Kuchi repack his load as we started again toward Panjwayi. Ahead of us, the contour lines on the GPS display converged, indicating more high ground to surmount.
After a few hours, we crested a hill and spotted a small cluster of multicolored tents pitched on a plateau. The Kuchi’s future father-in-law. As we passed, the man greeted us and asked if we had seen his camels. He didn’t seem too interested in the welfare of his future son-in-law.
“Typical father-in-law,” I told Brian.
The plateau fell off into another series of rolling hills. When we at last surmounted the final one, stretching out before us was the lush green Panjwayi Valley. I called Jared to let him know we’d made it out of the desert and were near the drop site. Jared radioed back that another truck was stuck, so Brian, Dave, and I shut off Ole Girl, shed our gear, and handed out bottles of water like celebratory champagne.
Beyond us flowed a vast ocean of green vegetation. I could see the Dori and Arghandab rivers framing the valley on either side, an intricate network of hundreds of villages crammed with mud huts, grape fields, pathways, trails, and irrigation ditches. For a moment, I imagined how ancient travelers must have felt when they saw the valley after weeks of walking across the desert, but the feeling didn’t last. The battlefield calculus was all too obvious. The Canadians were going to need more troops—a hell of a lot more. This wasn’t a few remote villages. This was an undeveloped city.
“Good thing we don’t have to clear it,” Brian said, reading my mind.
Jared’s truck pulled up next to mine, its radiator hissing, the cooling fan churning at full blast.
“Man, that sure is a sight for sore eyes,” he said.
“Let’s just hope we don’t have to fight in it,” I responded.
Victor hopped off my truck and pulled out several bottles of water and his prayer rug.
“What’s the water for, Victor?” I asked.
“It is time for me to pray,” he said.
We were close to the drop zone, but still short on supplies, which we’d been rationing for a day. I wasn’t taking any chances until the pallets of food and water arrived.
“You can either drink that water or wash your feet with it,” I said. “I don’t care, but that’s all the water we have left to share with you. Your choice.”
He thought for a second and put two of the bottles back in the truck. Dave looked down from the turret and smiled. “Maybe he’s a fast learner, Captain.”
“We’ll see.”
Jared met with the commanders and we all agreed to wait until dark to approach the resupply site, so that we wouldn’t compromise it. I spent part of the afternoon going over my gear. I had two pairs of socks and two T-shirts. My skin was raw because of the heat rash. I soaked an expensive Under Armour T-shirt in water and washed my chest and feet. My civilian boots were holding up, and it helped that they were a size too big. In this heat, my feet swelled badly. Army desert boots have a piece of leather that cuts across the top of your feet—and, when they swell, digs into them and cuts off circulation to your toes. You can’t cram a soldier into boots and equipment made by the lowest bidder and mass produced for every soldier. It doesn’t work that way and never has. That’s why most special operations soldiers wear civilian hiking boots. It isn’t because they look cool. It’s because they work.
I grew up in the infantry and still remember the Ranger instructor’s words of wisdom: “Listen up, girls, there are two things you will take care of as a grunt or you will not last long on the battlefield: your rifle and your feet. In that order.” I put on fresh socks and slid my boots back on. They were tight, really tight.
Team 26 had volunteered to lead the way toward the valley and we got under way as the sun was setting. As Hodge turned the convoy off the ridgeline and into the riverbed, the temperature dropped at least twenty degrees, and we were soon soaked by the light spray thrown up by the tires and the water sloshing over the floorboards of the truck.
The convoy churned along in the shallow river for about a mile, until we converged on the drop point programmed into our computer maps. For once the map of the area basically reflected the actual ground. Our homework had paid off; the site was perfect. A large sandy drop zone was surrounded by a ridgeline that we could set up on, and that provided some concealment for the vehicles and a commanding view for miles. Bill set up sectors of fire that I plotted on a laminated tablet, later adding the Afghan positions that Shinsha showed me. The sector sketch was basically a diagram of the position and showed the machine guns’ interlocking sectors of fire in the event a fight broke out.
