Pfinish

"The truth is a snare: you cannot have it, without being caught. You cannot have the truth in such a way that you catch it, but only in such a way that it catches you." - Soren Kierkegaard

"Finish" was one word our ANA knew in English. They'd been around Americans long enough to pick up that one very useful word at least. They pronounce it kind of like "pfinish", but the point is they knew what it meant. The word itself actually became a powerful camaraderie-building tool for us, as it really allowed the ETTs and the ANA to communicate directly with each other without the need for a terp, albeit in a very limited way, though one might be surprised how far that one word can go....

We might hear them say something like "Dooshman (the Pashto word for enemy) pfinish!!" when we were back at the base debriefing after the gunfights. I can recall a Marine saying "House is finish" to a couple of ANA and them returning huge gap-toothed grins after a bomb was dropped on a mud hut. Saying "Finish" after a meal meant the ANA might stop exhorting you to eat and drink more. When the ANA went to look for a blivet of fuel that we allowed to go rolling down the mountainside, they came back and pretty accurately described the blivet and its contents as "Finish". Saying "Finish" and holding empty hands in the air in reference to whatever the ANA were asking us for might get them off our case briefly.

In the end, for myself and the other ETTs I worked with, our time with the ANA was finished. Our ANA are still there, likely doing the same things, and playing the same games, that they did with us, but the reality is they can't escape from the war the way we can. Not that I feel sorry for them; they'll need to take ownership of their situation if they want it to improve, but it was always important to keep in mind that the ANA are in it for the long haul when we became frustrated at their lack of initiative.

Someday the fighting in Afghanistan may even be finished. Whatever the case may be for the future of the war, it is most definitely time for this blog to be finished. I had a few more topics on my list, but it's time to move on.

My heartfelt thanks to everyone who's read and supported this blog. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it...

Getting there

The events referred to in this entry happened about a year ago. Put this together based on some...memories.

You may find yourself in another part of the world...and you may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here!?" - "Once in a Lifetime" by the Talking Heads

Thankfully, the worst part of all of my deployments has been the getting there. The anxiety of the unknown combined with saying goodbye to friends and family, as well as the actual travel involved in getting yourself and your gear to these places on the other side of the earth combine to wear on you mentally and emotionally. Though my personal exposure to violence has exponentially increased through each successive deployment, I still felt quite a lot of unease before even the first one simply because I did not really know what I was getting into before I got there. One’s tolerance for known dangers can increase over time, but increasing one’s tolerance for uncertainty itself seems tougher to develop.

My deployment to Afghanistan has come with a special sense of concern, and is the only time in my life thus far I have felt compelled to buy more life insurance. If the numbers involved put the probabilities in your favor you have to invest right...? Going to a place as well known for danger as the Korengal Valley, one can’t help but be a little apprehensive, although those feelings of worry are offset somewhat by the excitement for the adventure and challenge ahead. All of us headed out the Korengal volunteered to be here, and several other Marines had wanted to be out here but couldn’t be. The Korengal is likely to be a bit more dangerous than the Pech Valley where the rest of the team is stationed, but the chief difference is likely to be in the living conditions, which are bound to be much more austere with no running water.

The trip out to the Korengal began about 2 AM one morning in late-November. We had to get up that early just to get over to the passenger terminal and get registered for the flight that would take off in the late morning. Hauling a few large bags around with all of your body armor and weapons has always been my least favorite part of these trips overseas. Something about that feeling of vulnerability when you have all of the things you are going to need and rely upon with you at that same time makes you a little nervous.

Pax terminal: we showed extremely early – par for the course. Sat around for a long while waiting before anything at all happened. Check. Mid-ranking personnel working there but not helpful - unable to make decisions or give useful information. Mm-hmm. People sleeping on the floor with their packs for pillows and few chairs in the pax terminal. A bearded well-built guy in the corner with tricked out gear keeping to himself. Removing rank insignia and boot bands...won't see those again for awhile. Having to physically attach each item we’d brought with us to our bodies by strapping, stacking, and grabbing before jumping on the scale to get weighed. After a few hours in the pax terminal we finally made it out to the tarmac…just as the sun was coming up.

