“We’re going to stop first at the Italian PX,” I told them. “I need to pick up some cigars.” The Italian compound was just north of Kabul, and I had promised cigars to a number of folks, including Kate. Our late-night cigar breaks were continuing, and I certainly didn’t want to run out of them. I was still mulling her massage offer, but the opportunity hadn’t come up to take her up on it. She was back stateside on home leave, and I wondered what would happen when she got back.
Brad turned out to be a cigar smoker. “This is great,” he said, “buying Cubans legally.”
From the Italian compound, it was only a five-minute drive over to the Russian tank graveyard, so I took them there. It was kind of a rite of passage for new members of the LTC—a reminder that in our testosterone-fueled combat atmosphere, it was important to stay humble.
It was a stunning sight, especially the first time. The graveyard sat up on a high plain that overlooked Kabul against a backdrop of brown and gray rock mountains. Faded green Soviet vehicles—T-64 and T-72 tanks, BMP armored personnel carriers, BRDM armored cars, and more—were stretched out on a tan, flat plain as far as the eye could see. Row after row of them. The numbers were in the thousands … it boggled the mind. Some were obviously shredded from being destroyed in combat, others you had to walk right up to to find the combat damage, but all were dead hulks in fading green paint, rust, and covered, increasingly, with graffiti.
The first time I had visited the graveyard, it looked like a vision from hell. It was a 120-degree day, and the green hulks seemed almost translucent from the heat waves coming off the vehicles. In the backdrop, three dust devils, spread almost equally apart in a steel blue sky, slowly turned above Kabul.
It was no less spooky today.
Many of the tanks had golf-ball-sized holes with the telltale melting marks around them of a direct hit of a shape charge—likely an RPG—that burned through the 10-inch steel and turned the interior of the tank into hot gas and shrapnel. It would have been an ugly way to die.
The Soviets were just one of many empires over the last several hundreds of years that had attempted to occupy Afghanistan and had left in defeat. All that was left were these weapons rotting in the desert. The huge amount of waste stretched out before us was dizzying, and it served as a strong warning to would-be invaders of what could lie ahead.
It was hard to imagine all the wealth the Soviets wasted here, I thought as we roamed around the wreckage, the FBI guys taking pictures. (We also had weapons at the ready; I’d been shot at on a recent trip there.)
The haunting landscape was a stark monument to Soviet misjudgment—a nine-year conflict that killed 14,000 Soviet soldiers and God knows how many Afghans. The Soviets were finally driven out by the Mujahedeen, backed by the United States, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and other Muslim nations.
It was a vivid example of the kind of trap that Afghanistan could become—and had become—to great nations that sought to conquer it. To have invested so much energy, resources, and blood for a large, landlocked piece of real estate that, in the end, meant nothing.
The lessons for Americans were all around us. By October, I had been there for almost four months, and had come to realize that Americans needed to maintain a small, agile footprint; to remain above the tribal entanglements and work to show the Afghans the path to a peaceful, prosperous society. We could help them along that path, if they so chose. Or, we could contain them should they choose not to go that route. It was up to them.
We’d already made so many mistakes here. Working with the Muj to expel the Soviets but then looking the other way as, next door, Pakistan developed its nuclear capability and nurtured groups like the Taliban and other terrorist groups right under our noses. Underfunding pro-Western groups like the Northern Alliance as well as Ahmad Shah Massoud, the “lion of Panjshir,” and hyperfunding radical Islamists like Hekmatyar, who would take it upon themselves to shell Kabul after the Russians had left, simply to prove the point that their belief in Mohammed was better than any other Islamic sect. Kinda like if the Baptists one day decided they didn’t like the Mormon approach to Jesus Christ and decided to shell Salt Lake City—not acceptable in our Western culture but fully acceptable in Afghanistan’s tenth-century take on the world.
