It’s a 30-hour trek from Lejeune to Afghanistan

[thedrifter]

24th MEU beginning operations
April 11, 2008 - 12:29AM
JENNIFER HLAD
DAILY NEWS STAFF
The 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit began operations in Afghanistan this week, participating in two International Security Assistance Force missions Tuesday.

The MEU's AV-8B Harriers provided close air support to forces involved in a fight with insurgents in Zabul province, and infantry Marines in Battalion Landing Team 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment joined other ISAF troops in a counter-indirect fire patrol in Kandahar province, according to public affairs officer Capt. Kelly Frushour.

The missions marked a step forward for the MEU, which previously had been working to get equipment and personnel ready for operations.

The MEU is deployed in Afghanistan as a "theater task force," which means the 2,200 Marines and sailors can be used anywhere in the country - wherever the ISAF commander needs them, Frushour said via e-mail.

The MEU works directly for the ISAF commander, she said, and that commander assigns the missions. However, because the MEU is not in charge of any "battle space," the unit must coordinate with other forces in the area before any mission, she said.

In terms of missions, working for ISAF means there are many different commands and countries involved in the planning process, Frushour said.

The MEU consists of a reinforced infantry battalion with air and logistics support under one commander, Frushour said, and anticipates doing all types of operations - from humanitarian missions to combat.


Contact Jennifer Hlad at jhlad@freedomenc.com or 910-219-8467. Read her blog about the MEU in Afghanistan at http://fromafghanistan.encblogs.com.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marine quick reaction force starts to settle into southern Afghanistan

By Gordon Lubold
Fri Apr 11, 5:00 AM ET

The Marine contingent arriving now at the massive airfield here in Kandahar will be tasked to become a quick reaction force that the senior NATO commander says will give him new flexibility to fight the Taliban in southern Afghanistan.

Coming as the spring and summer fighting season begins, the deployment of the roughly 2,300 Marines of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), based at Camp Lejeune, N.C., will help to better focus military efforts against the resurgent Taliban, observers say.

But Col. Peter Petronzio, who commands the 24th MEU, is seeking to manage expectations. "We're not the cavalry, we're not here to save the day, we're not here because other people can't do their jobs," he says in his plywood-paneled office. "We're here just to help."

The unit will perform a special duty here as a "theater tactical force," designed to deploy across Afghanistan if needed. And it will report directly to Army Gen. Dan McNeill, the senior NATO commander here.

"It helps me to have a force – and the US is most flexible and viable when it comes to this – to ... go where I say to go and do what I say to do without a whole lot of hesitation," General McNeill says.

Many forces in Afghanistan, like those of Canada or Germany, operate according to political caveats at home that can hamstring commanders. McNeill was criticized by some European nations last year, for example, when he deployed a force to southern Afghanistan to perform combat operations without notifying NATO officials in Brussels first. The Marine unit gives the NATO commander forces he can use without such constraints.

McNeill says the Marines will mostly be focused on fighting the Taliban and other anticoalition militias.

"They'll mostly be doing combat operations, but they'll be helping out whatever they can and in whatever ways they can, but expect them to be on the move and living hard, and to fight when they can find the fight," says McNeill, who will finish up his second tour of Afghanistan this summer.

Although the Marine focus will be on security operations, the distinction as a theaterwide force falling directly under McNeill means the NATO commander can also use them to perform other duties such as humanitarian assistance.

"We're kind of like a Swiss Army knife – there are lots of ways we can be employed," says Capt. Kelly Frushour, a spokeswoman for the unit, addressing what has become the new reality for most forces. "From humanitarian missions to combat operations, we'll go where [the NATO commander] directs us to go and we will do what [he] needs us to do."

The structure of the Marine Corps' MEU is a unique one to the US military and lends itself to such adaptable operations. It possesses its own command, air, ground and support elements.

"Simplifies matters greatly, it's all right there," says McNeill.

The Marines were welcomed by Canadian forces that are also assigned to the region. Canada had threatened to pull out of the mission if more forces weren't sent to help them in the volatile south. The Marine unit will return home by fall, and defense officials insist it's a "one-time" deployment. But Defense Secretary Robert Gates recently indicated that more US forces would be sent to Afghanistan by 2009, and the expansion of this large airfield hints at a larger presence in the months to come.

In addition to the Marine MEU, an additional 1,000 to 1,200 marines will be deployed to the southern region as embedded trainers and security forces. Those marines will be deployed to northern Helmand Province in the southern region of the country as well as the eastern portion of the province, says Lt. Col. David Johnson, a spokesman for the US command that oversees training here.

So far, marines here have been doing drills, firing at the shooting range, and practicing their popular martial-arts program. The unit as a whole won't begin conducting full-fledged operations "until we're ready," Colonel Petronzio says. It's likely, however, that the unit will begin engaging the fight in the coming weeks.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

baltimoresun.com
With the Marines, on patrol in Afghanistan

April 13, 2008

Sun reporter David Wood is embedded with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit in southern Afghanistan. Here are excerpts from his blog.

April 11: Looking for land mines

I used to know how many mines were thought to be buried in Afghanistan, but such statistics are useless. Known mine fields, after 40 years of war, carpet much of the country. Random and unknown mines continue to take innocent lives. The cleanup is endless.

On a training run this morning, I stopped to talk to some of the blue-helmeted Afghan de-miners (they obligingly came over to where I was standing). The work is pretty straightforward, as they described it. You start at the edge of a known minefield (Russian, in this case) and work from one end to he other and back again, like mowing a yard. You mark what's been cleared with a rock painted white on one side (cleared), red on the other (danger).

On your knees you prod, and inch forward. Prod, inch forward. After a couple of hours, a tea break out under the broiling sun. Then prod, inch forward.

If your prod (like a 15-inch pencil) encounters resistance, you back off and get a shovel, and carefully clear away the dirt to see what it is. Imagine yourself doing this in cement-hard, stony soil (is that a rock, or ... ? How hard should I push?) If you find a mine you summon the specialists. ...

