The Helicopter War: PM Reports from Afghanistan

Capt. Donna Buono climbs out of the cockpit of an Apache helicopter. For aviators with staff jobs in Afghanistan, like Buono, flying missions is an escape from incessant planning. Lt. Col. John White, the blunt, capable comander of an air-assault task force, compares himself to the conductor of a symphony: "I work with a lot of talented people. I just have to make sure their timing is right."

An Afghan soldier in the back of a Chinook helicopter ponders an impending infiltration, which will kick off Operation Thunder Almasak. The Afghan army’s gear comes mostly from old U.S. stockpiles or local markets. (Photograph by Chad Hunt)

By Joe Pappalardo

The 120 soldiers seated in the gravel at Forward Operating Base Zormat in eastern Afghanistan are all eagerly watching the sky. Early morning birdcalls give way to the steady thumping of rotors as two Chinooks slide into view, U.S. National Guardsmen seated at the controls, each helicopter’s ungainly airframe held aloft by the beating of six 30-foot-long blades. The aircraft make wide arcs around a surveillance balloon floating over the base and then slide into parallel positions close to the soldiers. Rotor wash lashes the troops with brown dust and pebbles as the choppers settle onto the gravel landing pad. When the men rise to their feet it’s obvious they belong to two different armies. Sixty soldiers stoop under the 100-pound weight of rucksacks that jut from their backs like tortoise shells. These are U.S. Army soldiers. The other 60 men have light packs and carry old M-16 rifles or rocket-propelled grenade launchers; some heft plastic bags filled with unleavened bread, pieces of pup tents and 5-gallon water jugs. These are Afghan National Army (ANA) troops. The two forces’ disparate equipment speaks to more than just a difference in funding. It indicates two fighting styles—the U.S. Army’s emphasis on individual self-reliance and discipline and the ANA’s tendency to travel light with minimal planning. Half of the Americans board one Chinook; half of the Afghans climb into the other helicopter. The ANA troops dump their gear in the cargo bay and fall into red canvas seats lining the walls. These soldiers have a tough, sad look. The old ones’ faces are like weathered rock; the young ones seem curious and restless. Like most soldiers before an operation, they joke around one moment and lapse into pensive quiet the next. The Chinooks take off, making room for a second pair of helicopters that will transport the remaining 60 soldiers into the Zormat Valley, less than 10 miles northeast, in Paktiya province. On this mission, Americans are providing the rides, but for the first time Afghans are responsible for the details of the planning. In just minutes the second pair of choppers, loaded with American and Afghan troops, takes off. Operation Thunder Almasak is underway.The operation’s Afghan soldiers–although poorly trained, ill-equipped and often illiterate—represent the exit strategy for a coalition of 42 countries dominated by the U.S. and other NATO members. For nearly eight years the coalition has tried to establish an effective national government in Kabul, but that requires a loyal Afghan army and police force that can exert control over the country. To do so, the Afghans must counter an insurgency sponsored by the Taliban, a homegrown but Pakistani-supported fundamentalist Islamic militia that ran Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. Insurgents receive supplies and refuge in neighboring Pakistan, then cross the border to pay Afghans to plant roadside bombs and launch ambushes. They also infiltrate villages by intimidating or killing locals. According to current military thinking, the best way to marginalize the Taliban is to convince Afghans that the government in Kabul can protect them. If Afghan soldiers and police can persuade impoverished locals to spurn Taliban paychecks and report insurgent activity, then the government may become securely established. Operations like Thunder Almasak—a house-by-house, village-by-village sweep for insurgents and weapons in the Zormat Valley—is designed to do just that. If successful, it will move the coalition one small step closer to withdrawal. Army aviators of Task Force Attack field plenty of requests from ground troops spread over 18,000 square miles of nearly roadless eastern Afghanistan. Most call for resupply, convoy escort or medevac flights; air-assault operations like Thunder Almasak come several times a week, when weather permits. These are the most complex missions—and the most dangerous. The task force, a collection of scout, attack and cargo-hauling choppers, is headquartered at Forward Operating Base Salerno in Khost province, east of Paktiya. Blue-gray mountains dominate the horizon in every direction: Pakistan’s ranges extend south and east; to the north and west 10,000-foot peaks separate Khost from the rest of Afghanistan. The FOB’s canvas-walled, wood-floored buildings garrison about 1400 soldiers. Like all