With the area secured, we set up signals for the pilots. A night air drop could be more dangerous than a firefight. Once those pallets slid out of the aircraft, the only thing controlling them was weight, wind, forward throw, and gravity. One mistake and thousands of pounds of water and ammunition might land on our heads.
With the sun now gone and still several hours until the aircraft arrived, we decided that the ANA could go down to the river in groups of ten men at a time. The first five would bathe while the others secured the area. When the first group finished, they would switch. We needed to wash, too, and the medics—Steve, Riley, and Greg—talked about it, consulting cards they carried in their uniform pockets and checking the amount and types of medicines on hand. The river was full of microorganisms and bacteria.
Finally, Greg gave us the thumbs-up.
“Do it, but you have to dry your clothes in the sun to kill any remaining bacteria,” Greg said. Riley added that we could soak the clothing in alcohol to kill most of the creepy crawlies if we had to move before it was light. I agreed to their recommendation and Bill sent the guys down to the river a couple at a time.
Nearby, Jared had some good news and bad news. He told me everything was on time and the Air Force was dropping more than twenty thousand pounds of water, fuel, repair parts, ammunition, medical supplies, and rations. Riley and Steve had also ordered boxes of baby wipes, rubbing alcohol, and rags to scrub the heat rash and sores. I could see Jared smile against the glow of his computer screen. The bad news was ISAF might delay the start of the mission. He didn’t say why. It wasn’t confirmed, and until it was, he was going to stick to the schedule. We had to be in position before they could launch the attack.
With only thirty minutes before the bird arrived, Jared, Hodge, and I separately confirmed one another’s math and walked to check the drop markers and signals, a series of infrared strobe lights arrayed in a predetermined shape. Bill made sure the team was ready and everyone had their nods and “go” bags, small backpacks with food, ammo, and other essential equipment, just in case one of the pallets decided to fall on top of a truck.
The pilot’s voice came over the radio.
“Talon 30, Talon 30. This is Archangel 51.”
Jared reached for the handset. The MC-130 was inbound. The specially designed aircraft could fly in any weather and was made for low-visibility operations.
“Archangel 51, this is Talon 30. Go ahead.”
“Talon, we have a few things for you. Are you ready for drop?”
“Roger that, Archangel.”
Jared went through the checklist in his lap. The aircraft flew over us to confirm the drop site and spot the marker on the ground. It would have to make two passes to put the cargo out. The calm, cool air turned electric with tension. Brian sat at my truck on the trail edge of the drop zone with the signal ready. I could hear the heavy hum of the plane’s four turbine engines closing in, and I caught a glimpse of the open tailgate on the aircraft.
“Talon 30. This is Archangel. We have you spotted. Half drop, ten bundles next pass. How copy, over?”
We were on our toes now. As the bundles came out, we had to confirm full chutes. If a chute didn’t open, a one-ton pallet was crashing to earth. A few minutes later, the plane made the fifteen-mile circle over the drop zone. The crew confirmed its course and requested that we light the infrared signals.
“Talon 30. This is Archangel. Markers identified. Drop in ten seconds.”
“Execute, execute, execute.”
As quickly as the turbine engines roared directly over head, they were gone. I could hear the muffled popping of parachutes opening. Brian shut the signal off. I scanned above: one, two, three, six, eight, and ten. Ten good chutes. I contacted Jared and Hodge on the radio.
“Roger, we confirm ten chutes,” I said.
The massive square platforms creaked and swayed as they drifted down directly in front of us, and we felt the crump of their weight hitting the earth. Jared reported all ten pallets were touchdown.
“Bill, give me a status,” I called over the radio.
“All good here, Captain, including ANA.” I still held my breath. We were only half finished. The MC-130 was approaching again. Without a word, Brian cut the markers on when he heard the engines.
