The Only Thing Worth Dying For - How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

410 Pages·2009·2.93 MB·English

by  Blehm Eric

The Only Thing Worth Dying For
How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan
Eric Blehm

This story is dedicated to the men and women of the coalition forces who
have fought in Afghanistan, and to their families and loved ones, many of
whom have come to realize that not all battles end with the war.
Ten good soldiers, wisely led, will beat a hundred without a head.
—Euripides
Contents
Epigraph
Prologue
1 A Most Dangerous Mission
2 The Quiet Professionals
3 To War
4 The Soldier and the Statesman
5 The Taliban Patrol
6 The Battle of Tarin Kowt
7 Credibility
Photographic Insert
8 Madness
9 Death on the Horizon
10 The Ruins
11 The Thirteenth Sortie
12 Futility
13 Rescue at Shawali Kowt
14 Worth Dying For
Epilogue
Map of Tarin Kowt
Map of Shawali Kowt
Acknowledgments
Selected Bibliography
Notes
About the Author
Other Books by Eric Blehm
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
I met Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, at the Barclay Hotel in
midtown Manhattan on September 23, 2008, when he was approaching the end
of his five-year term as the country’s first democratically elected leader. Since
1700, twenty-five of the twenty-nine rulers of Afghanistan had been dethroned,
exiled, imprisoned, hanged, or assassinated.1 That Karzai had survived multiple
assassination attempts since taking office was a feat in itself. Even more
remarkable, however, was the journey that had brought him to this presidency.
He greeted me in perfect English with a British accent, shook my hand firmly,
and ushered me across the elegant room of his suite. Though it was Ramadan,
when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset, he offered me cookies and coffee or
tea, which I declined out of respect for his religion. Sitting opposite the president
in a cushioned armchair, I handed him a stack of photographs. As he held them
in his palms, he stared intently at the one on top: eleven American soldiers
grouped tightly around him on a sandy hillside in southern Afghanistan. A smile
spread over his face, and he began to nod as he flipped through the pictures
chronicling the mission that had changed the course of history.
For nearly two years, I had been trying to interview Karzai so that he could
confirm crucial details of his rise to power during the early days of the Global
War on Terror, a war that Karzai and his staff—who had joined us in the room to
hear their president tell his stories—called by another name: the Liberation. He
transported us to the mud-walled safe houses of his insurgency, where, lit by
kerosene lanterns, turbaned freedom fighters with AK-47s planned strategy with
U.S. Special Forces soldiers wearing camouflage. He led me through the photos,
which I had placed in chronological order, taking us back to October, November,
and December 2001.
I was concerned that he might not be able to recall details about the men who
had sacrificed so much for both America and Afghanistan in carrying out one of
the war’s most dangerous and secretive missions. I wondered whether all that he
had experienced in the ensuing years had erased or distorted his memories.
Then he held up a photo to his staff and pointed to an American soldier. “Had
there been anybody else, things would have gone terribly wrong,” he said. A
mournful tone now entered his voice. “Oh, some good men…”
“Very sad,” he said about the next photo. “This is perhaps a day or two before
he died.” Looking closely at the following photo, he said, “This man is dead.
And this man—he is also dead. And this man.”
“When?” I asked. “Do you remember the date they died?”
“Of course,” he answered. “How could I forget?”
The following is a true narrative account of modern unconventional warfare as
recalled by the men who were there. Some names have been changed to respect
the privacy of the individuals.
CHAPTER ONE
A Most Dangerous Mission
[H]e knew from experience how simple it was to move behind the enemy
lines…. It was as simple to move behind them as it was to cross through them, if
you had a good guide.
—Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls
Late on the night of Tuesday, November 13, 2001, Hamid Karzai and his
military adviser, U.S. Special Forces Captain Jason Amerine, walked briskly
down a deserted road near their safe house in the Jacobabad District of Sindh
Province, Pakistan. For Amerine, it felt almost as if they were walking along a
country road stateside, the adjacent unplanted fields softly illuminated by
starlight. In the distance, a half mile to the west, a dull glow marked more
densely populated civilization, but here they were relatively isolated.
Karzai was unarmed and wearing the traditional Afghan shalwar kameez,*
and his poise and flowing arm motions marked him as an orator. Tall and thin,
Amerine had an M9 pistol tucked into the belt of his camouflage uniform. Above
a coarse brown beard, his alert eyes never stopped scanning the dark fields while
he and Karzai spoke in hushed tones.
“I just received confirmation,” said Amerine. “Tomorrow is the night—have
you heard any news from the tribal leaders in Uruzgan?”
“Yes,” said Karzai. “I followed up with one of the local chiefs in War Jan. If
the location we decided upon is safe, if no Taliban patrols are nearby, the signal
fires will be lit as planned.”
“Your men are ready?”
“They are—word has spread about Kabul. The Pashtun are ready to join the
fight.”
Earlier that day, allied U.S. and Northern Alliance resistance forces had
liberated Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital, from the Taliban. That was in the north;
in the south, the home of the majority Pashtun ethnic group and the birthplace of
the Taliban movement, things weren’t going so well. Neither the CIA nor the
U.S. military had been able to establish a presence, and there was no organized
resistance like the Northern Alliance. The few Afghans who dared to oppose the
Taliban had been imprisoned or killed.
For four weeks beginning in early October, Karzai had traveled the region