Operation Dark Heart (33 page)

On my trip to the house, I’d coordinated the specifics with Mr. Pink and Mr. White, *** ********** ***** ****** ****** **** *** ****** **** to support the SEAL assault. And, oh yeah, I’d finally collected a quality massage from Kate and gotten some extended sleep in a real bed. I felt almost human again.

While in Kabul, I detoured the convoy from its route to make a stop at Blue, the Western-style concession store located on the outskirts of the Kabul airport that sold all manner of Western luxuries—everything from Jack Daniel’s to the latest PlayStation. It had all the Western luxuries that were forbidden to the devout Muslim, and signs posted in the store said as much.

I had an order to pick up two dozen steaks for the 10th Mountain Intel NCOs. Blue sold the most outstanding, thick-and-juicy Australian T-bones, and everybody would buy them on a regular basis. We would always buy the 10th Mountain Intel NCOs a few more than they ordered to show our appreciation for the help they gave us, and I always liked to pick up some for the ***** folks, who never got the appreciation they deserved.

I had spent thirty-six hours integrating our HUMINT intelligence-collection into the SEALs’ planning. I knew if there were any problems with the mission because of us, I’d have to answer for it to General McChrystal.

Mr. Pink, Mr. White, and I had each been issued two sets of SEAL assault uniforms. Unlike the Rangers, the SEALs appeared to have an unlimited supply of kit, and they wanted all of the team—including me and my guys—to wear the same uniform.

At that time the SEALs were in their tan uniforms. They had blood-type markers—black writing on tan with Velcro backing that went on the top left arm. There was no rank insignia, only Velcro-secured patches with two-letter insignia denoting who was doing what on the team similar to those noting blood type on the top of the sleeve.

They’d pulled their weapons out, broken them down, and re-oiled them. Some carried M-4s with scopes and silencers or smaller MP-5s with silencers. A sniper, who would stay on a helo, had an M-14 in case the enemy decided to bolt the compound and he could get a bead on them from up above.

The SEALs were prepped to go in quietly—at first. Choppering in on five MH-6 Little Birds, they would land out of town and proceed in on foot to surprise the enemy. No use coming in accompanied by a brass band and lots of shooting—the bad guys would just escape and melt into the village.

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They had located the Hekmatyar compound. A small one—pretty typical—in the midst of about eighteen other compounds in the village. It was a remote burg, in the mountains about 10,000 feet up, where no one in the current war had conducted combat operations. The challenge was to get in—and out—safely.

The question was: Was Hekmatyar himself there? At the very least, we knew that one of his senior lieutenants was.

At 2100, there had been little movement in and out of the house since 1600. Our assets were watching it closely. They didn’t know when the assault would go down—we didn’t trust them
that
much—but they’d been told to plan to stick around for another twenty-four hours.

“We’d like one last report from your guys before we hit,” the SEAL commander told me. “Is that possible?”

“What time do you want the update?” I asked.

“Wheels up at twenty-three hundred hours. We’d like an update while we’re in the air,” he said.

“Around midnight?” I asked.

“Would be good, but later than that if possible,” he said.

“How about oh one hundred or oh two hundred?” I asked. They were expected to hit their target about 0300.

There was already a Predator above, sending down images, and those were appearing on a large screen in the main Tactical Operations Center of the Death Star.

We had maps showing approaches to the village, where the helos would drop off the SEALs. The overwatch helo with the sniper would hang off to the side for the first twenty minutes while the guys made their way to the village on foot.

Start was delayed slightly while they made sure the moon was over the mountains. At 0100, we had our usual global teleconference at the Top Secret/SCI level. Admiral Eric Olson, *** ** *** ** **** was on, along with the Counterterrorism Center at Langley, **** **** **** ****** CENTCOM HQs from MacDill Air Force, and Special Operations Command HQs, also at MacDill.

Colonel Keller reported in on our SEAL operation. He noted that DoD HUMINT had provided key information for the planning of the raid. McChrystal shot me a warning look. I smiled. Winking would have been too over the top.

Back at the SEAL TOC, I dialed the house on the Iridium.

“Individuals walking in and out of the house twice during the evening, but none of the targets of interest,” Randy told me. Good news. A mass exodus of vehicles would signify they’d gotten wind of something.

“Anything else?” I asked.

“That’s the best we can do,” said Randy.

“That’s all they can ask of us,” I responded. I told him to tell his assets to stay put after the raid so they could check out the village chatter.

I signed off with Randy and went back to the TOC and gave the senior intel guy the news. Swallowing cup after cup of coffee, I tried to kill time by talking to Colonel Keller about retooling the scout project. I was also trying to keep my mind off the upcoming raid. Once again, lives were on the line based on our intel. I was confident it was quality stuff, but life can take some left turns at times. I just hoped this moment wasn’t one of them.

We were getting updates from a helicopter via the team leader on board.

At 0200, I walked back to the SEAL tent. They had gotten their helos into the valley and expected to have SEALs on the ground about 0220. The challenge was to drop them off close enough so they could get there quickly, but far enough away so that the sound of the helos didn’t wake everybody up.

The SEALs would start their walk-in to the village at 0245, and the raid was at 0300. I went back out and called Randy one more time to make sure nothing had changed. Randy said they hadn’t called. I took that as positive news. I hoped.

