Yesterday was a bad day

Posted Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Yesterday was a bad day.

For some, it will be a morning they wished they never had awakened from. For others, I’m sure it will be a moment that will linger and stretch on unmercilessly until the day they too pass on into eternity.

I was in the motor pool with some soldiers discussing the best way to equip our new vehicles for the differing missions we had been given. Over the radio I heard the TOC call for the QRF for a possible aircraft crash in our area. I ran out and contacted my team leader and told him to assemble the guys for a quick hop outside the wire. While he was assembling the team I went to the command center for the latest Intel and see if there was updated maps and commo. They told us there was a helicopter down about twelve klicks south of our FOB in a mountainous region near a small village called Chashmeh Khani.

We gathered the leaders of the reaction force and decided on a route to the crash site while prepping all the vehicles and men for possible enemy contact, at this time it was unknown how or why this aircraft went down. Before leaving the compound we picked up a contingent of ANA and interpreters for they know the surrounding area much better than we who have been here just weeks. TOC radioed us and said the bird was possibly a Spanish ISAF {International Stability Assistance Force} training flight was out of Herat Air Base and they were asking us if we could assist them in setting up a perimeter around the crash site. With maps, GPS, and a little luck we would be able to find the site without too much trouble. We headed out the gate leaving a small dust storm in our wake, down route 1A of the ring road towards Shindand and Farah.

The road held out for about two miles before the first detour and then potholes and asphalt gave way to gravel and dirt. We turned off the road into the countryside staying on the paths, keeping mindful of the ever present uncharted minefield left by the Soviets. Away from all visages of man the Afghan landscape looked barren and lifeless as a Van Gogh or Renoir siphoned of all color and forced to broad strokes of a charcoal pen. After crossing several dry river beds and more than a few low mountain passes we ran into the village and one of the Afghani’s found a man who would guide us through. Once on the other side we ran up a small embankment and stopped to reassess our location only to see a few armored vehicles parked sporadically around the ridgelines and mountain peaks.

Only after we had unassed our vehicles did I look around and find we had stopped in the middle of an Afghan cemetery. I don’t claim to be precognitive or clairvoyant but that little voice inside said “I got a bad feeling about this.” An ISAF humvee with a fifty caliber machine gun aimed our direction came barreling up the wadi toward us and stopped, asking us who the hell we were. We told him who sent us and asked where the crash was and how we could set up our troops to best facilitate a 360 degree perimeter. The Spanish officer, looking very tired and solemn, said he hadn’t been advised from higher of our impending arrival and all he saw was a couple truckloads of soldiers carrying AK-47’s {the ANA} heading his way. Considering the situation and all the adrenalin flowing I guess it’s lucky we didn’t get our butts shot off.

The officer told us he had not one, but two helicopters down in a ravine about 800 meters to our front. We told him we had been sent by his HQ in Herat and he simply said they had evacuated the wounded and the rest were dead. We still could only see a few vehicles and we asked if our medics could go down and help in any way. He said it was alright if we took the medics and a small security element to survey the site. Being a Paramedic, I was asked by our medical staff if I would ride along with them. While I stepped up into the back of their vehicle for the short ride down I told them to prepare themselves for what they may encounter and to be “respectful” of the dead. Being such a small contingent of troops, most of these Spanish soldiers here probably know them. As we came over a small rise in the ground we could see into the river bed where fifteen to twenty vehicles stood running. What stood out however, was a field of debris covering an area of about three the four hundred meters starting at a shear cliff wall to my left and ending in an ugly black smear working its way up the next ridgeline to my right.

The Helo to my left was stuck in a small crevice about eighty feet up the side of a rock shelf and looked much like a dragonfly you find on the radiator of your car after a long road trip. The main rotor was shredded and missing, leaving only about 20 feet out from the Jesus nut.{the one nut that holds the main rotor on.} The tail boom was fractured and the rotor there was splintered leaving small honeycombed pieces of composite material strewn everywhere.
It seemed to defy gravity, perched in what was an almost continuous solid rock face. How the pilot managed to place his aircraft there was nothing short of a miracle. There simply was no other place he could have landed and survived. A few feet to his left or right and the bird would have smashed into solid rock and then rolled downhill spilling his crew and passengers down the rock face and into the river bed. I can only hope to one day look him in the eye, shake his hand and tell him his training paid off in spades for he saved everyone on his aircraft that day.

The other was less recognizable and far more painful to see. It started as a small divot in the ground and almost immediately became a greasy black patch spreading out wider from its base into a funnel shaped mass that looked like a hellish tornado that had simply gotten tired of spinning and lain down to die. Midway down the path started the pieces of wreckage. A tire with landing strut, an empty seat, a machine gun, all blacken from the fire and heat and all seemed to be slowly melting into one another. Then, as if my brain lifted some filter and allowed me to register what my eyes were seeing, they appeared.