I did ask their supervisor what these guys earn for this work. A heavily bearded Afghan, he leapt up with a grin from where he'd been sitting, on a rug under a white awning, as I approached. After we shook hands back and forth, he calculated the amount.

Thirteen dollars and 30 cents a day. March 30: What we ask

My mother died last night.

I got the news in an e-mail this morning, a crisp, clear Sunday dawn in the Afghanistan desert. It had been a day full of promise. I called home and spoke with my wife. Mom died peacefully. ...

I took a shaky breath and stared out through coiled razor wire at the bright, flat desert and the hazy horizon of barren mountains. Armored vehicles crawled along a distant road. Two platoons of Marines in battle gear trudged past, raising a plume of dust. A memorial service is planned, I heard my wife say. ...

This is not uncommon. 2,500 Marines are sent away to war knowing that among their many loved ones, there will be tragedy and triumph. ... A beaming child will excel, beyond expectations, on a math test. A championship game will be won; a graduation held. Someone will be arrested, someone married.

In this battalion (1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment) alone, 58 Marines will become fathers while they are away.

Only shallow glimpses of this rich, other life reach here, through the scratchy echo of a phone or by e-mail, or letter. The glimpses are precious, a grainy snapshot lovingly folded into a wallet.

It is perhaps the most we ask of those we send. ...

April 2: Marines on patrol, near Kandahar

One hundred twenty rounds of M-16 bullets. Sixteen hundred rounds of linked .50-cal ammo. One M-16 rifle. Twelve bottles of water, four MREs. Hand grenades, fragmentation. Hand grenades, smoke.

Throw all that in your rucksack and add two pair of socks, a small pack of baby wipes, one toothbrush. A small toothpaste for every four guys. Smokes or dip. Camelbak filled with water. First aid kit, night vision goggles and batteries, bayonet, tourniquets.

Hoist it all up over your flak vest and Kevlar helmet and you find you've gained 100 to 120 pounds. Now start walking.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

April 18, 2008
Suicide Bomber Kills 23 in Remote Afghan Province
By CARLOTTA GALL

KABUL, Afghanistan — A suicide bomber blew himself up outside a mosque in southwestern Afghanistan on Thursday, killing 23 people, among them two senior police officials and several children, officials said Thursday evening.

About 31 people were wounded in the explosion, which occurred just before evening prayers in the border town of Zaranj, capital of Nimruz Province.

Nimruz is a remote desert province, sparsely populated and poorly policed, where traffickers smuggle drugs across into neighboring Iran. There has also been an increase in insurgent activity in the province.

Many of those killed and wounded were civilians, shopkeepers and guests at the town hotel, the provincial governor, Ghulam Dastagir Azad, said by telephone.

He said he believed that the police officials were the bomber’s targets. One of those killed was Bismillah Khan a district police chief, and another the commander of a battalion of border guards, he said.

“They are the enemy of the poor people, the enemy of human beings,” he said of the attackers.

The American military said on Thursday that two United States marines from a unit that arrived just last month had been killed and two were wounded on Wednesday morning when an explosion hit their convoy in the southern province of Kandahar.

Under NATO rules their nationality was not released immediately, said Capt. Kelly Frushour, the unit’s public affairs officer. She gave few details of the episode except to say that it had been a hostile attack, and that the wounded were being sent to the American military base at Landstuhl, Germany.

The marines came from the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, a force of 3,200 that was sent to Afghanistan recently to help NATO troops faced with a continued insurgency in southern and eastern Afghanistan. NATO commanders in Afghanistan have called for more forces repeatedly over the last two years, but were rebuffed until the Marine unit arrived.

The marines came with their own artillery, helicopters and Harrier fighter planes, and were expected to add considerable combat capability to the NATO forces, which have struggled to contain the Taliban insurgency since being deployed in 2006.

About 2,200 of the marines will work with NATO forces and serve as a task force capable of being used across the country as needed. The remaining 1,000 will provide training and support for the Afghan Army and police forces under United States command.

The Marine unit has been stationed at an air base just outside the city of Kandahar, and has yet to see combat. In comments reported in The Baltimore Sun, members of the unit complained recently that the slow and cumbersome NATO command structure has delayed them from being utilized, and that they have been wasting time on the base rather than fighting insurgents.

Taimoor Shah reported from Kandahar, Afghanistan

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Learning to Bridge the Cultural Gap
April 18, 2008
Marine Corps News|by Cpl. Randall A. Clinton

KANDAHAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan - Gone are the simplistic battlefields of previous Marine generations where as the classic "Rifleman's Creed" boldly states, "what counts in this war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count."


Penned more than a half century ago, Marines on the ground in Afghanistan know that the accuracy of their rifles will only get them so far, that only by working with the people of Afghanistan will everlasting improvements be made. However, to work together first requires understanding the culture.

"The difficult thing for most people in this area is being able to see in shades of grey - things aren't black and white. So, it isn't all about knowing what's in the book and doing your drills properly, you still need to keep that in mind you need to be safe and secure, however to talk to folks and to understand the cultural nuances of a place and how to move through the society can take a bit of time to master. Some people have a knack for it some people don't, some people can learn the skill," said Canadian Capt. Michael Bennett, desk officer, CJ9 Civic Office, Regional Command South.

The Marines of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, NATO- International Security Assistance Force know the importance of this skill set, and sought out the assistance of local villagers to fine-tune their techniques...

Bennett prefers to explain the benefits of civil relations with locals in worst case scenario terms, and after spending years teaching and training the specifics of Afghan culture he has a clear idea of why it's important to do the right thing.

"Not having this type of skill or ability in your organization is like not having engine oil in your vehicle," he said. "Eventually you create enough friction that things begin to seize up, things don't work for you. So having the skill allows you to better look after the relations with the local population."