Tarmac: cold, windy morning. Soldiers hiding from the windblast behind the massive CH-47 smoking cigarettes…but not standing too close with those cigarettes. Been on a Chinook before, but never been this close to one in the daylight with this much time to look at it…it’s as big as a bus. We know we’re all headed out to the same place so the Marines strike up some conversations with some of the soldiers around us, who don’t appear to be new to the country as we are. A few of the soldiers are returning from leave and headed back to the Korengal. They have some interesting stories to tell about the place. Not much of it pretty. They manage to convey the impression quite succinctly that they hate the Korengal and are sick to death of getting shot at. These aren’t really the things most would want to hear on their way out there, but what can you do but laugh and say to yourself and your colleagues, “It’s all part of the adventure…” We talk to the crew chief and ask if we can get dropped off at Firebase Vimoto, or if we have to get dropped off at the Korengal Outpost (KOP). The crew chief looks at us like we’re crazy and says he doesn’t know what Vimoto is. One of the soldiers nearby chimes in that there is nothing resembling an LZ at Vimoto. We’ll have to walk down to Vimoto from the KOP.

Ride out: first first-hand look at the landscape. It’s clear day but the helo is not made for sight-seeing. Can see enough to notice mud-brick abandoned-looking homes scattered about just outside the wire from Bagram. The flat valley around the air base quickly gives way to mountains…tall snow-capped mountains…but not as green and tree covered on the slopes as I had expected. We make a couple of stops on the way out. I’m a little surprised how much time we’re spending on the ground here in broad daylight, but I suppose they know what they are doing. The last leg of the helo journey out to the Korengal only has ten or so passengers on board - the remaining few. Once we land, we’re not quite as organized as we ought to be getting our possessions and persons off the bird quickly, but we manage to get it done and the helo gets away without incident.

KOP: We're admonished by the head of the guys we're replacing for not getting our gear off the bird quicker. A Russian helo went down not far from here not long ago - no use keeping the bird around long enough for them to draw a bead on it. We chat for awhile, before we pack a bag with the stuff we need most and then take off for Vimoto.

Walking: Even the one kilometer walk over to Vimoto along a flat road is fairly difficult at the speed we’re doing it at with the stuff we’re carrying. I realize quickly my conditioning will need some work, though I thought I was pretty strong coming in. Tough to stay acclimatized to altitude when you’re not at altitude…and now we’re at about 4500 feet. Not too high, but high enough for now. At least we aren't heading up to Firebase Restrepo...that looks like a long way up.

Vimoto: Vimoto is about what I’d imagined it to be: a few mud buildings surrounded by concertina wire on the side of a mountain situated on the edge of a village. The guys we’re replacing look very lean and intense, but are confident and relaxed in this forlorn place. The ANA soldiers seem friendly enough…no doubt they’ll be sizing us up over the next few weeks. Rounds start flying around the valley a mere hour after we arrive, and a bomb gets dropped on a house a kilometer up the road. We made it here and some of the things I’ve been wondering about for quite awhile now are starting to become clear; all in all, a good first day.

Eats, shoots and leaves

"I am mindful of human weakness, and I reflect upon the might of Fortune and know that everything that we do is exposed to a thousand chances." - Scipio Africanus

Thinking back on things, it does seem strange some of the things that went on. You walk around among, shake hands with, and eat and drink in homes of people you don’t really know and may not like you. But I never felt any fear in those situations, though I knew some of these people collaborated with insurgents. Pashtuns are hospitable people, and they'll take it to the point that they're equally hospitable to some of our enemies as well.

I’d say we returned the favor and were pretty darn hospitable to local people as well, however. On one occasion the local villagers brought men to the base with bullet and shrapnel wounds. They looked like Taliban, with their beards and stares, and my interpreter was absolutely convinced that they were. And how does an innocent get bullet and shrapnel wounds anyway? There was generally enough notice given before the battle commenced (often in the form of a single shot cracking off, followed some 5 seconds later by larger barrages) to allow most people to take cover before things really got crazy. Well, we patched those Taliban up, though they may have been detained for awhile since they had to be shipped away for better care. It’s all part of the game. Patch them up and send them back out to play.