One by one, the bodies lie scattered among the wreckage.

They looked so small. Burned and blackened and utterly alien juxtaposed against the cloudless Afghan sky. I looked and tried not to stare. Tried to be respectful and yet could not stop myself from glancing back at them. They lie all along the path of the devastation yet I had not seen them before. Seventeen lives gone in an instant. Fire does bad things to bodies and causes the muscles to flex and contort into grotesque parodies of life. My last look will be the one that will haunt me forever. A single arm that once held a child or a first love, pointed skyward in a final act of mocking defiance to a mute God.

As both a soldier and a firefighter I have seen my fair share of misery and misfortune. Both careers fueled mostly by testosterone and beer you feel sometimes armor plated and invincible in our protective gear. But, if you let it get to you, and you embrace the pain too deeply and make it your own, you’re in trouble. That doesn’t mean you don’t comfort the living or understand the pain but you must stay strong and centered and slightly separate from the chaos that sometimes surrounds you. I have seen those who could not sidestep or deflect the emotion and have an especially bad call and just walk off never to return to the job.

I have what I call my encyclopedia of horrors.

That small dark corner in my soul I send all the accidents and misadventure, the images of torn flesh and things eyes shouldn’t see. There they usually stay until some cosmic meter reads full and they come back to visit. I remember some years ago I was on a medical call of a possible suicide. I was the first one in the house and a man dispassionately told me “she was in the back.” I looked into the room and didn’t see anything till I reached the walk-in closet. There lie a young woman who looked to be sleeping peacefully until I saw the gun near her left hand and a small hole in her chest. She had arranged a little bed complete with a pillow and covers drawn up to her legs. I remember wondering what she was thinking as she arranged this little crypt. Her children, parents, missed chances? It really didn’t hit me till the cop asked me for her license and I couldn’t seem to put the picture in life with the form lying before me. That night she came to visit looking for answers and I had none.

I had been speaking with my platoon sergeant about the mission and trying unsuccessfully to relate the helpless feeling I had during the operation and he said “It must have been hard for you with your friends going down in the bay like that.” Then I remembered Air Heart One. I had blocked them out and those feelings came rushing back with a vengeance. I tried to remember their names and I couldn’t and that made me feel worse.

After our after action report/debrief on the mission I had time to find my way to tower two. It is on the South side of the compound and not in use during the day so it’s there I go to read and get a little privacy among the people here at Camp Victory. There I gazed out over the wire and cross the Dasht-E-Yelan plains where the Hindu Kush mountain range lay undulating away from me like brown waves in a petrified cesspool. There I sat and thought about Robert, Tom, and Jack and what began as some of the ubiquitous Afghan dust in the eyes became a stream of silent sorrow. I wept for those friends I’ve lost and for complete strangers. For the Spanish soldiers and their loved ones. For their friends who witnessed the crash. And for those who had to police up their bodies for I knew they would never be the same.

I’m unashamed and unapologetic for my tears but, I think I now understand a trace of what Colonel Kurtz in the movie “Apocalypse now” called the horror…..the horror.

My Dearest:

Originally posted Wednesday, July 20, 2005

My Dearest:

Good to talk to you last night, I can only imagine how tiring this house/kids/moving adventure has been. Plus having to support me while I'm away. It can feel little overwhelming at times no? Know that this whole venture will make us stronger, better, more loving and appreciative members of this world. If it does nothing more than shows me what is most important in this life it has been a success. I miss all of you ...sometimes to fault and I must remind myself of the task at hand and that is to bring everyone home so we can pass on these lessons to others. The threat level here is low. There hasn't been an attack on this outpost and we are surrounded by hundreds of ANA soldiers including or own organic security.

You asked what our job is here so I'll outline it for you:

1. We man three different missions on a rotating basis. First there is the security of the FOB [forward operating base, Camp Victory] we man a number of towers and checkpoints to make sure the occupants of this base are safe.

2. Quick reactionary force. We fall in on a number of up-armored HUMVEEs and do convoy security for vehicles going into Herat or the airbase. Every time someone [military] fly's into the airbase we sweep the runway and perimeter for IEDs [Improvised explosive devices] and then lead the convoy back into the base. Any other contingency for rapid movement of reinforcements to our people of the ISAF crew. [International stability assistance force...i.e. the Italians, Spanish forces that help secure the Airfield etc...]

3. Internal reactionary force. We escort nationals into the base who supply needed commodities Fuel, cleaning services, construction etc... and take over QRF is the first unit is busy with another mission.

