SpartaHungCusC....

[gotmilk]

you like this stuff....

Posting date: 3/19/07
Stationed in: Sharana, Afghanistan


It was a new day, and time for more village patrols, where we pull in, talk to the locals and elders, and let them know about the upcoming Shura. We press them on Taliban presence and safety in the village, blah, blah, blah -- all the same stuff. The adults may or may not tell you anything. Kids are still the best source of information. They will tell the truth as long as they don’t think they will get in trouble for it.

Jawed has a good eye for who to talk to, and through many missions has repeatedly picked the right man or boy out of a crowd and been able to get some type of intel from them. On this day we went through about five villages. Somewhere along the way Face pulled me into the shade of a tree, which was a nice relief, and we just hung back and let the ANA and the 10th MTN work most of the people for intel. Jawed spotted this one little boy who was about 10-12 years old. Jawed told me later he was just not acting the same as the other boys, and we soon found out why.

Through Jawed talking to him we found out that the boy’s father had been murdered by Taliban just 12 days earlier. Apparently the boy’s father worked for the government of the province and was home one night when the Taliban came into the village. I guess it did not take long for the locals to tell the Taliban that he was a government employee. They busted into his house and started beating him and questioning him in front of his family. They made the whole family, including the boy, watch him get beaten like a dog. After they beat him really badly, he admitted that he worked for the Governor of the Province, and they took him out to the field behind the house. According to the boy’s words they hit his father with something in the head and split it in two pieces. The boy was quite descriptive about this, so it made us think they must have hit him in the top of the head with an axe.

The boy was somber and not begging us for things like other boys did -- we ran the rest of them off repeatedly while talking to him. He also told us that none of the local men would help the family with retrieving his father's body from the field, and even the Mullah of the mosque we were sitting right next to refused to give funeral rights or hold a funeral procession because the man worked for the government. This means the whole town is dirty, or the whole town is scared to death of having the same happen to them. Either way it just pisses you off to think you are trying to help these people, give them winter food and supplies and take care of them, when they won’t even help a man’s family out after he was just brutally murdered.

I almost never personally give out food or water when we are stopped, because I don’t want all the kids begging me. But this time I made it a point to give the kid some snacks and some bottled water. Not because he gave us the info, but because for one of the first times since I have been here I felt sorry for a local person that is not in the ANA. Normally they are all just in the way and always considered a threat. This time I felt bad for the kid, truly bad for him, and it just made me think what a sucky start to a life he has had. I figured the least we could do is give him some good water and the tasty treats that we take for granted, hoping maybe they would put a smile on his face.

In countries like this where the people are destined for poverty, sickness, and possibly early death just by being born here, you have to block out all your emotions or it will eat you up. Each of these people has a sob story, but not one you can listen to. The enemy on the battlefield is just a target of opportunity, and not someone's father, son, or brother. They are a target that must be eliminated, and when you see them drop, you just mark that as another one that can’t kill you.


I am not a liberal, bleeding-heart type of person ( in case you haven’t figured that out yet), but I am a human being that has a family back home and people I love and care about, both family and not family. I am not a cold-hearted killer, but I am a soldier. The only way a soldier makes it through the places and events that we must walk through is to remove the emotion and spirit from the people that are around us. It is easy with adults, actually very easy, but with kids it is not. When you hear a little boy laugh or a girl giggle, you are reminded of the innocence these kids deserve, but will never realize. They are destined to a life one tenth of which would drive a kid in our country to years of Prozac and therapy. It makes the kids hard mentally. They are not allowed to enjoy being kids.

When you are in a field trying to drag your father’s split-head body to a burial spot because nobody else will help you, your innocence is left in the field with your father's soul

 

[gotmilk]

Posting date: 3/14/07
Stationed in: FOB Sharana, Afghanistan


On 26 June 2006, CPL Polanski, our Afghan National Army (ANA) Company, and I spent almost four hours surrounded and under fire from a very tenacious and determined Taliban group in Andar District, Ghazni Province. It was only one of three separate combat engagements that we weathered that day.

After nearly eight hours of ambush, counter ambush, ineffective maneuvering, and a Black Ammo status, we took our cue from the setting sun and returned to our ANA FOB. Temperatures were still in the high nineties, and most of us were beyond dehydration. I remember stumbling into the TOC Office and tossing my rifle, body armor, and helmet on the ground. Then I pretty much collapsed right there in the middle of the meeting room, spread eagle on the floor.

Even though it was highly abnormal for someone to be laid out in the busy TOC, no one asked me what I was doing or why I was there. I alternated between mindlessly staring at the ceiling, and rolling over and marveling at my hands. I felt like after thirty-seven years of life, I had just discovered they were attached to my body.

After about thirty minutes of this mental escapism, I mustered the emotional and physical energy for a phone call home. I crawled over to the table that held the satellite phone, reached up, and called my wife. I remember trying to impress on her how lucky I was to be alive. I should have died in that long ordeal of being surrounded, and the more I told her this, the further I got from getting the point across. An RPG had me dead to rights, but by some manufacturing defect the tail fin stabilizer didn’t deploy, and it nose-dived into the ground in front of me instead of hitting me with a fatal kidney punch.

This war story carousel went round and round, until she finally told me to go to bed. I don’t remember anything else about my conversation with her, or even how I made it from the TOC to my room.

The next morning started like every other one. Our adversaries in Andar permitted no rest for our weary bodies and shaky psyches. We had our regular team meeting, and went over the day's planned mission. There was another patrol scheduled into the same area in which we had been ambushed three times the day before. The same undermanned and poorly planned mission into Andar was laid on for us.

