The Only Thing Worth Dying For (2 page)

Please don’t tell me you want the power
, Amerine had thought, anticipating the age-old solution to problems raised by a politician: the politician himself. Aloud, he’d asked, “What do
you
think would be best for Afghanistan? Who would be the right man for the job?”

“The best
person
for the job,” Karzai had said, “is not for me to decide. That is for the Afghan people to consider. I want to see the people voting, as in the United States. My dream is to see a Loya Jirga—a grand council where the tribal leaders set down their guns and talk. For years I have been talking about this. Nobody has listened.”

By now, on the eve of the team’s mission, Amerine had determined—over the course of several walks the past nine days—that Karzai was neither a warlord nor a politician. Indeed, he seemed to be a visionary idealist, a gallant statesman whose quest in Afghanistan bordered on quixotic.

Amerine liked the man. More important, he felt he could trust him.

The following morning, the safe house was abuzz with activity as ODA 574 from the Army’s 5th Special Forces Group prepared for that night’s infiltration into Afghanistan.

The eleven-man A-team had gathered in their meeting room in the safe house, dressed in a mix of desert camouflage pants, dark civilian fleece or down jackets over thermals, Vietnam War–era boonie hats, and baseball caps bearing such logos as Harley-Davidson and Boston Red Sox. As a sign of respect for the Afghan culture, none had shaved for the past month, starting before they had even left Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

Amerine watched as his weapons sergeants, Ronnie, Mike, and Brent, laid out enormous piles of weaponry and ammo as well as two laser-targeting devices and began to discuss the distribution of their loads. The only non–Green Beret on the mission, an Air Force combat controller (CCT) named Alex, joined the communications sergeants, Dan and Wes, in making final checks on all radios, laptops, and batteries. Victor, the engineer responsible for the load plan, paced back and forth between the two groups of men and their piles, ready to re-weigh the equipment for the helicopters that would fly them in. Every passenger and every item they carried had to be weighed and logged. Assigned to the team at the last minute, Ken, the medic, was leaning up against a wall with the medical supplies organized in front of him, laying out small but ominous morphine injectors that he would issue to each man.

JD, the team sergeant and Amerine’s number two, and Mag, the intelligence sergeant and third in command, placidly observed the scene. They were veterans of the Gulf War and had seen all this before.

By noon, the eleven men had double-and triple-checked their gear. Each would carry an M4 carbine,
*
an M9 pistol, grenades, ammunition, food, water, minimal clothing in shades of desert camouflage, a midweight sleeping bag, and a waterproof jacket. Each man would also carry gear specific to his job—communications equipment, medical supplies, extra weapons—that added another fifty-plus pounds per pack. They had no body armor or helmets: for this unconventional warfare mission, the team would share the risk with the guerrillas they would lead. If Karzai’s followers did not have armor, neither would they.

The load was split between a bulging rucksack and a smaller, lighter “go-to-hell” pack of survival essentials, always kept on their bodies in case they had to jettison their rucksacks in a firefight or retreat. Together, the two packs weighed about 150 pounds (not including fifty pounds of radios, grenades, and ammo in their load-bearing
vests, and a ten-to fifteen-pound loaded weapon), so heavy the men had to lie down on the ground to put on the shoulder straps, then roll over on all fours, and still needed help to stand up.

Extra team gear such as flares, computer equipment, and medical supplies for the indigenous population filled a half-dozen duffel bags that would be shuttled by vehicle or pack animal, both of which had been promised by Karzai.

An officer from Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) arrived to brief ODA 574, as well as the men from the Central Intelligence Agency who would be infiltrating with them, on their flight and escape-and-recovery plans. As the officer spoke, Amerine felt an eerie connection to the three-man Jedburgh teams—considered the predecessors to both Special Forces soldiers
and
CIA agents—that had parachuted behind Nazi lines to assist the resistance fighters during World War II.
¹
Those teams had received similar briefings. How many made it back alive?
Not many
, thought Amerine.