“Talon 30. This is Archangel. Markers identified. Last drop in ten seconds.”
“Execute, execute, execute.”
Again the roaring engines were followed by the popping and whipping of the chutes. One, two, four, seven, nine … nine.
“I count nine only nine,” I said, my stomach in a hard knot.
“Shit, I don’t see it,” Dave said.
“Neither do I,” said Brian and Bill simultaneously.
Jared spotted the two-thousand-pound pallet a few seconds later. It was a hanger—a pallet that comes out late or is hung up on something and breaks free to fall cleanly to the ground. I heard all the pallets hit the ground and finally relaxed. Jared called the bird and thanked them for a perfect drop. I had conducted dozens of these aerial resupply missions in my career, but none had gone this well. Almost every one of the pallets had landed upright and literally right in front of us on the dry side of the riverbed. I stood on the edge of the ridge and looked down directly at the top of a cargo pallet twenty feet below.
“Thank you God,” I said quietly. I knew we were being protected and cared for.
“Amen, brother,” Bill said.
Now we needed to move fast. The busy work had to be done to break down every pallet and distribute the supplies. We knew what we had ordered, but sometimes the bundles don’t get loaded, or they break or get stuck in the bird. Bill and Jeff, 26’s team sergeant, decided to unload the most critical supplies—ammunition and fuel—first, so that they, at least, would be secured if we got into a fight and had to leave the area. We were down to only a little more than a basic load of ammunition, about two hundred rounds each, but the resupply brought us up to a full double load. Since we are such a small unit, we have to gain fire superiority quickly, which requires the fast expenditure of about a third to a half of our stores. The enhanced loads were very welcome.
Next, we started on the fuel. We hand-carried twenty fuel cans to the fifty-five-gallon drums on the pallets and filled each one using a hand crank. The work took us all back to Special Forces selection, the first step in becoming a Green Beret. During one of the exercises, you have to carry fuel cans through the central North Carolina pine forests. It’s backbreaking work that seems on the surface like hazing to eliminate the weak. In some part it is, but in fact the task challenges you to work together as a team in tough conditions.
Meanwhile, Chris, the mechanic, had gathered up the repair parts—heavy jack, leaf springs, hoses, lines, and tools—and had already started repairing the damaged trucks. I found him covered in hydraulic fluid and oil underneath truck number 3’s hood.
“How long we looking at, Chris?” I asked.
He spit and wiped his mouth, smearing the spilled fluid across his cheek.
“With all the vehicles on both teams, maybe a day, Captain. I can’t really tell,” he said.
Bad news, but given that ISAF might delay the operation, Jared didn’t seem overly concerned with the repair time when I informed him. He wanted to take a day to recon the valley, rest, and wait for word on Team 36, Bruce’s team, which was coming from Kandahar on a shorter route with the ANA’s weapons company. The Afghan unit had about twenty men with heavy machine guns, recoilless rifles, and 82-mm mortars that provided tremendous firepower.
After we left, Bruce had waited in Kandahar for the second half of his team to arrive, and most of the guys spent about twenty-four hours on the ground before setting off. It took them about three hours to link up with us at the edge of the Red Desert, a fact that seemed to piss off Hodge in particular, given the bone-jarring days of stuck vehicles, heat rash, and aching muscles we had all suffered.
After four hours of unloading supplies, we finally got to the water, which we made sure was distributed equally between the American and Afghan trucks. The Afghans had learned about water conservation the hard way after spending a day without it, and as we hauled cases of water to their trucks, I hoped they’d listen to us next time. But their jugs were already full of river water. If any one of us had done the same without purification tablets, we would have been in the hospital within twenty-four hours.
The sun was still low on the horizon when we finished packing the supplies away. I laid my freshly washed shirt and socks on my truck and crashed in my seat. I woke three hours later baking in the sun. My shirt and socks felt like soft cardboard. Since the ridge offered us some protection, most of us left our shirts off. Tattoos and scars decorated my teammates’ bodies. Skulls, tribal designs, the names of loved ones were scrawled on our biceps, backs, chests, and legs side by side with grotesque, stretched scars from past fights or injuries.