operations, Thunder Almasak begins with a planning meeting: Six days before the Chinooks are set to take off, task force aviators gather in a one-story building close to the flight line. Capt. Donna Buono, an assistant mission planner, waits for the 30 pilots and support staff to settle down around a wooden horseshoe table before starting the briefing. Summer heat has descended, bringing with it fat, aggressive flies. One staffer earns applause when he finds the remote control for the air conditioner. Buono, a 26-year-old Apache attack helicopter pilot from Missouri, can be stormy or pleasant as the situation merits. Even hardened Special Forces personnel say they are afraid to answer the phone if they think she’s angry on the other end of the line. Today her face is pinched with exhaustion, a common trait among operations captains. “Okay,” she says. “This one is Operation Thunder Almasak.” On a screen at one end of the room, Buono flashes classified digital slides that describe each element of the mission. Generals at Bagram Air Base will later show updated versions of these slides to senior members of Afghan president Hamid Karzai’s government for approval. It’s war planning via PowerPoint. The Army aviators usually see a fully formed ground concept when they work up their air component. But the Afghan’s first planning effort is rudimentary. Hundreds of Afghan National Police and ANA troops from an Afghan army base near FOB Zormat will ride about 10 miles northeast in a truck convoy and spend five days rooting out insurgents and establishing a presence in one stretch of the Zormat Valley. Members of the U.S. 1st Squadron of the 40th cavalry division from FOB Zormat will roll with them, but inside mine-resistant vehicles. One slide shows a map of the valley with broad blue arrows pointing in opposite directions, indicating how the troops will crisscross the valley. The crude outline is immediately dissected by two majors, executive officer Phillip Cain Baker and operations head Tom Burke. They want to know when the Afghans will move from village to village, the radio frequencies of U.S. soldiers on the ground and the prospective landing zones for helicopters in case they are called for medevacs. The only person in the room who outranks the majors tells them not to expect many details. “Let’s try to keep this simple,” says Lt. Col. John White, the task force commander. “With these [ANA] guys, we have to.” Buono assures the room that the Afghan planners and their U.S. advisers at FOB Zormat will provide details over the next few days. At least the air portion is clear. Four helicopters will bring troops to two blocking positions along the valley’s only road—a wide dirt path—to prevent insurgents from fleeing. Baker and Burke zero in on more possible trouble spots. How many Chinooks can fit at one time at the forward refueling stations closest to the mission’s flight path? How will the timetable accommodate mandated pilot sleep cycles? What’s the camera range of the surveillance balloon at FOB Zormat? Buono scribbles details she needs to chase down. Minutes after the meeting ends, the tired mission planner is working the phone and e-mail, seeking answers. The night before the mission, the plan is still coming together. Afghan and U.S. ground force commanders at the ANA base near FOB Zormat gather around a topographic map of the valley. Standing in the back of the room, 1st Lt. James Covington watches silently as an Afghan general points at hilltops and villages, indicating where and when troops will converge. The infantryman pays particular attention to the heights near the northern landing zone; he and 60 Afghans under his tutelage will occupy them tomorrow. Surrounded by staff who translate hand gestures into executable orders, the Afghan brass is still adding details to the vague arrows that bothered the aviators at FOB Salerno five days ago. Now a spaghetti plate of smaller blue arrows crosshatches the valley—various ANA units sealing and searching villages. The plan is clumsy, but it gives Covington hope. The 26-year-old Virginia National Guardsman and Embedded Training Team member has never seen Afghans so deeply involved in planning. ETTs spend year-long deployments training, coaching and fighting alongside Afghan troops so they can stand up to insurgents. “From what I hear,” he says, “the ANA could not have done this two years ago.” Covington typically conducts operations with the Afghans he trains at another base, but he and his fellow ETTs have been called in to supervise the air-assault element of Thunder Almasak. He doesn’t know these Afghan troops, which complicates his leadership challenge. “It’s difficult to tell someone to do something differently when they are senior in age and experience,” Covington says. “Some of these guys have been fighting as long as I’ve been alive.” The Chinooks take off from Salerno just after dawn. In Afghanistan, aircraft, not pilots, have call signs. Inside Player 3, Chief Warrant Officers Mike Heuer and Lance Stafford cruise west toward the 120 troops