I can recall drinking tea and eating nuts with an elder when bullets from across the valley started impacting near our men outside the house. I immediately put my helmet back on and ran outside to help out, without finishing the nuts or tea, or even saying goodbye or thank you. Afterward, I couldn’t help but be reminded of the bad joke about bad punctuation regarding a panda who walked into a restaurant, had a meal, and then shot the place up...since the book on pandas stated that a panda is a four legged, furry animal that eats, shoots and leaves. Being a panda, he does eat shoots and leaves, but typically does not eat, shoot and leave. Well, Marines sometimes really do eat, shoot, and then leave the area.

Sometimes it's shocking how little we really know about the people we're fighting, but my feeling is that for a lot of these guys we're fighting, especially out in the Korengal, the insurgency is a way of life. It's just what they do, and how they gain respect. Many certainly are ideologically driven - but not all.

The only time we really got a good look at our enemy was on Friday afternoon at the local mosque or occasionally out playing cricket. All those young men that were missing in the villages during our regular patrols would appear out of the woodwork to attend the mosque on Friday, kind of like Sunday morning church for Americans. Their age, body language, avoidance of eye contact, and lack of response to our greetings told us all we needed to know about the loyalties of those young men. But did being 90% sure that these guys were the ones shooting at us from the ridgelines a couple of times a week mean that we could arrest them and deal with them? No. Not at all. We let them go about their business, only to meet again in the near future on the ‘modern’ battlefield to play our dangerous little game of long-distance target practice.

Letter response

Question from a reporter after I returned:

"I've heard from some troops who served there, as well as think tankers and other folks, that the US presence there was an "irritant" to the local population, and that they only joined the insurgency to get the US troops out of there.

I'm wondering if you've seen the same kind of insularity and isolation elsewhere in Kunar. Did you ever get the sense that the locals don't want you there, and could live fine alone, without US or ANA presence?"

My response:

True, the ETT job is not an easy one, but was by far the most rewarding thing I've done, and I think many ETTs would agree with me.

I do not want to denigrate the observations made by the individuals you talked to with experience in the Korengal, but I'm going to try to give you a bit of additional context on the Korengal before I move on to your questions. I think it's a bit of a simplification to say that Korengalis joined the insurgency to get us out of there. On the one hand, it's true that the folks out in Korengal do not like outsiders typically and will fight whoever shows up in their domain. They do want to be left alone. However, we have to keep in mind that not all the fighters in the Korengal were Korengalis. We heard a lot of voices over the radio that were from Pakistan or speaking Arabic. I think the fact was, that in the Korengal we never had sufficient combat capability (either in number or in the capability of the troops that were there) in order to provide a level of security to keep those outsiders out. So while we might say they fought us so that they'd be left alone, we could equally say they were forced to fight us by outside influence, including people that killed the local leaders when they cooperated with us. I don't believe the Korengalis wanted those outside insurgents in their valley either. The fact of the matter is we simply did not do a good enough job out there to win anyone to our side.

We can also equally argue that the locals' position on our presence was irrelevant. Part of the idea in having forces in the Korengal was to fight the insurgents there, rather than in the more populated areas. Those valleys in Kunar do eventually feed in towards Kabul, and the position at one time was to fight in the hinterlands as a way of taking pressure off the cities, specifically Kabul. Now that we've ceded that territory, it reverts to becoming a lawless region where things happen that we don't like - a safe haven if you will. We went into Afghanistan in the first place so that the Taliban would not have a place to hide unmolested to plot, plan, and train. The fact is, now that we're gone, the Korengal will not be simply a peaceful valley full of folks living a peaceful pastoral existence doing their own thing with no impact on the outside world. It will, and probably already has, become an area our enemies will use to their advantage. If the Korengalis could or would keep out foreigners and live peacefully, then we'd have no issue. But that will not be the case.