My back and legs ached and my body felt like it had been hit by a truck. I’m getting too old for this, I thought. As I stretched and worked the kinks out, I glanced over to Jared’s truck. He and Mike, another air controller who traveled with Team 26, were crouched over a large spotting scope, Jared scribbling notes on a pad. He saw me stretching and waved me over to take a look. I wiped the crusted sleep from my eyes with my shemagh, the traditional scarf of the Pashtuns. Through the hazy waves of heat, I could see a group of tan compounds with mud-packed walls. A large antenna protruded from the roof of a hut in the village market. Standing outside, ten men catered to two better-dressed older men. My eye drifted back to the small antenna array.
“Well, lookie, lookie what I see. Now why would a small merchant shop in the middle of the desert need a satellite communication system?” I asked.
Jared laughed. “I’m glad you asked, because I want you to go down there and find out.”
Bill stood on the other side of the truck, grinning like a hyena. He had lobbied Jared for the mission before my arrival. Now he got his wish.
Bill and I put together a hasty plan as we walked back to the truck.
“Let’s do a simple movement-to-contact drill with our four trucks. Once we get into the village, we’ll do a secure and lockdown on the main compound after setting blocking positions. I’ll post one truck and some ANA at the exfil route,” Bill said. “You lock down the blocking positions and do the command and control.”
“Sounds good,” I said. “You take assault one and hit the main building. Assault two will lock down the rear escape route and the roofs with Smitty.”
I grabbed the map from my truck and opened it on the hood. Taking out my laser range finder, I attached my GPS to it and shot an azimuth to the antenna. Plotting the point on the map, I plugged it all into my computer and got a satellite picture of the target. The picture was three years old and some things had changed, but overall it was okay. I figured that we could probably drive to the target, but it would take some navigating.
Several dry irrigation ditches led up to the village, but the terrain remained unforgiving. I went back to the scope and searched for the best way in. I didn’t want to get halfway down a ditch, tip off the bad guys, and watch them run out the back door. I turned to an empty page in my notebook, now full of notes about the village, and started to sketch. I focused on entranceways, high points, and possible ambush positions. I had been a scout sniper in my younger days and had done this kind of thing hundreds of times. My sketching skills were better then, but I had enough to brief the team and get the job done.
The team gathered around the map. The compound was two miles away. We decided to move several hundred meters down the riverbed before coming out at full speed about a mile from the village. They would give its inhabitants only about two minutes’ warning before we arrived. From there we would surround the market and begin our search. Team 26 would be the quick reaction force ready to bail us out if we got into trouble.
Back at my truck, Dave cleaned the .50-cal heavy machine gun on the turret. Brian was already making the communication checks with 26, Jared, and headquarters in Kandahar. I put on my body armor and set my GPS on my wrist and on the computer in my truck, and then I cleaned the M240 machine gun attached to my door, checking all its optics and those on my rifle. After calling to Bill to let me know when the rest of the team was ready, I took out my pocket Bible and started to read Psalm 91 to clear my mind. It helped me focus on the mission. “A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.”
As the truck grumbled to life I remembered thinking that someday all this would end. Then what would I do? Where do warriors go when they aren’t needed anymore? Staff and a desk, I guessed.
A huge dust cloud followed us all the way down the riverbed. All four trucks were side by side when we finally emerged and raced straight toward the market. I could see Afghan villagers running away or back toward the compounds. Over the radio Jared said he saw several men run out of the village, and that Taliban radio chatter spiked as soon as we cleared the riverbed, with fighters outside the village telling those near the market that they’d cover their escape. I gripped the machine gun and waited to see if they’d fight or flee.
“Four motorcycles just took off to the north,” Jared said over the radio.
