In the Shadow of Greatness

by Joshua Welle

  I was losing count of how many laps we had made when two dark objects caught my eye. One of the news reports had mentioned that the fallen climber’s partner had hurled his own pack into the crater, hoping that it would land near his friend and provide extra supplies. Knowing this, I identified the first object as the partner’s pack, which was mostly buried in a low drift. Fifty yards away, the second object was a set of unmoving arms sticking up out of the snow.

  The chatter inside the aircraft intensified immediately. As we circled back, the fear expanded inside my chest at the thought of what our SAR medic would discover when he was lowered into the basin to investigate. We entered a hover over the second object, tucked up tightly against the inside wall of the crater. As expected, our rotor immediately went to work on all that beautiful, soft, fresh snow. Visibility went to zero in a matter of seconds. In overland SAR, the pilot nearest the terrain usually manipulates the controls since he or she has terrain to see and can keep a hover position alongside. On this day, my copilot was the man who had to make it happen. Once established in the hover, my copilot began asking to deploy smoke grenades, all three of which were thrown down immediately by the rescue crewmen.

  “What the hell are you doing, man?” I shouted. Expending all of our smoke grenades at once was not normal practice. He answered, “I’ve got nothing to look at over here! I need some contrast on the snow!” Amidst the hurricane cloud of snow engulfing us, the low cloud layer directly above us, and the near vertical wall of white thirty feet beyond his window, my copilot was fighting with everything he had to maintain our position.

  My copilot and the crewmen at the back of the aircraft were extremely skilled and experienced, but we were struggling with every nugget of information we had, and I could hear panic rising in everyone’s voices; it was easy to see we were in a bad spot. To add insult to injury, a news helicopter now hovered in a patch of clear sky near the mouth of the crater, undoubtedly filming and photographing our every move. Great, I thought. Now if we crash, the entire world will get to watch it on the news tonight.

  The smoke grenades weren’t enough to give my copilot the references he was scouting for. The oscillating grew worse, panic continued to escalate, and we were quickly edging toward a loss of all control. As much as I wanted to get this person on board and put this whole story to rest, my better judgment prevailed. We stayed in that hover until the absolute last second that it was safe to do so, although thinking back, it was probably ten seconds longer than we should have. “Stop right, Sir!” the crewmen shouted. “Stop right, stop right!”

  I glanced out my window to the left, away from the terrain, and saw a small hole under the clouds that had since crept down and was basically sitting on top of us. It was time to get the hell out of there, and this might be our only opportunity. I didn’t think twice, grabbed the controls, and began to slide the aircraft directly toward the blue opening. “I have controls! We’re waving off!” I said. Out we flew, barely skirting the lava dome and sneaking out under the billowing clouds.

  I was collected, but scared. My arms and hands had a violent tremor to them as I guided us away. That particular incident was one of only two times in my flying career that I truly thought I might crash in a matter of seconds. We exited the crater, reevaluated our situation, and talked about what had just happened. I was secretly relieved to find out that everyone in the crew agreed that my decision was the correct one. With fuel low, a shaky crew, and poor weather conditions, we decided to depart the scene for a refuel and hopefully give the clouds in the crater a chance to disperse.

  After we landed in Portland, I called and briefed my boss on what we had seen and done. He now assumed what only my crew had observed: Our rescue mission had just become a recovery mission. Holding this information, we faced a tough decision. Do we tell the news stations what we saw and that we’d be sticking to our policy of not picking up dead bodies? Could we even say for sure that he was dead? Do we try to be heroes and get him on board? Was it worth the risk to my aircraft and crew? It wasn’t entirely my decision, but I told my boss, “Sir, I’m 99 percent sure this guy is dead. If we don’t get him today, though, he’ll never be found. As soon as it snows another six inches, he’s gone forever.”

