Tim’s been bugging me to write a summary post for all you readers wondering what became of us. (Most of us are all the way home now and struggling to catch up on sleep while making an appearance at our “day jobs”.) In short, we accomplished an awful lot and collectively recorded about 250GBs of photos and 30 hours of high def video – which has made it impossible to write a “short summary”. Tim would want me to point out that it hasn’t cost the tax paying citizens of any country a single dime/rand/quid/eyrir.
PART 1: A $400,000,000 $40,000 SURGE
On our last full day we alternated among frantically finishing projects, collecting stuff for the trip home, and seeing more stuff. We’re all a little sad to leave, there’s so much to do, could do. The guesthouse was bursting at the seams, and even though some of the FabFolk were stuffed three to a room, that, in and of itself made it fun. It’s like camp for grown up little geeks.
We’ve chased away the other Taj guests from the dining table by playing with our “Hundred Dollar Laptop”s with built-in Pashto keyboards… while eating dinner. We charge the laptops at the Fablab and loan them out for users to take home or on field trips.
The financial load was pretty hefty for a bunch of unemployed / students. I’m often asked to post our costs but I’ve been resisting for several reasons, the most of which is that I don’t want to seem like we’re complaining about our travel costs. We’d much rather see contributions going directly to FabLab users and infrastructure.
To bring the FabFi and other projects to the state it’s at, we’ve spent a total of about $40,000 where the bulk of that is travel costs across two trips (one in November and one in January).
Materials costs for three links were well under $1000:
$60 plywood
$20 chicken wire / screening
$40 staple gun, staples, gaffers tape, rope, etc.
$350 network routers (aprox $50 each)
$40 12V batteries and chargers
$60 network cables, jacks, crimper tool, etc
$50 phone sim cards and top-up cards
$60 wireless web cam (used for signal source when pointing)
$120 wi-spy (used as spectrum analyzer when pointing)
Average travel costs per person for what has been called the Fab Surge is about $4,000. In an ideal world, these costs would have been reimbursable.
$180 Afghanistan visa
$100 travel medical insurance
$100 travel medicines, vaccines, etc.
$2,000 – $2,500 Flight from USA to Dubai, return
$680 flight from Dubai to Kabul, return
$100 travel from Kabul to Jalalalabad by car
$630 guesthouse lodging fee (a special shared rate by cramming multiple people into rooms)
$20-$50 travel to/from home airport
(There is an additional $150-250 that each person has likely spent on random things to include internet access at Heathrow/Amsterdam/Delhi or postage fees of passports and so on)
In addition, all together we spent about $750 in excess baggage and/or shipping mostly for FabFi and video/photo gear, and we’ve used about $200 in DV tapes.
Additionally, Tim Lynch and Shem Klimiuk from Free Range International haven’t charged us a cent for several weeks worth of armed expat security work as well as rides to and fro. We never would have been able to cover those costs out of our pockets. Fortunately I think we’re a little bit entertaining to Tim and Shem and they kind of like us. But they have to fit us in with their day jobs which hasn’t been the most convenient for either side.
Perhaps the biggest cost that’s difficult to put a value on is the unpaid time. For some of us, our employers or universities did not want the liability of their student/staff in Afghanistan so we all had to quit and go on unpaid leave. For others, they were unemployed but could have been employed in the time they spent preparing for the trip (for example, Keith put in a solid 2 months of 100-hour weeks rather than, you know, working for pay.) That’s impossible to really put a price on.
One of the reasons we were so productive is because we’re individually experienced at what we do. You can’t throw newbies out into the field with no mentoring and expect them to do anything that doesn’t read like Lord of the Flies… and that’s if you’re lucky and they do anything at all. And not to pat myself on the back too much, but just as important is to put together a complementary team focused on a well defined set of goals.
Which is the biggest lesson I desperately hope someones out there learns. Never before in history has there been a significantly large population of educated, skilled, experienced, young talent with a semi-disposable income willing and eager to do professional work for little or no pay and even some that will spend their own funds. You have to provide a minimum infrastructure for them to come, and help offset some of the costs they just couldn’t bear. You have to rally them around an idea, spin a coherent vision and place them and their contributions squarely in focus. They won’t accept a mission that doesn’t make sense or isn’t technically or socially viable – and they’re more than competent to develop rational opinions that will need to be vetted and addressed. They will walk away from half-baked plans so you better be ready with supporting data for your claims; but once they buy into the vision they will autonomously meet mission with focus and intensity. It costs much less in dollars than you think.
Those few of us that have come to Afghanistan over the last few months represent a small part of the larger Fab Folk community. We are from many different nationalities and ancestries. Most of us have technical or professional degrees and advanced degrees. All of us have worked in the real world. We are generally between 25-35 years old, male and female.
Ryan from Hawaii and 6th grade boys from Bagrami. Ryan has a PhD from MIT in Urban Planning and is now working on the Hawaii airport light rail project. Ratafullah, the boy on the left, is the leader among equals of the T-shirt Club.Andreas and Lucy from DC getting the OLPCs ready for a mini-lesson. Lucy has a BS in Biochemistry, MS in Applied Anatomy & Physiology, is former Navy, and is a DOD analyst.Andreas from Iceland (but lives in Argentina) installing the downlink at the Public Hospital. Andreas has BS in Math from University of Iceland, is working on an MS Math at the University of Amsterdam and works as a computer virus disassembler/analyst.Said Jalal from Bagrami and Steve from Seattle atop the water tower near the long haul link from the Fab Lab. Said Jalal is a high school student. Steve recently worked in the Dean’s office in the MIT Sloan School and is now in Seattle goofing off — restoring and flying WW2 era aircraft.Smari from Iceland concentrating hard while peaking an antenna in Jalalabad City. Smari studied Mathematics at the University of Iceland and is currently working as an IT projects manager.Carl from South Africa and Naqueeb from Jalalabad/Peshawara configuring and peaking a router. Carl is currently a Physics / Math PhD student at Cambridge University in the UK. Dr. Naqueeb just passed his exams in the Medical School in Jalalabad.Keith from Boston tethering down an antenna on the water tower for the downlink to the hospital. Keith has a BS in Biomedical Engineering Sciences from Harvard and most recently helped found a medical devices startup.That’s me, Amy, with what seems to be a perpetual cadre of inquisitive kids excited to learn by day and (sometimes) friendly ANA soldiers by night . I’m an American and I live in Boston. I have a dual BSes in Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering from Purdue, an MS from MIT, am working on a PhD from MIT, and have more than 10 years experience as a defense engineer… and have been on the Fab Lab ride since 2002.
The FabLabs all over the globe are magnets for us, offering technological infrastructure nearly as good as (and often better than) what we have available at home. We’re big-brained bugs flitting about bright pinpricks of light we don’t need lush hotels, gourmet cooks, or shiny cars. Most of us don’t even have TVs at home. More and more of us are coming of age every day, seeking and searching for light.
Smari, Lucy, Carl, Andreas, Steve, Keith, Amy… enjoying a proper spot of tea.