waiting at FOB Zormat. On the headsets, behind the radio chatter of an air traffic controller, a faint Metallica soundtrack is playing on Stafford’s MP3 player. The pilots chose the flight path days ago, but the tactical operations officer at Salerno refined the plan with FalconView, a flight-mission program that plots aircraft routes across detailed 3D maps. Red domes represent the range of any weapon reported in the area that could threaten a helicopter, including assault rifles, RPGs, even Soviet-era, towed antiaircraft guns. The domes are notched where the landscape blocks the line of sight of a weapon, allowing pilots to plan a safe approach. The ground is also rendered with fidelity to give pilots recognizable landmarks. The landscape is in 3D, but most villages are shown in two. Task force planners could ask for more detailed models of the landing zone from the National Geospatial–Intelligence Agency in Bethesda, Md., but those requests add delays to already demanding schedules. Over rural Afghanistan, a helicopter becomes a time machine as much as a method of transport. This 21st-century war is being fought over 18th-century terrain. Extended families live in unheated mud-brick buildings inside walled compounds. When low-flying helicopters buzz past, women and children tending herds of goats gaze up, and the animals flee. The temperature inside Player 3 plummets as the yellow-green digital altitude readout ticks higher. The aircraft shudders as the engines suck thin air. In most theaters Black Hawk helicopters are the primary platform for air assaults, but they don’t have the muscle to conduct heavy lifts over these mountains. Conditions in Afghanistan have promoted Chinook cargo haulers into frontline battlewagons. Circling the landing zone at about 1100 feet, Lt. Col.White peers through his Apache’s powerful daytime optics, scanning the terrain for threats. For Army aviators with staff jobs, missions are dangerous but satisfying. There are clear objectives, and the pilots have the best tools in the world to complete them. In an Apache, White can see for miles. As the commander of Task Force Attack, he’s blindsided by one problem after another. White is in one of four Apaches escorting the two pairs of Chinooks. After the troop-laden twin-rotors are launched, however, he has to divert one Apache to escort a medevac flight. No plan ever goes off without a hitch; he hopes this is the only one. One minute before the Chinooks reach the landing zone, the Apache pilots make the cherry/ice call. If hostiles are in the LZ, it’s hot, or cherry; if not, then everything’s cold, or ice. The Apaches can cool down a cherry LZ with 30-mm cannon fire or high-explosive or steel-dart-spewing antipersonnel rockets. Or, if the threat seeks refuge in a building, the pilots can launch Hellfire missiles, designed to take out Soviet tanks but with warheads adapted to limit collateral damage. White radios the verdict of the southern landing zone: ice. The Apaches circle over the LZ while the Chinooks descend. Inside Player 3, heavily laden U.S. troops clasp the hands of the men seated opposite from them. That way they can simultaneously pull themselves upright. The Chinook settles to the ground with a bump, and within half a minute, the experienced U.S. troops shuffle out, the first taking positions to provide covering fire if needed. The rear-door gunner reports that the Americans are safely gone. The Afghan troops are still unloading from the other Chinook. Player 3’s crew watch as a couple of Afghans tumble down the steeper-than-expected slope as they exit. “We’ve got a guy with a mule,” someone in an Apache reports over the radio, relaying the presence of an Afghan local. “Yeah, and we have about 30 jackasses over here,” a Chinook crewman shoots back on the chopper-to-chopper frequency. Laughter crackles over the headsets. Pilots often disparage the ANA; ground forces usually have a higher opinion of their competence, or at least temper their criticisms. Soon, the Afghans exit the second Chinook, and the two helicopters take off in an explosive bloom of dust. About 5 miles away, the Apache pilots call ice, and the other two Chinooks set down in their own clouds. The ANA troops dash out of the choppers without taking the plastic bags filled with bread and water, so the air crews toss the supplies out after them. The guardsmen are also dismayed to see the ANA troops watching the choppers instead of establishing a protective perimeter. Two minutes tick by before the Afghans finish unloading. By this time, some have joined U.S. troops on a nearby hilltop, securing the immediate area. White circles over the disembarking troops, working the radio and scanning the terrain for threats. He sees only small children foraging for scrub-brush firewood. White lingers until his chopper has just enough fuel to get back to base. After six days of planning and 2 hours of flying, all four infiltrations have been completed in minutes. An hour and a half after touchdown, the troops have sealed the north-south road with two