We do this on a 24 hour continuous schedule.

So far I have been able to go out into Herat twice with the QRF and yesterday with some officers in LTVs [light armored vehicles] as a shooter. Needed security for the guys outside and the vehicles we use inside the city proper. The Afghani's seem to be an interesting people, probably as interesting as we are to them. Anytime we stop a small crowd appears, mostly children because they're fearless and undeniably curious, most of them know little English and like to try their speech on us. I try and bring some candy or treats with me when ever we go out so I can give it away to the kids; they have so little and are mostly dirty and raggedly dressed. Not all mind you, but given the economic and socially disruptive environment they have grown to accept as life they are pitiful by our living standards.

Just got back from a small mission outside the wire with the Major, someone dug up a bunch of mortar rounds and other ammo outside our compound so EOD [explosive ordinance disposal] has to come later and blow them up.

I went out with the garbage truck this morning to provide security and it was a sad sight to say the least. Two dozen children from the ages of 3 to 14 or 15 were there fighting to get to our trash. The security isn't for the driver or us but to keep the kids from climbing up onto the vehicle and injuring themselves. They just jump into the pit [still burning] and pull out anything of value before someone sets it on fire; meanwhile the trash is cascading down on them from above. Quite a sight. I remember seeing the same thing in Korea so many years ago. One of the guys asked me to take some pictures but, after witnessing that spectacle I would have felt shameful to have exploited their plight. Something's are just to tragic to simply take snapshots of so, instead I found one of the two adults present, caught his eye and with my left hand over my heart said "Salaam A-likem" "Peace upon you" which showed him respect and I hope a small level of human understanding.

Hello again, had to go on duty {Sergeant of the guard] for my shift. Some of us NCO's have had some difficulty impressing upon the kids [nineteen/twenty something] the gravity of the situation we find ourselves in. The easy part would be to say were in a foreign country that has known only war for more than one generation where most families have lost members to its insatiable appetite. Another would be to tell them as I have already have that there are people out there who would gladly kill you just because of the clothes your wearing. This uniform that we wear so proudly is just a target for those who wish nothing more than anarchy to rein here again. Then they would be free to move back into the area and terrorize the local population with their polluted sense of righteousness. However, sometimes an abject lesson comes along that is just too easy to ignore.

Yesterday a suicide bomber blew himself up in downtown Herat trying to kill the local police chief/interim Governor. He was unsuccessful and luckily no others around him were injured. If you can imagine a small block of New York with ten thousand motor bikes and bicycles all trying to use the same road and sidewalk as twenty thousand others you'll soon get the point, that no one else was hurt was a small miracle. It was near some of the same road I had traveled yesterday pulling security with the interpreter and the maintenance chief. So I found a picture of the bomber on the web, just what was left of him surrounded by a crowd that had formed, and I made everyone in my squad look at it and try to picture one of us there that could have been killed if we didn't watch our six or we fell asleep on post.

All it takes is a second, a moment you let your guard down and feel complacent and it reaches up and bites you in the ass.

Unfortunately in war there is no room to grade on a curve or produce the will needed to put the Genie/bullet back in the bottle/barrel.
Please my love, don't think me cruel or heartless but, if I'm going to bring all these men home in one piece, both body and soul, we may have to become a little of that which we detest. Remember the only thing you said to me when I told you I was leaving? You said come home in one piece. Well I’m and I will.
Kiss our children for me and tell Dev to remember Daddy and his soldiers in his prayers.

I love you
Always...
P.




[Reprinted with the expressed permission of the Queen.]

Gentleman: Welcome to Afghanistan

Originally posted 07/14/2005

Gentleman: Welcome to Afghanistan.

That disembodied voice came over the intercom as we rolled to a full stop at KIA, Kabul International Airfield whose weathered facade still showed the bullet holes and pot marks from the ravages of twenty years of war. As the ramp on the C-130 lowered we got our first taste of our new home for the next year. I do mean taste, for the air is so hot and impregnated with the dust and earthen particles kicked up by a savage wind that you can actually taste it. {We later decided it tastes like dry oatmeal, red tide, with carpenters chalk and a dash of peat moss thrown in}

My eyes kept tearing up so badly in the first few minutes I couldn't see around me enough to keep myself in line to the terminal. We walked from the plane to a dark front room with one cooler full of bottled water and a dusty clock that stood still at six fifty-three. As we waited for our ride to Camp Phoenix we watched dozens of different aircraft take off and land from an airfield that looked as deserted as the rocky landscape that surrounded us.