The Fab Folk continue to work like demons to maximize their time on the ground. Yesterday they had successful test shots with their fabricated internet antennas to both a local NGO and the Nangarhar Public Hospital. They work every evening setting up the XO laptops they have sent in and early each morning they meet for a couple of hours to learn Pashto. Their teacher comes from the local school and is a life-long resident of the local village. He tells me that, despite the very mild winter we have had to date, that poverty is driving people to desperate measures. Frequently voices call out to him from the shadows at night “we are Taliban give us your wallet, watch and cell phone.” They are not Taliban but men he has known for years. I asked why this was happening because our understanding of Pashtun culture would prohibit such gross criminality inside one’s own community. “Yes this is true but we are now so poor that the elders do not ask young men where they got this or where they got that they praise them instead for bringing anything of value which will ease their poverty.” This is just a hint at the amount of tension under the surface of a population located in one of the more affluent portions of Afghanistan. Across the river at Little Barabad (official name) or Tutikas (the villagers do not like the official name) the villagers cut down their large shade tree which served as the communal meeting place and picnic site. The wood is not for them – it was sold to a “rich man” to generate cash to buy medicine for several of the children.
We have been running the road to Kabul a lot as of late taking people to and from the Airport in Kabul. A couple of days ago we took Dr. Dave and Dr. Art Mendoza back to Kabul for their flight home and saw the aftermath of a big fight the night before. We were warned prior to leaving by another security firm (we share all intel at all times in the field) that there had been much fighting outside Gamberi and sure enough when we got to the point in the road where the Afghan National Army (ANA) and Afghan National Police (ANP) had set up on the shoulders we saw this:
Apparently a group of Armed Opposition Group (AOG) fighters sneaked up the draw between the ANA and ANP positions and shot up the truck above with small arms and RPG’s. They then fired at both the ANP positions to their west and the ANA positions to their east before withdrawing across the Kabul River. The ANA and ANP spent the next hour or so firing at each other. By the time we rolled past the ANA had taken their casualties and withdrawn leaving the poor police to sit in their shallow little holes to suck up all the rain we have been getting of late.
We are convinced that somebody in Laghaman Province is running an RPG gunners school because we see reports of RPG-only attacks on police posts along this portion of the road every 4 to 5 weeks. Normally they volley 10 rounds in rapid succession and withdraw causing little to no damage. But we know there is at least one RPG mechanic out there (most likely in Laghaman) who can really put some English on his rockets and make very difficult shots consistently. I bet he has a group of students he is working with and what better way to train them then to take on the softest of soft targets like the silly deployment of ANA and ANP forces five feet off the main road? You could tell just by looking at them they had no fire plans, no fire control measures, and probably no plan at all. What they need is not more PowerPoint lectures from DynCorp contractors they need mentors with them in the field and there are not enough here.
Yesterday I was returning from dropping off James the Marine and because I had no choice had to make the return drive alone. As I rounded the Mahipar Pass I saw a wall of trucks pulled off to the side which indicated some sort of blockage in the tunnel. I drove far enough to get a look before turning around and saw it was a U.S. Army convoy stopped right in the middle of the pass. Once the traffic stops flowing in Afghanistan it is very difficult to start it going again because all the east bound traffic will move into every nook and cranny available to their front and block the road. It takes a good hour to get them out of your way so that a convoy can move again. But I was ready checking my wallet to find 100 Euros there I turned around and headed back to the German PX at the ISAF camp outside Kabul to score some premium German beer (at only 12 euro a case) figuring if I had to drive back in the dark I might as well do so with a truck load of beer.
Sure enough when I made it back to the Mahipar Pass it was clear and I was smoothly driving for the next 45 minutes until I got outside Surobi. Rounding a corner I saw all the trucks parked in the right lane and taking the left lane I moved far enough down to see the same convoy parked in the middle of the road. They sat there for 30 minutes and then took another 30 minutes to get moving before stopping again maybe five miles down the road. I had worked my way up to the front of the line by then and 45 minutes into this stop I approached the convoy tail gunner to ask if they would let me through. He got on the radio and in a few minutes said “no because the road to the front is blocked (by the west bound traffic) and I couldn’t make it through anyway.” I asked him what the problem was and he replied “don’t know” which is exactly the correct answer because he has no business telling me a damn thing just because I’m a lone American with a CAC card. He brushed me off without a moment’s hesitation like a real pro I like seeing that kind of heads up thinking by our troops.
But the longer we sat the more upset the locals behind me became. Soon the sound of a thousand car horns filled the air. Over a hundred men were now standing around my vehicle trying to get the ANA troops to let them pass. As is usually the case there were several fluent English speakers amongst them and they came over to chat me up about what was happening. I was as pissed as they were and being a poltroon by nature freely admitted this. Then out of the crowd came a man with a very sick looking child and I was pressed into service to intervene on his behalf. I walked over to the tail gunner and asked if a vehicle with a medical emergency could get through. He asked how many more vehicles contain people with medical emergencies and I glanced back saw about a thousand vehicles stacked up behind me and said “probably about a thousand” which made the kid laugh. Again correct response from the tail gunner who seems like a great trooper because if you let one vehicle through the rest will follow TIA this is Afghanistan. To make a long story short it took me five hours to get back to the Taj. Several more times the American convoy stopped and each time the fluent English speaker from Leeds England came up to stand near my car. That is a very Pashtun thing to do he was watching out for me to ensure none of the drivers behind took out their frustrations on the lone American in their midst. Not that I thought this would occur but it was a nice gesture.
The struggle of the average Afghan to find enough to eat; the continued lack of performance by the Afghan security forces and the inability of the ISAF military to operate amongst the Afghans without treating every civilian they come in contact with as a crazed jihadist killer are linked. The United States and her allies have spent billions in Afghanistan and have very little to show for it. Afghanistan is currently in a death spiral not because of a lack of aid funds but rather how those funds have been spent and allocated. Every indication we see on the ground is that more money will be thrown into the same failed programs currently being implemented; another demonstration that we have not learned any meaningful lessons.
The reason these programs won’t work is that they are off the shelf solutions designed to make the lives of bureaucrats and contracting officers easy rather than bringing assistance to the Afghans. The Department of State has spent 2.5 BILLION bringing in police trainers, jail guard trainers, and lawyers to train the judges. Now what the hell does anyone at DynCorp or PAE know about Afghan police or Afghan jurisprudence? Nothing of course but that is not why they win these large lucrative contracts it is because they already have large lucrative contracts and therefore know how to work with DS contracting officers to make their lives easier. What is the return on our investment? After the large scale jail break in Kandahar last summer investigators discovered there were over 100 illegal cell phones in the hands of inmates. When we capture important Taliban leaders and send them to the main Afghan jail at Pul-i-Charki they are often back home before the soldiers who delivered them. The Afghan police are unreliable and prone to preying on the population. The current Afghan government is more of a problem than a solution. It is being out-governed by the Taliban in the many districts under Taliban control. Who “built capacity” with these Taliban? How many billions of dollars were spent teaching the Taliban to administer justice and civil control so effectively?
