No Hero: The Evolution of a Navy SEAL (14 page)

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A
few years before, I invited Walt out to SHOT Show, a shooting trade show in Las Vegas. We’d usually go out there to meet with vendors and see what kinds of new guns and gear were available on the market that we might be able to use.

The first day, I introduced him around to all the vendors. By the second day, my contacts were asking me where Walt was hanging out. At a bar after the show the third night, I found Walt holding court with executives from the National Rifle Association. He had a cigar in his mouth, and he was slapping backs and shaking hands like he was running for office.

But one look at the guards and I was sure his winning personality wasn’t going to help here. We were in a lot of trouble. We weren’t sure what was going on, but from the looks of it, we weren’t going to talk our way out of this one.

We were herded into a waiting room near the flight line. Walt sat down in the chair next to me. I could just make out his exasperated grimace through his beard. He kept his head down and his eyes low.

“This is bullshit,” he growled.

A couple of the diplomats and younger soldiers began showing signs of stress. They were beginning to get more and more upset. The State Department staffer who pulled us off the airplane wasn’t in the room, so to me that was a good sign. Hopefully he was working out whatever issues there were. I looked over our group and could tell that there were some very worried folks.

“Hey, guys, everyone just needs to relax. I’m sure this is being worked out right this second,” I said. “Let’s just all keep our mouths shut and wait to hear more.”

There were multiple guards armed with AK-47s standing in the room, and there was no doubt in my mind that they spoke English. They were not only guarding us, but also listening to everything we said, waiting for someone to slip up and say something they shouldn’t.

We sat in the room for almost an hour. The guards kept coming in and demanding our military ID cards or passports. Once they made copies of those, I guess, they wanted
our driver’s licenses and any other documents we could produce.

Each time, I’d hold the document up, only to have it snatched out of my hand by the guard. He’d growl something at me in Urdu and march off. My mind was spinning. Why did they let the plane leave, but not us? What exactly were they looking for? Why were they harassing us? I started to wonder if I had diplomatic immunity.

Then the State Department staffer was back with the guards. No one looked happy, but the color had returned to the staffer’s face. Instead of that frazzled look, he now just looked tired.

“OK, we can go,” he said. “Head out to the van. They are going to let us go back to the embassy.”

As we passed, the guard’s scowl got more severe. Walt and I pulled the staffer aside in the van. We wanted to know what had happened as well as where our gear was. We never traveled without our weapons and kit, and it felt wrong to leave them behind.

“What’s the deal?” Walt said.

“I finally got to my boss at the embassy and he made some calls,” the staffer said. “The plane was allowed to leave, but your kit will have to meet you back in Afghanistan.”

“OK, so our kit is safe. Now, what the fuck was up with that entire situation?” I asked angrily.

The staffer was flustered again. He stammered out something about a mix-up. I turned and looked at Walt and could
already tell that he was thinking the whole explanation was suspect.

“My money is on the fact that you fucked up and forgot to file the proper paperwork,” I said to the staffer.

He didn’t respond, but kept talking about getting us home.

“I’m going to need to work some angles, so it may be a few days before I can get you guys out and back to Afghanistan,” he said.

After lying low at the American Embassy for a few days, we were allowed to leave. Walt and I landed back in Afghanistan a week later and couldn’t have been happier. We both had gotten a healthy dose of what it’s like to work without a swim buddy, and neither one of us wanted to repeat it anytime soon. While I had endured living with a horrible version of a swim buddy, Walt had stayed at the American Embassy without one at all. He was left with no mission and no support. All he had to do was kill time. We were not only happy to be back and linked up together, but very appreciative of each other’s support.

When all was said and done, the Air Force essentially knocked the tops off a few of the Tora Bora Mountains and my teammates went on a weeklong camping trip. There was no sign of any man in flowing white robes. My money is still on the fact that the single-source intelligence was shit from the beginning. We’d never forget the “flowing white robes,” and from that point on, the term became slang for a mission that was all fucked up from the start.

