Mangwel and the Konar River Valley

[Friends, with apologies, a stomach virus has laid the blog low.  Here's a re-run of a post that has been a reader favorite. We'll be back on Wednesday!]

June 22nd, the Washington Post ran an excellent article by Greg Jaffe, titled “A Personal Touch in Taliban Fight.” The piece is about a young Army captain, Michael Harrison, and his up-close-and-personal work as a company commander in the remote tribal villages of the Konar River valley in Afghanistan.

Flashback to 2003, same valley, same U.S. Army—different captain. This is the story of then-captain Jim Gant of Las Cruces, NM, and how he and Capt. Harrison are linked by a gift of honor, a 12-gauge shotgun.

A tribal chief

Mangwel is a village in Konar province, close to the border with Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province. Terrain is mountainous, no paved roads; Taliban fighters use the valley regularly as an infiltration route to and from Pakistan. The chief in Mangwel is Malik Noorafzhal. He’s 86 now; he fought the Soviets in the 80s; he’s been defending his tribe’s turf all his life.

In 2003, Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha 316–twelve men, led by Capt. Gant–had Mangwel as part of its area of responsibility. The ODA helped the chief in some tribal warfare, fighting alongside him. The chief said he would return the favor to augment the ODA’s mission; he mentioned that he could deliver 8 men with guns, then upped it to 80. On 23 April 2003, Capt. Gant had a meeting with him and other tribal leaders. The following is from the captain’s OPSUM [Operation Summary], written immediately afterward:

The head local we have named “Sitting Bull.” He is an old, old warrior. He didn’t speak much. I didn’t speak much either. I mainly listened. I looked him in the eye often. After the meeting was adjourned, he asked to speak with me privately. So my terp [interpreter] and I went out back with him. He took my hand in his. “I want you to know, Commander Jim, that you have my loyalty. If you need men with guns you come see me.” He promised 800. From 8 to 80 to 800!

Bonding tribe-to-tribe

Capt. Gant made it a point to bond with Sitting Bull. This nickname that the ODA gave the chief captures the spirit of their affection and admiration. These tough Special Forces soldiers regarded the malik as a living figure of legend, a warrior who had fought and defeated many enemies, a leader to whom the highest respect was due. They loved to question him about his battles with the Russians and he loved to tell them his stories. The warriors, American and Afghan, would stay up deep into the night, drawing maps of ambushes and infiltrations. Capt. Gant had his own father, James Karl Gant, send Malik Noorafzhal a knife with “Sitting Bull” engraved on it—and a letter, man-to-man, father-to-father. Here is part of it:

My son says you are a great warrior. He respects you and considers you to be his friend. He tells me that your enemies are his enemies. He says he would give his life to protect you. Be my son’s father while he is in your country. Take this gift from us as a token of our friendship.

Through his interpreter, Captain Gant read the letter to the chief.

When I read [the letter] to Sitting Bull, he was outwardly moved by it and said, “Tell your father not a hair on your head will be harmed as long as you are with me, you are now my son.”

Sitting Bull, the shotgun and Capt. Gant, 2003

A gift of honor

Capt. Gant and the ODA wanted to give the chief their own gift of honor. They searched and found a beautiful 12-gauge shotgun. The photo on the right shows the moment they presented it. That’s Capt. Gant beside the chief. Up front is SFC Mark Read.

Flash forward to 2009, a few weeks ago. Marine Col. Bing West, author of The Strongest Tribe, about Marines in Iraq, is now in Afghanistan researching a book. He visits Mangwel and meets with Malik Noorafzhal. The first thing the chief does is to bring out, proudly, the gift shotgun and ask Col. West if he can get him some shells, as he is all out. The photo below tells everything. Bing West e-mailed it to now-Major Gant, who forwarded it to me. The young officer next to Sitting Bull is Capt. Michael Harrison—the company commander profiled by the Washington Post–who is now on his second tour in Konar. Here is part of an e-mail Capt. Harrison sent from there to Major Gant, 18 June 2009, a few days ago.

Over the past five months, he [Malik Noorafzhal] has helped us out tremendously. His son and son-in-law both work at our COP [Combat Outpost] as ASG [Afghan Security Guards.]