What the State department did was to use off the shelf solutions which had nothing to do with the situation in Afghanistan and everything to do with what was easy for the Department of State. After all when you spend all your time in Afghanistan locked inside a gigantic posh embassy compound how in the world would you know what the Afghans need? You are forced to work through the Afghan government and have any of you ever read one news story about the Afghan government that was not about the appalling amount of corruption found at every level in every ministry? I would say you have not but as an insider I will tell you there is one ministry the ministry of aviation is every bit as honest and effective as its international counterparts. In fact the Afghans working in that ministry are more honest than any politician to be found within 153 miles of Chicagobut I digress.
The State Department is and has been the lead agency in Afghanistan and their performance here is every bit the fiasco as their performance in Iraq. Remember that Paul Brenner was a compromise President Bush made between Foggy Bottom and the Pentagon he gave the boys at state a year to get Iraq back on its feet but Brenner used his 12 months to destroy the country and hamstring our military. He unilaterally made decisions for which we paid in American blood. The price tag for his incompetence paid by the Iraqis is probably beyond measure. Colin Powell, who foisted Brenner upon Iraq had more to do with the fiasco portion of that war than Rumsfeld but you’d have to do some serious archival research to know it because the nitwits in the MSM would not in a million years burden the people of America with good honest reporting which strayed from their preferred narrative.
That is not to say that the US Military has demonstrated the capacity, tactical flexibility, or ability to assess the situation on the ground, learn from past mistakes, and formulate a strategic framework under which all operations in Afghanistan can be conducted. They have not and we are risking another Vietnam and I am not talking about getting beaten by the rag tag assortment of Taliban and neo Taliban on the field of battle. I am talking about having the American peoples will to fight crippled by a media who are able to reveal that the Generals are spinning tales that are as stupid and uninformed as the old “five O’ Clock follies” in Saigon were back in Vietnam. Let me make this point clear I am not critical of the American (or any other ISAF) soldier who is over here doing his duty. Every one of them volunteered to join a military at war and their grit, determination to do what is right and courage are commendable. I am critical of the generals who seem unable to implement the very doctrine they tout as the answer to the counterinsurgency battle. I am not the only one who sees things this way please take the time to read this excellent piece by a retired Army Colonel who is much better writer than I am. He is calling for a massive forced retirement amongst American General Officers which would be a smart move given their lackluster performance and one with serious historical precedent.
The only reason we are not at the point where the American people start to treat their military in the manner it was treated in the early seventies is that our media is even more incompetent than the Department of State or the Pentagon. If we had the same type of reporters as the ones who worked Vietnam year in and year out they would be able to throw the BS flag at every single briefing they are given because the things I hear the big Army saying about the situation here are flat out nonsense. This situation will not last much longer. The drive by media is starting to get a clue as I saw when talking with Martha Raddatz the Senior Foreign Affairs Correspondent from ABC news. The only thing stopping her from getting a really comprehensive first hand view of how silly the DS and military approach is to this conflict is her own silly corporate “force protection” rules. But she got an earful from me and spent a few hours roaming about the countryside like the thousands of other internationals who live and work here. Not that you can do that in every district or province in Afghanistan there are many where it would now be suicidal for a westerner to walk around knowing where you are safe and where you are not is the most basic function of military intelligence. Why we cannot figure that out and act accordingly is beyond me.
Here is the connection to my rambling observations. If our billions of dollars went to implement the infrastructure improvements which the Afghans at the district level have been pleading for during the last six to seven years you could instantly start employing massive amounts of idle unemployed men. But you cannot do this with the Department of Sate contracting vehicles nor through large, bloated, international companies like Louis Berger or DynCorp or PAE or KBR or any of the other current “implementers” who are receiving most of the reconstruction monies. You need a company like Louis Berger to build big things like hydro electric dams, posh embassy compounds, or international airports. You do not need Louis Berger to build roads and schools. The Afghans can do that themselves. You also don’t need the nitwits of Foggy Bottom deciding how to implement a reconstruction plan because what you get is what the average Afghan sees now. Lots of police posts, government office building and training bases being built for the very people and organizations who abuse them, steal from them and fail to protect them from other (non uniformed) criminals or the Taliban. The only way forward are civil military teams who are embedded into the community, who stay in the community and who are able to green light and supervise Afghan designed and built irrigation, road, and micro hydro projects. An excellent prototype of exactly this kind of team was working in Afghanistan back in the early days before Big Army came and put all the SF teams back inside the large FOB’s. It will be the topic of my next post.
Let me stress something my friends and that is time is running out for us in Afghanistan. Soon the MSM is going to discover they are missing a great opportunity to play in their favorite game of pin the tail on the Pentagon spokesman. They are still sore at the military for making them collectively look like a bunch of know-nothing amateurs back in 2003 during the massive military embed for the storming of Iraq.
I asked the local headmaster what he was going to do about the highway men who lurk in the shadows around Bagrami but he said it is no longer a problem and would say no more. That means the Taliban have stepped in and are now active right behind my guesthouse. In time we will have to reach some sort of accommodation with them. We are not going to be attacked because the local people would not allow it and the Talibs, if they are here, are local people too. Plus we have excellent fields of fire, Pashin (not Pashtun) tribal fighters for guards and lots of guns and ammo. Local Talibs do not attack hard targets like us for good reason they are trying to feed their families too and will be of little use to them if they get “seriously kilt” by the Free Rangers at FOB Taj. We are probably teaching their kids in the Fab Lab; in fact I know we are. But This Is Afghanistan and if they are here it is going to cost me more damn money to be left alone. Just as in Chicago, you have to pay to play and just as in Chicago one check will not cover the entire bill if you know what I mean.
The Fab Lab team has arrived and is now hard at work. They are blogging daily and you can monitor their progress here. They’re doing cool stuff like fabricating antenna’s to share our fatpipe with the local schools and NGO’s. They’re raising money to buy XO Laptops for every 6th grader in the local (Bagrami) school. They’re setting the local kids up with a tee shirt business to fund the Jalalabad FabLab operations and the local kids are beside themselves with opportunity that just landed on their doorstep.
Amy and her roommate Keith from Harvard – the Fab Lab advance party
We have had to run up to Kabul and back several times to get all the Fab Folk to Jalalabad. The Jalalabad to Kabul road is a vitally important supply route to both the military and the government of Afghanistan. There were several attacks on the road this past summer and there continues to be problems on it now despite the winter weather. We saw several interesting things along the route and the first was the number of French Army troops transiting from Kabul to Surobi.
French troops on the road outside of Kabul
Surobi is a large hamlet half way between Kabul and Jalalabad, last August the French suffered a humiliating defeat in the Uzbin valley which is just to the north of Surobi. The town has long been considered to be sympathetic if not supportive of Gulbiddin Hekmatyar and his party Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin (HiG.) We see sunburned adult males with high-water trousers, tennis shoes, and black turbans every time we pass through Surobi. They could be Sheppard’s or gold miners but it’s a safe bet their Taliban fighters hitting Surobi in for in-country R&R (rest and recreation).