While he freely admits that most of his teaching is common sense, Marines also need to be mindful of local customs.

"The combat zone doesn't have anything to do with it," explains 2nd Lt. Chad Bonecutter, Fire Support Team leader, Bravo Company, Battalion Landing Team 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 24th MEU, ISAF. "Something we may take as standard and very polite they look at as rude in their culture. So it's more a culture understanding (task)."

Bonecutter points to the way men are expected to greet, "If they try to hold your hand longer than you want, which makes western cultures a little uncomfortable, but it is very accepted over here. So pulling you hand away pretty quick can be rude."

In this area, tribes live by an honor code, known as the Pashtunwali, and adapting to another culture while communicating through a linguist can be a challenging experience.

"Shame is really big over here. It's just a matter of showing respect, (For instance) talking to someone who may speak English but is not the elder, not the one in charge. Don't hold your conversation with him, use your linguist. That's why they've been disseminated down to the platoon level," he said.

"The big thing they taught is you are going to talk to the elder, you are not going to talk to the linguist. Make sure you don't do that, because that is perceived to be rude as well."

Maj. Bryan Anderson, deputy operations officer, CJ9, ISAF headquarters, emphasized an even more drastic approach to civil affairs.

"Hospitality is even more important here in Afghanistan (than Iraq). It all goes back to the Pashtunwali code," he said. "The code says "if you offer hospitality then you must offer the last piece of bread that you have to the person you bring into your house. You must even risk your life for that person. It is an honor therefore to be asked into a house, to be a guest in Afghanistan. We have to return the favor; we are guests in this country. So it is important to go above and behind and return the hospitality given to us. Anytime we invite someone onto a base with us, near our vehicles we have to be the ultimate guests offering them anything we can, water maybe the candy bar out of the MRE, anything we have we should offer up to them, because they will certainly do the same."

It's the golden rule to the extreme: "Doing it in the context of a combat zone is difficult, but civil affairs is basic common sense if we remember what we would like to see in Jacksonville, (N.C.) or Ocean Side, (Calif.) on the weekends when we are home with our family. That's what the families here in Afghanistan want," he explained.

Over and over the Marines practiced speaking through their linguist, breaking down complicated issues like medical care, sanitation and security into simpler, more-suited for translation sentences. Each time the locals worked with the Marines to bridge their communication divide.

"It was a friendly area, so they welcomed us. They would tell us what was right and what was wrong," said Bonecutter.

The right: Marines stuck to the code of the Pashtunwali and were respectful of the village leadership. The wrong: using words that don't translate correctly, he explained.

Interacting with the local Afghans gave some of the Marines a chance to personalize their presence in country and practice answering questions from local leaders.

"I just put an Afghan face on what we are doing," explained Lance Cpl. Shannon Shipley, artillery scout observer, Bravo Co, BLT 1/6, 24th MEU, ISAF.

Instead of allowing questions to be phrased in term of what the Marines are doing, he began turning the question back to the villagers asking them in turn if they had brought their grievances up to their local government officials. His method helped reinforce the idea of self-sufficiency within the village, province and country, Bennett pointed out.

While he struggled at first communicating through his linguist, the six hours spent in the village gave him the confidence to deal with an elder correctly. "I got a lot more comfortable talking with them," he said.

Shipley's new-found ability should help these Marines avoid Bennett's worst case scenario.

"The benefit is that they will see that "hey, the Marines really aren't bad guys," said Anderson. "If we earn just a little bit of credibility that might make the mission tomorrow easier."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Afghan commandos emerge
U.S.-trained force plays growing role in fighting insurgents
By Ann Scott Tyson
The Washington Post
updated 1:06 a.m. ET, Sat., April. 19, 2008

KHOST PROVINCE, Afghanistan - Night after night, commandos in U.S. Chinook helicopters descend into remote Afghan villages, wielding M-4 rifles as they swarm Taliban compounds. Such raids began in December in the Sabari District here, long considered too dangerous for U.S. patrols, and have already resulted in the death or capture of 30 insurgent leaders in eastern Afghanistan, according to U.S. commanders.

"The Americans are doing this," the Taliban fighters concluded, according to U.S. intelligence.

But though the commandos carry the best U.S. rifles, wear night-vision goggles and ride in armored Humvees, they are not Americans but Afghans -- trained and advised by U.S. Special Forces teams that are seeking to create a sustainable combat force that will ultimately replace them in Afghanistan.

"This is our ticket out of here," a Special Forces company commander said last month at a U.S. base in Khost, where his teams eat, sleep, train and fight alongside the commandos.

The creation of a 4,000-strong Afghan commando force marks a major evolution for U.S. Special Forces in Afghanistan. After small teams of Green Berets spearheaded the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001, they took the lead in combat, with the disparate Afghan militia forces they trained and paid playing a supporting role. Today, by contrast, the Special Forces advisers are putting the Afghan commandos in the lead -- coaching a self-reliant force that U.S. commanders say has emerged as a key tool against insurgents.

Three of six planned Afghan army commando battalions -- with 640 commandos each -- have begun operations over the past five months. U.S. commanders say hurdles remain, from basic logistical issues such as teaching the commandos to conserve water to the larger challenge of ensuring that they are well integrated into the regular Afghan army. Still, the program is a bright spot in the broader effort to train Afghan security forces, a crucial aspect of the NATO and U.S.-led strategy to stabilize Afghanistan -- one that is slowed by a shortage of thousands of trainers and recruits as well as equipment problems.

The new approach also offers the prospect of relief for the Special Forces, strained by years of deployments in Afghanistan, commanders say. At any one time, more than 2,000 Special Forces soldiers and support personnel are on the ground, many operating in 12-man teams partnered with Afghan forces in the country's most troubled districts.