checkpoints. The ANA soldiers begin screening all car, truck and mule traffic. Hilltop observation posts protect these checkpoints with snipers and M240B machine-gun crews. The next morning hundreds of Afghan soldiers start their sweep through the valley. It’s been a lonely 24 hours since the air-assault troops took up blocking positions on the road, but the ground assault is right on schedule. Long convoys of Ford Ranger pickup trucks fan out from the dirt road into the villages scattered through the valley. The ANA and police first raid areas where suspicious activity has been reported, forcibly searching homes. They are rewarded with a cache of explosives and other IED ingredients. But the ANA gain access to the majority of the walled compounds by knocking, not by kicking down doors. They make small talk with the locals and ask about conditions in the valley, and find an ambivalent but not overtly hostile populace. At times, successful counterinsurgency operations can resemble heavily armed community outreach. The number of enemy killed is not always the best metric for success. U.S. infantry stay in the background, watching carefully as the Afghans disembark from the trucks and cordon off one village at a time. Some American soldiers take positions on high ground in case of violence; a controller is in contact with an A-10 warplane overhead, ready to call in close air support. The mission’s tactics show how coalition commanders want to fight this war: Train the Afghan army to repel the insurgency, while keeping U.S. troops on hand in case of emergencies. Well-trained U.S. soldiers are not enthusiastic about letting undisciplined Afghans take the lead; strict rules of engagement add to their frustration. During encounters with the enemy, U.S. officers urge their soldiers to use “tactical patience” before shooting or calling an airstrike. The reasoning is sound: Civilian casualties sap the effort to legitimize the shaky Afghan government, and are often blamed on coalition forces regardless of the circumstances. But such caution means insurgents who are not caught in an overt act of violence often escape merely by setting down their weapons. On the third day of the operation, the Chinooks return with water and food. They do not have to replenish ammunition—no shots have been fired. From an observation post near the northern checkpoint, Covington watches black smoke rise in the distance. After four days, things are going well for his fellow ETT mentors and the Afghan troops. Even for soldiers who can’t speak one another’s language, sharing food and hardship on an extended field operation builds trust. But Covington fears the worst when he sees the smoke—the dirty black color and a firecracker noise minutes earlier could be signs of a roadside bombing. The radio soon confirms his suspicions: Four Afghan police on a supply run were killed when their pickup truck ran over a pressure-plate-activated IED. They are destined to be the only casualties of Thunder Almasak. By the fifth and last day of the operation, the ANA men are weary of daily foot patrols and eager to get back to their barracks. But there’s more village-level diplomacy left: a meeting of locals called a shura. About a dozen men from nearby villages, including a mullah (religious teacher) and several tribal elders, hike to the northern observation post to drink tea, talk security and collect donated supplies. The fact that local leaders are willing to walk up a mountain to confer with ANA officers bestows a degree of legitimacy to the distant central government. After the shura, the ANA troops give extra food and water to the poorest locals and hike to the Chinooks’ pickup zone. Since U.S. doctrine forbids air assaults to come and go from the same spot, planners designate two new LZs. When the Chinooks deposit the Afghan and U.S. troops at FOB Zormat, the task force’s role in Almasak is over. As the guardsmen clean out the back of the chopper, they find two 60-mm mortar rounds that the Afghan soldiers left behind. Even though the rounds cannot be armed until they are fired and reach altitude, the pilots roll their eyes with exasperation. Meanwhile, back in the operations planning office at Salerno, Buono affixes a yellow and black sticker with helicopter silhouettes to a wall. She has now memorialized Thunder Almasak alongside dozens of previous air assaults. The staff will burn hard copies of the maps and radio code words in rusted metal barrels and send the most recent digital copies of the slides to Fort Rucker, in Alabama, to be preserved as a part of military history. There are two more air-assault infils set for the week, plus exfils of ongoing operations, and more requests from ground guys stacking up behind that. Buono begins another performance around the horseshoe table: “Today, it’s Operation Steel Toorah.” Everyone turns to the slides on the screen, continuing the cycle of mission planning and execution. It will last eight more months, until they go home.

Posted in: Afghanistan,Fighting Al Qaeda and Taliban,Helicopter