The French have been serious about establishing a presence in Surobi since their first unfortunate encounter with the Taliban. They are keeping units in the field 24/7; have launched several operations which have netted some prominent local commanders (according to UN incident reporting). It’s good to see our ISAF allies taking the initiative, going on the offensive and clearing out such an important area.
But after you clear an area you have to hold it and it will be interesting to see how (or if) they do that. The operations in Surobi are not impacting the repeated attacks on the Kabul/Jalalabad road – with one exception. We’ve heard from reliable sources they tracked down and killed The Mechanic. It appears to be true too because it’s been months since we’ve seen his signature long range pin point RPG shots nailing tankers. The tankers are still getting nailed but only other portions of the road that allow ambush from rifle and machinegun range.
As noted in previous posts these occur in the Tangi valley area east of Surobi and in portions of Laghman Province below the Tangi. Both the ANP and ANA have posted small units along the road to augment the numerous permanent police posts. As you can see from the pictures below the positions they have set up are weak at best and their patrol routine, which appears to be sitting by the side of the road, is not proving very effective.
Typical ANP deployment on the Jbad – Kabul roadANA machine gun crew – they are not dug in and they don’t move so they do not really accomplish much
Here is an intel report from one of the PSC’s (the private security companies in Afghanistan do a lot of intel sharing with each other.)
Laghman Province, Qarghayi District, Route 1-area of Tangy
AOG Vehicle Checkpoint 05 January 2009, between 1630-1700 hrs
A doctor who works for a NGO was returning to Jalalabad from Kabul alone in his private car, when his vehicle was forced to stop by a group of armed men. The doctor was then questioned about his work and personal behaviour. He was finally allowed to proceed unharmed when, on seeing the cassette player in the vehicle, the armed men instructed the doctor to play a cassette found in the vehicle. The cassette played was a religious tape and satisfied the requirements of those who had stopped the car. Despite reported increased security force deployments, this is the third reported instance of AOG activity on Route 1 in the Tangy area since 31 Dec 08. All three incidents have occurred in daylight hours and two have been attacks on military vehicles. These incidents should demonstrate to all the risk of travel along Route 1 between Kabul-Jalalabad at any time of day. Any international staff using Route 1 should expect further instances such as that outlined in this report and seek alternative means of travel between Jalalabad-Kabul.
Along with the above report, we have made several trips the past few days along the route. A few ANA vehicles have been pulled off the side of the road about half way back to Kabul, and the soldiers were in a defensive posture behind their vehicles, weapons pointed at the high ground. Most likely some pot shots taken at the ANA as they passed thru.
The Kabul to Jalalabad route is one of the most important in Afghanistan. The effort being expended to secure this route is currently being wasted because the troops are being deployed in poorly sited positions and being tasked to do nothing other than sit there. There is an easy fix and that would be to embed and infantry squad into the Qarghayi District ANP headquarters with a mission style order. It should sound something like this; “Sergeant you’ve got six months to work with these guys and stop any and all attempts to attack this vital route, go down there scout it out, come up with a plan and I’ll see you in five days so you can brief me on your plan. ” Winning the IED battle requires that you kill the IED makers and you can only do that if they are unmasked by the people. To reach the people with the consistency required to gain that level of cooperation requires that you leave the big armored vehicles and spend time (lots of it) among the people. I am pretty sure that if you consult the Pentagon’s counterinsurgency manual you’ll find that it says more less exactly the same thing.
It is always a good sign to see American soldiers getting a handle on the recent attacks along the Jbad to Kabul road
There is hope for those of us who use the Kabul Jbad road frequently and that is the appearance of a small American patrol right in the heart of the Tangy valley visiting the local ANA checkpoint. Inshallah they will be spending some time and effort trying to help the various small unit commanders develop a more aggressive plan to secure the route. We did not encounter any problems on our numerous trips to Kabul and back. What follows is some photo blogging about the Fab Folk we are hosting and some of the things they are up to.
Dan the Reconstruction Man is back with James the Kiwi – we have a lot of James’s here (James the Brit, James the Aussie, James the Marine, and James the German)- chatting with Dr Dave from the Synergy Strike ForceKeith, Steve and Carl from the Fab Folk team. Carl is from South Africa, Keith and Steve are Americans. The Taj manager Mehrab is pulling interpreter duty – he is between Steve and CarlMiss Lucy, a former US Navy officer, getting ready to cross the Kabul river from Little BarabadHere is a better shot of LucySmari and Andres – Fab Folk from IcelandSteve and Keith getting ready to cross the river to Little BarabadThe Fab Folk took a box of stuffed animals with them to Little Barabad. Here is a great shot of the girls watching them cross the riverWe hosted ABC News reporter Martha Raddatz at the Taj yesterday. She interviewed myself and Dr. Dave, the Fab Lab Folk, saw a school built by the La Jolla Rotary Club, and made the river crossing to Little Barabad. She had a big day and shot lots of tape. More on our day with ABC in the next post.
Here’s a link to Martha’s first news story from her visit to Jalalabad.
The Pentagon recently released a directive on Irregular Warfare that has generated speculation among the various players in Afghanistan. When you see documents that say “The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff shall” it is a powerful piece of paper from on high. There are a finite number of people in the world who can task four star generals or deputy secretaries of defense and professionals in the business study these directives as if they were the Dead Sea Scrolls. This comment came from a discussion thread in a group I belong to.
“I find it particularly interesting that DoD would come up with a “Directive of the obvious”… For all of its claims the Army as an organization doesn’t learn so quickly. I suppose that it took years of doing the same things expecting different results for the light to shine on reality. Not to be condescending in any way; I am glad to see the directive has been introduced. I hope that it grows roots quickly and flourishes… There is a full-spectrum under which many current peripheral entities can be brought to bear in order to surpass the expectations that DoD may currently have.”
I could not have said it better myself; it will be interesting to see how this directive impacts the template used by the U.S. military as it introduces more maneuver units into the country. Reports in the press indicate that the Army is planning on sending combat units in to Loghar and Wardak Provinces which are just outside of Kabul. The Marine Corps appears to be preparing to deploy in expeditionary force strength into the south. That could mean up to three infantry regiments of Marines with all their supporting arms, aircraft and logistics. That is a lot of gunfighters. The Question is – does it matter?
The Taliban control large swaths of Afghanistan not because they are better fighters but because they are beating the Karzai regime with better governance in the areas they control. The people know that a Taliban tribunal will not award land and water rights based on the largest bribe. They also know that once a case is settled the dispute is over. Fire fights between families involved in land and water disputes are frequent and bloody affairs in areas under government control. In areas under Taliban control the losing part accepts the Taliban ruling or 15 rounds in the chest. People tend to cooperate in systems like that.
