Foxtrot in Kandahar
Page 10
We arrived at the base camp, which was situated at a junction with a smaller valley. Next to where we parked, there was a small stream that had been damned up with rocks so that a clear pool of water a couple of feet deep and maybe 30 feet across had formed. It was the only surface water I would see during my entire time in southern Afghanistan.
We were led up a dusty trail to a dilapidated mud house on a hillside overlooking the water. As we walked we passed scattered groups of Afghan men squatting around small fires along the trail. Some looked at us warily. When we reached the house we saw that a green cargo parachute from a CIA supply drop made to Shirzai some days before was draped across it and served as the roof.
Inside there was a small room with an Afghan carpet on the floor. Lanterns and candles provided the lighting and a wonderful aroma of cooked food was in the air. The scene would have been romantic were it not for the AK-47’S laying all about and the several bearded men who sat around the carpet looking sternly at us as we entered. My first impression was that they looked a lot like the Taliban. My second impression was that they looked exactly like the Taliban.
One of them stood up and came over to us. It was Gul Agha Shirzai. He was a good-sized, barrel-chested man, in his late 40’s, with dark hair, beard, and eyes. He was smiling broadly and gave each of us a welcome hug. As Khalil translated, Shirzai explained in Pashto how delighted he was that we were there. He told us he had a special dinner prepared in our honor and invited us to sit down and eat.
Before the meal was served, as we sat on the floor around the carpet, Shirzai made a little speech. He said he felt terrible about the 9/11 attacks and asked that we convey his condolences to the American people. He said he hated the fact that the people who were responsible were in his country, and he promised to help us find and get rid of them.
As Foxtrot’s team leader, I felt obliged to reciprocate. Using Khalil as the translator, I told Shirzai and his lieutenants that we were happy to be there among such good friends, and together we would rid Afghanistan of the blight of terrorists. The Afghans nodded and made noises, best described as grunts, which I would later learn meant they agreed with what was being said. That was my initial firsthand lesson on Afghan culture and customs.
The food was brought out and we ate it communal style. If you wanted rice, you just reached in the bowl and grabbed a fist full. Custom dictated, based on sanitation concerns, that only right hands be used for this purpose. A poultry dish—chicken they said—was served. It was quite good, tender and very juicy. By the time we were done eating, our beards glistened in the flickering candlelight.
From the moment I had stepped off the helicopter, the night had had a surreal, otherworldly quality about it. At some point, I realized, it indeed was another world—it was Afghanistan.
23
Reflections on Leadership
The SPARTAN AND MILITARIZED life I would be leading in the coming weeks was a significant change from what my life had been before the 9/11 attacks. I was now in what the CIA would call a “paramilitary environment.” The Army’s designation for it was an “unconventional warfare environment.” Whatever the description, it was certainly different than my former existence at Langley. Of course these kinds of surroundings were not new for me, but it had been a while. I was particularly grateful for my time in Special Forces, which had trained me specifically for the mission of working with a guerilla force behind enemy lines. But many years had passed since then so I knew that when it came to things military, I had to rely on the expertise of Gary and Mike, the two SpecOps task force personnel detailed to Foxtrot.
Still, not having current military skills did not absolve me of the responsibilities of being the team leader. Ultimately I was responsible to the Counterterrorist Center and the CIA for what we did or did not accomplish, as well as for the safety of Foxtrot’s members. I took those responsibilities seriously even while I tried to maintain a light touch in my team leader role. Fortunately, in addition to having attended leadership courses at various times in my life, I could also draw upon some significant experiences from my time in both the Army and at CIA. Admittedly, none of those experiences had been in a combat environment.
My ideas about leadership and what the role entailed had been formed long before I came to Afghanistan. In fact, even before I joined the Army or the CIA. As a kid I was lucky to spend a lot of time with my father and, as I’ve alluded to before, his influence as a role model was significant. Most of our time together was spent outdoors, usually related to taking care of our livestock or hunting. Over the years I was able to observe him in many situations, and although I’m sure I didn’t know it at the time, I was absorbing a lot of lessons that would shape my ideas about leadership and how to deal with people. When faced with a problem he was very deliberative in deciding on how he would solve it; he did not “shoot from the hip.” He also was patient and slow to anger, and he never spoke badly of anyone or was disrespectful of even the poorest and most ignorant person. Completely unselfish, the needs of others always came first. But despite these positive traits, there was an underlying sternness about him, and my siblings and I were always on our best behavior around him, although he never raised a hand against us.