I’d remember the mission for another reason too. Working without trust, solid communication, and the ability to pull your partner aside and give him or her your honest opinion—and get honest feedback in return—was tough for me. Good, bad, or otherwise, your swim buddy is there to protect you, encourage you, give advice, call you on your shit, and most importantly be there when you need
help.

Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

Discomfort

It was
Alaska cold.

Not kind of cold.

Not partially cold or even the type of cold where you think you could go without gloves and a hat.

I’m talking bone-chilling cold that hits you at your core.

I couldn’t feel my toes, and my fingers were numb despite thick gloves and hand warmers. The metal of my rifle hurt to touch barehanded and I alternated putting each of my hands in my pocket in hopes I’d be able to pull the trigger when we got to the target.

We were on a winter deployment in 2009. Our intelligence analysts were tracking a group of fighters in a valley south of Kabul. We’d hit a couple of decent targets, but mostly dry holes. The winter deployments were always slow because of the weather. The run-of-the-mill, low-level fighters hung up their guns when it got cold and waited for the spring fighting season.

Our analysts were working on tracking down a very high-level Taliban commander. Using multiple sources, including drones, they were able to locate him. From the drone feed we
could see that the commander was traveling with a large group of fighters and they were holed up in a building at the center of a village.

We were told the commander and his fighters were responsible for a series of attacks in the valley that killed several Coalition soldiers. At this point we had collected enough intelligence; we were sure we could get a missile strike approved. After all, there was no reason to go out in the cold and risk our lives in a gunfight if someone could simply push the “easy button” and drop a bomb on him.

But these guys were not your standard Taliban fighters. The commander moved from mosque to mosque and village to village, never staying more than a short time in any place. They had been trained and knew our limitations. The Taliban were getting smarter and smarter at countering our tactics. They knew that with our current rules of engagement we couldn’t bomb a mosque or even go inside. Working with this kind of knowledge, they simply never exposed themselves long enough for us to take a shot.

That meant we’d probably have to go out in the dead of winter and hunt them down. Combat was dangerous enough, but even more so in waist-deep snow and freezing-cold temperatures.

SEALs are taught starting in BUD/S to be comfortable being uncomfortable. From drown proofing, where the instructors tie our hands and feet and throw us in the water, to Hell Week, where we spend five and a half days swimming, running, and moving with fewer than four total hours of
sleep during the whole week, SEALs experience a lot of uncomfortable conditions.

Part of being a SEAL is overcoming cold, exhaustion, fear, stress, and pain. It is easy to lose focus, drive, and determination when things are uncomfortable. We know from early on that not everything we do in the job is going to be comfortable.

Not everything is going to be easy.

During BUD/S training, I concentrated on just getting to the next meal. If I made it to breakfast, I started thinking about lunch. After lunch, I focused on dinner. If I started to think about the weeks and months of uncomfortable challenges ahead of me, I lost focus, so I just didn’t.

That was a mind-set that was coming in handy during this deployment. As I trudged toward the village, I broke the mission down into small steps. First conduct the patrol. Then assault the target. Then go home and get warm. But at that moment, I was still on step one. I knew I had to set little goals and reach them. And along the way, I might forget I was miserable.

There is a reason we chose “The only easy day was yesterday” as our motto. We used to joke, “Everyone wants to be a SEAL on Friday.” It was easy to be a SEAL at the bar or when you’re out with friends relaxing. But being excited about being a SEAL in the middle of winter in Afghanistan when you know you have a long, crazy, cold night in front of you is a different story.

The analysts continued throughout the day watching the
commander move from building to building in the village. As it got dark, his group moved farther up the valley and entered what could be a mosque. From the drone feed, it was kind of hard to tell which mud building among the rest of the mud buildings was indeed the mosque.

I huddled in the operations center with Steve and watched footage of the fighters trudging down a goat trail, moving from compound to compound. As they walked, the last guy in line fell back a little, checking to make sure no one followed. They walked in patrol order; it wasn’t the typical gaggle of farmers walking down the road. My eye tracked forward, looking at each fighter in the line until I got to the point man. He was well ahead of the main body and keenly looking for possible Coalition forces waiting to ambush them.