In violent parts of Khost and elsewhere, the commandos play a narrow but critical role: They capture or kill insurgent leaders, financiers and bombmakers as the first phase of the strategy to clear areas of enemy cells, hold the territory and build security and governance. The need for an Afghan force skilled in attacking insurgent networks is particularly pressing, as roadside bombs and suicide attacks have increased since 2006.

In a training camp surrounded by mountains in Khost, Lt. Mohamed Reza, 29, of the 203rd commando battalion counts down for a mock helicopter landing. "One minute . . . 30 seconds . . . touchdown!" His platoon rushes forward, one soldier kicking open the door of a compound before the rest run inside, pivoting into each room. A commando grabs a U.S. trainer impersonating an insurgent, puts him in a painful finger lock and forces him out the door.

"Alaklat!" they yell. All clear!

Looking on, a Special Forces adviser makes sure that the commandos do not miss any rooms and that they deal readily with whatever challenges he throws in their path, such as stray goats or disguised fighters. These rehearsals -- starting with simple drills tracing tape on the ground and rising in complexity to assaults on multistory buildings -- exemplify the exhaustive training they receive.


Commandos compete for selection and go through 12 weeks of initial training at Camp Morehead, south of Kabul, before being assigned to a battalion attached to one of five regional Afghan National Army corps. They then begin a rotation with Special Forces advisers that includes six weeks each of training, missions and recovery.

"Our guys live with them and train with them every day, share all the hardships and are with them shoulder to shoulder on the objective," said Lt. Col. Lynn Ashley, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group, which is mentoring the new force. "They really become brothers in arms."

Such a regimen hones the skills of commandos far beyond those of their Afghan army peers, U.S. combat advisers say. In marksmanship, for example, commandos fire more than 6,000 rounds of ammunition in their initial training alone, while the average Afghan soldier fires 60 rounds in training each year. "I've jumped into stacks and gone into a building shooting live rounds with commandos," a U.S. Special Forces communications sergeant said.

The commandos' high-quality gear and training is an advantage that few regular Afghan security forces have. The U.S.-led training effort in Afghanistan lacks about 3,500 trainers -- or more than 40 percent of its required manpower -- a shortfall that will be only partly made up by the 1,000 Marines arriving this month. Afghan police units suffer most from the shortage, with trainers present in only about 30 percent of Afghanistan's nearly 400 districts.

Special Forces advisers show the commandos videos of their missions, to build pride. "We are the best unit in Afghanistan right now," said Sgt. 1st Class Mohaber Rahman, 22, the platoon sergeant.

"We do everything quickly and accurately," added Pvt. Said Askar, 25, a medic and kung fu instructor.

The commandos also receive $50 in extra pay each month -- raising the total pay of a junior sergeant, for example, to $200 -- as well as better equipment than their regular army counterparts and a double ration of food. "Nobody wants to quit this unit," Reza said over a meal of flat bread, stewed meat and rice with raisins.

In many commando raids, the sudden arrival of an overwhelming force causes insurgents to surrender without a fight, U.S. advisers said. In December, about 200 commandos in Khost and dozens of Green Berets surrounded five targets in one night, detaining five insurgent leaders and 18 suspects involved with bombmaking cells -- all without firing a shot. And on Feb. 9, commandos captured Nasimulla, the leader of a Taliban bomb cell based in Sabari responsible for attacks on U.S. and Afghan forces.

"These are targets we would hit ourselves if they weren't here," said a Special Forces captain who, like other Special Forces soldiers, spoke on the condition of anonymity for security reasons. "They are going after the highest-level guys we can pull out of the area."

The Afghans are arguably better suited for the raids because they know the language and culture and can gather intelligence more easily and avoid friction with civilians, according to the advisers. In one instance recently, a commando found an insurgent hiding in a sheepfold after U.S. troops passed by, the company commander said. And when a suicide truck bomb struck the Sabari District center March 3, killing two U.S. soldiers, the Americans asked the commandos to help secure the area. "That was the first time I ever heard U.S. forces request Afghan assistance," said the company sergeant major. "There were Americans buried underneath the rubble."

But the commandos still have much to learn -- sometimes frustrating their U.S. advisers. "We yell at them for . . . drinking too much [water], constantly eating, using their under-gun lights to walk to the bathroom," one U.S. adviser said, adding that the Afghans lacked effective methods for distributing and conserving resources. "They'll have 20 bottles of water, five guys and four days to go -- they'll just drink it and look at you and say, 'I need more water,' " the sergeant major said. The logistics problems, he said, are "across the board."

The commandos rely on U.S. forces to provide helicopters for transport, attack and medical evacuation, as well as satellite communications, intelligence and a range of other support.

A larger issue for U.S. advisers is how to integrate the commandos into the Afghan National Army. "My biggest concern is right now I need to get the rest of the ANA to really understand Afghan commando operations," which differ from conventional maneuvers, the company commander said. "We are trained to do so much more than to air assault into really treacherous areas and be an anvil for the hammer of the regular heavier forces to smash."

Ultimately, the goal is for Afghan commandos to rotate into regular infantry units to spread their skills, "like U.S. Army Rangers," Ashley said. Added Maj. Gen. David Rodriguez, who until this month was the top U.S. commander for eastern Afghanistan, "They're professional, they're well led, they're well disciplined. And they're really setting the standards for the rest of the Afghan National Army."

For the Green Berets, many of whom have had several tours in Afghanistan, the commandos offer hope of an eventual respite. "We're not saying we're anywhere close to getting out of here," said the company commander, who has had five tours, while spending just five months with his 2-year-old daughter. Even as the Afghans step forward, he said, "it's going to take a long time."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

A day of skirmishing for Marines in southern Afghan town

By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writer
Fri May 2, 2:46 PM ET

Gunfire zings in near Sgt. Dan Linas' patrol, pinning his squad down against a dirt berm. The Marines peer across the field to their left, at three mud huts and a grove of trees, searching for the muzzle flash. Then they cut loose with their M-16s.