We had come from a world wind 60 hour flight that took us to some incredibly memorable places. We started off with a Bluebird bus ride from Camp Shelby to Kessler Air Force base in Gulfport Miss. Here at the Trent Lott Air National Guard base we were counted and recounted for the manifest before we were able to board the flight. The first leg was a little over three and a half hours to Stephen King's homeland, Bangor Maine. Although we arrived at 03:30 in the morning we were surprised to find the "Maine troop greeters." This group of about fifteen men and women lined up in a gauntlet down the concourse to shake hands and welcome all the troops that come though the airport from Iraq and Afghanistan and all points in between. They were mostly older WWII and Korean War veterans that were making sure that we knew that they knew of our collective sacrifices for our country. They looked like our Mothers and Fathers, our Aunts and Uncles and those distant kin folk you see once a year at Christmas or holidays. Yet, here they were with the sun barely cresting the horizon holding hands and speaking in hushed tones to these strangers as though they knew us from long ago. They served us coffee and homemade cookies, listened to our talk of family and friends and graciously allowed us space to start to accept the entirety of the task that lie ahead. I will never forget them or the humility they shared with us one extraordinary morning in July.

We reboarded the plane for a long eight hour flight over the Atlantic. We skirted the edges of Canada and Greenland until banking right to make the jump over water. Our next refueling point would be Shannon Ireland. Home to green rolling hills, ageless castles and Guinness Stout beer. Imagine my unbridled joy! To be in the home of the most coveted dark beer brewed for centuries in the same fashion for King and surf alike. We nearly ran up the gangway and much to my delight found "Joe Sheridan’s old Irish Pub" complete with wooden floors and hot and cold running adult beverages. We bellied up to the bar five deep and began an ordering frenzy that would put Wall Street to shame.

Nothing like a comely Irish lass speaking in her native tongue to wet the appetite for shameless imbibing debauchery. Alas, all good things must come to an end and once again we were called back to continue our journey. Another eight hour leg done in darkness over the European continent watching the endless progression of nameless cities gliding under wing. We stopped again for fuel in Adama Turkey where they refused to let us off the plane for three hours until we finished trading pilots and fuel. So much for Turkish hospitality.

After take-off I watched as we ascended from the darkness to the edge of the coming dawn. The clear unadulterated hues at this frozen altitude spread before me like Gods pallet with enough color to paint all the worlds below. In hindsight, at that moment, I guess I had a sort of epiphany. From this precipice of indescribable beauty to the trash strewn dusty streets of Kabul where the children beg from the side of the road for anything to fill their empty bellies.

We crossed North of Israel and Iran, crossed over the Caspian Sea and through one of the most inhospitable areas on earth: the Kara desert in Uzbekistan. Thousands and thousands of miles of desolate empty barren terrain. After flying over that area for forty five minutes the only sign of habitation was on the banks of the Amadar JA River where those people had scratched out a few acres of plants near the rivers edge. Finally to Manus Air force base in Kyrgyzstan where we off loaded our bags and waited for movement into Afghanistan. Twelve hours later we caught a hop into country. As we drove out to the flight line I saw our aircraft: a C-130 Hercules transport. I caught myself smiling broadly. My Uncle, Major [ret] John .J. Pietenpol had flown tens of thousands of hours in this ugly plane but loved it like an old mutt. Ungainly and ungraceful but reliable and strong. So there, high above the Hindu Kush Mountains, on the way to another war, the irony was too much to bear and a single tear slid down my cheek for the man I loved so dearly and never felt closer too than that moment.

We were picked up from KIA by a convoy from the 151st Infantry, Indiana National Guard. These are the men we would be replacing. They rode up with gun trucks front and rear security for the Haji buses rented to take us to Phoenix for processing in country. Different sized armored vehicles from France, Germany, Romania, were parked all over the airfield. All units with the ISAF, International Stability Assistance Force. Each lending a hand with operations all over A-stan. The ten minute ride down Jalalabad road to the camp was an eye opener. Bombed out buildings, open air market stands, trucks and cars of all shapes and sizes in all stages of disrepair and dilapidation.

To drive in this country you only have to pay the price and figure out which hole to put the key in. This leaves the roadway looking like a mad incantation of the Indy 500 and Mad max wrapped up in a demolition derby. Like our own highways there are crosses here along the roadway to mark the deaths by car. Only difference here is if you die in an accident they bury you under that cross on the side of the road. There's no 911 or hospitals or ambulances to take you away from the scene, if your relatives aren't there to pick up the body you get interned on the side of the road.
Our first night here we were hit by three rockets fired from the mountains to the West. They struck downtown Kabul near the U.S. embassy and fortunately no one was injured. Two days later as another group of our company was landing two mortar rounds hit the airfield, again no one injured. We had received our new up-armored Humvees and the Chief wanted everyone to get rated to drive them so we set about giving a sort of outside the wire drivers test. Our company area inside the compound is considered a safe area so you only need to carry your individual weapon and at least one magazine for protection. However, once you leave the front gate your in a hostile fire zone. That means full battle rattle and all the weapons for security during any movement.