The CIA team, led by a spook called Casper,
²
sat beside Amerine’s men as the officer explained that they would be flown by AFSOC pilots from a nearby airstrip to a clandestine one near the Afghanistan border on two MH-53 Pave Lows,
³
the Air Force’s heavy-lift helicopters. There they would board five smaller MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters—piloted by the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR), which specializes in clandestine low-altitude night operations—for the flight into Afghanistan.

Shortly before 3
P.M.
, ODA 574 was loading gear onto a flatbed truck for transportation to the helicopters when Casper drove up with three men in a Humvee, parked, and approached Amerine, shaking his head. “Change in plans, skipper,” he said.

Here we go again
, thought Amerine.

In the War on Terror, the CIA and Special Forces were working side by side, but with Special Forces running military operations, Amerine couldn’t determine exactly what the CIA’s role in Afghanistan would be. Casper’s agenda had at times intruded during the planning
of the mission, even though Amerine had been told that he and his men were in charge of the insurgency.

“These guys are coming with us,” said Casper, motioning toward three Delta Force soldiers unloading rucksacks and weapons from the Humvee. “They’re a recon team that’s spotting for emerging al-Qaeda targets. We’ve got to come up with some seats in the helicopters. Task Force Sword
*
isn’t going to let us fly without them.”

Every seat in the helicopters, every ounce of weight, had been scrupulously allotted. Now, minutes before the team was to board the Pave Lows waiting on the tarmac, was the worst possible time to reshuffle.

“They expect us to bump our men to make room?” asked Amerine. “This is ridiculous.”

“You’re free to take it up with your boss,” said Casper. “He can hash it out with Task Force Sword, but we don’t have time to argue it now. We’ll have to scrub the mission for tonight.”

Amerine thought through his next move. He doubted Casper’s story about being ordered to take the three Delta Force soldiers, and questioned his motives: Was he attempting to bring along bodyguards for Karzai? But if they postponed the infiltration, Amerine’s commander, who had voiced reservations about the mission in the first place, might cancel it entirely. Maybe that was Casper’s agenda: gum things up enough to scrub the mission and keep Karzai stranded in Pakistan.

All that really mattered was getting Karzai into Afghanistan.

“What’s going on, sir?” JD asked Amerine as he joined them.

“SNAFU,” said Amerine. “We’ve got those guys coming along.” He pointed to the newly arrived soldiers loitering by the Humvee with their piles of gear. “We’ve got to lose some weight.”

“I can leave two guys and you guys leave one; we’ll split the loss,” said Casper.

“We don’t leave our guys alone,” said JD; the Special Forces buddy system dictates that a Green Beret never leaves another Green Beret
alone, even at a secure location. JD knew that whoever was left behind would be joining the team soon enough, and that meant another flight into bad-guy country. If that aircraft were to go down behind enemy lines, the buddy system was crucial. ODA 574 was already short one man, however, and losing two more would sap nearly 20 percent of the team’s already less-than-optimal combat strength.

JD and Amerine made the decision to leave behind their engineer, Victor, and junior weapons sergeant, Brent—since Mag, the intelligence sergeant, was also a trained engineer, and they had two senior weapons sergeants, Mike and Ronnie. They knew the reorganization wouldn’t sit well with anybody on the team, but it was the only alternative.

Casper strode off toward one of his fellow spooks, and Amerine walked in the opposite direction to greet the Delta Force soldiers. “I don’t want to ruffle things up,” one of them quietly told Amerine, “but you should know that Task Force Sword had nothing to do with putting us on this mission.” He pointed his chin toward Casper. “
He
wanted us here.”

As ODA 574 and the CIA team loaded into the cavernous cargo holds of the two Pave Lo helicopters, JD paused for a moment beside Amerine. “Sir,” he said, “you know, I’ve never been a big fan of some of the people in this part of the world—and warlords in general, the lack of respect for human life, we saw that in Somalia. Hell, sir. What those fanatics did to all those people in New York City and the Pentagon, those passengers on the airliners…it’s hard to think about it still.”

Stroking his beard, JD gathered his thoughts, then continued. “Karzai is either feeding us a load of bullshit or he is something different from the warlords up north. This is a good mission. Feels right.”

They were interrupted when Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Steve Hadley approached. “You two are the last to load.”