This would have to change if there was to be any real progress. We could help shape that change—creating economic incentives and cultural benefits—but it was hugely important that we not become a central component in the change. Or in ten years, we might see a large plain filled with Abrams tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, and Hummers.
After one last look, we hopped back in our vehicles, took a dusty back road to the New Russian Road, and headed back to Bagram.
I had just let down my guard after the usual tense race into town when the IED went off, and I could see the mushroom cloud. It was a grayish tan billowing cloud rising over the horizon, set against the mountains and a crystal-clear blue sky, over the adobe-style mud huts that made up the village of Bagram. I could see it to my right, out of my window.
Mushroom clouds are never good, I found myself thinking. I could feel the concussion like a force—a wave of some sort.
There was nothing between us and the threat ahead except a lot of hysterical Afghans. We were totally exposed, stuck behind a pileup of Taliban taxis and a truck and hemmed in on either side by the mud huts and shops of Bagram. There were no alleys nearby, but even if there were, there was no way I was going to take the convoy off the main road and trap us in an alleyway—the perfect kill zone.
I thought fast. It was important that we keep the vehicles running and not move too far from them since it’s faster to escape by vehicle than on foot. Out of our trucks, we set up a perimeter with overlapping fields of fire to cover 360 degrees. Upfront, the ***** guys took 90 degrees on either side of the vehicles, as we had rehearsed. The FBI guys took 120 degrees—from the other car back to my vehicle. I got out of the left side of the Toyota and took the remaining area.
We struggled to say focused, surrounded by confusion and hysteria. To maintain concentration, I literally had to take a step outside myself. This is Tony playing me in a movie, I told myself. It was a way of detaching to get over the shock of what had just happened. Don’t worry. It’s just a movie.
Over the noise, I shouted for the DIA guy who had been in my backseat to call the base and tell them an IED had gone off outside the gate and that we were stuck. I heard snatches of what he was saying into the sat phone, giving them our convoy number and asking for help. I glanced over. I didn’t like the look on his face. Whatever they told him, it wasn’t good news. I started watching the roofline and looking in every window up ahead.
Then I saw them.
Dark, shadowy figures on the roofs and in windows on the left, holding Kalashnikovs. Maybe a dozen. I couldn’t tell for sure.
I pointed to the FBI guys to look up. I could see them tilt their heads up and then look back at me, fear dawning.
The gunmen could advance toward us, we couldn’t move away from them, and they were too far away for us to take a shot at them. Besides, there was the danger of hitting a civilian.
It was the longest five minutes of my life.
They seemed to lie in wait, biding their time, waiting for us to move closer so they could get a better shot. We were trapped farther down the road in that sea of humanity, and I knew they would realize this shortly and begin moving in our direction. Where the hell was help?
In front of me, I saw one of the ***** guys suddenly stiffen. Barely visible, two Humvees—machine guns manned and ready and a Mark 19 grenade launcher mounted on top—loomed in the distance, coming out of the Afghan-controlled gates of Bagram. Out of the windows, I could see an MP yelling at the Afghans, getting them out of the way as the vehicles made their way slowly toward us. Drivers looked up, saw what was coming, and jumped into cars and trucks to creep out of their path. Pedestrians retreated to the side. Bicyclists picked up their bikes. Inch by inch, the traffic cleared ju
st enough for the Humvees to make their way through. It was an agonizingly slow trip toward us, as the MPs shouted and waved at the crowd.
I made a circular motion with my finger to my convoy. Mount up! Let’s go! They got the message and hopped back in the trucks, M-4s pointing out the windows. We moved forward, weaving over to the right where the traffic was thinner. They finally reached us. One pulled up parallel to me.
“Sir, you guys all right?” a sergeant shouted.
“Fine,” I said. “We appreciate you coming out to help us.”
“No problem,” came the reply. “Anybody behind you?”
“No,” I said.
“Good,” he said. “We’re going to follow you back in.”