As for other areas of Kunar, my experience is with the Pech Valley, which has several large valleys branching off from it, including the Korengal, the Wama, the Watapor, the ChapaDara, and another whose name eludes me where the famous battle of Wanat took place. Go far enough into any of those valleys and we have little influence and no control. The people in the region are certainly not homogeneous, but they do share a lot of characteristics. I think it's fair to say that most do not want to be ruled by what they perceive as a corrupt regime in Kabul, and are probably tired of the US presence. I also think it's fair to say that they don't want to be ruled by the Taliban. They do want economic opportunity. They do want their daughters to go to school. They do want to live in peace. While some share an extremist ideology (and probably more so in the Korengal than other places in Kunar) with the Taliban that they picked up during their time as refugees in Pakistan during the Soviet conflict, certainly not all or most feel that way. Many of those people understand why our forces are there and what we're doing.

FOO

The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club! - Tyler Durden

In the interests of writings something people might want to read, sometimes you have to break a rule or two.  Though more rules were broken in the doing than the writing, writing about FOO (Field Ordering Officer) funds was something I did not think I would do.  After all, our first rule of FOO was we do not talk about FOO.

And why did we laughingly come up with that as our first and only rule?  Probably due to all the rule bending and breaking we had to do to make the system work.  Let me explain.  FOO funds are cash given to units in the field.  We use the cash to buy  mission essential items.  Ostensibly, the funds exist to fill holes in the supply system.  However, the money comes with so many strings attached that using it by the book becomes nearly impossible...and for an ETT doubly so since FOO funds are only supposed to "support US forces".  Of course, you don't have to be an attorney to see the opportunity latent in a word like "support", but FOO had many other restrictions.

One of the most onerous for us was the requirement that we had to go to a different base (in Jalalabad for us) in order to pick up the money.  For people far from the main lines of communication, a trip anywhere means at least a few days gone, as we have to wait for the next round of helicopters to bring us back out.  If someone other than the actual FOO or his assistant the Paying Agent (PA) or could have signed for and picked up our money, it would have saved us days and trips.  But no such luck.

The more interesting restrictions are on what we can and cannot spend the money on.  A sampling of things the money could not be used for would include

- construction materials for permanent building structures
- food and water
- laborers for more than a single day
- gifts
- phone cards
- booze
- ammunition
- bribes
- intelligence collection
- furniture
- computers
- personal items
- interpreters
- renting or leasing real estate
- medical supplies
in addition to other fun restrictions like how the PA and FOO had to be present for each payment and how the receipts had to be signed by often illiterate "contractors".

Of course, rules exist for a reason, but with something like FOO you wonder how much bureaucracy was in place to support it.  I mean, they only gave each FOO/PA $10,000 at a time, which my group only drew 3 times.  Our team as a whole maybe drew 200,000, which is certainly not an insignificant amount, but over a nine-month period and in the context of the larger war effort it's nothing.  Is there anyone out there doing a cost-benefit analysis on the subject...maybe not, and probably better that they don't in the context of the war in general.  

In any case, let's just say the system in practice works quite a bit differently than how the guys in the rear draw it up.  Most of the things were spent money on were on that list above, which isn't to say that we were cheating the system.  The things we really needed out in the Korengal were things like food for our Afghan soldiers and building materials for permanent structures.  So that's how we spent the money for the most part, as well as having to often pay someone to actually deliver our supplies to us.  We did not carry around receipt books in our back pockets underneath our body armor.

I was told once recently by my Afghan platoon commander that the platoon would not patrol if I did not buy them some cooking oil.  Did I lecture him about using the Afghan supply system?  No.  I gave him the money and that was that.  When the platoon went over a month without eating any meat...we bought them a cow and butchered it.  When we needed better lookout posts and force protection...we bought the materials locally and hired locally for things to be built.  The receipts got creative, but it all went to support the mission, and that was what was important.