The sun is barely up, but for the men of Bravo Company's 2nd Platoon, the firefight proves just the first in a series of skirmishes Friday that will see Marines unleash earsplitting barrages of machine gun fire, mortars and artillery, most of which land just 600 yards away.

To the east, north and south lie bountiful fields of opium poppies, to the west an unseen enemy.

Airstrikes and artillery have thundered around this southern Afghan town all week, since several companies of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit took the offensive before dawn Tuesday and swept into Garmser, which sits in Taliban territory where no NATO troops had ventured.

The British military is responsible for Helmand Province, but its 7,500 soldiers, along with 2,500 Canadian troops in neighboring Kandahar, hasn't been enough manpower to tame Afghanistan's south. So the 2,400-strong 24th Marines have come to help.

The push into Garmser is their first mission since arriving from the U.S. last month, and it is the farthest south that American troops have been in several years. Most of the 33,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan operate along the border with Pakistan.

Some of the men in the 24th Marines have seen combat in the toughest parts of Iraq, and their commanders hope that experience will help calm the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.

British forces are mainly in the northern part of Helmand, which is the world's biggest producer of opium poppies. Britain has an outpost on Garmser's northern outskirts, but NATO has had no presence south of that.

The Marines in Garmser do not plan a long stay. They will leave the poppy fields be. Their only mission is to open the road for a Marine convoy that will move through town. They sit and defend the 10-foot-wide lane of dirt.

After returning fire from the berm across the empty field, the men under Linas — a 21-year-old from Richmond, Va. — jog 100 yards to the platoon command center, where Marines in the lookout post provide covering machine-gun fire.

The platoon mortar team then dials in coordinates and fires off shells in high arcs toward the suspected location of Taliban fighters, throwing up puffs of smoke in the field. There is no way to tell if any militants are hit.

In the foreground, perhaps 40 yards from the Marines' post, a half dozen Afghan men work in their illegal poppy fields, slicing the bulbs to coax out opium resin that will be used to make heroin. They look up as the mortars boom out, then go back to work.

The 24th Marines served in 2006 and 2007 in Ramadi, capital of Anbar province in western Iraq. The vast region was al-Qaida in Iraq's stronghold before the militants were pushed out in early 2007.

Compared with the dense population centers where they fought in Iraq, Marine artillery and mortar teams have much more freedom to fire in the open spaces of rural Afghanistan, where the Taliban operate.

But before more mortars are fired, 2nd Lt. Mark Greenleaf, the 24-year-old platoon commander from Monmouth, Ill., asks his observers if any civilians are in danger. "What's the collateral damage beyond the tree line?" he barks.

The expanse to the Marine post's west has been empty for days, even as farmers have worked with their poppy plants in all other directions — an indication the Taliban have a heavy presence to the west. But the company commander, Capt. Charles O'Neill, decides he's not interested in an all-day mortar battle with the insurgents.

Mere moments later, the Marines hear the whoosh of a rocket being fired in the distance. Everyone rushes for cover, pushing themselves up against mud walls or down into trenches. The boom of exploding missile rattles the outpost but it's a couple hundred yards off target.

A wave of gunfire rings out as Marines react, until sergeants shout for the men to cease fire. One Marine infantryman with a team still on the berm states the obvious: "They missed."

But Lance Cpl. Matthew Cato of Simpsonville, S.C., 21, says: "I don't care, it scared the ... out of me."

"I hate hearing those things go off because then you're just sitting here going, 'Oh, man,'" adds Cpl. Keith Manley, 23, of Ilion, N.Y.

The heat of the noon sun settles in. Marines — and militants — put down their weapons and hunker down in any shade they can find.

The countryside stays quiet until a convoy of Humvees pulls up in midafternoon to evacuate a Marine with a badly swollen ankle from a sprain. As soon as the Humvees stop, incoming fire starts up.

The gunner atop one Humvee opens fire with his .50-caliber machine gun, and Marines with M-16s also blaze away. After several minutes of heavy gunfire, which kicks up clouds of fine sand that sift down on the Marines, squad leaders yell for their men to conserve ammo.

"If there's too much ... smoke to see the target, then don't waste the rounds," yells Sgt. Chris Battaglia, 28.

An artillery post outside town then joins the skirmish, sending round after round exploding only 600 yards away. Marines yell for everyone to stay down, in a case a shell falls short.

O'Neill, the company commander, says all-day potshots by Taliban fighters are little more than nuisance attacks. The militants use binoculars and have forward observers with cell phones to try to aim better at the Marines, he says.

"This is pure asymmetric harassment," he says. "They'll pop out of a position and fire a rocket or mortar."

The Marines don't move into the field to take on the Taliban at close range. Their mission is to open the road that goes through Garmser, and nothing more. NATO troops are not authorized to eradicate poppy crops, and the Marines have assured farmers their fields won't be touched.

At the end of the day, no Marines are hurt or wounded. The Taliban casualty count is not known. But the Marines living in the mud-hut compound under Greenleaf are buzzing from a day filled with adrenaline.

"I thought it was fun," says Cato. "I know I'm doing my job. It's just a good feeling."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/200...TAN_index.html

Ellie

[thedrifter]

http://www.strategypage.com/military...050501542.aspx

Ellie

[thedrifter]

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline...-s.html?csp=34

Ellie

[thedrifter]

U.S. and NATO battle on uneven Afghan patchwork

By Luke Baker
Wed May 7, 8:34 PM ET

Last week U.S. Captain Roger Hill led a patrol into the Jaldez valley, just southwest of Kabul, and was immediately ambushed from three sides by 50 Taliban fighters armed with rocket-propelled grenades.

The army of attackers, robed and bearded, fired somewhere between 25 and 30 grenades at his convoy, Hill said, pinning the patrol down in a furious two-hour gun battle that ended only when U.S. fighter planes swooped in for support.

It was a relatively rare and surprisingly staunch attack for that area of Afghanistan, reminiscent in its intensity to episodes in Iraq, where Hill spent more than a year. Yet asked where he would rather be deployed, he is clear.

