Chapter 12
If men make war in slavish obedience to rules, they will fail.
—ULYSSES S. GRANT
My day started with a tug on my foot. It was Jude, waking me up for my guard shift. I hadn’t seen much of him on the road during his stint driving Jared’s truck. It was good to have him back in the fold.
“Nothing going on out there, Captain,” he said.
“I’ve gotta have a cup of coffee today or I’m gonna break something,” I said.
He shrugged and handed me the night-vision goggles. Before I could get out of the truck, he had disappeared into his sleeping bag for a few hours of sleep. I opened the door and pulled a bag of ground coffee and filters from a metal box.
It was just after four a.m., with the sun just below the horizon. While the coffee was brewing, I walked over to check on the ANA. Taz sat with his legs tucked under him, the American-made AK-47 magazine carrier I bought him on the last rotation strapped across his chest, the small squad radio at his ear. He gave me a thumbs-up and grinned.
“Dodee wharlee, Turan?” he asked. Do you want food, Captain?
“Walee na zma, malgaree,” I said. Why not, my friend.
Coughing and a growl issued from a sleeping bag behind me.
“Roostie.” Shinsha jammed a cigarette in his mouth before completely sitting up. He slapped my leg, nearly knocking it out from under me.
“Sahar pakair, Komandan,” I said in Pashto. Good morning, Commander.
We could still see torches flickering down in the valley as the long lines of civilians continued to flee Panjwayi. Taz and Shinsha were clearly disturbed by the refugees and the prospect of their country being torn apart, again.
Operation Medusa was set to kick off in just a few hours, and talk soon turned to the Canadian attack. Shinsha was sure he knew how the battle would turn out.
“This is same as with the Russies,” he said. “They attack and the Taliban will make defense and absorb attackers until they are too weak to go on.”
“This time, though, you’re rooting for the attackers,” I teased him.
By the time the sunrise sent streaks of brilliant gold light into the deep blue skies above the desert, I was nearly full of tea and bread. I hope today is better than yesterday, I thought.
A Canadian special operations unit had infiltrated onto Masum Ghar, five kilometers north of our position, under the noses of Taliban fighters during the night. We heard them on the radio for the first time that morning. Masum Ghar was the northernmost terrain feature, with commanding views of the Canadian objectives. The Canadian plan called for several days of bombing, targeted in part by the Canadian special operations team, followed by a ground attack across the Arghandab River.
The first dull gray A-10 streaked high across the desert overhead, engines wide open. It climbed straight up for several thousand feet, banked hard left, went wings level, then dove like an arrow, belching fire. Like preying birds, bomber after bomber swooped in, pounding Taliban positions.
I stood on the hood of Ole Girl following the aerial assault with my binoculars, my adrenaline spiking. I felt like a Spartan captain watching the Persian navy smash into the Greek coastline.
“Ahhhhhh,” I bellowed, bringing Brian out of his sleeping bag, pistol in hand.
“Where, where, where?” he yelled.
“Be cool. The Canucks are crushing some nuts across the river,” I said, grinning.
The bombardment was the “softening,” or targeting of the objectives in the valley to destroy enemy communications, command positions, defenses, and logistical sites. I had never seen this much firepower from either side in all my tours in Afghanistan. Streams of anti-aircraft fire arched into the sky, trying to clip the fighters. The lofting wave of bullets coming out of the valley was as transfixing as the arsenal going in. This was not a collection of hillbillies. These were hardcore fighters.
Then word came that a general somewhere in the chain of command had moved up the attack without conducting a reconnaissance, or recce, of the target. Instead of following the plan, this general had received “intelligence” that the Taliban were breaking and made the change of plans to attack early. You never conduct a deliberate attack without conducting reconnaissance. It didn’t shock me, though. I am never amazed that certain generals, however far away they are, know more about the battlefield than those standing on it.
Jared and I studied the maps and the new timeline. Brian and Dave monitored the radios and called out friendly and enemy positions to the group in order to keep everyone informed. The aerial bombardment had just begun when we heard an unusual noise. I looked at Jared.
“What the hell is that?” I said.
South of Masum Ghar, one of the men attached to the Canadian recce company commanded by Major Andy Lussier pointed to the sky. Andy saw it immediately: a four-engine British Nimrod on fire and trailing thick black smoke. Seconds later, the plane disappeared in a massive fireball. Not waiting for orders, Andy and his men started for the crash site. The Canadians knew the unspoken code as well as we did. Andy could not, would not let the Taliban get there first.
The explosion reverberated deep in the ground. We felt it at our position, grabbed weapons, and scrambled to the top of the small ridge behind our vehicles. “Lord,” Dave mumbled, looking at the distant fiery debris. We said a prayer for those on board and their families.
As we watched, the radio announced what we already knew. “All Task Force 31 units, this is a net call. We have a coalition aircraft down. Aircraft is a British Nimrod. Can anyone identify?”