The SEAL recon element was up in the mountains looking down on the compound, setting up blocking positions.

Back at Bagram, in the SEAL HQ tent, there was near silence. The room was filled with a group of men with a great deal of stress on their faces. I decided to move out and leave them be. There was nothing more I could do from here on. The intel was in, the operators were moving into place, so I decided to go into the main TOC and join Colonel Keller to watch the raid.

Just as I moved toward the door, I heard the command.

“Team Alpha, go.” The SEAL team leader’s voice in the helo came in clear over the radio, over a low, but distinctive, hum. The speaker chirped a couple of times with static.

I decide to loiter to hear the outcome—and hoped it would be good, both for the sake of the HUMINT collection effort and my own ass with McChrystal.

There were multiple transmissions—conversations all going on at once—nothing I could really discern. Then an eerie silence.

Well, that probably meant someone got killed. More undecipherable, overlapping voices, and then another break.

“Clear,” came the last call.

The team leader radioed in that they had secured the compound without killing anybody, capturing six individuals. Three were suspected Hekmatyar lieutenants. There seemed to be a collective sigh and smiles all through the room. I started to move toward the door and felt good that we had played some small role in the effort.…

“In the wall,” we heard.

Just as I moved to go to the door, an excited voice broke in from one of the helicopters.

“They’ve got a runner. He’s now observable.”

The runner had taken a back way out of the compound and headed for the mountains.

Somebody had escaped. But who? In the TOC, the intel guys were starting to formulate questions for the team leader in the helo to get a spot rep on who exactly they had captured.

Who do they think got out? The team leader relayed the question to the guys on the ground.

A few minutes went by, and then we heard the team leader’s voice.

“We don’t have the target. The prime target is not here.”

“The runner,” said the SEAL commander in the TOC. “Do you have the runner in your sights?”

“Yeah, we got him,” came back the answer. “We see him.”

“Can you take him out?”

A brief pause.

“Yeah, he can. He’s got a clear shot.”

“Is there any chance the ground team can capture him?”

A brief delay.

“No, we don’t think so. He’s got too much of a lead.”

Everyone looked around the room.

“Take him out,” said the SEAL commander in the TOC.

“Roger.”

A thirty-second delay.

“OK, he’s down.”

“Is he still alive?”

“Can’t tell. We’ll have someone to him in less than ten minutes.”

The TOC SEAL commander looked pissed.

“What the …? Why is it going to take ten minutes?”

“We’re still trying to secure the compound, sir. Give us a minute.”

It only took them five minutes to reach the guy.

“OK. We’re there.”

“What do you got?”

“It’s him. It’s the guy we were after. He’s dead.”

“Do you need us to do site exploitation with the FBI team later today?” I asked.

“Stand by,” said the SEAL team leader on the helo.

A minute went by.

“Affirmative. If they want to bring the guys out of Jalalabad to do the exploitation, that’s fine. We’ll maintain security until then. How soon can they be here?”

The commander looked at me.

“Depends on your aviation,” I said. “When you guys can get them out there. Let’s go talk to Keller.”

“Fair enough,” he said.

I breathed a sigh of relief. While they hadn’t gotten Hekmatyar, they had taken out one of the senior guys and rolled up a couple of junior lieutenants, so at least the change of mission would alleviate General McChrystal’s concern about refocusing the resources.

The FBI got to the site by late the next day and found material that provided critical info about additional safe havens relating to Hekmatyar and bin Laden. The problem was, it was all stuff on the Pakistan side of the border.

We were back to
that
again. Pakistan.

22

“THEY’RE REALLY PISSED AT YOU”

DECEMBER, like a cold banshee from the iciest parts of the surrounding mountains arrived, yet leaving Bagram to go back to the States was bittersweet. Even after extending twice, my six-month tour was now up.

As the days ticked down, I spent long hours running along Disney Boulevard (named after a fallen soldier, Jason Disney, not the amusement-park company). My knee was still swollen and sore from my awkward landing coming off that helo in ******, but I needed those runs to clear my head.

As I passed the 1099 compound and the 180 headquarters, I thought about how I would miss this place that I had become so familiar with. Part of me didn’t want to leave the Spartan conditions of Bagram because, in some ways, it was so “pure”—as much as chaos and savagery can be pure. Performing my mission in Afghanistan was the culmination of twenty years of training and working. It was the nexus of everything I had been taught and everything I had been born to do. In a way, it had all come together: the right people at the right place at the right time in a desperate battle based sometimes on flawed policy decisions.

Hell, there had even been several times when I was the happiest I’d ever been in my life and, at those times, there was not a place on the planet where I would rather have been. I was doing service for the people I worked with. I believed that when they asked me to get a mission accomplished, I did it. I wasn’t seeking glory or fame; I just wanted to get my freakin’ job done.

I believed there was a clear path forward to victory. It wasn’t out of arrogance but out of clarity. Anyone could have seen it. I wanted to grab bin Laden, and I believed we could if we were allowed to do cross-border operations. I wasn’t the only one who thought that. Back at the 180 HQ, I briefed Colonel Ritchie, on my departure.

“Do you have to go?” he asked.

“I don’t want to, but I have to,” I said. “This was originally a ninety-day tour, and I’ve already extended twice. If I could stay, I would, but it’s programmed in.” My replacement was already in the cue and set to arrive.