We drew up the manifest for our road march, body armor, commo, M4’s, water and had a pre movement brief on actions on enemy contact then, on to the motor pool where every footfall raises dust like small atom bombs in a Childs miniature dirt war.
Seven vehicles outside the wire took a left down J-bad road passed the Afghan Army camp and took to the hills to get a feel for the new heavier vehicles. When I say hills I mean two and three thousand foot mountains that surround the city on three sides. They rise up into the dusty sky like so many jagged rotten teeth. I never knew there could be so many different shades of brown. Up on the trails winding around the ANA training area we rode keeping our interval between vehicles and tested the maneuverability of the new Hummers.

We rode passed an old Soviet motor pool now gone bone yard. Hundreds and hundreds of tanks and armored personnel carriers, anti-aircraft guns strewn about like a careless child’s playground. Rusting and wasting away they mark the sad passing of a dying communist dream that cost the Afghani's millions of lives. On to a set of caves dug by the Russians to house their armor and passed the village of Pole-I-Charki where a refugee camp has risen. It only takes a second and the kids come running out from everywhere to give us the thumbs up and beg for anything. We have nothing for them and cannot stay idle so we move out swiftly. Avoiding them is an ever present danger because they have no adult supervision and run in and out of traffic hoping for a handout.

"Ish Allah" means "Gods will” the Afghans say it so everything they do and anything that happens is according to the will of God. A seven year old girl was struck and killed yesterday by one of our trucks coming back from Kandahar. I wrote my Mother and told her it will take a while to harden my heart to the realities of this new life.

A restless wind blows
Howling in catacombs
Whispers an ancient
and anxious melody
A child's breathe on glass
Collage of love
Finger painting
Bumps and bruises
quickly forgotten
with a Mother's kiss
The tears of Angels
have fallen

A GRUNTS EYE VIEW

A GRUNTS EYE VIEW

Originally sent out 04/01/2005

Hello again South Walton, glad to be around again in one form or another. My name is Staff Sergeant M*****, US Army infantry squad leader A.K.A. Lieutenant Paul M***** South Walton Fire department. I have been afforded the privilege by the Sun of writing a column following my task force as it prepares to deploy to the Middle East.

This is an honor I don't take lightly. With all the media focus on the death and destruction surrounding the war on terror I thought it would be educational if not enlightening to have a first hand look at the war from a different perspective, say a grunts eye view. Down here where the leather, canvas and sweat mingle and the long hours of the day blend all too easily into the night. I hope I can take you with me- to see though my eyes. I'll show you the pride, dedication, and love shown by so many soldiers young and old.

Our mission is training the Afghanistan National Army to be an independent fighting force able to protect its borders and citizens from outside or internal aggression. After two decades of high intensity warfare there is little left of any infrastructure in any major city much less in the outer lying areas. We hope to assist in rebuilding schools and other small projects near our area while not on combat operations. These people need our help. By no means are we the only ones sacrificing however.

I thought my decade of Army training had prepared me for another deployment to foreign soil only to be blindsided by a heart attack. Not the E.R. lights and siren type I'm used to responding to but the one that comes when saying goodbye to the ones you love. How do you tell a five and a one year old you love more than life itself you’re leaving them? The Army doesn't have a manual for that. The wives, mothers, children and families of these men and women, the finest America has to offer, suffer and sacrifice along side us. Each holding their own silent vigil awaiting a warrior’s return. Remember them as much as us in your prayers. The days weeks and months ahead will be difficult and challenging for all of us. I look forward to sharing this mission with you. So, using the infantry’s motto "Follow Me"

FOB Tombstone

FOB Tombstone

We passed through Char Rah, Delaram, and a thousand small dirty sun baked hovels. Every mile further south the poppies grow from small plots in secluded places to fields that cover the landscape from one end to the other.