"I feel like we're getting somewhere here. In a way we've had to start much more from scratch in Iraq than in Afghanistan," he said. "Here there's a sense of progress."

His commander Major Christopher Faber, the operations officer for a task force of the 101st Airborne Division in Maidan Wardak, a province just south of Kabul, is even more succinct.

"In Iraq, it's hunting season all year long for them," he said, referring to the insurgents. "Here, I feel like there's a lot more optimism."

In some ways those views contradict the received wisdom on Afghanistan, described by military experts in the United States as a "forgotten war" and one America and its NATO allies will lose if they do not boost numbers and change tactics rapidly.

Yet on the ground in Afghanistan the conflict quickly shows itself to be far more nuanced, with large swathes of the country relatively stable and making slow if very cumbersome progress, while other areas -- particularly the far south -- are mired in a conflict that frequently eclipses Iraq for intensity.

"THE RITZ"

In the southern portions of east Afghanistan, where U.S. forces have been operating for more than six years, even the provinces that border Pakistan and have been a refuge for the Taliban in the past are showing signs of calm.

U.S. commanders spend the bulk of their days meeting local Afghan officials, trying to coordinate efforts with French, Czech or Turkish reconstruction teams and running patrols alongside the slowly improving Afghan army.

There tends to be little combat, although rockets are still frequently fired at U.S. bases, roadside bombs are an occasional threat and an uptick in violence is expected as the weather warms into a possible Spring offensive by the Taliban.

At the main U.S. base in the area, just 20 km (13 miles) from the Pakistan border, U.S. soldiers appear very relaxed about their deployment and the day-to-day duties.

"This place is the Ritz," says Private Adam Grow, 23, referring to what is known as Forward Operating Base Salerno.

"I work a 9 to 5 shift, get my work done, and then go the gym or take a class. There's definitely worse places to be."

Grow and his friend Specialist Christopher Moore, 34, are taking a philosophy class as part of a military education program. The gym on the base is the size of an aircraft hangar with 10 running machines, endless weight racks, ice-cold water on tap from stainless steel fridges and live U.S. sports on TV.

"This is a war zone, believe it or not," jokes Moore.

GENERATION TO RECOVER

Three provinces to the southwest, it very much is a war zone. In Kandahar and Helmand, in the desert regions of southern Afghanistan, U.S., British, Canadian and Dutch troops battle furiously against an entrenched Taliban on a near-daily basis.

Hundreds of U.S. Marines were sent in the last week to retake a town in south Helmand, where around 7,000 British troops have been based for two years and are making slow progress, sometimes taking territory only to lose it weeks later.

The battle to secure Helmand, which alone produces nearly half the world's opium, could drag on for years more. Afterwards, years of intense reconstruction would still be required to prevent the region collapsing again.

Kandahar, the one-time headquarters for the Taliban, is little different. Alone, the two vast provinces help explain why even military and civilian optimists think it could be a generation before Afghanistan is fully on the road to recovery.

At the same time, in those areas to the east and in northern Afghanistan where progress appears to have been made, the United States and NATO have to be sure to coordinate their efforts so that the overall impact is not two steps forward and one back.

Forty countries are now contributing to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) which has around 47,000 troops, but drawing up a strategy that unifies their work has proved elusive. In addition, the United States has some 14,000 troops serving in a separate force.

The U.S. defense secretary has expressed frustration that NATO cannot or will not come up with more troops to support the fight. Washington has mooted it could now send up to 7,000 more of its own troops to boost numbers next year.

Perhaps partly as a result, U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan joke that ISAF stands for "I Suck At Fighting." Yet a serious note underlines the soldiers' ribbing of their allies.

Because they don't feel totally supported by ISAF on the battlefield, there are elements of tension between U.S. and NATO commanders when it comes to managing post-combat reconstruction.

In Wardak, Major Faber shares a base with some French troops involved in reconstruction, and the Turks have a nearby compound from where they administer aid and training of Afghan forces. They wave hello, but do not always know what everyone's up to.

"I see a lot more international effort here than in Iraq," says Captain Hill, weighing up the positives. "But I don't necessarily know what a French officer, or a USAID guy, or a Turkish reconstruction guy is doing and that makes it hard.

"We're making progress, but if we can't coordinate better then we're kind of shooting ourselves in the foot," he says.

(Editing by Megan Goldin)

Ellie

[thedrifter]

From The Times
May 12, 2008
British troops guide US Marines on anti-Taleban raids in Afghanistan
Michael Evans, Defence Editor

US Marines supported by British troops in Afghanistan now command three key locations south of the town of Garmsir, in Helmand province, putting pressure on the main supply routes of the Taleban for arms, opium and reinforcements.

For the first time since the Nato campaign expanded to the south in 2006 the Taleban stranglehold in this part of Helmand – stretching from the Pakistan border to Garmsir – has been weakened. Crucial vantage points are now held by 1,200 US Marines from 24 Marine Expeditionary Unit (24 MEU) and 200 soldiers from the 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Scotland (2 Scots) battle group.

Lieutenant-Colonel Robin Matthews, the chief British spokesman for Task Force Helmand, said that the US men were guided by British troops as they moved at night “over extraordinarily difficult terrain . . . to launch their assault”.

The operation, which started on April 28 and involved helicopter and ground assaults, provided the US Marines from 24 MEU with their first offensive against the Taleban since they arrived in southern Afghanistan last month as a special reserve manoeuvre force for the Nato commander of Regional Command South. They have already lost two men.

Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, the British commander of Task Force Helmand, told The Times: “This operation has severely dislocated Taleban control of an area in which they have traditionally enjoyed considerable autonomy.”

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marines take Afghan battle to the Taliban

May 12, 2008
Rosie DiManno
Columnist


KABUL–The spring offensive is well launched – by NATO.