Fortunately, I wouldn't have to endure the blood bath that was only hours from occurring. I was physically sick, with an extreme case of diarrhea and dehydration, and mentally I was still rattled by the previous day's combat tripleheader. Given my condition, my Commander said I was in no shape to go out on mission that day. But I felt a sense of guilt that I was being a pussy, and was sure all saw me as ducking my duty as an Infantry Officer.

So CPL Polanski, CPT Krow, and CPT Castro were selected as the crew for the sole Up Armored Humvee going out on patrol that day. Within the hour, they linked up with the ANA Company that would accompany them, and made their way down Ring Road towards Andar District.

CPL Polanski had a habit of placing his digital camera in the windshield of the vehicle when he was the driver. He would put it on movie mode and let it run when he anticipated trouble. His two-gig memory card allowed for a good forty-five minutes of footage. Because of this practice, he captured some memorable moments and great audio of our combat engagements.

The transcript you are about to read is the audio, as recorded on his camera, from the final assault on a small Andar village, on 27 June 2006. In this attack one ANA soldier was killed by an RPG, and 4 Taliban were KIA. Most were shot by CPT Krow. Both sides sustained numerous wounded.

Setting up the scene is simple: Ski is the driver, CPT Krow is in the turret manning the 240Bravo machine gun, and CPT Castro is commanding the vehicle, trying to manage the fight as best he can. Janis, the Afghan Combat Interpreter sits in the back seat, communicating with the ANA on a handheld radio.

On the audio, the noises of the incoming and outgoing fires are deafening at times. Add to this the clunky hum of the HUMVEE engine, and the radio traffic squawking, and you can appreciate the confusion and perhaps understand the amount of repetition of orders and comments passed among the crew of the HUMVEE.

CPL Polanski is driving the Humvee out of a narrow alley on the outskirts of the village, and CPT Krow is engaging some Taliban who are attempting to cross an open road. Ahead, about fifty meters, is an opening where ANA and ANP (Afghan National Police) have set up a supporting fire position...

AUDIO STARTS:

(Heavy gunfire from the 240.)

Krow: "He went down!"

Ski: "Nice, you want me to go forward?"

Krow: "Fuck!" (The 240Bravo machine gun jams.)

Castro: "Yeah, yeah, go forward, see if we can go to an open field."

Krow: "He had a fucking weapon!"

Castro: "Okay, get to a fucking open field!"

Krow: "He went down, that's all I know."

Ski: "That's what's up!"

Castro: "You shot someone, you saw someone go down?!"

Krow: "Yeah, I seen somebody fall down."

Castro: "Okay, then we gonna search in a minute over there."

(The vehicle starts moving forward towards the opening and the ANA and ANP soldiers.)

(Incoming gun fire is heard.)

(Vehicle stops near the opening.)

Krow: "Goddammit I don't have a shot here!"

Ski: "Backup?"

Castro: "Do you have a shot?"

Krow: "The wall's too high!"

(The vehicle creeps forward.)

Castro: "Can you see anything?"

Krow: "Trees are in my way!"

Castro: "The wall finishes over here. Once the wall finishes you should have a clear shot."

Castro: "The ANP are calling us, go go go!!!"

Castro: "Do you have a clear shot now?"

Castro: "Get ready for it, get ready for it..."

Castro: "Here, you have a clear shot?"

Krow: "No, I don't have a clear shot!"

(ANP soldiers yelling in background.)

Krow: "What is he saying?"

Janis: "He is saying they (Taliban) are in the corner of that hill."

Castro: "Lets get over there then."

Ski: "Huh?"

Castro: "Go forward, and then turn to your left."

Janis: "One of the ANA is wounded."

Castro: "One is wounded?"

Ski: "Where?"

Krow: "Right there!"

Ski: "Want me to give him first aid?"

Castro: "Yeah, fuck the risk."

Janis: "Don't go out there, they (Taliban) are in front of us there!"

Krow: "He's right behind us!"

Castro: "Wounded..."

(Audio is disrupted by a large near-miss explosion of an RPG aimed at the HUMVEE.)

Krow: "God Dammit!!!!!!!!!"

Ski: "Yo, I'm getting the fuck out of here!"

Ski: "You want me to go forwards?"

Krow: "You need to either go backwards or forwards!!!!"

(Vehicle starts moving forward.)

Castro: "Right here."

Krow: "STOP!!!!!!"

Castro: "You got a clear shot? Go for it!"

(Long bursts of 240 machine gun fire.)

Krow: "I'm out!"

(Reloading noises -- ammo cans clanking.)

(Continued 240Bravo fire, as well as incoming shots.)

Castro: "The ANA is moving. Fire!! Fire!!"

(Audio disrupted from another RPG explosion near HUMVEE.)

Krow: "See that wall, they are right in there!"

Ski: "I wish I had a fucking 203 (grenade launcher)!"

(Incoming enemy AK-47 and RPK Machine Gun fire.)

Krow: "Where the fuck did that come from?"

Castro: "Where is the guy that's wounded?"

Krow: "He's right back there, he's sitting there on the side of the road!"

Ski: "Get me the (medical aid) bag quick, I'm gonna run!"

Ski: "Get me the bag!"

Krow: "Hang on, I'll cover you!"

Ski: "Start shooting!"

(Extensive incoming/outgoing fire as Ski exits the vehicle and runs back to treat the wounded ANA soldier.)

(Gunfire.)

(Gunfire.)

(RPG explosion.)

(Gunfire.)

AUDIO ENDS.

Postscript: CPT Krow was severely injured by an RPG weeks later, within kilometers of the site of this 27 June, 2006 Engagement. He was in Afghanistan for only six weeks before he was evacuated back to Walter Reed for extensive surgeries and rehabilitation.

 

[Spartacus]

"Each of these people has a sob story"

 

[Spartacus]

I can still cry over the children,but even then I need to see the family in tears for it to affect me