The fact that my father was in combat in World War II and Korea held a special fascination for me. Over the years I learned about some of his experiences, a couple of which surprised me, but gave me some indication of how he balanced the issue of mission and the welfare of the men in his charge. Two of the experiences occurred late in the Korean conflict when truce negotiations were ongoing and Chinese forces were pushing hard to gain as much territory as possible before an agreement was reached. Dad was a tank company commander with the rank of captain and his company was holding a defensive line that was constantly being hit by artillery and ground assaults. During a lull in the fighting a major with a film crew came up to the front from the battalion headquarters. Spent round casings, ammunition boxes, and ration cans littered the area. Apparently not pleased with the unsightliness of it all, and perhaps wanting a more pristine combat landscape to film, the major ordered my father to have his men get out of their tanks and police up the area. My father refused, telling the major that they were subject to being attacked and his men were staying in their tanks. The major became angry and threatened to bring insubordination charges against Dad. Suddenly an artillery barrage began during which the major happened to be wounded. Apparently, his wounds were not too serious, and to the dismay of the tank crews who witnessed the event, he was able to direct the film crew from his stretcher in filming his own medical evacuation from the battlefield. No charges were ever brought against my father.
During this same time period, Dad regularly received orders from battalion to send out nighttime foot patrols down into the enemy-occupied valley his tanks overlooked. The stated purpose for sending the patrols was to “keep up the aggressive fighting spirit of the men.” Initially, patrols were sent out with the only result being men lost, killed, or wounded. Dad tried to get battalion to rescind the order for nightly patrols but the order stood. Finally, Dad just began to ignore the orders, and when queried about the results of the patrols he would advise there was nothing to report.
Upon hearing about my father’s wartime actions when I was a boy, at first I was confused because I thought soldiers always obeyed orders no matter the consequences. But when telling me these stories Dad explained that sometimes leaders have to take care of their people even if it means not obeying an order, no matter the possible consequences for the leader. On the other hand, Dad told me of an experience where he took action when he had no orders, something else he said a leader had to sometimes do.
In that case a massive Chinese offensive was underway and a South Korean division had been smashed and was falling back in a disorganized, panicked route. Dad’s company was ordered to move forward through the stream of fleeing South Korean forces to try and blunt the Chinese assault. As it happened, this attack had occurred on
the same day that my father had turned over command of the tank company with orders to report to 8th Army headquarters to take over the security detail for General Maxwell Taylor. The new tank company commander who was to replace Dad was reported to have arrived at battalion but strangely could not be found. Dad technically was no longer in command of the company, but he knew the new commander, if he could be found, would be at a great disadvantage trying to take over in the middle of the Chinese assault. Dad knew the terrain, the tank platoon commanders, and the situation on the ground, so he decided not to leave for 8th Army headquarters. Instead he stayed with the company and continued to act as its commander. For the next three days, the Chinese assault continued during which Dad’s company lost five tanks along with a number of killed and wounded. Dad suffered an injury himself when evacuating wounded from a knocked-out tank. The new company commander never showed up. Dad eventually was awarded the Bronze Star with a “V” device for his actions during the battle. Because he technically wasn’t the company commander the award citation describes him as a “Special Advisor” to the tank company. I eventually was able to read official Army documents concerning this battle and the role my father and his company played in it. Years later Dad was told the destroyed hulks of his lost tanks had remained on the battlefield and served as part of the demarcation of the border agreed to in the Korean armistice.
Hearing these stories from my father had a huge impact on my thinking regarding the role of a leader. Even as a boy my takeaway was that taking care of and protecting your people was the most important thing you could do, because it was your people who were ultimately going to be the ones who would accomplish the mission.
* * *
My first formal introduction to leadership was through the Reserve Officer’s Training Program (ROTC) at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. The four years spent at NMSU were some of the most enjoyable of my life, and ROTC was perhaps the biggest reason why. ROTC became my fraternity, and through it I made friendships that last to this day. I also met professional soldiers who were assigned as the ROTC cadre responsible for our training. Almost all of the cadre were Vietnam veterans who, like my father, had had life and death experiences where leadership had mattered.
Undoubtedly the most influential of the ROTC cadre for me was Sergeant Major John Quirk, who had served in Vietnam as an Army Ranger and in the Korean War as well. A Boston native, SGM Quirk was the quintessential soldier and I got to know him well. In addition to his teaching responsibilities he was also the coach of the ROTC detachment’s four-man orienteering team of which I was a member. A disciplinarian, he trained us hard in the use of a map and compass, and equally hard in our physical conditioning, running us for miles through the desert around “A” (Aggie) Mountain which overlooked the campus.
SGM Quirk used his involvement in the Orienteering program as a platform to continue the leadership lessons he sometimes taught from the lectern. Once during an overnight drive to an out-of-state competition, SGM Quirk told the team a story about an American infantry platoon that his unit had been sent to assist after it had come under nighttime Viet Cong attack. Unfortunately, by the time they reached the scene the battle was over and the platoon had been wiped out with 18 men killed. SGM Quirk said it was the worst thing he saw in Vietnam, and the memory of the faces of all those dead Americans soldiers was something he would never forget. The point he made was that it had happened all because the platoon leader had not insisted that his men dig foxholes after they had pulled into their patrol base for the night. Without the ability to get behind cover the men were easy prey for the VC, who had probably watched them move into the patrol base, waited until nightfall, and then attacked. It was a great failure of leadership about a simple thing, with disastrous consequences. It was stories like these, more so than the classroom theories on leadership, that really got my attention about the difference between a good leader and a bad one and the impact each can have.