Or, put another way, pre-emptively provoked by the U.S. Marines Expeditionary Force.

If the best defence is a good offence, American troops recently arrived in the southern provinces have wasted no time taking the battle to the Taliban, putting an entirely different complexion on combat tactics in the heartland of the insurgency.

Joining forces with British troops who have responsibility for NATO operations in Helmand province, these battle-hardened Marines – many of them veterans of fierce combat in the Iraqi city of Ramadi two years ago – hurled themselves into the insurgency cauldron last week, with the objective of dislodging Taliban fighters from strongholds north of the border with Pakistan.

Although the British have a base in the town of Garmser, NATO's most southerly outpost, and have battled strenuously to maintain it against encroachment, the vast surrounding district, much of it inhospitable desert, has been essentially free movement territory for the neo-Taliban.

Garmser is a main assembly and staging point for jihadists as they enter Afghan soil. It is also a key transit route for smuggling in arms and smuggling out opium – the vascular network that pumps blood into the insurgency.

The claims and counterclaims – success versus failure – have been fast and furious. While American authorities claimed on the weekend to have killed nine militants, Taliban spokesperson Qari Yosuf asserted it was the insurgents who had killed nine Americans.

There have been no official reports of U.S. casualties from the fighting. But provincial government sources, along with aid workers in the region, accuse the Marines of conducting aggressive door-to-door searches, rousting civilians from their homes, arresting innocents and forcing upward of 15,000 Afghans to flee into the hot desert for safety.

None of these claims has been confirmed. However, the U.S. propensity for using air strikes and artillery and mortar barrages in support of their ground troops has much of the domestic media here caterwauling about a suddenly "Americanized war" in Afghanistan.

NATO had begged for these reinforcements – 2,300 Marines started arriving seven weeks ago – and clearly will not criticize their performance now, particularly since it appears to have achieved the initial goal in Helmand, clawing back turf and pushing back Taliban elements in one of the few regions with a clearly defined front line.

"Several reports tried to overshadow the success of the Marines, accusing them of excessive use of force resulting in civilian casualties and excessive damage to civilian infrastructure," Brig.-Gen. Carlos Branco, chief spokesperson for International Security Assistance Force, told reporters yesterday. "These allegations are very far from the truth. The United States Marines forces have responded to all hostile acts and intents with proportional force, strictly in accordance with the law of armed combat."

Yet Branco couldn't say if American troops are bound by the same rules of engagement – never specifically spelled out for public dissemination – as their NATO colleagues. "I don't actually know the answer to that question," Branco told the Toronto Star.


Civilian casualties are the primary cause of embitterment towards foreign troops, even among the majority of Afghans who support NATO's presence. As propaganda fodder, dead innocents have been heavily exploited by the Taliban, though their fighters routinely take cover among civilians and shred Afghan bodies in suicide attacks.

"We do everything we can to avoid civilian casualties,'' Branco said, reaching for a clutch of statistics: Of more than 16,000 aircraft sorties in 2007, only 0.1 per cent resulted in civilian deaths. "But 100 per cent of suicide bombing events resulted in civilian casualties."

So far this year, insurgents have killed six times as many civilians compared to the same period in 2007, Branco said. Yet only 1 per cent of deaths caused by suicide bombers have been ISAF personnel. "The facts coincide with our words,'' said Branco. "They are the ones who don't have any consideration for the value of human life."

The military operation in Garmser did account for the highest number of "kinetic events" – hostile contact, weapons fired – over a one-week period in 2007.

Branco framed this development as evidence of NATO setting the combat terms with the Taliban, an enemy that usually shuns conventional fighting because it cannot win in that arena.

"It is the Afghan security forces and ISAF forces that set the operational tempo, not the insurgents. But increased military activity does not mean increased insurgent activity. In fact, it is completely the opposite."

The Taliban, it is quite obvious, have changed their tactics in recent months, taking their bombs and blasts to the cities because, ISAF says, they were bleeding out in the volatile southern provinces, with few territorial gains to show for their protracted campaign there and many of their top commanders either killed or captured. And they've achieved some spectacular bragging triumphs in Kabul itself – January's suicide bombing at the Serena Hotel, the attack during a military parade late last month, seen as an assassination attempt on the president. Both incidents ratcheted up the fear factor in the capital, while demonstrating the Taliban can pounce at will, wherever they like, if not with profound tactical payoff.

The optics of a spreading insurgency are misleading, Branco insisted, even as the papers are filled daily with reports of Taliban strikes hither and yon.

This year, Branco noted, 78 per cent of those "kinetic events" have occurred in 10 per cent of Afghanistan's regional districts. "This confirms ISAF's view that the insurgency is confined to specific areas of Afghanistan. In fact, it clearly disproves the widely purported view that the insurgency is spreading nationwide.

"The so-called spring offensive was a mere act of propaganda. We haven't seen any spring offensive. It's true that we have seen increased activity but you have to understand who is taking the fight, who has the tactical advantage and initiative.

"It's not the insurgents. We are going after them and we are hurting them in their backyards."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

12 militants killed in southern Afghanistan

By FISNIK ABRASHI, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 39 minutes ago

U.S.-led coalition forces called in airstrikes against the Taliban, killing a dozen militants during fighting in southern Afghanistan that has displaced many families, officials said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, an old mortar round exploded in the north of the country, wounding 17 children.

The coalition said in a statement that its troops opened fire and called in airstrikes Monday after observing militants trying to set up an ambush. The coalition had been targeting a Taliban commander transporting weapons.

The troops also discovered weapons and ammunition in a search of compounds in the area, it said.

Fighting has intensified in the southern province of Helmand since U.S. Marines pushed into the town of Garmser late last month aiming to cut Taliban supply lines in the heart of the insurgency.

About 1,200 families — an estimated 7,000 people — have left their homes in recent weeks because of the fighting in Garmser, said Mohammad Nader Farhad, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

About 900 of those families have relocated to Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand, and about 300 have moved to neighboring Kandahar province, Farhad said. The families were staying with relatives and friends or in rented houses.