  I was sure he’d tell me to head home as body recoveries are not in our playbook, but he surprised me. “Do you think you can safely get him out of there?” he asked. “Only if the clouds clear, Sir,” I answered. “I need some visibility to make this work, which we didn’t have last time” He snorted, then said, “Recharge your batteries and head back up there if you’re comfortable. Don’t do anything stupid trying to get this mission done. And as far as you know, he’s still alive. Roger?” “Yes, Sir,” I replied, understanding that a gentlemen’s agreement had just been made.

  My crew hid out and recouped in a back room at the airport, away from the throngs of reporters. I had briefed the crew upon landing that they were to talk to no one and assume nothing about the outcome. We debriefed on what we had experienced, focusing on how each crew member felt about continuing. The overwhelming response was to charge back into the fray and get the mission done. We constructed our approach, debated what needed to be done differently, and lastly, discussed our comfort limits.

  When we returned to the crater, by the grace of God we found clear skies. We flew right to the victim’s position, and the hover was not a problem now that we had solid ground reference. We deployed our SAR medic to proceed to the victim and evaluate his condition. We orbited above for mere moments before the crackle on the radio confirmed what we had thought. “Rescue Two, Rescue Ground. We have an angel here. Ready for hoist pickup in ten,” came the medic’s report. There was silence in the aircraft. We had struggled as a crew for six hours to hopefully save this man’s life, and now we knew for sure we wouldn’t be doing that. We delivered the body to the local sheriff at the predetermined location, shielded from media coverage. The sheriff and his deputies expressed their profuse thanks for the assist and took custody of the body.

  On every clear day of my childhood, I looked up at the south side of Mount St. Helens and thought what an amazing sight it was: snow-covered in the winter, bare in the summer, but jagged and broken all the time. At eleven years old, I watched as a large steam vent shot into the sky and created a flurry of rumor and mystery around town. During college, I climbed Mount St. Helens twice. Both times I stood on the summit staring down from exactly 1,500 feet above where I’d one day be hovering in a $20 million helicopter. What a view.

  It will always be upsetting to our crew that the man we were sent to save was dead before we had a chance to save him. I didn’t walk away from this feeling like a hero, but I didn’t feel like a failure either. What I do know is that my decisions and the razor-sharp skills of my crew returned this man’s body to his family and answered questions that otherwise they might have wrestled with for the rest of their lives.

  I’m not a war hero. I haven’t saved hundreds of lives in a massive, coordinated humanitarian effort, but I have been part of something powerful for a few and that justifies the investment I’ve made. Humanitarian service impacts people on a personal level. Although this was only one of hundreds of missions I will fly as a naval aviator, I know this man’s family will remember this single mission forever. I used my education, military training, and an expensive piece of hardware to get the job done on my home turf. Not many people ever get that opportunity, and I know I’ll cherish if forever.

  Inland Sailor

  Joshua Welle

  “Wheels up!” the air crewman yelled. He was nineteen years old, with a blond streak of hair trimmed high and tight. Only his accent revealed the cowboy beneath the shine and polish of military professionalism. The C-130 Hercules roared at 440 mph. It was able to go into dangerous terrain night or day, making it the workhorse of the U.S. military logistics network.

  This was my third visit to Afghanistan in six months, and although it was getting to be routine, it wasn’t any less of
a marathon. It was a sweaty and claustrophobic commute. I was thirsty, crammed inside with 125 other soldiers departing Ali al-Salem Air Base in Kuwait en route to Kandahar, Afghanistan. The 1,300-mile journey skirts Iranian air space and circles the shockingly beautiful Hindu Kush, a region most Americans will never see.

  I was returning from an all-too-brief R&R at home with friends and family on a mid-deployment leave. At my departure, my mother cried as if I were going away for plebe summer while my dad maintained his typically stoic exterior even though he too was upset. I was returning to Afghanistan for another five months to support the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), an international coalition formed and maintained in response to the 9/11 al-Qaeda attacks and in defense of other terrorist attacks in Madrid, London, and India. NATO had a UN mandate to establish good governance, internal security, and to sow the seeds of a democratic nation.