Sitting Bull, the shotgun and Capt. Harrison, 2009

Tribesmen relate man-to-man

Men of the tribes never forget an insult or a kindness. Six years later, Capt. Gant and ODA 316’s heartfelt gift of honor is paying dividends for follow-on generations of American soldiers. And Capt. Harrison (though he and Maj. Gant have never met) is employing the same tribal language of man-to-man, person-to-person bonding. From Greg Jaffe’s article in the Washington Post:

Between his two tours, Harrison, whose boyish face and blond hair make him look like an especially earnest grad student, had kept in touch with his interpreter and several of the Afghan leaders from his old sector via e-mail. He sent them packages of T-shirts, jeans and toiletries. Soon after he arrived in Konar for the second tour, Harrison bought mosque speakers for the religious leaders in his area. Although his current sector is a three-hour drive from his old base, Afghans whom Harrison hasn’t seen since 2007 sometimes arrive at the gates of his new base. Many show the guards scraps of paper bearing Harrison’s signature, proof that they once knew him. “You cannot come to me, so I am here to visit with you, my good friend,” one man told Harrison.

All this is not to say that life is roses today in Konar province. Successes are unfortunately the exception, and tribal-savvy breakthroughs like those produced by Capt. Gant and Capt. Harrison are, so far at least, only the model for achievements to come.

Tribes and Alexander the Great

When Alexander fought in the Afghan kingdoms 2300 years ago, a gift of honor might be a horse or a Damascene sword. Alexander understood that such tokens, presented man-to-man, warrior-to-warrior, were the currency of tribal alliance. The celebrated tale of Alexander marrying the Afghan princess Roxane is usually told as a romance–the youthful king smitten by the ravishing damsel. There may be an element of truth to this, but Alexander was also a shrewd political animal whose army was then mired in a disastrous three-year counter-insurgency campaign with no end in sight. He married his way out of that quagmire, by taking to wife the daughter of his most powerful foe, the warlord Oxyartes, thus making his enemy into his father-in-law.

That marriage was an act of honor. In tribalspeak it said to Oxyartes and the other warlords, “I honor you as an equal, you have fought me to a draw and won my respect; let us make war no longer but join our two peoples in a peace whose issue will be prosperity and happiness for all.”

A shotgun and a bride, a gift and an act of honor. Perhaps the Obama era’s young officers and men, incoming now to Afghanistan, can take a page from Alexander and Oxyartes, from captains Gant and Harrison, and from a chief called Sitting Bull.

The challenge for General McChrystal is creating a comprehensive and integrated strategy for Afghanistan out of the hundreds, if not thousands, of peoples, identities, and conflicts in the country.

This next quote from Sitaraman’s op-ed reminds me of the work of then-Captain Jim Gant and Captain Michael Harrison, which I wrote about in the post “Gifts of Honor: A Tale of Two Captains.” It takes getting to know people on a one-on-one basis. As Tom Daly wrote in his guest post “Lessons from Ramadi”—which Neptunus Lex also pointed out to his readers (Thanks, Lex!)—“step one is showing up.”

Paradoxically, the right strategy for the Afghan war is one that recognizes there can be no single strategy. To be sure, broad principles and strategic direction are absolutely necessary, but the strategy must be flexible and adaptive. It must recognize that what works in one province or district might not work in the next, and that some of the most important strategic decisions cannot be made by generals in Kabul or Washington, but only by the soldiers and civilians who are out in the villages.

About two weeks ago, Seth G. Jones made some of the same points in his Wall Street Journal op-ed “Going Local: The Key to Afghanistan—The U.S.’s strategy of building a centralized state is doomed to fail in a land of tribes:”

One of the biggest problems, however, is that since late 2001, the United States has crafted its Afghanistan strategy on a fatally flawed assumption: The recipe for stability is building a strong central government capable of establishing law and order in rural areas. This notion reflects a failure to grasp the local nature of Afghan politics.

When I started writing this blog, I came under fire for what some perceived as a lumping together of everyone in Afghanistan. Not the case or intention. My point has always been that the tribes should be worked with—understanding that each tribe and region is different. Jones adds:

Tribal, religious and other local leaders in Afghanistan best understand their community needs, but they are often under-resourced or intimidated by Taliban and other insurgents. This is where the Afghan and U.S. governments can help. A key starting point is security and justice. In some areas, local tribes and villages have already tried to resist the Taliban, but have been heavily outmatched. The solution should be obvious: They should be strongly supported.

This past Thursday, the elections in Afghanistan took place, and the following two quotes from the article “Of Afghan Warlords and Polling Places” (from Stratfor’s Geopolitical Diary) caught my eye:

What we have here is a clear indication that the underlying geopolitical nature of Afghanistan has not been altered by attempts to steer the country toward democratic politics. Political parties have not supplanted ethnic- and tribal-based warlordism. On the contrary, warlordism determines electoral outcomes. . . . 