But they don’t like it too much and would rather see a platoon of Marines or Army soldiers hanging around than a crew of religious zealots. It would be a pleasant surprise to see the Army and Marine units who flow into the country next year deployed down to the district level. I suspect that there will be tentative steps to branch out like that and these steps will involve what the new directive terms “civilian-military teams.”
That will be interesting to see play out and I believe small teams at the district level can, if properly funded and deployed, make a difference in the battle to control the only thing that matters in Afghanistan. The people.
Getting ready for a road mission. The guy on the right is our buddy Brandon who just graduated college and is in Nangarhar teaching orphans English (a story line he is planning to use to pick up women when he returns home; we’re coaching him on the art of seduction but he’s a big Liberal and isn’t catching on too well). The pixalated guys are American SF – Shem and I are in the middle.
We were able to conduct a “civilian-military team” field trial a few days ago during a road mission to Kabul (to re-stock the bar). This was a demonstration to our SF buddies of why we prefer unarmored local vehicles and they caught on fast. One of the Captains remarked that he never really got to see too much of the country because his visibility in an armored hummer was so restricted. They also marveled at how we attracted no attention (except in the busy main street of Surobi; a HIG R&R village). We also rolled up on a French convoy which gave the boys an excellent opportunity to experience the joy of low visibility ops when the Frenchman manning the trail .50 cal swung the barrel towards us.
Using local transport is not always a good deal
The military travels in convoys that do not allow the local vehicles to get near them. They do this to avoid being hit by “suicide vehicle borne improvised explosive devices” (VBIED’s). In the south Canadian and British forces force all traffic off the roads they are driving down to prevent VBIED’s. In the east sometimes all the traffic will pull off the road when they see an American convoy approaching and sometimes it won’t.
One of the Army officers had “good glass” on his camera and took this photo which I think looks pretty damn cool – if I say so myself
Using unarmored local vehicles with light body armor and fighting kit is another option. This appears to be taking unwarranted risks but I’ll let the quote below from Vietnam legend Col David Hackworth address the issue.
“In Vietnam, today’s most successful infantry tactics and techniques were yesterday’s heresy and madness. When these ‘overly reckless’ ideas were first introduced by farseeing innovators in 1965 and 1966, few commanders took them seriously. Most, because of parochial conventional orientation, looked upon these new concepts with contempt not unlike many reactionary English lords’ attitude toward the longbow before Crecy. But today in Vietnam, these once ‘wild schemes’ have become standard drill. These bold techniques have changed the thrust of the war from uneconomical multi brigade operations to fights that are fought almost exclusively by the squad and platoon.”
That was true in Vietnam and it’s true today; we need to win the people and that means being in the with them 24/7. We can do it and do it for pennies on the dollar we currently spend. But only if we reach back to our past and remember how to conduct independent small unit operations on a very large scale. Let them live and move around like we do and you’re talking change you can really believe in.
Another cool photo shot with the good glass – this is the Mahipar Pass outside Kabul
It is time for some “outside the box” thinking and last week’s demonstration may lead to more discussions between the big base behind the wire military and all the other internationals in Afghanistan who feel safer at night on the streets of Kabul or Jalalabad than we do in Washington DC or Chicago.
For the past five years I have listened intently to the senior generals, politicians, and U. S. State Department officials as they tell the world that the most important thing to be done in Afghanistan is reconstruction and the rehabilitation of infrastructure. In countries where a majority of the population is illiterate actions speak much louder than words. Our ‘actions” on the reconstruction and rehabilitation front are so woefully inadequate that they should be a national scandal. I hold the military and the Department of State equally at fault. The reconstruction “battle” is a Department of State responsibility and they set the security parameters under which US contractors operate. The State Department and US AID people live in the US Embassy complex – a gigantic walled ultra posh compound with everything you could ask for, great gym, extra pay, dirt cheap booze and cigarettes. But they never leave and there is a mindset which develops when you live behind gigantic walls with lavish security and that mindset is THE REASON why reconstruction is so slow.
The security situation is dramatically different from district to district within the 34 Provinces of Afghanistan but you would not know that unless you were in those Provinces 24/7/365. Instead every venture outside a “secure compound” by the embassy or Army is treated like a combat patrol, every Afghan a potential attacker and every vehicle on the road a potential car bomb. A trip to the international airport (3/4 of a mile from the embassy) is as serious to these people as a jet fighter sortie over North Vietnam circa 1969 was to a jet jockey. Tijuana, Mexico is far more dangerous for Americans than Kabul, Afghanistan but getting decision makers to understand that and then adopting force protection rules which reflect it seems to be impossible. The American military is not as culpable as State – a few commanders have even dispersed their formations down to the district level bringing instant stability and security to those areas during their brief tenure in country. But as a general rule the American military is confined to large bases, their situational awareness generated by the classified intelligence circulated from on high.
But we continue to try and find a way to operate better using the same constraints, the same policies, and the same force protection rules which always produce the same results. Capacity building means using and training local contractors to deliver their product to Corps of Engineers (CoE) standard. The CoE personnel and contractors in Nangarhar Province take this seriously. They teach courses on various trade related topics, host RFP (request for proposal) writing workshops, they do what they can but realize that you cannot “capacity build” from inside a gigantic secured compound. CoE personnel may venture away from base but I have never seen them so like all the other U.S. government agencies they use Afghans who have been appointed by the government to be their eye and ears. Have I ever mentioned the government of Afghanistan has a little corruption problem? Do you think it a solid plan to trust government officials to do 100% of you QA/QC work for American construction projects?
Dsn packed up and ready to go with our new protector dog in training Scout
The free market is a wonderful thing and the Afghans are responding to the trickle of money not going directly to DynCorp or The Louis Berger Group by developing their capacity to compete without CoE or US AID help. Which brings us to Dan The Reconstruction Man. The Afghans may not have much formal schooling but they are smart. They know they have to perform to standard and need to learn how quickly. There is a model in use which works and works well Dan is one of the expatriate operators working under that model. Dan works for a small group of local construction companies who are building various bases around Nangarhar for the US and Afghan government. His job is to ensure that the bids are written and priced correctly, the work is done correctly, to keep all the various subcontractors honest and on schedule, and to keep the amount of (US Taxpayer) project monies lost to bribes and theft to an absolute minimum. Dan lives at the Taj with us, drives all over the province in a Toyota Corolla, and spends long hours doing the tedious work of mentoring young Afghan construction workers on the finer points of project management. His life support costs are somewhere this side of 2% of the life support costs we pay for State Department and Corps of Engineers (CoE) personnel stationed in Afghanistan and unlike them he is out interacting everyday with the locals by himself mind you. Dan has been in Afghanistan, off and on, for seven years, speaks some Dari (no Pashto which is a tough to learn) has a full set of local garb and like the so many other Afghan hands is perfectly comfortable being the only international around for miles while working on his projects.
Dan is getting ready to head home for a well earned 30 day break. His flight from Jbad to Kabul was canceled so he has to go by road which he doesn’t like one bit. He is not worried about Taliban but the Afghan government security forces might see his jocked up AK and assume he is illegally armed. Which means they will take his kit and demand bribes which if not paid could result in a couple of weeks in the Pul-e-Charki prison. That sort of thing happens here with depressing regularity.