JD slapped Amerine on the shoulder and walked up the ramp and into the second Pave Low.

“Thanks for the ride,” Amerine said while shaking Hadley’s hand. “Sorry you’re not taking us all the way in.”

“You’ll be in good hands with the 160th,” said Hadley. “We’ve got your back, though. Just call if you need us. Anytime. Anyplace.”

Over the noise of the engines powering up, Amerine yelled, “I’ll remember that.”

The two helicopters hugged the rolling hills of the Pakistani desert for an hour before coming upon an airstrip just south of the Afghan border, which appeared like a mirage on the horizon. They landed when it was still light enough to see squads of Army Rangers patrolling the perimeter. When the helicopter ramps dropped, some of the Rangers ran over to help the teams unload their gear, then the Pave Lows immediately lifted off, blanketing everyone in dust.

“Now we wait,” JD said to Mag as the men settled on their rucksacks.

As the sun disappeared behind the mountains, they heard the
thump, thump, thump
of rotors beating against the wind, announcing the arrival of their next ride: five Black Hawks to carry the men in groups of four and five on a western heading into Afghanistan. The Rangers helped move the gear onto the helicopters, which lifted off into the night sky in a tight combat formation—staggered, with a distance of one rotor disk between them. Two more Black Hawks beefed up with heavy weapons flew on the flanks. Thousands of feet above, heavily armed jets escorted the formation. At the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan, the flock turned north. If all went well, they would cover close to two hundred miles before setting down on Afghan soil for a few seconds to unload their passengers.

In pitch darkness, the SOAR pilots used only their night vision goggles, known as NODs,
*
to fly ODA 574 deeper behind enemy lines than any U.S. team currently in Afghanistan. The ground signal the helicopter pilots would be looking for in the mountains was a configuration of wood fires: the same “all clear” signal that Allied pilots had often relied upon when inserting their Jedburgh teams into Nazi-occupied France.

In the third helicopter, Communications Sergeant Wes McGirr—new to ODA 574 and at twenty-five its youngest member—was electric with anticipation. Looking down at the rugged mountains of Afghanistan, he realized that he was experiencing the same combination of euphoria and fear that the Jeds had felt when they’d crossed over the English Channel.
It’s dark, and I’ve got more gear than I can possibly run with,
he thought.
Once we get dropped off, we’re on our own. God, this is awesome. This is a war and we’re live and we’ve got ammo and anything can happen from here on out: We’re in enemy country.

The flight held a northerly course toward the Hindu Kush mountains. Two hours in, during a midair refueling, Amerine’s helicopter—first in the formation—filled with jet fuel fumes and, strangely, the scent of flowers. It wasn’t the right season for poppies, and Amerine didn’t know what poppies smelled like anyway, but the thought of flowers in the midst of all this firepower and modern military might brought a smile to his face.

A few moments later, the Black Hawk bucked and jerked in an evasive maneuver, and its right gunner squeezed off a burst of gunfire. Amerine looked at the SOAR mission commander, who shrugged. Whatever it was, they were apparently okay.

“What happened?” Ken asked, tugging on Amerine’s sleeve. “What just happened?” Even in the darkened interior of the helicopter, Amerine could see fear in his medic’s eyes.

Putting up his hand, Amerine waited for the mission commander to update him through his headset, then told Ken that the gunner had apparently mistaken the infrared laser-aiming beam
*
from his own mini-gun for ground fire.

“Sir,” said Ken. “You need to keep us informed right away.”

Amerine said nothing, but he thought,
I hope this isn’t how he’s going to react in combat
.

A half hour out from the landing zone, surveillance aircraft flying ahead reported no signal fires. Although Karzai had been confident that the landing zone was both remote and void of Taliban activity, no fires were to be lit if the enemy was thought to be nearby.

“Remote” was relative. The landing zone was only a couple of miles east of the Helmand River, where villages were regularly patrolled by the Taliban. Because of the anti-aircraft artillery known to be in the area, the Black Hawks could not deviate from the route or circle around for another pass: If the fires were not spotted soon, the team would have to cancel the mission.