“Damn, there goes the commander,” I said into my Peltor headset. We couldn’t cut off the escape routes as planned—we were almost into the village and focused on going straight to the target compound instead of chasing them. Anything or anyone of value was probably gone, but hopefully they left something behind in their haste. Brian slammed on the brakes as we reached an intersection of dirt roads on the village outskirts, smashing me into the windshield and jamming Dave’s big turret machine gun into his chest. He’d seen too many trucks race to a target, only to hit a mine. If it took us a few seconds longer to get there alive, I was willing to be patient. Brian raced around the intersection, made a sharp right-hand turn, and sped down a small pathway to the shop, stopping just past the front door. I jumped out and covered the building while Dave covered our rear with the big gun. Bill and the search team, interpreters in tow, fell immediately into line at the back of his truck and approached the shop. It was beautiful to watch. The formation was nearly in step, weapons covering every position as they flowed smoothly inside. Several minutes of screaming and yelling, but no gunfire followed. Finally Bill peeked out the doorway and came sauntering out.
“Captain, we have the building locked down and the perimeter is secure,” he said. “We haven’t begun the search but the roof is clear. We will be bringing out the occupants in a minute.”
I asked if there were any PUCs (personnel under confinement). I despised that term. It was a politically correct, pussyfooted way of saying prisoners. Just saying it pissed me off. As the occupants filed out, it was obvious who they were. About six of the ten had dark olive-drab clothing and black turbans. These were the lowest-hanging fruit on the Taliban tree and usually the recipients of our fury in battle, the Talibs who are left behind to cover the escape of those more privileged who run off via motorbikes or Hilux trucks. Bill lined them up on their knees in front of the building. Some of them were just boys.
An old man with thick glasses, a gray turban, and a cane came out and looked me square in the eye. I greeted him and asked him as a mesher, or senior, to please sit. He smiled. I knew he was not a combatant or an enemy. There was no sustained eye contact, scowling, head hanging, cursing. Instead, he looked at me and my long gray-and-white beard, which he slowly reached out and touched, his hand shaky.
“You. I have seen you before,” he said.
I helped him slowly sit down on a bench near the market’s door. His smile grew to chuckling, his chuckles to laughter. I was not in the mood for humor and told the interpreter to ask him what the joke was.
The old man, who turned out to be the shop owner, pointed an arthritic finger at me and continued to laugh as he said, “I know who you are, gray one. You are of the long beards. Amerkaianu Mushakas Kawatuna.” American Special Forces.
He then pointed his crooked finger at the men lined up in front of the store.
“These Talib boys will not run like wild animals while you are here.” He laughed in a low, vindictive tone. “You have much work to do here, gray one. Many Talibs have returned with their Arab friends.”
In my full kit with weapons and assault pack, I weighed nearly three hundred pounds, but right then, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I nodded respectfully and took out my notepad. Bill stuck his head around the corner of the doorway of the store and said that he, Riley, Smitty, and the others were going to start their search. I nodded and returned to my notebook. I wanted to capture every word. What the old man told me about the current situation, the enemy, and the attitude of the local population surpassed two weeks’ worth of intelligence work.
The heat of the day was sucking the life out of everyone, and it was obvious that the Talibs were getting thirsty. I went to my truck and pulled a bottle of water out and handed it to the old man. An ANA soldier squatted by him and wiped his brow. Afghans have a great admiration for their elders. They appreciated the fact that I showed him respect.
The PUCs had been separated from one another so they could not communicate, and the ANA were more than happy to begin questioning. The teenage boys were the first to get the ANA’s full attention. They were the youngest, least trained, and would usually be the first to provide useful information. When the ANA found someone they were sure was a Taliban member, he was pulled off to the side and given a GSR, or gunshot residue and explosives test. Whenever a gun is fired, the shooter gets sprayed with an invisible blast of chemical residues that are by-products of the incomplete combustion of gunpowder, primer, and lubricants. The kit can identify very small amounts of these chemical markers on a person’s hands, arms, or clothing. Out of the six Talibs, the one who scowled the most had residue all over his hands.
