7
Leaders’ Recon

So we believe that the defeat of America is something achievable—with the permission of God—and it is easier for us—with the permission of God—than the defeat of the Soviet Empire previously.

—USAMA BIN LADEN, OCTOBER 21, 2001

Bernie’s radio check back to Bagram awoke us on the morning of December 8, 2001. We had stayed up late taking stock of our situation and had managed only an hour or two of sleep during a night that had been chilly and restless. We dug in our rucks for some MRE packets that would be a cold breakfast meal and grabbed bottles of water from a box outside the flimsy wooden door.

As we slowly came to life, I could not help thinking how lucky and proud we were to have been handed this mission. Here we were, thousands of miles away from Ground Zero in New York City, at the most extreme and sharpest end of the spear in the hunt for Usama bin Laden. We were enormously thankful for the opportunity.

It was going to be “fly by the seat of your pants” war fighting, in which it would be impossible to predict what might happen within the next hour, much less a day in advance. My formal military schooling had ended as a young infantry captain at Fort Benning in 1995, where the approved course curriculum contained little on the art of ambiguous and unconventional fighting while connected at the hip to some third world warlord.

This type of work, however, was practiced at the Special Warfare Center at Fort Bragg, and few officers understood it better than the Task Force Dagger commander, Colonel Mulholland, who did not like it at all. He had voiced his strong objections to going after al Qaeda in a mountainous environment with an unknown army of indigenous fighters and without a solid support structure in place. If things fell apart from here on out, nobody could blame Mulholland. He had sent up the red flags of warning.

Our own task force commander was not without his own reservations. General Dailey certainly could not be described as impetuous or flippant when the lives of his men were on the line.* In fact, the general leaned slightly toward the cautious side, as most prudent commanders often do. But Dailey also knew the opportunities to nail bin Laden were going to be few and far between, and killing bin Laden was the premier mission of the war to date, no doubt about it. It required a commander willing to take a deep breath, grasp the moment, suppress the high-risk nature of the mission, and let loose the dogs of war. Whether or not Dailey was personally comfortable with the whole deal or not was irrelevant. He had pulled the trigger, and we respected him for that.

We had been warned by the CIA guys the day before that General Ali was a master of doublespeak, and often talked in circles. He would promise the world, but rarely deliver if he did not see the promise as being useful or helpful to his own agenda. The more time we spent in Afghanistan working with indigenous fighters and warlords, the more we realized Ali’s behavior was far from unique. It was just common to the culture. You don’t obtain warlord status without being able to play both sides, and the middle, and around the edges, too.

On the surface, Ali was physically small, quiet, and unassuming. His formal schooling ended in the sixth grade, which meant little in this harsh environment. What did matter were the hard-knocks education, street experience, and the reputation he earned fighting the Soviets and rival tribes as a young mujahidee. These characteristics had produced a dangerous mix of politician, manager, and warlord who, when stirred sufficiently, became as cocky as a cornered rooster in a henhouse.

General Ali was in good spirits that morning, and was quick to praise his own efforts. His men “generally” had bin Laden surrounded and cut off from any support by the locals, and Ali strongly implied that escaping from Tora Bora was not an option for the al Qaeda leader. This was welcome news to us, for we did not have the manpower, or the permission, to surround the massive battlefield, and we didn’t expect a sizable infusion of reinforcements anytime soon.

We crossed our fingers and took the general’s declaration at face value, since it meshed with the fact that few other people believed the al Qaeda leader would cut and run. Indeed, early radio intercepts told us bin Laden wanted a fight in the mountains, which had been prepared so well in advance. Al Qaeda was confident it could stem the fighting spirit of their fellow Muslim adversaries so as to better focus attention on the American forces that were assumed to be coming.

So we had no reason to doubt that bin Laden wouldn’t fight to the death.

The Prophet Muhammad faced worse odds at the Battle of Badr in the seventh century, an event well known in Islamic circles. Muhammad’s army believed their victory against an overwhelming force of unbelievers was possible only by placing their fate in the hands of Allah.

Certainly, bin Laden, who repeatedly invoked the life, times, and sayings of Muhammad in his war against Crusaders and Jews, knew that a retreat in the face of onrushing kufars would expose him as a superficial follower of Allah’s will and an apostate himself.