Riding down out of the craggy mountain cliffs and into a vast open plain that lies north of the Khash desert ends the nine hour trip. At the gate we waited for 30 minutes for someone to get there collective shit together and let us in.
Tombstone seems to be just another shit hole rising up from a layer of bedrock, dust and flat stone in the middle of nowhere.
With the vehicles parked I told my guys
“Be sure an go over your guns with a brush before you plant your ass anywhere.”
“Joker, go with the colonel and find us a place to sleep…roger?”
He came back fifteen minutes later sayin
“Watch out, some Navy light bird came over to Dave and just went ape shit because he was wearin his ball cap, made him take it off” he said.
“You gotta be shittin me man?”
“Does this guy know where the fuck he is?” I said.
“The Colonel told me to pass it on brothers…boonies only.” Joker said
“Alright…alright I’m too tired for this shit, let’s find an empty rack.” “Take your weapons off and keep um with you, there’s no telling who’s watching the chickens in this henhouse.”
Nate motioned me over to a Quonset hut and I found us a few bunks to crash on. I laid my 240, my M4 and the Drag on the bottom bunk and climbed up, boots and all, and promptly feel into a dreamless sleep.
The sun has barely crested the horizon and already the dust and heat waves have begun to obscure the surrounding landscape. I got up, scouted out the latrine and took a piss then found my way to the chow hall. It’s always a treat for the first few meals to see all the fresh fruit and green salad in one place, it sounded like a fuckin rabbit warren in there.
Nate came over and told me we would be getting an “official” briefing later today but the consensus from the drivers, SECFOR, LTF, and the Brits is Sangin area is a very bad place.





Joker had cornered a Spec-4 named Morrison who was a medic and worked with the SECFOR team from Kandahar. He told us he was going to act as a scout with a couple of the other guys and lead us up North into Sangin. He said
“This is a place where you don’t want to get caught with your pants down.”
Our rules of engagement [ROE] has changed somewhat to reflect the METT-T [Mission, enemy, terrain, troops, time] we have here. Intel says expect to be hit on the way up and never get on the road, it has been mined so heavily no one uses it. Instead we will be using the open desert between the road and the adjoining eastern ridgeline and if things weren’t interesting enough, the powers that be have introduced another poppy eradication mission called “Riverdance” to our full schedule.
At 10:30 we gathered together and entered the CP to receive our brief from a Lieutenant Colonel Slusher [previously National Guard Bureau Pentagon seat shiner and five star REMF asshole] and another Captain. He kinda looks like a shorter, pudgier Telly Savalas albeit the lollypop and “who loves ya baby” smile.
I’m not wearing any of my Army designated patches or rank, my mustache is way outta limits, and a fine layer of afghan dust covers me from head to toe. As I move through the office area I’m noticing everyone else watching me from the corner of their eyes.
Great, I’m thinking, these are the spit and polish types the other team warned us about.
The LTC began by telling us that we were now under the operational control of the 205th RCAG {him} and no longer a part of the command structure of the 207th in Herat. This was diametrically opposed to what we were told when we received the initial brief and I looked around seeing all the others looking around with that “What the fuck?” kinda look. The LTC on the brigade team from Herat says he’s in command, the ODA team say they have operational control of the FOB, the Canadians want some kind of say in this show…Jesus this thing is beginning to be a fuckin goat rope nightmare.
The Captain took over the brief and began showing us our new area of operations and contacts from fire and IEDs over the past few months.



Each contact was represented by a red box containing date, time and weapons used during the engagement. The route we’re taking looks like it was hit point blank by a shotgun and started hemorrhaging.
The main supply route 611 is unusable cause every time someone uses it they blow up. The land to the west of the road is full of pissed off poppy farmers and drug runners.
The land east of the road is open desert but the ridgelines form a couple of nasty choke points we will need to stay away from.
So, in a nutshell, the path we will take will meander [Not a term used much during military planning] east to west in a crazy, irregular pattern.
This is my type of planning! The young Captain is doing an exceptional job during the brief but he is constantly being interrupted by the Colonel who adds nothing of any interest but I guess he feels he needs to say something.
The Captain says, “No accurate estimates of the enemy strength can be made but we believe there is fewer than 150 dedicated Taliban fighters in Musa Qala, Kajaki and Sangin districts of the Helmand Province.”
They seem to have the strongest presence in Musa Qala and generally operate in squad sized elements. We also believe they are trying to rebuild their numbers and leadership after the TICs in March.” “The timeline of significant events is as such:
In February during the beginning of the mission and build up of FOB Wolf there were a few minor TICs mostly involving the SF team and the ASF members near Sangin village. Then, as it looked to the locals like we were going to stay around for awhile they started routine probes using small arms fire and mortars.”
“Things were in a state of relative calm until March 25th and the SF team at Wolf conducted Operation Carpe Diem. While securing an LZ near Sangin they took one US KIA and another WIA. On the 26th a SECFOR element was ambushed near the junction of RTE 611 and Hwy 1 taking no casualties.”