  The touchdown at Kandahar Airfield was the culmination of a fancy combat landing. It felt like we were on a rollercoaster as the C-130 screamed high into the sky and then dropped low, finally swerving to a landing position. It is considered a combat maneuver because the plane shoots flares off the wings to distract any RPG strikes.

  After helping unload the duffle bags, pallets of bullets, and rations, I called Maj. Fred Tanner, my best friend in country, to pick me up. As I waited with my body armor, an extra thirty pounds, I leaned against a protective barrier and thought back to the many unexpected twists and turns that had brought me, a Navy surface warfare officer, to this strange, remote place.

  The opportunity had presented itself in July 2008. During a military fellowship at a think tank in Washington, D.C., I participated in a counterinsurgency (COIN) conference in which Afghanistan experts discussed U.S. policy. The guest of honor, Brig. Gen. John “Mick” Nicholson, presented lessons learned and battlefield perspectives from his recent command tour in eastern Afghanistan’s Kunar and Nuristan provinces. General Nicholson captivated the audience with tactical insights and a genuine compassion for the Afghanistan mission and purpose. He believed that the only way to win over the Afghan people was to fight side-by-side with them against the Taliban. The warrior spirit and trust are at the center of the Pashtu culture, and the people deeply respect their elders who survived the war with the Russians and later the mujahidin. In General Nicholson’s view, the best way to establish that trust was to fight, sometimes die, and soldier on with Afghan partners.

  After the general’s talk, I approached him at the roast beef buffet line and introduced myself. General Nicholson stood 6 feet 3 inches and looked like he could run a mile in a respectable 6:00. He had salt and pepper hair, a weathered and tanned face, and piercing blue eyes.

  “Your talk was outstanding, Sir. I understand you’re going to southern Afghanistan this fall. I’m going to Afghanistan in November. To Bagram,” I said.

  “That’s great, Josh, what’s your mission?” he asked, speaking to me as though he had a personal interest in me. I was elated to think that he might actually want to know about my small part of the Afghanistan mission.

  “I am going to be the public affairs officer for CTF-101, serving as a visitor’s officer,” I said. This admission was a bit embarrassing for me considering that Nicholson had just served fifteen months as a battlefield commander. In essence, I was going to Afghanistan as a travel agent, albeit one facing high risks. Serving as a visitor’s officer is not exactly Rambo duty, but it was closer to the fight, which was where I wanted to be. I sheepishly followed up: “It’s not great, but the best I could get as a Navy guy, and I want to be in Afghanistan.”

  He could probably sense my dissatisfaction with the job. My best friends had already served two or three tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I was anxious to get closer to the conflict. Still, I was caught off guard when he asked, “Wanna join my team?” Even though I had half imagined that approaching him might lead to some kind of opportunity, I never assumed it actually would. I stuttered, “Uh . . . My tour is six months, Sir, how long will you be going?” I was a little worried that he would say fifteen months. The time commitment was a constraining variable because there was only a twelve-month window in my career “pipeline” in which I could detour from my surface warfare trajectory. At the time I didn’t know that General Nicholson’s “team” consisted of only four other officers. This number seemed insubstantial relative to the task they were assigned to accomplish. As I would discover, General Nicholson had been given special tasking from the senior levels of the Pentagon to usher incoming forces to the southern region should U.S. combat operations surge in Afghanistan.

  “At least a year. Are you in?” he responded in a way that implied that anything less than a year would be short. In that moment I felt as though I was being asked a fairly straightforward question: “Josh, do you, or do you not, have a spine?” This was my Rubicon, a moment that would undoubtedly change my life, but I took mere seconds to respond: “Sir, I’m in. Let’s do it, Sir.” It was the only correct response.

  “Outstanding,” General Nicholson replied.

  The time was August 2008, and although Barack Obama had not yet been elected president, the Department of Defense had already begun to focus more on Afghanistan than on Iraq, especially Afghanistan’s southern region. The new president, Republican or Democrat, would need to decide whether to send 17,000 more troops to Kandahar and Helmand provinces.