After the aborted attempt to get a look at the front lines before running from the press, General Ali offered to take us to the front again this morning. The general said he had taken care of the media problem, so Bryan, Adam Khan, and I agreed to go. We had to go.

George went along as well, a good move, since Ali seemed to respect him. General Ali was not stupid. He knew that George held the large sums of money he so eagerly desired and he seemed to be figuring out that the newly arrived commandos represented his best chance of eliminating bin Laden. The body of Usama bin Laden, dead or alive, equaled a cool $25 million bonus.

This time, we jumped in Ali’s lime green SUV and departed the schoolhouse headed for the southern foothills along the western flank of the battlefield. A few minutes after crossing the dry streambed, Ali’s radio came alive. One of his forward commanders was begging him to stop the bombs from pounding their positions. A U.S. Air Force B-52 was overhead and supposedly their bombs were hitting the friendly muhj, having mistaken them for al Qaeda. Easy to do from 30,000 feet when everybody is dressed the same down here.

Ali pleaded for George to stop the bombing, and George looked at Bryan and me sitting in the backseat. “Can you guys get them to stop?”

“Uh, well, er, okay. Pull over,” I said. I jumped from the SUV, grabbed the handheld GlobalStar satellite phone from my belt and dialed up the guys back at Bagram, who quickly relayed the message.

Whether or not the word would make it all the way to the aircraft high above the clouds was anyone’s guess, but I jumped back in the vehicle and gave George a thumbs-up. Ali smiled and thanked us graciously, then radioed his forward commander, likely telling him the problem had been fixed. Bryan and I looked at each other with poker faces, savoring the moment as we rolled along, knowing that a B-52 could only carry so many bombs.

Sure enough, the bomber went Winchester—empty on ammo—and curled out of the area to return to its base. In a real sense, this unforeseen event likely raised our stock with Ali. Having some Americans who could order up or cancel falling bombs whenever they wanted might not be a bad idea after all.

We passed through the press with no problem that day, but not necessarily because of Ali’s promise the night before. More likely, most reporters were napping inside their tents after having stayed up all night awaiting a much anticipated drop of a giant BLU-82 bomb. The drop had been postponed several times already.

Developed in the 1960s to cut helicopter landing zones in the triplecanopy jungle of Vietnam, the fifteen-thousand-pound BLU-82 was tested during Desert Storm to clear minefields. Now receiving renewed attention in the new global war on terror, it had been yanked out of mothballs as a potential cave buster. If the $28,000 bomb, which was about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle, could nail bin Laden, or even scare the shit out of him, it came at a bargain price.

As we crept along a north-south narrow dirt road that skirted the edge of a major streambed, we passed small pockets of Ali’s fighters. We noticed among them a couple of light-skinned Afghans who wore lighter colored beards than the traditional dark-skinned locals. We learned they were from Nuristan Province, and their appearance gave us a little more confidence that we gringos might be able to fit into the surroundings.

The road ended a couple of kilometers farther south, where we dismounted and moved into the foothills. The air seemed thinner, even at this relatively low altitude, and we outlanders were forced to breathe more heavily while trying to hide the pounding of our hearts. Ali appeared to be immune to the physical strain.

After several hundred meters of tough ground, we reached two aging T-55 battle tanks and a T-62, all formerly Soviet property and now controlled by the muhj. They were ominously positioned, with a commanding view of the entire mountain range, their main gun tubes raised skyward as if they were ready to shoot rounds over the tall peaks and hit Pakistan. A couple of muhj crewmen were still asleep on the ground behind one of the tanks, wrapped in thin blankets. Two alert fighters had seen the general’s vehicle approaching and were on their feet, waving and smiling, certainly wondering who the hell the new light-skinned fellas accompanying Ali were.

Somewhere up in those beautiful White Mountains waited a thousand or more al Qaeda fighters, hunkered down and largely invisible to the American bombers circling overhead and invisible to us on the ground as well.

Bryan and I made a few notes, checked our maps a dozen times, and marked our location on our Garmin GPSs. Ali pointed to the bombers far above and said that if the bombers were not overhead, then al Qaeda mortars would be in full swing and certainly would have welcomed us by now.