Andy’s team was having difficulty finding its way through the villages and around the irrigation ditches that crisscrossed the district. Finally, an American Apache helicopter guided the Canadians to the gruesome crash site. Parts of the aircraft were strewn everywhere across the scorched earth, but the plane had impacted with such force that there was little to recover. All fourteen British crew members died.
That night on duty, I listened to the coalition satellite radio transmission to help pass the time. Settling into the turret, I had the radio in my ear when I heard a transmission about the Taliban leader Mullah Omar and Mullah Dadullah Lang, commander of southern Afghanistan. Both men, according to the transmission, might be in Panjwayi. If they were down there, we would dearly want to be in on their demise. After my shift I found Smitty and we spent the next few hours drilling down on our hard intelligence and educated assumptions about what we could expect to face in the valley. If there were senior-level Taliban commanders and foreign fighters in there, the resistance would be particularly stiff, Smitty insisted.
For the moment, there was little we could do but remain on station, ready to support the Canadians.
The next morning, our radios crackled to life. The main Canadian ground attack had started. Over the next few hours, as we listened intently, the situation deteriorated rapidly. Very soon, Charles Company was fighting for its life near Objective Rugby.
Rugby was a small white schoolhouse in the middle of Panjwayi. The array of irrigation ditches, bisecting tree lines, and dense marijuana fields, their plants taller than a man, made the schoolhouse the natural center of the Taliban’s defense. We could see the fight from nearly a mile away. It was vicious.
Charles Company of the Royal Canadian Regiment had come under lethal fire and taken heavy casualties almost immediately after crossing the river. General Fraser’s intelligence about a weak, broken Taliban was wrong. In minutes, several Canadian vehicles were destroyed and four soldiers dead.
We tracked the battle on our maps from our blocking position. The concept was to keep the enemy compressed in the meat grinder. “Battle tracking” was the only way to keep up with what was going on and pass the time. It also kept us abreast of where everyone was located on the battlefield. Midway through, my interpreter, Victor, raced to me, his eyes filled with tears. He held out his radio and I tried to make sense of what I heard. Taliban soldiers screaming. Gunfire, so dominant that I guessed the fighter was holding the radio against his weapon. He said the fighters were forcing the remaining civilians who hadn’t escaped into the open courtyards and streets at gunpoint as shields against air strikes. Fighters circled above but didn’t attack. Stalemate.
Establishing the Blocking Positions (August 31–September 1, 2006)
Ambush at Sperwan Ghar (September 3, 2006)
Mere spectators, we could only watch and listen to our comrades fight for their lives. After a few hours absorbing the panicked radio calls, I gazed out over Panjwayi. Dozens of thick black smoke plumes climbed into the blue sky as buildings and Canadian vehicles burned. Secondary explosions shook the ground. Each time the fighting spiked, Smitty raised his big bushy eyebrows at me as if to say, “I told you so.” The fierce resistance he had predicted earlier was playing out now in real time.
Slowly the sun slipped below the mountains, and I thought of the Canadian soldiers, pinned down and buttoned up in their vehicles in the hellish heat, surrounded by scores of enemies, with little air cover.
We listened as the Canadian infantry moved forward again. This time, Andy’s unit would fake an attack to the north to draw fire and Charles Company would push across the river. Artillery and 25-mm cannons signaled the push. The Taliban answered with recoilless-rifle and machine-gun fire, and we periodically heard the metallic thump of RPGs against the Canadian trucks’ armor plating. Even with superior equipment, the Canadians weren’t gaining ground. The terrain was as much the enemy as the enemy.
Andy’s feint was dashed when we heard over the radio that an A-10 called in to engage an enemy position had strafed the Canadian forces by mistake, killing one soldier and wounding more than forty. The whole attack stopped as the Canadian forces reorganized and evacuated their wounded.
Jared, Shinsha, and I stood over the map. The attack had to be reorganized, but quickly. “It wasn’t necessarily a bad decision—unless, of course, they wait too long,” I said to Jared.
Several critical hours passed.
“This is bad,” I said.
Jared agreed. Shinsha inhaled heavily on his umpteenth cigarette, as engaged as if it were his unit in the fighting. “If they wait too long, the Talibs will move into positions closer to the Canadians than before,” he said urgently. “It will be much more difficult to use the airplanes. The fighting will get very, very bad.”
The whole intent of my training was to teach us always to remain two or three steps ahead and to think like an insurgent. I pulled out my notepad and started to work out the scenarios. If I was trapped what would I do? Where would I go? How could we get in there and help?
Then I saw it. Sperwan Ghar. It wasn’t really a mountain—it was more of a tall hill surrounded by villages. It hadn’t captured our attention during planning, but now, with the battle unfolding before us, it was clear that not only was this key terrain, but based on their radio calls, the Taliban thought so too. I knew that once on top, we could call down hellish air strikes in support of the Canadian forces pushing west. I picked my words carefully as I pointed it out to Jared on the map.
“Sir, this terrain feature could be the key to success or failure for this entire operation,” I said.