  At the COIN conference, I had told General Nicholson about my experience as a military fellow and about the master’s degrees I had earned from the University of Maryland. I talked of my experience teaching political science at the Naval Academy and how I had proven myself as a capable communicator and staff officer. I’d also been at sea and had accumulated some “salt” as a surface warfare officer, particularly as an engineer officer in Yokosuka, Japan, managing the propulsion plant of a Navy cruiser. I was comfortable working in dynamic environments, and I had no problem doing grunt work. Maybe I would be a good fit to join his band of strategic planners.

  General Nicholson filled me in on my new position. “Josh, you will have an important task. I want you to work in a SECDEF-endorsed Civil-Military Cell. It’s brand-new. You will operate side-by-side with other nations’ civilians and military officers and create a framework for economic development in southern Afghanistan. We start training with the NATO staff in Germany next month. I’ll work to get your orders changed. We need you there.” His small team consisted of three Army officers, a Marine lieutenant colonel, and now, me.

  During the Afghanistan tour, I served as the CivMil Cell operation’s boss, energy analyst, agricultural adviser, general’s aide, infrastructure engineer, and strategic planner. With a tidal wave of soldiers and Marines inbound to Afghanistan, everyone, from the White House to congressional staffers, wanted to know more: What are the troops going to do? Where are they going to stay? How would we measure coalition success?

  Joshua Welle conducts engagements with Afghan leaders, a key component of counterinsurgency operations in Afghanistan. (Courtesy Joshua Welle)

  The team was General Nicholson’s brain trust, and he was the voice back to Washington on daily operations in Kandahar and Helmand. The CivMil Cell became the node for information flowing up to coalition headquarters and the U.S. embassy and outward to provincial reconstruction teams, those responsible for rebuilding civil society. We were not rugged combat arms officers on patrol, but we had an important mission: We were interlocutors for senior officials who needed to know how to allocate assets for the president’s renewed commitment to Afghanistan.

  Australia, Canada, Denmark, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Romania were all key stakeholders and had participants in the CivMil Cell. During our NATO training in Germany months prior to deployment, we met experienced Afghanistan experts responsible for teaching inbound troops the social and economic dynamics of the region. Rodney Cocks, a former Australian army veteran working for the British government in Kabul, was a crucial link for General Nicholson as
he established the first joint interoperability task force to address the nexus of crime, narcotics, and corrupt government officials. Sarah Chayes was also an irreplaceable adviser in Kabul. A former National Public Radio correspondent, she moved to ISAF headquarters to help advance good governance throughout the provinces. Both Rodney and Sarah would become close friends in-country and my knowledge-link to Kabul.

  In ten months’ time, the U.S. secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the British prime minister, and the NATO secretary general all made trips to meet General Nicholson. In some of these meetings, I was a fly on the wall; in others I was a briefer and participant. My job put me face-to-face with congressional representatives and had me playing email tag with colonels in Kabul and Washington. Everyone wanted to know the plan, and we were the “subject matter experts” We did not, however, limit our communications to only senators, representatives, and colonels. We also talked to pomegranate farmers, grocers, Afghan contractors, foreign military staff officers, and non-governmental organizations to explain the tactical dynamics on the ground. Knowing the supply chain of the farmers or the value chain of exported goods fed into the detailed regional economic strategy that would enable a physical corridor, bringing goods to market to and from Pakistan.

  Early in my tour, we befriended a U.S.-Canadian contractor working to improve pomegranate farming in rural areas outside Kandahar City. He worked with brave men who had been hardened by the elements and were desperate to have their contracts renewed by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). At one meeting in the RC-South Compound, I took notes as the growers briefed General Nicholson. Their pictures showed Afghans working on farms, nurturing and packaging pomegranates for export to Dubai. These men seemed genuine, but they were a few of hundreds trying to tap into the flood of aid provided by the U.S. government.