Almost

For our patrol one day, we decided to move up the hillside toward Restrepo and then set up a kind of observation post on a rocky little plateau to the southeast of Restrepo...more or less in the center of a triangle between three of our positions: Restrepo, OP Dallas, and Vimoto.  From our position there, we'd have visibility down into the village of Loy Kalay (a place we rarely if ever go).  Given the terrain, it can be challenging to visualize what you will and will not have visibility of until you actually get to a position, despite the maps.  So I decided we would go up there and get a first-hand look at what we could see from there.  Along the way to and from that outcrop we would sweep the area for possible hidden weapons, as shooters had set up in that vicinity to shoot down a helicopter in January.

Setting up on an exposed hilltop in broad daylight would undoubtedly draw fire, but then, this was how we did business out there: locate the enemy by letting him shoot at us.  (I use the word "at" in the previous sentence to emphasize the fact that the enemy shot in our direction...but did not often actually shoot us...thankfully, shooters in the Korengal were not terribly accurate...on most occasions.)

Of course, this is a terribly reactive tactic...but identifying the enemy in counter-insurgency can be hard, to say the least.  At any rate, once we got up to our spot, we found the area to be sparsely vegetated, like most of the land at that elevation (about 5000 feet above sea level), though there were a number of hasty fighting positions available that had been constructed out of large rocks.  We quickly dispersed our roughly 12-man patrol (8 ANA, 2 Marine ETTs, an interpreter, and a cultural anthropologist who was along for the ride...in retrospect it made little sense to bring him on the mission as we had no intention of talking to anyone...but then he didn't often let us leave him behind, and would later do all academics proud by popping off a few rounds with his M16). 

I quickly directed the ANA to disperse around the area, oriented where we were most likely to take fire, that is from the south and potentially from across the valley to the east, though taking fire from the east would involve a long and likely errant shot.  We ended up arranged along about a 50 meter long stretch of the hillside, more or less in a line oriented to the south/southwest.  We had a little knoll in the middle of our position, which would make communication within the patrol itself a bit more difficult.  Our setup finished, I settled in to my own little "fighting position", which was certainly not the best one...but it was the only one available after the others had taken their places.  It was formed of few low football-size rocks strewn about in the form of a half-moon.  A tree of about a one-foot diameter was directly in front of my fighting position, which obscured my field a view a bit.  I would shortly become very grateful for the presence of that tree.

As always, while we were up there we were constantly receiving receiving LLVI (low-level voice intercept) feeds.  Basically, the LLVI guys (a stationary unit back the KOP, though mobile capability does exist) intercept radio communications between the bad guys.  Since the bad guys use handheld radios (we called them all ICOMs...a popular brand), we are able to not only hear what the enemy is saying (which often has limited utility due to our interpreters' inability to understand the Korengali language), but more importantly, get an azimuth (or direction) from where the signal was coming from.  Extrapolating from signal strength, the LLVI guys could also give a rough distance on how far away the signal was emanating from.  Distance plus direction equals location.  Not an exact science, but helpful.  I went so far as to draw angle lines on my map I carried with me allows, which most importantly had a list of the many indirect fire targets.  So if I heard from the KOP that the signal was coming from a 190-degree azimuth I would basically trace that line from the KOP down my map until the came to an area that looked like where the enemy might be.  I would then make note of the pre-planned indirect fire targets we had in that area.  Once the shooting started, I would likely call in mortars on that target or a nearby one, as a kind of opening salvo. 

After a short while it became apparent the bad guys knew we were there...and thanks to the LLVI teams updates over the radio, I had an idea of where they were.  Figuring I would kill two birds with one stone, I decided to relay that information to the ANA, which would also allow me to check to see if the ANA had their heads in the game.  After making the rounds and relaying the information, I was on my way back to my position when a shot rang out.  Though I didn't hear that round buzz overhead or feel that it was close to me, I nevertheless took the sound of that shot quite personally, as it seemed they had waited until I was walking around in the open to start the shooting.  I quickly scurried back to my position and began trying to get an idea of where the now steady fire was coming from.