 

 

Given the objectives of the Taliban, any political settlement would not come in the form of a democratic framework, and especially not Western-style democracy. Ironically, it is the politics of warlordism that could provide a framework for calming down the insurgency. A wedge will not be driven between pragmatic Taliban elements and the more hard-line ideological types because the pragmatists play by the rules of a Western-style political system; rather it would materialize as deals are cut with various Taliban commanders who would be willing to lay down arms in exchange for recognition of their domains of power.

Then there’s the report “Afghan Voters Defy the Taliban” from CBS’s “Washington Unplugged.”

The segment features John Nagl (Center for a New American Security) and T.X. Hammes (National Defense University). Afghanistan election talk aside, T.X. asked:

Are we destabilizing Pakistan? We’re driving the drug dealers out of Afghanistan. Where are they going? Are we destabilizing Pakistan? What is the impact on India? We’ve almost got this reversed. We’re all focused on Afghanistan, but the important players—India and Pakistan, and all the effort is focused on Afghanistan. . . . Is Afghanistan the right place? Would we be better spending a third as much money in Pakistan and working for Pakistani stability? And what’s the impact on India? Those are the bigger questions you have to answer.

This would be the never-ending-mashup if I tried to include everything from the past week, so I’ll leave you with just one more thing.

Among other things, this week marked the 40^th anniversary of Woodstock. The interviews and articles related to the anniversary vary, but overall, people seem to agree that we support our troops these days—Yellow ribbons, #militarymonday on Twitter, etc.

But I wonder if saying we support our troops really means we support our troops. How have we changed in the past 40 years? Some of us said we didn’t support the troops then, but we say we support our troops now? Is the change in just the wording? After Vietnam, veterans went untreated. Same story today. And within the services, there’s still a division over support of Reservists and National Guard members. Some have said they receive even less support.

Here’s a story of support in action that I really get. Michael Yon wrote it this week.

A gunshot ripped through the darkness and a young British soldier fell dying on FOB Jackson. I was just nearby talking on the satellite phone and saw the commotion. The soldier was taken to the medical tent and a helicopter lifted him to the excellent trauma center at Camp Bastion. That he made it to Camp Bastion alive dramatically improved his chances. But his life teetered and was in danger of slipping away. Making matters worse, the British medical system back in the United Kingdom did not possess the specialized gear needed to save his life. Americans had the right gear in Germany, and so the British soldier was put into the America system. 

 

British officers in his unit, 2 Rifles, wanted to track their man every step of the way, and to ensure that his family was informed and supported in this time of high stress. Yet having their soldier suddenly in the American system caused a temporary glitch in communications with folks in Germany. The British leadership in Sangin could have worked through the glitch within some hours, but that would have been hours wasted, and they wanted to know the status of their soldier now. So a British officer in Sangin – thinking creatively –asked if I knew any shortcuts to open communications. The right people were only an email away: Soldiers Angels. And so within about two minutes, these fingers typed an e-mail with this subject heading: CALLING ALL ANGELS. 

 

Soldiers’ Angels Shelle Michaels and MaryAnn Phillips moved into action. Day by day British officers mentioned how Soldiers Angels were proving to be incredibly helpful. The soldiers expressed deep and sincere appreciation. Yet again, the Angels arrived during a time of need.

There’s much more to this post, including information on Soldiers Angels, provided by Shelle Michaels. Please read it in full.

Now that’s support!

Tribal elders tell US Special Forces about their "muj days," fighting the Russians

A week ago I ran a post about two young Army captains—Jim Gant and Michael Harrison—who served in the same valley in Konar province, Afghanistan.  Their service was six years apart, yet the two were linked by their bonds with a tribal chief named Noorafzhal and by a gift of honor—a shotgun that Capt. Gant and his Special Forces ODA 316 had presented to the tribal elder in August 2003. Just three weeks ago, June 2009, Noorafzhal was still showing that gun off—this time to Capt. Harrison.

This is Counterinsurgency (COIN) at its best and something equally important—positive continuity. The following is from an e-mail Capt. Harrison sent me from Konar a few days ago:

 There is definitely a direct carryover of goodwill and overt support for American forces from Maj. Gant and ODA 316. During our first shura (meeting) with the elders in Mangwal [Noorafzhal’s village], we discussed the importance of working together to better their country and village. They all agreed, bringing up their past relationship with “the bearded Americans.” 

 Tribesmen connect man-to-man. In Mangwal in 2003, Capt. Gant and his team loved to stay up till all hours with Noorafzhal–to whom they gave the honorific nickname, Sitting Bull–listening to his stories of how he and the other tribesmen fought the Russians in the 80s.  (Note, in the photo, the sketch of the topography of an ambush.)

I feel [Capt. Harrison’s e-mail continues] that the way Maj. Gant and the rest of his unit dealt with Noorafzhal helped us establish ourselves and cut down on the time required to develop the trust and relationships that yield cooperation, accurate and timely intel and buy-in from the village elders.