He also mentioned that enemy snipers had been harassing his tank crews the last few days, which kept his men down behind the tanks or buttoned up inside. Ali seemed to be testing us, always alert to our reactions.

About twenty minutes later, we loaded into the vehicle and drove back through the journalists’ base camp again before turning south to head for the eastern front. The drive was quiet until we turned the last corner, where we came face-to-face with dozens of reporters mingling with muhj fighters.

As Adam Khan maneuvered to turn the vehicle around, we noticed two more tanks and a couple of armored personnel carriers. Whether or not they worked was anyone’s guess, but they apparently made excellent backdrops for the international picture-taking media. The news of a sweet photo spot must have spread quickly that morning. As we made our way back to the schoolhouse, we counted four more press vehicles crammed with reporters and photographers zooming past us, heading to the choice real estate and the collection of old armor before their next deadline.

As much as Ali’s inability to control the roaming scores of journalists and their paid local chogi boys had become a problem, the real issue was the questionable constraint placed on us by our higher headquarters. The requirement to not be seen or photographed by the press actually limited our freedom of movement more than the enemy did.

Both comical and frustrating at the same time, the snag prompted George to berate Ali a little. He reminded him again of the importance of keeping the presence of American commandos secret, for his own good and ours. Ali nodded in slight shame, and again shrugged his shoulders as if to say that he was unsure whether his men had carried out his order for media control. This is when we started to wonder if Ali’s orders were ever disseminated at all, much less enforced, or if such orders were more like advice to be taken or left at one’s whim.

For the second time in as many days, our attempts to conduct a solid reconnaissance of the battlefield had met with limited results, but that was about to change.

As we arrived at the schoolhouse, a notorious special guest was waiting for General Ali, the distinguished-looking rival warlord Haji Zaman Ghamshareek, the defense minister of the Eastern Shura and leader of a second opposition group of muhj. About a dozen of his fighters were with him. We vividly remembered that it had been Zaman’s boys who had tried to swipe our trucks just a few nights earlier.

In his fifties, Zaman was of average size, and his jet-black hair so noticeably contrasted with his close-cropped gray beard that I wondered whether he colored it. He wore a tan traditional Afghan wool hat and had a habit of talking with his hands, which exposed surprisingly well-manicured fingernails. He was well educated, and had at least an elementary command of the English language.

Zaman had been one of the more infamous mujahideen junior commanders during the Soviet-Afghan War. When the Taliban took over, Zaman departed Afghanistan for France. He had visited Alexandria, Virginia, numerous times over the years and was known to favor the bite of fine Johnny Walker Red scotch.

When the Taliban fell from grace after 9/11, the articulate and cunning warlord returned to his homeland to reclaim his former VIP status. He was said to have influential friends within neighboring Pakistan, including members of the Pakistani intelligence service.

Fundamentally, his rivalry with Ali stemmed from the desire of both men to be the sole ruler of Nangarhar Province in general, and the city of Jalalabad specifically.

Zaman was an ethnic Pashtun, whereas General Ali claimed allegiance to the minority Pashai tribe, which meant that he had to augment his small following of loyal fighters with men from other tribes. The recruitment effort could secure loyalty only as long as the daily CIA paycheck continued, highlighting the importance of keeping George happy. For the present, Zaman’s rival group of muhj was allied with, but subordinate to, Ali’s command for this particular battle. Keeping all of the players straight was going to be difficult.

It did not take a master of observation to notice the high tension between the two warlords and their men as Ali and Zaman met on the front porch and shared some tea. After a few minutes of the usual meaningless pleasant welcoming, they were arguing on a subject unknown to us, so George and Adam Khan joined them.

Zaman was disagreeing with Ali’s tactics. He felt that relying solely on heavy bombing without threatening al Qaeda with maneuver forces was a mistake. Zaman even pressed Ali to employ the new American commandos immediately. All of that was good news to us. Should we be dealing with this guy instead?

Zaman then offered to take us right up to the front, all the way up, to get a better look. He confidently said there would be no problems with the press.

Ali balked. Making the same trip again unnerved him, but after some squabbling between the two, Zaman seemed to have shamed Ali into it. Were they playing chicken?