“On the 28th at 15:00 hours a re-supply convoy heading to the FOB was hit by an IED and it destroyed an ANA LTV killing eight Afghan soldiers and cratered the road so badly they had to unload an excavator to fill in the hole.” All the while they’re taken fire from the village near Hyderabad and they called in CAS to lay in a coupla 500 pounders complements of a pair of A-10s. That seemed to quiet them down enough for them to finish the march and they ended up inside Wolf without further losses.”
“We believe this was the first shots of the battle that culminated with the attack on FOB Wolf that evening at approximately 23:00 where there was one US and one Canadian KIA and three WIA.”
All the while I can see the light bird eyeballing us and I can tell he’s fuming about something. Some of the guys wear DCUs, others the new ACUs and most of my SECFOR team is sterile.
He interrupts the brief again and starts talking about the uniforms and personal hygiene of the team members at Wolf. He says our guys up there are all screwed up and it looks reminiscent of a scene from “Apocalypse Now” and he doesn’t run his operation that way and on and on…then he picks out SGT Reddick and tells him the combat patch he’s wearing is unsat. This leads into an even bigger argument because Reddick isn’t backing down. He quotes 670-1 word for word in a calm and somewhat contemptuous tone and now the colonel looks more like an ass than before and it takes a few minutes until the whole room gets back in order.
These guys here are more concerned with uniform violations and etiquette than combat action, I’ve heard you promote to the level of incompetence but this is ridiculous. Where do they find men like these? The colonel ends his litany by saying “There are 5-“Stans” here; Tajikistan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, and now “Talibanistan.” Great.

Sangin....leaving home

4/21/06
Leaving home


We woke early from our last day at Camp Mog and began the final preparations for the movement south to relieve our team in Sangin.

What an odd feeling it is to be leaving this area which has been such a large part of our tour. The members of the ODA team have begun to mingle into the group and offer last minute suggestions and tips for staying alive down south where the war strikes swifter and deadlier than the desert asp.
We emptied the ammo conex and distributed the entire load of ordinance between the vehicles and stocked as much water and food as we could manage. The lack of any real intelligence for this mission so far has been a real ass kicker. It’s like playing a treasure hunt, only when you find the “X” that marks the spot it lies over a booby trapped triple stacked mine.
“We won’t be coming back, so pack anything not coming with us into footlockers and boxes for movement to Camp Victory” Said Colonel A. We packed our green footlockers for pickup and I brought along only what I can fit into my ruck, bug-out bag and computer case.
I must admit it’s hard to leave this small group of men I have grown so close to and become so fond of. To call them the “Silent professionals” is such a grossly held understatement. They are the heart and soul of so many operations throughout this country and their absence on this movement will be felt for some time to come.

The convoy moved out of Camp Mogenson first gate at 0600 passed the ANA barracks then out the second gate to the open range of the Palha Shorab Mountains to test fire the guns. We had built some of the locals build a 25 meter range complete with overhead cover and another 100 meter range right outside the FOB walls so we could train with live ammo anytime we felt the urge. We drove out and parked, waiting for a quick check of the area. Slappy and any number of children might be out drifting around the impact area looking for scrap or food in our garbage. We never waited for them to move we just shifted fire and drove on; they knew how to get out of the way.

As usual the Afghans are taking their sweet fucking time getting to the assembly area and were burning valuable daylight waitin on their asses.

By the time they have gotten all their people together we’ve lost 45 minutes. Something about which team was in the red cycle or who was too stoned to drive or some shit. Hell, they said smokin hash made them better soldiers---who am I to argue?
As we pass the second gate leading out of the camp Colonel A. breaks radio silence with “The box is hot” meaning he has turned on the ECM device which always causes a few snickers among us adolescence killers.
Joker is manning the “Ma deuce” fifty cal and is leading the element down the rutted concrete road leading passed the school, the SHAF gate, and down the long curving passage way leading to Highway 1. The children come running out from behind the mud walls and earthen hovels leaving a small dusty cloud in their wake. By now I can recognize most of them. Their small faces dirtied by the ground they so recently slept on. I wonder what sort of future lies ahead of them.
We pulled out past the main gate occupied by the ANA and took a right heading south through the town of Azizabad where one of the 7th group’s ODA team, SFC Pedro Munoz, was killed by small arms fire in January of 05. He died while trying to capture Mullah Dost a local Taliban leader who had pulled off many attacks on coalition troops. Dost was killed in the initial firefight but unfortunately “Papi” died on the medevac chopper in route to the nearest field hospital. His award of recognition was hung over the coffee maker in our team house and I read and reread it daily.
We drove on for a few hours until we met up with our other SECFOR/ETT team from Farah who had brought out their re-fueling vehicle to top off our tanks for the long ride to FOB Tombstone.
Fuel wasn’t the only thing we got though; Sgt Dave L*** from Vermont was going to bolster our ranks. Dave had an easy going manner but always managed to upset the higher ups wherever he went. He had a “no bullshit” attitude and could sniff out a ticket punching, badge chaser a mile away. Maybe that’s how he ended up in Farah.