“Let’s just bomb these guys,” Steve said as we watched the fighters enter the village.

“Can’t see any guns,” said one of the intelligence analysts. “No guns, no strike. Besides they very rarely clear civilian buildings long enough for us to coordinate an air strike.”

We watched helplessly as the fighters filed into what we thought was another mosque. While most of them got warm inside, three stayed outside to keep watch. Two of the fighters started to walk up and down the main road, and a third sat outside of the main entrance to the building. Maybe we couldn’t see their guns, but obviously these men were guards. There was no other reason to stay outside in this weather. How often did we find Taliban fighters pulling security without weapons? Never.

My troop chief asked each of us for our assessment.

“What do you think, fellas, can we pull this off?” he said.

We knew the hard truth: If we didn’t roger up to conduct this mission, the bad guys would get away. They would go on to conduct more attacks or set IEDs that would in turn kill American or Coalition forces.

“I guess they’d rather send us in, with the possibility of getting one of us shot, than to drop a bomb,” Steve said with a short pause and a disgusted look. “We all agree that this is a ripe target. If we don’t take a swing at it tonight, we’re going to miss them.”

Steve paused for a second.

“I’m in.”

In a way I was happy. The deployment had been too quiet. We all wanted to get outside the wire. Our job was dangerous, we knew that, but we preferred work to sitting around. Boredom was worse than danger.

Steve and I had been swim buddies a long time and I knew he was doing the same mental checklist I was.

It was a good target. The illumination was low—not zero percent, but close. The enemy was located so far up an enemy-controlled valley they wouldn’t be expecting us. Add the freezing-cold temperature, blowing wind, and snow, and you’d have to be insane to attempt this mission. I loved the harder missions. My mind wandered back to the miserable conditions and freezing-cold days spent in Alaska. I’d grown up in these kinds of conditions.

“OK,” I said. “Let’s do it.”

All the team leaders gave him the thumbs-up.

The troop commander and troop chief left the planning to us. Steve and I sat down along with our recce team leader and studied all the possible routes in and out of the village. The target’s current position sat at the end of the valley.

There was no way to land our helicopters uphill from the target, and if we landed over the ridge in the next valley, there was no way we would be able to patrol over the extremely steep mountains in waist-deep snow in one cycle of darkness.

Everyone knew the dangers of being caught in the valley when the sun came up. With our small force, we could quickly find ourselves in a very bad position. Plus, there was tons of snow, making any cross-country travel slow and miserable.

We had only one choice: fly in and land well down the valley, far enough away from the village that the Taliban wouldn’t hear the noise from our helicopters. The planning wasn’t anything special—we were relying on our ability to shoot, move, and communicate. It was pretty basic, and besides, we’d been conducting these types of missions for years at this point in the war. The only thing different tonight was the snow and cold.

I didn’t relish the thought of slogging my way up the valley, but my hope was the weather would keep the bad guys inside. We were banking on being the only ones foolish enough to be out.

Helicopters had heaters, but they never worked that well and the ride to the target was a suckfest. We sat huddled together on the jump seats with huge down jackets draped over
our shoulders. The trick was to wear just the right amount of layers so that you’re not too hot on the patrol when moving, but not freezing once you stop. I had my Arc’teryx jacket and gloves, but nothing on my legs except an extra pair of long underwear. Some of the guys had on Gore-Tex bibs to protect their legs, but I always got too hot in those.

“One minute,” I heard the crew chief yell as the ramp of the helicopter began to lower into the open position.

A rush of even colder air entered the cabin as I threw off my large parka.

“This is going to suck,” I thought.

I could tell by the howl of the engines that we were close to landing. From the one-minute call until we touched down I always looked out of the window. I tried to gather as much situational awareness of the immediate area as possible. You could never know what piece of information was going to be necessary in a firefight, especially if we were ambushed as soon as we landed.

Tonight, all I could see was white. Snow covered everything, and I could see the moon glistening off the ice. It was beautiful. The snow and mountains of Afghanistan rival some of the best ski slopes in the United States. This place could be a resort if the locals weren’t always trying to kill you.