Dan is from North America, a retired military combat engineer with SF time under his belt and an understanding wife who supports his current overseas endeavors. Yesterday evening, as he was sharing the finer points of holographic weapons sights with a couple of his former me and some other outside the wire security operators he told us a quick story which illustrates exactly how bad things have gotten in the Stability Ops battle.
Chatting up former team mates who are down in Jbad with clients at the winterized Tiki Bar
Apparently Dan got a snarky note from the CoE accusing him of not doing the proper QC on his concrete mix, not having his QA guy on site as required, and not having the required personal protective equipment (PPE) for his stone masons. They sent pictures and demand an immediate response. At the site in question Dan was not even close to pouring concrete and he employs no stone masons so needless to say he was perplexed. He was also (unexpectedly) still in Jalalabad and thus able to get on this complaint quickly. He checked his vehicle log to see if his QA guy had been dispatched, he checked his phone logs to see if his QA guy had called in from the work site, he asked the assigned driver if he had taken him to the work site and finding all in order he drove out himself to find out what the hell was going on. Surprise, surprise it turns out the CoE Quality Assurance engineer (a local national from the government) wanted his “sweets” (shereni) from the subcontractors and was not getting a penny. He thought Dan was gone for a month and made his move thinking he could get away with it. Shereni is a dreaded word in Afghanistan. It is the code for a bribe and internationals will run into this at some point but Afghans deal with it is every time they interact with any government offical.
Dan was able to send back his own tempered response which should serve as a wake up call but won’t. He pointed out that they were not pouring concrete yet and that the pictures of his “stone masons” were taken at the Afghan business located next to his site which has nothing to do with the project in question. He deals with issues like this almost daily and more than earns his salary by doing so. Dan and people like him are taking serious risks operating without a wing man, armored vehicles, radios, or any kind of protection. The American embassy does not encourage guys like him or I to be here. Dan provided an immediate, direct, positive impact on all the projects being funded in the eastern region. Without guys like him the Government of Japan would not be able to operate here and they are about 1,000 more effective than US AID. It is not like we are the only ones who have broken the code on this, I know a few of the CoE reps in Nangarhar and they, to a man, want to operate the way we do, get around like we get around, and use their talents to make a difference. It is easier spending so much time in Afghanistan when you live like we do, when you can have your own little Scout puppy dog, your own room with attached bath, a bar where you can sit and spend time with friends. But that is not the reason to imitate our operational posture the reason to mimic us is the cost savings. We cannot afford to continue operating with the lavish overhead found at the embassy and all large military bases in this country. Quick example – KBR charges the military $35.00 per man per meal. I can feed myself and 10 guests for $35.00 a day…total.
I live like a king; well more like a king whose family is almost broke but a king all the same. I do so for pennies on the dollar of what is currently spent for life support by the military and Department of State. I also impact the local economy every bit of food consumed on our military bases and embassy is flown in from Dubai, every stinking morsel. We eat locally procured food prepared by locally trained cooks and it is good. When I need work done on the Taj I hire local contractors and use local products, the military hires KBR and imports every bit of their construction material. I would think “capacity building” means trying to build capacity. To our friends from Washington DC “capacity building” seems to mean talking about various million dollar programs with well healed lobbyists who recently retired from either State or the military. I guess a complicated society like ours needs and values people who have the fortitude and stamina to engage in endless conversations and meetings about things like “capacity building.” I can’t do that, I hate meetings with a passion. Dan is the same way he doesn’t talk about capacity building nor does he think he is building capacity. He has been paid a fair wage, given a set of tasks and like every good SNCO I have ever known goes quietly about his job demonstrating more initiative and self motivation than any three self help gurus you can think of. Actions speak louder than words in the third world.
Scout – the official protector dog in training at the Taj
Our country is going broke. We are already over a Trillion dollars into the bailout money and have yet to spend a penny on the “toxic sub-prime mortgages” which the money was supposed to buy in order to save our economy. The big three are lining up for their turn at the public trough. Arnold wants us to bail out his state while maintaining all the bizarre policies and taxes which has driven capitol and jobs out of California. The Office of the President Elect (I did not know we had one of those need to check my pocket constitution because I’ve missed that part somehow) is talking stimulus but the kind of “stimulus” that Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi have to offer is not something I would care to experience. We are going broke and need to start realizing that at least in Afghanistan we can be much more effective for much less money. Let the senior people who hide their tired, micro managing, ineffective, morale crushing, modes of operation behind the rubric of “force protection” take all their fobbits and go home where “force protection” is much easier. There are already people here who can do the job faster, better, cheaper while saving the taxpayer hundreds of millions of dollars.
The way forward is clear; the operational model designed and verified by the people who have been working effectively here for years. I will say this again knowing that I sound like a broken record we are running out of time. When the people of Afghanistan decided that we are not serious and not really here to help they will eject us and we will have no choice but to go. The butcher’s bill for that will be more than most Americans will want to consider. Look at what happened back in 1978 when the people of Herat decided they wanted the Soviets and their families to go, they all went, in body bags.
It was a regular Saturday night in Mazar-e-Sharif quiet, cold, yet comfortable as I say having dinner with a friend at one of the only restaurants catering to internationals the mighty Oak. We were passing the time with small talk. It was towards the end of our evening that my mate received a phone call from a member of the international community telling him there had been an accident and he needed help immediately. My driver, who was waiting outside rapidly saddled up and we flew across town to lend a hand.
We arrived at the residence, my accomplice started getting the patient’s history and checking the vital signs. I checked out the scene and saw blood everywhere lots of it. I knew that there was no time to lose – this was a ‘Fair Dinkum’ MEDIVAC!
Time to do a ‘Harry Bolt’ up to RC North. RC (Regional Command) North is an ISAF base on the outskirts of Mazar-e-Sharif. It is the only facility providing western standard health care in the region. Once we took off from the scene, I instructed my driver to ‘Punch It’! This was due to the casualty having lost a substantial (however, not immediately life threatening) amount of blood. Hand in hand with that, I predicted that there would be dramas at the gate (because it was around 2130 hours), and unless you have direct HF/VHF COMMS with these guys, you get the usual run around.
Once we got to the entrance of RC North the immutable rules of Murphy’s Law took over. I dropped off my local driver and took over driving duties to avoid time consuming screening procedures used when Afghans come on the base. We were greeted by the Force Protection (FP) soldiers who are from Croatia. These FP guys were actually very friendly and helpful they understood exactly what needed to be done however, rules and guidelines aren’t so simple. Once they had a clear handle on who I was, whom I was carrying in the vehicle and the reason I was there, the whole ‘liaison drama’ began.