It didn't take long to realize I was completely pinned down as rounds began peppering the tree in front of me and ricocheting off the rocks around me.  I quickly got on the radio and called in a mortar strike on a pre-planned target in the vicinity of where I guessed the shooting was coming from.  What I remember about that radio call was not so much where the round went or why I called for it in that spot, but rather the fact that my voice cracked as I called it in - a bit embarrassing, and can indeed be frightening to be on the receiving end of accurate machine gun fire; however, it is a testament to our training that despite the density of fire coming my way, I was able to make the radio call.  I didn't freeze up or panic, and did not feel scared...at least not on the conscious level.  Of course, there is certainly there is nothing heroic about what little I did in response by making a radio call, it just a reaction...but it was reassuring to know that when you get into a tight spot where you're inches from death you can still think and perform.

In any case, not being able in those moments to get eyes on the shooters (tough to get eyes on much of anything when your more or less hiding behind a rock pile), I quickly deferred the adjustments of that initial mortar rounds to the other marine on the patrol with me, who had smartly taken the best fighting position available and was well placed to control fires and return fire with his own weapons.  He was able to adjust the rounds close enough to get the shooting to stop and then actually saw the shooters as they ran down the hillside away from us after taking their shots, though neither he nor our Afghans were able to shoot them.  It was a nice display or working together, though I did not relish my role as the bait that drew all the fire.

In any case, that's what friends are for, and that particular incident also nicely demonstrates the advantage we have on the enemy.  They unfortunately nearly always have the initiative and the element of surprise, but we have much more firepower.  If they want to concentrate fire on one person and pin him down, that's all good as we have 10 other guys on patrol and multiple other positions around the valley, as well as indirect fire support that can respond.  In that case they certainly came closer to getting us (me) than we did them, but more often than not we will come out on top in these little engagements. 

We hung out in our spot for a bit longer (don't want the enemy to think they succeeded in determining our course of action...though of course they do in many ways) before heading home.

23 Dec 2011

I was reminded of this incident when I was recently robbed at gunpoint by two men.  After they removed my bag from my person, I decided to fight the one with the gun and had nearly succeeded in disarming him when a third attacker jumped out of a car that had pulled up and began sighting in on me with another pistol.  And that point, I ceased resisting, and they thankfully didn't shoot me afterwards.  I had the awareness to remember the plate number and immediately called the police.  The incidents were similar in my mind in that while my execution in both cases was much less than perfect (failed to disarm my opponent in a quick fashion during the robbery, and failed to effectively plan and anticipate the enemy on the patrol), I did at least show courage and the ability to operate under stress in both cases.  

In neither instance do I recall being scared at that moment...the effects in both cases were more afterwards.  After the incident in the Korengal, I no longer viewed what we were doing out there as a kind of high-risk game.  The "risk" was just too close to home after that to really enjoy "the game" anymore.  I had been in plenty of firefights prior to that, often in exposed positions while on patrol, but none of those incidents affected me the same way.  The incident up on the rock that day changed my attitude...I would continue to operate the same way as before, but from that point onwards I fully appreciated the risks and the "fun" was gone.  Thereafter, I went about my daily business out of a sense of duty rather than a sense of adventure.  

As for the robbery, it (re)awakened me to the risks I face living in a 3rd-world country.  Sometimes one has to be reminded of past lessons and relearn the same things.  In 3rd-world countries there is simply less margin for error.  It's less forgiving.  If you get in a fight with your wife, and decide to walk a few blocks home from the office with what is obviously a laptop bag...well, someone will likely take notice and make efforts to dispossess you, whether you are in a nice part of town or not.  Call it metaphysics or simply losing situational awareness, but thinking about being angry with another person and not paying attention to what is going on is always a bad idea in some places, whether it's war or a poor South American country. 

Helicopter downing

Helicopters do get shot down in Afghanistan. It was the mujahideen’s proficiency in destroying helicopters that really ended up chasing the Soviets out of Afghanistan back in the ‘80s. We’ve certainly lost our fair share of helos in the time we’ve been over in Afghanistan (maybe ten a year), though honestly, we have not lost nearly as many as you might think we would, given how many helicopters we have flying around and the predictability of the routes they run.