All around me, my teammates shrugged off their jackets and started to work the circulation back into their legs. I moved my rifle into my lap and held on to the crossbar of the seat. This deployment we were working with National Guard helicopters, and their aircraft lacked the high-speed avionics
of the special operations squadron. Let’s just say their landings weren’t the best. We hit the ground with a thud, and I could feel the helicopter’s wheels skid as it lurched forward.

From my position looking out the open ramp of the helicopter, it seemed as if the ramp was stuck. I refocused my night vision goggles and could see that we’d landed in such a deep snowdrift that the ramp couldn’t open all the way. Our recce guys began climbing through the small opening between the top of the ramp and the top of the helicopter.

When we emerged, the air was bitter cold. I trudged through the waist-deep snow to get out of the rotor blast. I looked back to see my teammates dropping off out of the helicopter and into the snow one at a time. The rotor wash blew snow in my face, all over my equipment, and down my neck.

I began to get my bearings and could see our snipers moving into a position out in front of me. Just then, the helicopter powered up, blowing a second batch of snow down my neck. I stood in place, not moving until the snow subsided and the helicopter noise faded. Up ahead, the snipers started to break trail. Thankfully they’d remembered their snowshoes. The snipers started stamping down the snow so we could walk off the drop zone.

I just wanted to walk.

I knew from my childhood growing up in Alaska that movement was the best way to fight the cold. When we finally got on the road, I started to warm up. I looked back over my shoulder and saw the long line of men, dark against the fresh white snow, snaking its way to the road. Besides my
troop, we had a group of Rangers and some Afghan commandos with us.

The moon hadn’t set yet, and there was a decent amount of moonlight, so looking through our night vision the landscape was super bright. Above me, the stars seemed to go on forever. Is this what “the Chosin Few” in Korea felt like?

“The Chosin Few” were UN troops, mostly Marines, who fought in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War. It was legendary in our circles. The Chinese encircled the UN troops, who fought for seventeen days in ice and snow before breaking out of the encirclement.

The weather and terrain in some ways were more hostile than the enemy. Temperatures at night bottomed out at thirty-five degrees below zero and just barely reached zero during the day. Food rations froze. Vehicle engines refused to start after being shut down. Marines suffered from frostbite.

It made this march look easy.

During the Korean War they didn’t have the cool-guy, top-of-the-line Arc’teryx gear that we had. That’s how I rationalized it in my mind. I knew I couldn’t bitch about it; plenty of soldiers in the past suffered through much worse.

The crystal-clear night only made it colder. There were no clouds to trap even the smallest amount of heat. I slid one hand at a time into my pocket. My fingers reached for the balled-up chemical hand warmer I carried.

For three hours we patrolled up the valley and toward our target. The march was just plain miserable. The weather was more brutal than even my worst days in Alaska riding on the
back of my father’s snow machine. There was no avoiding it. My fingers stiffened each time I took them out of my pocket. Gusts of wind blew snow into my face.

Up ahead, I could see enormous wisps of snow blowing off the top of the mountains that towered over the end of the valley. With every gust, I had to make a conscious effort to focus on the mission and not the cold. We were deep within an enemy-controlled valley, outnumbered, and our assessment said we were heading toward some pretty hard-core fighters.

Over the radio, the drone pilots were still reporting just the three guards. The rest of the fighters were holed up in the building.

“The warm building,” I thought.

We took a quick break and one of my teammates gave me an Atomic Fireball candy. My feet were numb from the cold and I was reluctant to even take my gloved hand out of my pocket to accept it.

“Maybe it’ll warm me up,” I thought as I popped it in my mouth.

At the very least, it would keep my mind on the burning sensation on my tongue and off my cold feet. When things get miserable, especially this miserable, the only thing to do is laugh about it. The roads were icy and very slick. Every five minutes or so, one of the guys in the patrol would slip and crash to the ground. I laughed to myself each time, until I hit a slick patch. My foot instantly started to slide and I knew I was going down.