He worked for the US Border patrol and due to his background in Special Forces he had an unconventional and unique way of doing things and I loved the guy. He kept an AT-4 rocket with him everywhere he went so if he got the chance he said he’d
“Shoot the first Tali-bastard with it I see.”
Unfortunately during the one time he wasn’t driving he happened to be directing the ANA fire from a plateau near the base and he didn’t have it near him. It became a running joke every time we got hit…
”Hey Dave, did you get to shoot your rocket?”

The Poor Bastard's Club...exerp from the upcoming book

SANGIN


Leave me here in my…stark raving sick, sad, little world. [Incubus]




Security Issues:
§ On 22 April, four Canadian soldiers were killed when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb in Shah Wali Kot district about 75 km north of Kandahar. A US contractor was also attacked in the same district on the Kandahar-Tirin Kot highway. On the Herat-Kandahar highway (Kandahar province) one checkpost was attacked twice in two days. The Coalition forces and the ANA arrested insurgents in Zabul and Uruzgan provinces.
§ The Coalition forces and the ANA established a joint base in Kunar province, and requested the deployment of 20 more ANA as Operation Mountain Lion continues.
§ On 20 April, insurgents attacked an ANP checkpoint in Duab, Nuristan. One insurgent was killed and three were arrested, one of whom reportedly of Pakistani nationality.
§ On 22 and 23 April mines were discovered on the main roads in two districts of Nangarhar province.

Political Issues and Verification of Political Rights:
§ Illegal occupation and construction of houses on publicly-owned land and the case of a child allegedly killed by ANA in a traffic accident were discussed in the Provincial Council meeting in Kandahar.


Sangin is little more than another small town along another dry riverbed in a mixed group of mud huts and compounds collectively gathered around thousands of acres of poppies growing out of a vast, empty desert.
It lies in the southern part of the country about 30 kilometers northwest of Gereshk off the ring road in a fertile valley where the Musa Qala and Helmand rivers converge. None of us had ever heard of it until Doc had been killed.
We knew we had an ETT/SECFOR group down there near Laskar-gah at FOB Tombstone but like most of our Kandaks in the outer regions we didn’t know what they were doing on a day to day basis.




The only time we heard from them is when they got hit or someone was injured and that was normally hours, even days after the incident happened.
Most of these small FOBs, like ours at Shindand, were basically independent little training areas for the ANA. How most of these places were chosen is still a mystery to me. I guess since the Afghans had no real ability to travel or transport soldiers around the country in mass they created small bases in the places most likely to be populated by soldiers living near that province.
Shindand airbase however, was an obvious choice given all the time effort and money the Soviets poured into it during “their” war. Not only that but the Afghan government didn’t want it falling back into the hands of any of the rival warlords who continuously fought for the land and prestige of owning such a prized area of surplus aircraft and parts to be sold abroad.
The others however, like Chagcaran, Farah and Qal’eh-ye Now, were so remote and rudimentary they were little more than mud huts and small compounds wired up with small generators surrounded by uninhabited oceans of desert.
The initial mission, made by the team from FOB Tombstone in Lashkar Gah, was to venture into the Sangin valley in early February and recon the area to see how much influence the Taliban had and to re-supply or relieve a group of ANA soldiers that had set up a temporary base there. The mission was supposed to last less than seven days so the team of American and ANA drove right up route 611 into the heart of enemy territory. They met up with the Kandak that had set up on a plateau over looking the Helmand River and began small excursions into the valley to judge the locals reaction to their presence.
No one, at least at our level, knew the real reason we were there. Perhaps it was a precursor for the “Riverdance” missions or to extend our strike capabilities into another lawless region. What we didn’t know was how many lives would be lost in the fight to pacify this small enemy stronghold.






From the very beginning of the incursion it was readily apparent that the Taliban and the OMF were not going to make their arrival a welcome one.
Within hours there were signs that the enemy was tracking the movement of anything up on the plateau and began a systematic probe of their defenses.
After the first week the team called back to Tombstone asking for re-supply and direction instead, they were told the follow-on mission was hold the plateau and stay with the ANA until further notice. The men were living out of their UAHs and eating MREs and bottled water until the ANA was able to hire a man to come live inside the base and cook bread and goat for them. The Afghans had tried earlier to buy food in the bazaar down in the valley but most of them ended up sick from some sort of poison or foul meat.
Later, when the ODA team arrived with all their Jingle trucks and conex containers full of gear they told them to take over the small compound in the center of the plateau and run a temporary wire perimeter out front of the position.
What began as a small ANA outpost began looking like an American FOB. Hesco barriers were flown in and the slow process of filling them around the entire perimeter began.