On January 17, 2009, I got the opportunity to witness what predictability can do for you against a thinking adversary. But let me explain first how it is that we get our supplies out here in the Korengal Valley. Given the topography of eastern Afghanistan, building a road is no easy task, especially a road that can support the large and armored vehicles we use. As you can imagine, building a road is even tougher when you can’t get any local support or labor for the project due to poor security. A road into the Korengal does exist, but it’s not often used due to its poor condition and the aforementioned poor security situation. I can actually recall an evening when a convoy was on its way out this way to deliver supplies, when a well placed boulder brought the convoy to a halt. The road being carved out of the side of a mountain, there was surely no way to go around the boulder. Apparently, it could not be easily moved either, so someone decided to blow it up. Naturally, the decision being made to blow up the boulder led to the boulder (and the road) being blown up. And the convoy returned from whence it came.

Ground resupply being intermittent and inadequate (Actually, effectively non-existent during the latter part of our tour.), we’re forced to rely on air resupply. Sometimes it comes in the form of C-17s flying overhead and dropping parachuted pallets of water out the back. These CDS drops as they are called, are always interesting, not just for the aftermath involving the recovery of all that water as it’s landed in the village, on homes, or down the mountainside, but also for the fact that the C-17s are often shot at as they fly by, which is comical given that the plane if flying far outside the range of the weapons systems being employed “against” it.

The C-17s help, but most everything comes in via helo. The sensitive stuff (people, classified materials, etc.) stays in the belly of the bird, but the rest of the supplies are “slung” beneath the helicopter. The process of how those supplies are attached beneath the helicopter is pretty interesting to watch. Getting the supplies in their slings attached to the bottom of the helicopter involves the helicopter hovering close to the ground, while some intrepid soul braves the winds and dust underneath the helicopter to attach the sling to the hooks on the bottom. I’ve heard it’s not easy to hover a helicopter; I know I sure couldn’t do it when I tried it in a simulator once. But these guys manage to do it and keep it steady night or day until the slings (up to 3 at a time) are attached. The floor of the helicopter opens up to provide the place where the slings are attached, and surely also makes it easier for the crew to talk to the pilots to give them some idea of how the process is going. Conceivably, the open floor of the bird could provide a place for the guy underneath to go if the helo came down on him since he’s standing right there, but luckily I never saw this happen.

At any rate, we’ve got helicopters flying out here regularly, often making multiple trips to the same location, hovering while the slings are dropped, and then “parking” briefly while the people on board get off and others get on board. All of this takes some time, and since these operations have been going on during the daytime, you would not be crazy to see some danger in the process. The presence of Apaches providing armed escort may deter some would-be attackers, but for some, the sight of a CH-47 (which is about as big as a city bus) must present an inviting, if not irresistible target, if the shooters can manage to get themselves situated in a position close enough to make taking the shots worthwhile.

The hillsides upon which the bases and outposts are situated in this tightly confined valley are rocky and sparsely vegetated at the lower elevations, but the terrain itself provides enough undulations for someone or a group of people, moving carefully, to get reasonably close to some of our outposts. This fact is proven on a nearly daily basis at OP Restrepo. Though OP Restrepo is situated on the high ground with pretty good visibility, it comes under fire constantly, sometimes from fairly close in. Those guys up there at Restrepo have it pretty tough, and tougher still since they can’t seem to kill the guys constantly taking potshots at them. A reporter came out and was shot in the head on his first day there at Restrepo (His helmet saved him and he stayed up there for several days afterwards.). We’re thankful for them there though, as their position on that hill helps protects our base from being attacked from that high ground. That, and the insurgents in the area seem to spend a lot of their time and energy taking it to the guys at Restrepo, which makes for a more relaxed experience down here at Vimoto. Not that we mind a firefight that much, but our position is potentially a bit more precarious than the other outposts in the area since we have no standoff from the village below and depend on our ANA to do much of the fighting, with only a handful of Americans onhand here.