For the next several minutes, I laid it out. Charlie Company had attacked Objective Rugby and had been repelled. The enemy’s numbers and strength were far, far greater than anyone had expected, and they were wholly committed to the fight. The Canadians had had to stop to evacuate their wounded, and their ability to use air cover was limited.
We had just lost the initiative.
“Look at the defense they put up against a mechanized task force,” I pressed. “This is bigger than anyone ever planned. This hill holds too much potential to either side not to own it.”
I presented three alternatives. The first split our force between the blocking positions and the hill. The second moved our force to the top of Sperwan Ghar and used the advantages of the high ground to control the whole southern part of the valley. The last option was to stay put and take our chances.
Slowly, Sperwan Ghar became an obsession. The more I discussed it, the more certain—adamant—I was that we had to take it.
“If the enemy takes this hill, and holds it, the Canadian forces will be open to direct observation and will have their flank and rear unsecure when they push farther south,” I argued. “No doubt about it. Whoever is out there advising the Taliban is experienced, probably foreign—Pakistani, or worse, Chechen.”
Jared studied the map one more time and agreed to call Bolduc and brief him—on one condition: “You can go if you convince another team to go with you,” he said.
Jared headed over to his truck and pulled out his satellite phone. Twenty minutes later, he gave me the thumbs-up. Good. I set off to recruit the other team.
I went to Bruce first, figuring he would take the longest to make a decision. He was new and tended to debate more before approaching his team. I understood. No one wanted to come to their team with a stupid idea and look bad. I gave him the same pitch I gave Jared and he agreed to take it back to his men.
My second target was Hodge. He and I thought alike, and before I got halfway through the pitch, he and his team sergeant, Jeff, were on board. I suspected they would have done anything to get us into the action.
“Hodge’s boys agreed to go,” I stated, walking toward Jared.
“Well, I’m glad to hear it, because Bolduc thinks it’s a really good idea in light of the current circumstances and we’re all going,” Jared said. “He’ll call once the movement is approved by ISAF. Get me a plan pronto. We move on Sperwan as soon as I get the call.”
I glanced over at Hodge; he looked at me and laughed. “Oh, no, brother. This is your idea, you do the planning. We’re just along to make sure you’re alive to pay for the case of beer this is going to cost you,” he said.
Bill drove over in his truck, his shit-eating grin making it clear he had already gotten the word from Dave or Brian.
“S’up, Captain?” he said. “You know I’m not going to let you make the plan without me.”
“This might be a little detailed for you, Bill,” I said, straight-faced.
Bill knew tactics better than I did. After a little more requisite ribbing, we spent the next several hours poring over maps, satellite pictures, and checklists. On the satellite imagery, Sperwan Ghar was not that impressive. The ashy gray mound stood nearly sixty feet tall and looked like the world’s largest dirt pile. A large berm, nearly twenty feet tall, surrounded it. It looked like it had a large circular pool at its top—probably an abandoned water storage facility. A circular road wound from its bottom around to the top. A U-shaped building at the base looked fairly new; another, smaller building stood a short distance away. Only two roads led to the hill, one from the south, where we would be coming from, and one from the north. From the aerial photo, the site resembled a spoon, with the hill and the buildings in the bowl, accessed by way of the handle. The location was entirely surrounded by compounds, grape huts, and walls.
The plan seemed easy enough, and now all teams would be involved. Two teams would move into the bowl of the spoon and one would be in reserve at the handle. My team would be in the lead, with Jared as the ground force commander (GFC). His truck would follow me, as the command and control unit, as we probed forward. Bruce’s team would trail us as the last element moving toward Sperwan Ghar and maneuver to the left or right depending on enemy fire. Hodge’s team would provide fire support and reinforcements at the entrance in case we got trapped inside. If things got out of hand, Hodge would knock the wedge in between the enemy and us so we could get out. Shinsha’s Afghans split into their platoons and were distributed among the teams.
When the attack started, my team would clear the route to the mountain and set up on the first large berm, covering Bruce’s team as they cleared the buildings at the base of the hill. Hodge’s team would set up a defensive perimeter. Once on the hill, we’d set about leveling the Taliban positions that were delivering lethal fire on the Canadian task force across the river.
We briefed the plan to the other teams and the Afghans, checked our equipment, and waited for Bolduc to give us his final approval. After more than ten days in the field, I finally found myself with nothing to do and realized that I hadn’t talked to my family since I arrived. A phone call home would settle my nerves.
The black satellite phone was hot when I pressed it to my ear. The distant, scratchy ringtones were finally interrupted by my wife’s familiar voice. After a short hello and family update, she put my child on the phone.
“Daddy, whatcha doin’?”
“Oh, just getting after the bad guys,” I said.
“Be careful. Daddy, I had a dream. In my dream the bad guys were shooting at you from the bushes. They wanted to hurt you.”
“Well, what do you want me to do, honey?” I asked, pouring all the support and love I could muster into my voice.
“Shoot into the bushes, Daddy. That’s where they are hiding. Shoot into the bushes. Shoot everywhere.”