In the minutes that I was waiting for a clearance to proceed I kept focused on the casualty, checking the vitals and making sure that the bleeding was kept under control. The FP kept on coming back and telling me the hospital is not responding”! They were at a loss, about how we should proceed. This is a German base; the Croats were there to guard the perimeter and apparently did not enjoy the luxury of independent decision making. Between trying to persuade them that we needed to get moving and checking my patients vital signs, I became cut as a mad snake, pulled out my phone and called the Medical Director (MD) for RC North. This is a silver bullet which I would rather not have wasted but the urgency of our situation demanded it. A person in his position is usually pretty busy between his normal daily routine as well as supporting combat operations.
An IED casualty being treated on the scene, Tarin Kowt, Oruzgan.
He took my call and said he would get us cleared immediately. Thirty seconds later the FP Commander arrived to escort us to the hospital. We needed the escort too as were traveling at a much higher speed than allowed at the base. We got to the hospital, and rushed our casualty in. It was surprising that there was a stretcher waiting at the entrance considering the ‘V8 super car lap speed’ we took to get there. The good doctor was true to his word and had, in less than a minute, infused a needed sense of urgency into the hospital staff.
The German medics quickly controlled the bleeding and were able to suture our friend up and release him within an hour. He came out with a jolly old smile on his dial. We rolled out the gate, picked up my faithful driver Nasser, who was freezing but happy to see us, and headed back into town dropping everyone off at their shacks.
The whole point of this unfortunate event is this; when you have a Priority 1 (Life threatening) or a Priority 2 (Life or Limb threatening) casualty, you need access to professional care quickly. Seven years into this mission and we still do not have these basic procedures in place.
A typical VBIED attack which usually ends up in fatalities and Priority 1 casualties.
This is not the only time or place in Afghanistan where I have experienced these sort of dilemmas. To us former soldiers on the outside looking in the international contingents within ISAF seem to do little if any coordination between themselves. The brand ‘Coalition Forces’ has little meaning when they cannot function as whole, and I believe it has been displayed time after time in this conflict. I’m a former enlisted soldier not an officer like my mate Tim and I do not claim to posses any brilliant insights into the art of war. But I know this mate when you see the lack of coordination in an effort of this size, it tells you something. And usually that something is that we do not have a single focused mission under which to plan and conduct operations. There is no unity of command or unity of purpose concepts I learned as an NCO. Junior enlisted leaders can see the root of our problems in Afghanistan so why can’t our governments? I guess we are Poles Apart.
This week has been very busy. It started with another covert radio show interview. Brett Winterable had Bill Roggio from the Long War Journal and I on for the opening segment. Bill is an old friend who visited with us back in 2006. He and I took a run to Qalat where he got some good footage of Taliban outriders stalking a large convoy of civilian trucks. You can find the video here. Bill is also the most knowledgeable person I know on what is happening in Pakistan, the second most knowledgeable on Afghanistan and the third most knowledgeable on Iraq. I’m kidding of course, he may well be the most knowledgeable on all three – you can find a link to the podcast here.
Also on Monday Michael Yon released a post on his web site about the French Army ambush in the Uzbin valley last August. We set up his interviews and took him out to the meetings. The back story can be found in the “talking with the AOG” post I made shortly after our trip into the Uzbin. You can find the Michael Yon article here it was also linked at Fox News. Michael has moved on for now but I hope to run into him again in the future he is really a great guy doing important work.
The Bot and I getting jocked up for the run into Uzbin Valley. See the post”Talking with the AOG” for the full back story.
Proving once again that things happen in three’s on Monday night we had a huge wind storm blow through which took the transponder right off our Gatr ball thus bringing to an end (for now) our fat pipe internet. Mehrab and the Jalalabad Geek Squad from Synergy Strike Force have been trying to super glue the mounts in and get it back on line but it is still “Nishta” which in Pashto means something like “no have.” Canadian Dan and I have the day off tomorrow and will try to fix that bad boy up our ownselves but that is probably a waste of time. The Jbad geek squad is a proficient crew, if it was going to work they would have probably got it up by now.
Gatr down – winds tore the transponder off our ball. It has survived everything mother nature threw at it until last Monday nightYou hate to see this – transponder attachments torn off the ball – this thing was super fast when up and running
Here is something really cool – the young boys from the village behind our guesthouse who are learning how to build battle bots. They are in the MIT sponsored FabLab which we host in our compound.
Local boys from Bagrami Village self-learning how to design and build their own bots.
There is a web page for the Jalalabad Fab Lab which can be found here and it contains links to the San Diego Sister Cities Foundation which is where the Jbad Geek Squad got its start and meager funding. For those of you who want to read about the brave men and woman who come here at their own expense to coordinate the delivery of aid directly to the people of Afghanistan you should take the time to look through those blogs. Much of the aid they bring comes from donations and charitable contributions. None of it comes from the billions of dollars being spent by US AID and our hapless Department of State. This is the story of American generosity and compassion which every American should know and be proud of.
Amy Sun during one of the many visits she made to local area schools
There are other organizations from other lands doing the same; Rory Stewart’s Turquoise Mountain Foundation jumps immediately to mind and he should be the pride of England for all the good work and good will he had brought to this blighted land. No doubt there are others here too which I do not know about. What I do know is people like Amy Sun of MIT, Ken Kraushaar and Dr. Dave Warner of the Synergy Strike Force make me proud to be an American. The most effective aid programs come from non government organizations and these people who risk so much to help with the goal of developing even more effective methodologies for aiding the poorest of the poor in the future deserve at the very least our thanks, respect and admiration.
Dr. Dave, Ken and I at the Taj last winter
Please spend a little time reading about what these talented, motivated, and very bright people are doing it will make you proud too. Plus you will be flat out amazed at what a FabLab is and what it can do.
If you are a wealthy person or heading up something like…..oh let’s say the Annenberg Foundation this is where you should leave a grant or two. You would then actually get a return on that investment rather than watching it go down some Chicago rat hole.
Making a real difference – the first group of FabLab instructors in training. This is how woman empowerment is done in a country like Afghanistan. One step at a time by internationals who live and work with the Afghan people. It takes courage to do it for all the women involved. See the Jalalabad Fablab blog roll link for the details
This is the second day in a row we have been working on upgrading the Tajmahal website. With the able help of webmaster Ken and many others we are finally there. www.tajmahalguesthouse.comHere is a great shot of geek central.The Taj’s Bamboo bar where we hang out most evenings with our laptops listening to Soma FM and sometimes chatting about the stories we email each other from a foot or two away.
The services and security section of the website is pretty good so I’m posting it here too for the edification of my readership.
Fridays are always laid back as it is the one day off we get each week. We had our normal compliment of French and German aid workers come by for drinks and a dip in the pool.
If you can’t tell my French friend Pierre is in flagrant violation of the Taj no Speedo rule. Every time we try to explain the rule to him he pretends not to understand English. But he and his crew are great folks who pay in Euros which makes them especially popular with me so we let him slide on the speedo thing.
The interesting tidbit of the day comes from the lady all to way in the right. She is German, works for GIZ and asked for our assessment of the attack last night on the Dih Bala district center which is 300 meters away from one of her offices. Like many IGO workers she has a high tolerance for risk. She has been here a long time, knows Dih Bala and the surrounding area well and is completely freaked out because there have been no problems with Taliban before.