On the morning of the 17th, I headed over to the main base in the area, Korengal Outpost (KOP), to meet up with my team leader who happened to be flying in for a brief face to face meeting with some of us out here. We don’t often get to see each other, and this was the first time he’d come out to the Korengal. The plan was for him to get off the helicopter, stop and talk to us for a short while, during which time the helicopters would be making their supply runs to the outposts in the area, and then re-board the aircraft and fly back to our headquarters base, Camp Blessing. He was only supposed to be with us for maybe 30 minutes. But it didn’t end up working out that way…

After the copter stopped at KOP, it picked up some slings while still there at KOP, as well as a passenger, and then headed up to Restrepo to drop it all off. I was not really paying attention to the whole operation until I heard a long burst of machine gun fire, which we all quickly determined was directed at the helo on approach to the Restrepo landing zone. The burst of machine gun fire was quickly followed by the sound of a small explosion (later determined to be caused by an RPG), and the back portion of the cabin of the helicopter bursting into smoke and flame. Seeing the helicopter on fire after being shot was certainly one of the more disheartening moments I've experienced out here to this point. Despite the smoke and flames, the bird kept hovering there in the same place for what seemed like an eternity, until the crew was able to drop the three slings hanging underneath. I suppose you could say that we were lucky the helicopter was shot where it was, since Restrepo is situated at a much higher altitude than the other bases around. Having that extra altitude I’m sure was useful to the pilots as they pushed the helo down into the valley to pick up speed in order to keep the aircraft flying. They attempted to fly all the way over to Firebase Vegas, which is several miles away and probably 1000 feet lower in altitude than Restrepo. They darn near pulled off a great recovery as the helicopter made a ‘hard landing’ (as it was called in the news) near the LZ at Vegas. The helicopter quickly became a smoking ruin, but 6 of the 7 passengers on board were able to make it off alive and with apparently mild injuries.

Bullets and mortars were flying around the valley for probably 30 minutes after the helicopter was brought down, but there was nothing remarkable about any of that - well, at least nothing that was apparent to me at the time from my vantage point over at the KOP, but more on that later.

Once it was determined that one individual did not make it off the helicopter and was missing, my guys back at Vimoto mounted up a group of a couple of Marines (all we had at Vimoto with me being at the KOP) and a few ANA soldiers to search the mountainside to see if the final soldier had somehow fallen off the helicopter as it got shot. No one was found, and it was later determined that the last soldier had not been able to get off the helicopter at it landed and had died. I never did get word whether he was killed by the initial hits the helicopter took or later, but at any rate he did not make it, which marked the first death of any of our forces in the Korengal during my time out there. (The Korengal would claim the lives of 42 US servicemen before we finally pulled out for good in April 2010.)

Once I got back over to Vimoto, I was informed that our ANA had been more concerned with collecting brass and getting to shoot the 240 machine gun than they had been about actually fighting the guys that were shooting down into our base from up the hill toward Restrepo. I will mention that it was quite unusual for us to take fire from that area...Restrepo's presence did effectively (usually) prevent people from shooting down into Vimoto from the high ground to our west. In this case, the insurgents who were able to get close enough to Restrepo to bring down the helicopter likely figured they may as well get a few good shots in at Vimoto since they had the field of fire to do so. Knowing the forces at Restrepo would never assault out of their redoubt to come after them, they could sit in the dug in position for plenty long enough to get some rounds into Vimoto.

At any rate, the ANA performed quite poorly and worse, did not appear to even be taking things seriously, in the opinion of the senior Marine who was present during all of this. This would lead to the first time I would severely chastise the ANA, telling them essentially, "Hey, here we are out here helping you guys, bringing in your supplies, supporting you, and one of our helos get shot up and a man killed, and you guys just screw it away." Of course, this brought denials and recriminations from the senior sergeant on the base, as the platoon leader sat idly by listening to what turned into a brief argument. (I like that particular platoon leader, and he will get better, but assertiveness and taking command are not his best qualities at the moment.) Rather than argue with them, I attempted to let them know we were disappointed and expected better of them, which appeared to soothe them a bit. We'll move on.