SGM Quirk was transferred before I completed the ROTC program, but I saw him again on a mountainside in north Georgia during the summer of my junior year while I was attending Army Ranger School in lieu of the ROTC Advance Course. SGM Quirk was now the Command Sergeant Major of the mountain phase of Ranger School. We were in a patrol base when he appeared early one morning. He had come specifically to see me and a couple of my Ranger buddies also from New Mexico State. We all held him in the highest regard and felt honored by his visit, particularly knowing he had to hike up a mountain to get to us.
Ranger School itself is considered by the Army to be its most demanding leadership school. It utilizes small unit tactics such as patrols, raids, and ambushes as the leadership training vehicle. The training environment itself is arduous and requires the Ranger student to survive on two-thirds the normal food ration and an average of two or three hours of sleep per night for the duration of the eight-week course. Actually, our course was nine weeks because most of the students were ROTC cadets and an extra week was added to cover some additional subjects. Students are rotated into and out of leadership positions and evaluated on how well they perform. The evaluation process also includes a peer evaluation so there is nowhere to hide if you are not carrying your weight in the course. I was in the best physical condition of my life when I entered Ranger School and was a physical wreck by the time I finished it. Undoubtedly, it was the most demanding training I have ever endured, but it was effective, and to this day I believe I could still organize and lead a combat patrol.
Upon graduation from NMSU I received a 2nd Lieutenant’s regular army commission in the Military Intelligence branch. After I completed the Basic Intelligence Officers Course I would be given the opportunity to put what I had learned and believed about leadership into practice. My first opportunity was as the Operations Security platoon leader in the 82nd Airborne Division. Much like what I would experience many years later in Afghanistan, many of the men under my command were experienced professional soldiers. A quarter of the platoon was made up of non-commissioned officers, either Staff Sergeants or Sergeants First Class; another quarter was made up of Chief Warrant Officers, former non-coms who had become intelligence specialists. Many of the Sergeants and Warrants were Vietnam veterans. The other half of the platoon was lower enlisted personnel with very different specialties and work responsibilities than those of the experienced personnel. This situation created a real dichotomy in the make-up of the unit in terms of experience level and maturity. I knew my leadership style would require some flexibility, and the experience I gained leading this diverse group of soldiers was probably the best I could have hoped for. As a new 2nd Lieutenant, I constantly had to calibrate how best to address a particular soldier or situation, and I think I became a better officer for the experience.
I did make mistakes, however. In one instance I was designated to lead a detachment of about 10 soldiers drawn from across the MI battalion to support the 2/508th infantry battalion during its rotation through the Army’s Jungle Warfare School in Panama. I met with the detachment soldiers to insure they knew all the operational and administrative details about our mission. The night when the soldiers were to report to me in front of their barracks, one of them, a PFC, arrived in a drunken state. Although from another platoon, I recognized him immediately. He had an unusually large head and because of the difficulty in fitting him with a standard helmet, he had been issued a test-bed version of a yet to be issued new helmet frequently referred to as the “Fritz” due to its similar look to the WWII-era German helmet. Given the size of his head and the distinctive helmet, he was hard to miss.
I was not happy that he had showed up drunk. In fact, I was pretty angry. I called the company First Sergeant who came down to the barracks. I told him I didn’t plan to take the soldier with me when we went down to the infantry battalion, saying he would be an embarrassment to the MI battalion and he was in no condition to participate in an airborne operation. The First Sergeant talked to the soldier, who said he was sorry and begged to be
allowed to go to the training in Panama. The First Sergeant and I stepped away to discuss the situation. He said the PFC was a good soldier, although he certainly had just screwed up. He also pointed out that it was going to be at least another 12 hours before we hit the silk over Panama and by then the soldier would be sober. The First Sergeant suggested I take the PFC down to the infantry battalion and talk to the company First Sergeant there and let him decide if he wanted him along. I was surprised that he was suggesting this course of action as I thought he probably would recommend disciplinary action be taken against the PFC. I liked and respected the First Sergeant, and while uncomfortable with the suggestion, I decided to follow his recommendation. Once down at the infantry battalion, which was assembling on a lighted football field, I laid out the situation to the First Sergeant there. He was a pretty rough looking soldier, with a haggard face and deep wrinkles in his forehead. A Combat Infantryman Badge and Master Parachutist Wings stitched onto his BDU’s, he looked like he had seen a lot in career. He walked over to the PFC and looked him up and down.
“Where the fuck did you get that damn helmet, soldier?” he asked.
“They gave it to me because my head’s too big for a regular helmet. The whole Army is going to get one in a couple of years,” the PFC said.
“Jesus Christ, your head’s too big?” The First Sergeant shook his head and chuckled. “Yeah I heard they’re going make us all look like a bunch of Germans. Thank God I’ll be gone by then. So you want to go to Panama, huh?”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
“Once we get in that plane you going to throw up on my men?”
“No, Sergeant, I’ll be okay.
“Alright, if you can show you can do a proper PLF (parachute landing fall) when we go through pre-jump you can go. But you better not fuck up down there. You’re with the infantry now.”