Dih Bala is about 10 miles to the east of us and the home of many large clans of Brigands. They never molest the NGO’s or IGO’s as reconstruction makes it easier for them to smuggle stuff across the frontier which is how they have earned their living for the past 2 to 3 thousand years. The Governor of Nangarhar Province has successfully eliminated the cultivation opium poppy in the area but there are still tons of the stuff here because of the smuggling expertise of peoples like those in the Dih Bala district. So the fact that Taliban (armed criminal gangs do not attack district centers) is reportedly active and attacking the district center means something.
It could be the elders posturing with weapons to get the governors attention. The Governor, Gul Agha Sherzai, is from Khandahar Province and the local tribal chiefs have a tenuous working relationship with him. One way to get the attention and a little love from the big man is to have your district center attacked and then say you drove the bad guys out when the Afghan Army arrives to investigate. Or it could be the Taliban has moved into the district and that is always bad news for the elders. The Taliban normally removes the local power structure in order to dominate an area. Removal could be in the form of forcing them to pledge allegiance with the Taliban to outright assassination. If the Taliban are not strong enough or if they miscalculate when dealing with certain elders the villagers will grab their rifles and fight. Intimidation of an armed population is a dangerous game – the Taliban screw it up sometimes.
Our assessment of Dih Bala district is that the Taliban are back and strong enough to challenge the central government for the district center. Our German friend agreed which is a bitter thing for her to do because with the Taliban back her work here is at an end.
As the security situation continues to deteriorate we have been making it point to look at every tanker and police check post attacked by the Taliban.
This truck was attacked by the Taliban note the local kid who has walked about 3 miles from Surobi to drain some of the remaining diesel.
The tanker pictured above was attacked from across the river and took a good 60 to 70 rounds into the cab and front right aspect. It also took an RPG round into the cab. The RPG shot was either beginners luck or we have one hell of a pro RPG gunner working the area. The closest probable ambush site is 400 meters away and 200 meters above the truck.
This truck was not attacked by the Taliban; it was torched to cover up fuel theft. I’m with my buddy Special K who visits from time to time and wanted a picture in the blog.
The tanker pictured above had 10 bullet and one RPG hit; all the rounds came in from the left rear or road side of the river. There are ANP checkposts 500 meters behind us and 500 meters to the front – it is impossible for an ambushing party to cross the river or set up on the side of the road without being detected. All the Taliban attacks come from across the river and include enough firepower to fix the checkposts while they got after fuel tankers. That didn’t happen this time and there is also little fuel left in the tanker. Our guess is that it was emptied in Laghman Province and then shot up in exactly the same spot as the previous two Taliban attacks. The criminals were probably mounted in local vehicles, and they and driver escaped after paying off the cops. Just a guess but it is the simplest explanation.
Two trucks on the same road and attacked in almost the same spot and reported as Taliban attacks. This is why we spend so much time getting out and about.
It has been seven years since the events of 9/11. The war of terror or the Long War which is a better term is the reason I am here. I’m in Jalalabad Afghanistan where I’ve been living for the past year. I spent a few years living in Kabul and free ranging the country having found a reason to visit every province in Afghanistan. I’m a security contractor; outside the wire type and the crew I run with use low profile, local vehicles and are very good at talking their way past checkpoints.
The security contracting business in Afghanistan is tough. The American firms Blackwater, and DynCorp have all the good paying DoD and DoS contracts locked up and the rest of the market here consists of British PSC’s and a growing number of Afghan companies who employ Expats. Tight competition for lucrative reconstruction work drove the compensation rates into the basement.
Our State Department and US AID have established ridiculously heavy security standards that far exceed the UN MOSS (minimum operational security standard.) These stringent standards slow projects and drain millions from building infrastructure to paying for fleets of armored vehicles and large secure compounds. Other donor countries abide by the UN standards and their operating costs are a fraction of what the US spends on security and life support for their Aid implementers.
Tonight I am sitting behind the bar of the world famous Tajmahal Guesthouse (Taj) of Jalalabad. Check out the high speed hat;
Today we had a very pleasant surprise. They guys from LaRue Tactical in Texas sent us some candy, cool hats, and Dillo Dust which we immediately put to good use on our meat pie. Our cook Khan has been pissing and moaning about cooking during Ramadan and came up with a dozen very crappy meat pies and then took off for his home village to prepare for Eid. We were getting ready to go buy some chickens to cook up but tried dillo dusting the meat pies. It’s Thurday night which is the night the Tiki Bar hosts all the NGO folks and who wants to fuss with dressing out a skinny chicken during happy hour?
So it is Poppy Eradication Program Bob’s birthday tonight. He’s former Army SF and loves to sing all the old crappy high rotation FM hair band songs from his misspent youth. His singing is horrible but he’s a “good bloke” in contractor speak so we tolerate the noise with grace and humor.
It is about 2200 here now and we have the usual mix of European NGO, American NGO and a sprinkling of outside the wire security types. Outside the wire guys are the ones who live in villas with the population where most of our military should be but is not.
The price we are paying for not having enough troops outside the wire is increased instability and more and more Taliban attacks. It is not yet a problem in Jbad city but the Jalalabad to Kabul road which is essential to the ISAF and US supply efforts and also for our weekly booze runs has been hit with all sorts of ambushes this summer. We go out to look at most of them in order to get a handle on just how bad the attacks are getting and the tactics they are using.
Here is a photo of the whole team from this summer when we were fortunate enough to have Amy Sun a PhD grad student from MIT who is a no kidding missile engineer. She was pretty sharp about figuring out what happened from the forensics and amount of fuel left in the tankers. She wasn’t bad at reading bullet and RPG strikes too in fact she was smarter about all this than we are which was annoying but handy.
Here we are checking out an ANP checkpost that claimed they were attacked and repulsed a force of 30 Taliban expending all their ammo in the process. Did you know 7.62×39 mm ammo (Ak 47 bullets) sells for in Afghanistan? 75 cents round. We suspect that most of these “attacks” are really done to cover ammo sales on the black market. The Taliban humping in over the mountains are not doing so with 800 rounds of ball (that is grunt speak for full metal jacket rifle bullets) on their backs.
So it is 7 years since 9/11 and I have been out here for almost four of them. We work for the Japan International Cooperation Agency . Unlike US AID the JICA people work in the countryside or in Kabul with their Afghan counterparts. Every yen the Japanese people send here to help the Afghans gets spent exactly as it is supposed to because the Japanese JICA staff is in the offices with the Afghans ensuring they know where every yen goes. We’d be in much better shape if US AID did the same.
This will be a long war which my children will fight, if they chose to serve, and their children will too. There is no way to understand this place or fight effectively here unless you understand the people and their culture. Eventually we have to figure out how to keep more people like me in country for long duration so that they too know how to operate in the tribal districts. I havbe lots of ideas on how to do that which I will share in future posts.