Ali agreed to go, but he was adamant that the number of vehicles be limited to reduce the attention we would surely receive from both al Qaeda and the press.

As the bickering came to an end, I put in a fresh wad of Redman leaf chew and hopped in the general’s SUV to head to the front. Zaman ignored Ali’s desire to limit the number of vehicles, so our lime green SUV was just one of eight vehicles making the trip, and every pickup truck was jam-packed with gun-toting muhj.

Officially, all of them were Ali’s fighters, but some were more loyal to Zaman. The other warlord seemed more aggressive, but Adam Khan told us after the meeting that Ali had accused Zaman of allowing forty Arabs to pass through his lines and escape into Pakistan last night. Zaman vehemently denied it. Keeping score of who was doing what to whom was difficult.

Enemy spotters high in the mountains must have laughed at the massive dust trail created by our line of slow-moving vehicles. Forget a stealthy approach. They saw us coming. The general was noticeably flustered, and bitched and moaned about Haji Zaman during the entire trip, calling Zaman a “politician” who was only interested in personal fame and fortune.

We took a slightly different route this time in hopes of bypassing the press, but no luck. The media seemed to have every road into Tora Bora covered. Nonetheless, we pressed on through and continued to the front.

Well past the press, the convoy stopped along the right edge of the narrow dirt road, and General Ali, George of the CIA, Adam Khan, and I moved up the high ground to get a look over the hill toward the front lines. I looked skyward in hopes of seeing reassuring signs of aircraft contrails. None!

Haji Zaman arrived with several of his men and started to point out the enemy positions. His English was not much better than a first-grader’s, but it was good enough for me to understand as he briefed us on the lay of the battlefield.

While we stood there, a single enemy mortar round dropped in about a hundred meters to our front right and exploded. Zaman said it was a 120mm, but to me it seemed more like an 82mm. It had landed too far away to hit us and I thought that we were just out of range, that the gunners had given it everything they had, but didn’t make it.

The incident spurred Zaman to complain of how he had been unable to find and destroy the enemy mortars that had plagued them for a week. That assessment jived with Ali’s.

Not long afterward, six or seven more mortar rounds landed and detonated simultaneously to our front, this time only about fifty meters away. The smoke signature revealed a linear sheaf of impacts spread across roughly five hundred meters. This was textbook work—a single tube firing a spotter first round, then multiple tubes using that one to adjust range and fire for effect. This signaled three things to me.

First, al Qaeda certainly had us under observation from somewhere up in the mountains. Second, there definitely was more than one mortar tube at work. Third, and most important, was that these were not being operated by just some bums hastily dropping rounds down the tubes: The crews obviously were well versed in the finer points of indirect fire and trained in bipod and bubble manipulation.

Zaman and Ali were standing by their vehicles, kind of yelling at each other, a useless sort of bickering that would prove to be routine every time they got together. The only words I recognized in their rapidfire conversation were “al Qaeda, al Qaeda.”

With wild arm gestures, Zaman was daring General Ali to venture closer to the front lines and see for himself why they had not been able to get past the dug-in defenses and al Qaeda trenches. Ali clearly was uncomfortable and didn’t want to continue.

“Ask the American commando what he thinks,” Zaman barked.

I told them both that the current observation posts did not offer enough views to support an advance deeper into the mountains. I still needed a firsthand look at the battlefield to refine our plan of action.

As soon as Zaman understood that I still wanted to go forward, he told his men to get into their pickups. The cautious Ali once again said he did not think it wise to go farther, now adding the reason that darkness was near.

Zaman, as a further insult to Ali, invited me to ride with him, an offer that I declined. Our convoy crawled south another three hundred meters before Ali decided caution was the better part of valor and stopped his vehicle again. When Zaman saw that in his rearview mirror, he also stopped and came back on foot. Another heated discussion erupted between the two muhj warlords, with Adam Khan refereeing and translating. Ali tried in vain to raise one of his subordinate commanders up ahead over the radio.

“What do you want to do, Dalton?” Adam Khan asked.

Nothing had changed for me. “Tell them I absolutely must get a look at the enemy positions. It’s critical to see what lies ahead. If it will get things going, then I’ll get in with Zaman and link up with you guys later.”