Farhad said the government is assessing the situation, and UNHCR, along with other U.N. agencies, is prepared to assist the families as needed after the findings are complete.

Helmand Gov. Ghulab Mangal denied there had been a major exodus, but said authorities would compensate all families whose homes were damaged or destroyed during the fighting.

Mangal said about 150 militants, including foreign fighters from Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Chechnya, have been killed since the operation began. He said there are still about 500 insurgents in and around Garmser.

A U.S. military spokesman could not immediately be reached to comment on the governor's claim.

In the northern town of Baghlan on Tuesday, a boy dropped an old mortar shell that he was trying to exchange for ice cream with a scrap metal dealer, said police officer Habib Rehman.

The shell exploded, wounding 17 children and a man. Fourteen of the children were evacuated to a hospital in Baghlan. Three others were sent to the nearby town of Pul-e-Khumri, said Dr. Narmgui from the Baghlan hospital. Like many Afghans, Narmgui goes by one name.

Afghanistan is littered with old ordnance left over from decades of war.

On Monday, a rocket hit a house in the eastern Kunar province, wounding two children and a man, said provincial deputy police chief Abdul Sabor Allayer. He blamed insurgents for the attack.

At least 1,200 people — mostly militants — have died in insurgency-related violence in 2008, according to a tally compiled by The Associated Press of figures from Western and Afghan officials. The U.N. says more than 8,000 people, most of them militants, died in insurgency-related violence in 2007.

___

Associated Press reporters Amir Shah in Kabul and Noor Khan in Kandahar contributed to this report.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

MILITARY: At war in Afghanistan

By MARK WALKER - Staff Writer

AFGHANISTAN ---- Twenty-year-old Navy Corpsman Joshua Spencer and Marine Lance Cpl. Nathan Cordero are key players in the U.S. military's campaign to quell an uprising by Taliban and al-Qaida insurgents in this mountainous country.

Spencer, a native of Prosper, Texas, who completed his medical training at Camp Pendleton, treats local Afghans.

"A lot of elders will come up seeking help for infections and things like that," Spencer said Monday from Korengal Forward Operating Base, a mountainside post in an isolated region of Afghanistan near the border with Pakistan.

Cordero, 21, patrols an area around an isolated outpost tucked high along a steep hillside.

Spencer and Cordero are among more than 900 Marines who are working with the army and security forces in Afghanistan. They are part of a force of more than 3,000 Marines ordered into the war-torn country by Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

The troops are using humanitarian aid, as well as bombs and bullets, to stabilize this Middle East country.

Cordero, of Fontana, Calif., said the increased Marine presence in Afghanistan is helping.

"We can see that we are making a difference," he said, referring to combat and large-scale humanitarian efforts, such as food and hygiene kit distribution and medical assistance to the local population.

Col. Jeff Haynes of the III Marine Expeditionary Force based in Okinawa is directing several teams of Marines working with the Afghan Army near Bagram.

Haynes detailed his teams' efforts during a briefing for the head of Marine Corps forces throughout the Middle East, Camp Pendleton's Lt. Gen. Samuel Helland. The general is in the midst of a tour of the Middle East, visiting his commanders and troops in the field.

Haynes' teams are assigned to several bases in a mountainous region of northern Afghanistan near the Pakistani border.

Afghan National Army troops are becoming more aggressive in the fight against the Taliban and al-Qaida in the 75 days since the bulk of Haynes' forces arrived in the country.

The Afghan army recently conducted a heroin poppy eradication program around a lake, cutting into the Taliban's primary source of income. That action was significant, Haynes said.

"The point is that these guys moved and for the most part did it on their own," Haynes said in reference to the Afghans.

Haynes echoed what Marine Corps Commandant James Conway proposed last fall ---- leaving Iraq and putting more forces in Afghanistan.

"Afghanistan is a better fit for us and what we do," Haynes told Helland during the briefing.

The general said he understood the desire on the part of the commandant and other Marine leaders, but warned no additional Marine troops beyond those now here should be expected.

"This will be an economy of force," the general said.

Shortly after Haynes gave his briefing, Helland and Maj. Gen. Thomas Waldhauser, commander of Camp Pendleton's 1st Marine Division, toured three bases in the rugged terrain.

At base Tagab, where a small contingent of Marines is working with several hundred Afghan troops, two Afghan commanders described recent fighting in the area.

Sitting inside a small, wooden room, the commanders said the recent poppy eradication in the area removed about 70 percent of the local crop.

Speaking through an interpreter, they said about 16 different enemy groups were operating in the area. The 500 insurgents were armed with AK-47 assault rifles and rockets but hadn't attacked any of the Afghan bases.

"Thank God they did not do any attacks on us," said an Afghan general, whose name was not released.

Local residents are increasingly reporting planned attacks, the Afghans said, because they are tired of the violence and intimidation waged by the Taliban.

During a stop at Cordero's outpost, Marines reported frequent attacks, mostly small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades.

Cordero said he was hit by a round during an operation on April 12.

Displaying the hole where the bullet struck, Cordero described how the round struck the casing for a grenade he was carrying on his chest. The bullet stopped there, combusting the grenade charge and slightly burning the 21-year-old's neck.

"I was laughing at first, but then I got mad at myself because I got hit," he said.

Spencer's outpost also has taken its share if gunfire.

"We usually take small arms fire every couple of days," said Spencer, who is able to call home every other day and check on his older brother who is serving in Iraq.

"My mom is really worried about us," he said. "But we're both doing just fine."

Spencer said he joined the Navy because he was looking for a more exciting way to apply the emergency medical technician training he undertook before joining the service.

"I just wanted to do something more," he said. "And this is sure different."

Contact staff writer Mark Walker at (760) 740-3529 or mlwalker@nctimes.com.

Ellie