I looked up. The figures had faded away. What saved us, I realized later, was that the blast had gone off too early and the traffic had compressed so quickly, we hadn’t had a chance to move into their kill zone. They screwed up. Otherwise, we would have been dead.
It was time for king crab, and I didn’t care how rubbery it would be.
Never a dull moment. Never a dull freakin’ moment.
12
AL QAEDA HOTEL
“I’VE got something for you, shipmate.”
With a slight grin, Dave was standing, sentinel-like, just outside our HUMINT tent getting printouts off the network printer, as I was passing by.
“I hope it’s some of that Starbucks coffee you just got,” I joked. Starbucks was the coin of the realm in Bagram. In all of Afghanistan, for that matter. Elixir of the gods compared with the tree bark the military poured. I always donated the Starbucks I got in care packages to Dave’s mess—and we all shared in the booty.
“Even better,” said Dave, a glint in his eye. “My foreign analyst has found some significant intel you’d be very interested in. She’s found a spot where there is real potential. I’d like her to brief you on it.”
“Sounds promising,” I said. “When?”
“How about right now?” He paused. “There’s a spot she’s calling the ‘Al Qaeda Hotel.’ ”
Whoa, I thought. This must be good.
“Let me grab my mug, and I’ll meet you at your tent.”
I met Captain Knowles and Dave at his office tent. She had gathered her briefing materials, and the three of us went into the big briefing room of the main tent.
Dave and I sat down, while Captain Knowles put some maps on the table and then positioned herself by our big map of Afghanistan on the wall, which also showed its eastern border area with Pakistan—often called Pakistan’s “lawless territories”—and for good reason. The FATA, or Federally Administered Tribal Area, was where bin Laden had escaped to in 2001. It was an area that Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, an expert on the Taliban and al Qaeda, would later call a “multilayered terrorist cake.”
“Based on ******* analysis, we’ve identified three primary centers of gravity for known and suspected al Qaeda and Taliban operatives in Pakistan,” Captain Knowles told us in her flat foreign accent. Attractive, with bright, intelligent eyes, she was a waif-thin brunette who bicycled everywhere in Bagram. More important from our perspective, she was extraordinarily gifted in her intelligence work. *** ******** **** *** * ****** **** * *** **** ******** ** *** *** ******* ******* ***** ** **** **** ** **** ***** and I had the distinct impression that most of the ***** at Bagram had figured out by now who I was. The **** military was a small world.
Captain Knowles pointed at the wall map and moved her hand down. “The three known centers of gravity are ****** to the south …” She moved her hand up slightly. “Wana, here in the center of the Pakistani territories …” She pointed farther up. “And ******** up here.”
I had a feeling this was leading up to something very interesting.
“We have the best intelligence,” she said as she turned and gestured toward the map on the table, “on Wana.”
I squinted to focus on the very small spot on the map.
“Wana?” I had heard of it, but it never really stood out in the jumble of facts, locations, and events that I had been trying to familiarize myself with since coming to Afghanistan.
Wana, I found in researching it later, was a Pakistani city about twenty miles from the Afghan border and the main town in South Waziristan, the largest of the seven tribal areas in the FATA. South Waziristan was the perfect lair for terrorists—towering mountains, deep forests, steep ravines—and Wana was its administrative capital: a market town with a resident population of about 50,000, and thousands more coming in to do business each day.
“Captain, Dave mentioned something about an ‘Al Qaeda Hotel,’ ” I said to Captain Knowles.
“Absolutely,” she said. “Let me show you on the Wana map.”
We headed back to the table where she showed us a higher-resolution map of the central city of Wana, including a U-shaped building that she said was used by transients and visitors.
****** ******* ******* ** ******** ** *** **** **** ********* They’re linked to activities that occurred during Mountain Viper,” she told us.
Dave expanded on Captain Knowles’s comments. “There are significant indications that they are using Wana to regroup and come back.”