Zaman liked that idea and smiled broadly, which made Ali even more nervous. “The general is deeply worried about getting George and you hurt,” Adam Khan offered. “He believes he will be blamed.”

“Do you really need to go any farther?” asked George, who was frustrated with the whole show and its accompanying histrionics. He already knew the answer.

That left Ali as the sole vote against moving up. He didn’t like it, but gave in, and the little convoy headed deeper into the base of the mountains.

Another three hundred meters. Another stop. It was time to ditch those mortar magnets, the vehicles, and continue forward on foot, which neither warlord was keen to do. They finally agreed on something—that it was getting dangerous.

The muhj dismounted and the vehicles were taken around the hill to a position out of the enemy’s view, while we headed for the southern hilltop that overlooked the al Qaeda positions. Zaman and George were to our right and a little below us as Ali, Adam Khan and I climbed on the east side of the approach.

Finally, however, we had reached a worthwhile spot. From a military tactician’s point of view, the terrain to our front was ugly for an attacking force. We had been told that al Qaeda held the advantage of the high ground and assumed they were well positioned to thwart any advance on foot. After seeing it firsthand, all doubts were gone. Numerous positions provided al Qaeda interlocking fields of fire and excellent observation of anyone approaching. For the attackers, plenty of defilade offered respite from direct fire but not from the high angle of mortar rounds. We were about to get proof of that.

As we talked about the enemy dispositions, several of Zaman’s fighters took cover behind some large rocks and others hurried down the hill a bit and went prone. I had heard nothing to warrant such an action, but they had picked up the telltale muffled thump, thump, thump of mortar rounds leaving their launch tubes. Our short advance had brought us within range.

Within a few seconds, the mortar rounds came raining down and impacted between our vehicles and where we were standing. The barrage lasted at least two minutes and flung rock, shrapnel, and soil in all directions at blistering speeds. The sound was deafening, and all too personal.

When I looked back, the smack-talking Zaman and all his men had taken cover, but General Ali had not moved. My first inclination was to get my rear end down, but Ali was showing no fear, and stood steady only a few feet from me, which meant I was going to stand firm, too.

A slight smirk was on the general’s face as he stared directly into my eyes. He was at ease, almost as if he had been in this situation many times before. OK, I got it, he was brave, but it seemed crazy not to take cover. We had too much riding on this guy to risk having him shredded by some random mortar round just to show up his rival warlord and the visiting Americans.

Ali heatedly resumed discussing the mortars with Zaman, who was cowering on his knees behind a large rock formation. Several more rounds dropped in and exploded so close by that we were both momentarily knocked off balance, but still remained upright. I couldn’t tell if Ali was still testing me, or if he was simply placing his life in Allah’s hands—a customary gesture expected of a mujahideen commander in battle.

Ali screamed at Zaman, waving his free hand in the air while clutching his radio tightly in the other hand. It was obvious that Ali wanted to leave immediately and probably was telling Zaman that it had been foolish to come this far. Made sense to me.

In beween the impacting of more mortar rounds, the irate general called out, “Look at the vehicles. Who is going to retrieve them?”

Apparently he decided the answer to that question was Adam Khan, who suddenly asked me to hold his AK-47.

“What the hell are you doing?” I demanded. This was getting silly. Adam Khan, in my mind, was just as important to the mission as General Ali.

“The general asks that I get the vehicle,” he calmly said.

“Whoaaa! Adam Khan, you are way too important to this gig,” I said. “I recommend that you part with a thousand dollars and have one of the muhj go get it.”

Adam Khan shook his head and gave a little smile, knowing better than to take my recommendation. The money was no big deal to me, a Westerner, but offering money to some common soldier to act in a dangerous situation would be regarded as an egregious slight on his courage. Another matter of cultural pride.

General Ali changed his mind and ordered one of his bodyguards to retrieve the vehicle. Deciding to build a little bit on the image that had just been explained, I told the general that I, not Adam Khan, would go along with the young fighter.