“Hey, Captain, we need you in here,” Bill called from the store.
Jackpot, I thought to myself. My guys would only call for me if there was something of interest. Riley and Smitty had been first inside. The interior was cluttered with pills, injectable antibiotics, and bandages. The other side was stocked with clothes, candy, and trinkets. Riley had been poking around the back wall near the antenna base. He casually swept the ground with his foot. Unlike the usual earthen floors in the country, baked hard from decades of heat and blistering sun, this one was soft. Someone had disturbed it. Digging down about six inches, Riley had uncovered a notebook wrapped in a plastic bag, which Smitty handed to me as I stepped inside. It was a small green tablet, about three inches long, text reading from right to left. The only markings were names and numbers. Jackpot.
There was no sign of the phone that belonged to the satellite array. I was absolutely sure that the others had taken it with them when they made their hasty exit. The antenna on the roof ran to a hidden cable and charger. Riley took great pleasure in snapping the antenna from its base and tossing it off the roof.
Intravenous needles, IV bags, clotting agents, pressure dressings, morphine, tourniquets, needles, and sewing thread were packed in boxes and stacked neatly in the back of the shop. When I came out and asked the old man who the medical supplies belonged to, he told me Hafiz Majid’s men. Hafiz Majid was one of the top-five Taliban commanders in all of Afghanistan. If those supplies belonged to his men, he couldn’t be far away. I wondered if he had been one of those who fled, but I doubted it. Senior Taliban commanders did not travel without Al Qaeda bodyguards, and their visits were no secret, heralded by much fanfare. They generally wanted the entire area to know they were there in the face of the infidels’ invasion.
We spent the next several hours questioning the Talibs. The ANA squad leader stood smiling at me.
“We take them, Captain?” the Afghan soldier asked.
I knew what he meant. If I had said yes, the whole bunch would have been taken on a one-way trip into the desert and never returned. It sickened me to have to deny the ANA request because I knew we would be fighting these Talibs later, but something had to separate us from them.
“No,” I said flatly.
The Afghans understood, but they always asked anyway, hoping I might say yes.
I walked over to the Talib who scowled the most and drew my knife to cut his plastic flex cuffs. I commanded him not to move. Then I took his right arm and with a Sharpie marker drew an American flag on his wrist.
Grinning, I said clearly for the others to hear, “Nanawateh tismedel.” I had just given him safe passage according to one of the most primary Pashtunwali benefits. Like it or not, he now owed me a favor.
He was obligated to obey.
“I have a message for your boss. Show him this,” I told him through a terp, indicating the flag. “Tell him we are looking for him.”
He jerked his hand away and glared. I gave him a little wink and stepped up into my truck. We made the turn out of the compound fully prepared for an ambush. I saw the ANA squad leader wave to the Talib who had just walked away with his life.
As we headed back to Jared’s position, I got a call on the radio that there were some serious arguments among the Taliban as to why we were not ambushed on the way out of the compound. Apparently there was a very, very irate Taliban soldier who wanted to engage us but was told by his commander he was obligated not to.
At the top of the ridge, Jared waited anxiously with his interpreter for the captured notebook. I handed it off to him as we drove by. Now the administrative pain would begin. I was hoping someone on the ridge had kept our timeline for the after-action report. I began a brain dump of everything I could remember, while Bill and the team began cleaning gear and weapons.
A shadow fell over the door of my truck. It was Jared, grinning from ear to ear. “Do you know what this is?” he asked, holding up the notebook Riley and Smitty had found.
“Yep,” I replied. “It’s a list of Taliban commanders and phone numbers. This wasn’t left there by accident. It was hidden.”
I studied the list carefully and recognized at least four of the names immediately as men I had been hunting during my last rotation. This time we might not have to chase them all over Afghanistan.