“You mean the insurgency,” I said as the light went on.
“That is a very unpopular word,” Dave said, looking up at Captain Knowles, who was still standing over the map of Wana. Oh, yeah, right, I remembered. We were supposed to be in rebuilding mode. There wasn’t supposed to be an insurgency in Afghanistan. Silly me.
“Yes, we mean an insurgency,” said Captain Knowles. “In the case of Wana, there are indications that this is a major command-and-control node that is not simply a terrorist-training facility, but a full-blown military headquarters. It is clear that this location is involved in the Taliban’s effort to retake southern Afghanistan.”
“All well and good,” I said with a tick of impatience, “but what specifically do you believe we can get in this hotel?”
“We believe that a dozen dedicated rooms are being used by the Taliban,” she said serenely.
“And we are talking about al Qaeda senior leadership,” Dave added.
That was a shock.
“Really?” I said. “What do you mean?”
“Well, nothing we can pin down, but the ************* pattern is similar to those we know to occur around known al Qaeda leadership,” said Dave.
“You mean there could be Tier 1 HVTs there?”
Dave and Captain Knowles looked at each other. “Precisely,” said Captain Knowles.
I looked at Dave. “Why don’t we just bomb it when we think one of the al Qaeda guys is visiting?”
He shook his head. “It’s a location with a lot of civilians. Attacking it would result in a lot of civilian casualties, plus a degradation of intelligence ** *** ******* ** ********** ***** ******* ****** **** **** **** this target.”
I put my hands in my lap, stared down at them, and started to think. “What do you need from us?” I asked him. I looked down at the table and recognized that it was built in the same U-shape as the Al Qaeda Hotel.
“I thought we should partner on this,” said Dave. “Can you get some folks in to put eyeballs on the facility? I figured you might have some good ideas based on your previous life on how to enhance our information from the location.” I instantly thought of my friend, Lt. Col. Jim Brady, *** **** ***** *, where he was the DIA rep. The initial part of any operation wouldn’t be hard because we could do those cross-border intelligence-collection operations, but to do anything “active”—such as raids, renditions, or any other offensive operations—would be a whole different ballgame.
“The first thing we need to do is verify what’s going on at Wana,” said Dave.
“I’m with you,” I said. “How soon do you need this?”
“I’d like to get this started before I leave country in three weeks,” Dave said.
“I think we can do that,” I said. “But if we’re going to do anything to su
pport ********* operations, we’ll need to get Washington started on it immediately.”
“Agreed,” said Dave. “I can have you talk to Washington directly to lay out what you think we’ll need.”
He stood up. “Colonel Negro has some thoughts on this, too.”
“Have you talked to him specifically about this?” I asked.
“No, not about Wana, but he’s talked about doing the night-letter thing.” That was where we planned to influence operations to intimidate the Taliban where they lived in Pakistan. Night letters—a centuries-old tradition—had been co-opted by the Taliban into something more sinister. Colonel Negro figured we could return the favor by putting night letters in their safe havens in Pakistan. I had volunteered to be on the first mission in. Night letters are a throwback to earlier centuries. The Taliban posted threatening letters on the village bulletin boards and on doors to intimidate local populations. We wanted to do the very same thing to them: post letters on the doors of Taliban leaders residing in Pakistan threatening them with harm, death, and all manner of bad things if they crossed the border and did anything in Afghanistan.
“I’m aware of the night-letter idea, and I think it’s a good one,” I said.
“This would be a good location to consider it for.”
We finished our coffee. I wondered what kind of amenities the Al Qaeda Hotel offered. Frequent Jihad Stay Points for every visit, maybe.
Captain Knowles gathered up her papers. “I’m going to go back and finish my tasks and leave you to think,” she said. She knew we would be talking about matters she couldn’t be a part of. While she had a top-secret SCI clearance, we still did not share some intel******* ** ***** ********* details with her.
Operation Dark Heart Page 15