We ran around the hilltop toward the vehicles, and two more rounds impacted nearby. I crossed the road and took up an overwatch position with my weapon as the fighter broke for the general’s vehicle. Another round exploded near the trucks, and this blast threw him down like he was sliding into second base to beat the catcher’s throw. Shrapnel had given him a slight wound in the thigh, but he popped back up and hopped forward until he reached the general’s SUV. The explosion had blown out the rear window.

I went back to Adam Khan and Ali and tried to explain the obvious—that it was time to stop arguing and start moving. We were definitely under enemy observation, and they had a bead on our location.

It was crazy. I was talking fast, Adam Khan was translating, mortar rounds were bursting all around, Zaman appeared to be frozen in fear, crouched behind his rock, and General Ali just stood there doing whatever it was that he was doing. The sparring warlords seemed quite content just to yap at each other while the enemy was trying to kill us all. Neither was giving any commands, which left everything at a standstill, not a good move on any active battlefield.

If they would not issue orders, then I would. I told them to move their fighters to the back side of the hill, to our rear, and have them spread out. This would get them out of sight of the al Qaeda OPs. I also said not to worry about the vehicles until it got dark, but as Adam Khan translated this, it was immediately obvious that my suggestion was going to be ignored. Mortars or no mortars, these people wanted their vehicles. They were not walking home.

Having come this far, I decided to get a still better look while the mortars were searching for other targets. As the muhj took off running for safety, General Ali, Adam Khan, and I went the other way, crouched over and moving farther up the hill. We crested it just enough to observe the enemy trenches, and were actually eyeballing the enemy’s forwardmost lines.

We hoped for some signature of a mortar tube firing or to spot any movement of al Qaeda fighters. No luck! Al Qaeda was smart. They didn’t expose themselves. No need to, really, as they knew we were not there to conduct an attack.

Some more mortar rounds looped overhead and impacted behind us and wounded two of Zaman’s fighters, prompting the warlord to shake off his paralysis before pleading with us to leave the battlefield. The idiotic game to see who was the braver of the two was definitely over.

Earlier, Zaman had questioned Ali’s bravery. Now, the shoe was on the other foot. Ali appeared almost comfortable under fire. As Adam Khan translated, I tried to share with the general the concept of creeping mortar fire, but now that Zaman had blinked first, Ali was also ready to leave. We all took off down the hill.

But we were still in range. As soon as we reached the others, another mortar round landed only fifteen meters away with a tremendous roar. This provided good motivation for us to continue another hundred meters or so, when we saw the lime green SUV and the other vehicles, waiting with the engines humming. We jumped into whatever vehicle had room in a classic Keystone Kops free-for-all and the convoy sped north along the narrow dirt road.

In days to come, this area became known as Mortar Hill, because it was a vital piece of terrain that any attacking force had to transit before attacking the dug-in al Qaeda positions. The trip to the front had been more than worth the risk. Now I knew what we were facing.

As we approached Press Pool Ridge, we found Ali’s gutsy young nephew waiting in the middle of the road. He walked over to the general’s window and handed him a small shiny video camera taken from one of the photographers. The general was having trouble trying to figure the thing out, so I offered to help.

I flipped open the side screen and rewound the saved footage. As the tape began to play I turned the volume to max so all could listen.

A horrific scene unfolded, gruesome and personally saddening for Ali. The camera zoomed in on a few of Ali’s men who had been killed or captured and executed somewhere in the mountains. All were dead and half naked.

The screen went blue for a moment before showing a couple of older men placing two large brown burlap bags on the ground. The camera zoomed in closer as their hands unrolled the outer edges of the bag to expose the contents. Body parts!

Ali sat motionless as the screen blued out again. He bowed his head, and softly said, “We have had no word of these brothers for days. I thought they had changed loyalties.” The mystery was solved.

George of the CIA secured the tape for intelligence reasons and handed the camera back to Ali, who leaned out his window and gave it back to his nephew. Warn that Western reporter, he said, but take no action. Should he be caught a second time with this sort of material, the general would be less understanding.

* Retired Lieutenant General Dell Dailey’s exploits as the JSOC commander are well recounted in numerous books by various authors. In Jawbreaker, Gary Berntsen shares his personal interaction with Dailey during the opening days of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. In Sean Naylor’s Not a Good Day to Die, and in Cobra II, by Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor, the friction between Delta and Dailey is shared in detail.