 This sounds like a success story and it is.  But the point to take note of is how accidental it all was. Capt. Gant didn’t know Capt. Harrison. There was no planned or institutionalized contact between the two officers, no handover, no collaboration. A number of other units served in the valley between their deployments. It was just luck that two such tribally-savvy officers happened to work, in different eras, with the same elders and the same tribesmen.

“Sitting Bull” still carries enormous influence [reports Capt. Harrison]. Whenever he arrives at a shura, everyone shuts up and stands up.  He is the first to speak on all issues.  He “allows” the sub-governor [a non-tribal post of the Afghan government] to assert his power and is careful not to circumvent or marginalize the district leadership. But it is apparent that the respect and power is still there. He could definitely put armed men into the field if he wanted to.

 Donald Vandergriff, a retired Army officer and military leadership maverick, asks:

What would have happened if Capt. Harrison and his unit had overlapped with Maj. Gant and his team? It would have made the good situation that Capt. Harrison describes even better. In today’s personnel system, people are seen as individual replacement parts. The system does not take into account the intangibles of unit cohesion, trust and competence. The only way we can successfully wage this war is through the building of professionalism and trust.

To that, I would add the building of ongoing and uninterrupted bonds with village and tribal leaders.

In his book The Sling and The Stone, Col. T.X. Hammes makes a related point:

The weakness of our current personnel system is that it is a hundred years old and grooms people to run organizations based on concepts from another century. Unfortunately, that is not the only weakness. The bureaucratic model itself is a major problem. In this model, “career development” requires frequent moves and a wide variety of duties. The idea is to ensure that every person has the broad range of skills necessary to function at the top of the organization. It focuses on creating generalists rather than experts … [The typical officer’s career pattern] consists of a series of short (one to three years) postings in a wide variety of jobs … They are, in effect, amateurs by profession. They never spend enough time in any one job to become an expert.

 How many critical Afghan-to-American relationships are we destroying by failing to rotate or redeploy outstanding officers back into Areas of Operation (AOs) where they have successfully bonded with tribal leaders and elders? Officers like Jim Gant and Michael Harrison should be working together. Their tours should be overlapping or tag-teamed so that tribal leaders don’t have to reconnect with new faces each time around, but can deepen and broaden already-established bonds with men and warriors they know and trust.

I’m certain that addressing this situation is on Gen. McChrystal’s to-do list.  I applaud it.  And one further thought.

Maybe the clean-shaven look is overrated.

First, many thanks to all correspondents and contributors for the tremendous and very thoughtful response  to the previous post, “A Tale of Two Captains.” More to come in a couple of days about Capt. Harrison’s work, including an update dispatch from him in Konar.

But first, here’s a strikingly apt flashback to 2006—when Army Times journalist (and author of the excellent Not A Good Day To Die)  Sean Naylor and I did an interview together for C-SPAN’s “BookTV.” The topic was “The War in Afghanistan.”

We thought the piece was pretty timely then. I just watched it two days ago. Not only has very little changed in AfPak since that air-date in ‘06, but very little has changed since 327 B.C. 

I was citing Alexander the Great’s campaign in the Afghan kingdoms 2300 years ago.  I made the point that that ancient superpower army had its hands full against a cunning and resourceful hit-and-run foe who employed the tactics of insurgency, rallied and regrouped within mountainous and cross-border sanctuaries and recruited reinforcements from tribal populations in the north and east. In the interview, Sean Naylor said this of our troops:

They are fighting a counter-insurgent, counter-terrorist campaign against the Taliban and al-Qaeda and allies of al-Qaeda that are hiding out in the mountains, regrouping in Pakistan, coming back across the very porous Afghan/Pakistan border and gathering strength in the Pashtun tribe lands in Eastern Afghanistan.

In a piece that appeared in Small Wars Journal , titled “Sisyphus and Counterinsurgency” Major Niel Smith wrote:

In Greek legend, Sisyphus was a king condemned by the gods to roll a huge rock up a hill only to have it roll down again for eternity. Students of counterinsurgency often feel like Sisyphus, as the United States Army continually resists institutionalizing counterinsurgency across the force, only to have to re-learn the lessons at a heavy price later before preparing to discard them again.

Watching the C-SPAN interview three years later, it’s hard to ignore the elephant in the room–in this case, the huge rock being rolled up the hill over and over again.

 June 12, 2009, Lara Jakes of the Associated Press reported:

Gen. David Petraeus said the number of attacks in Afghanistan over the last week hit “the highest level” since the December 2001 fall of the Taliban. . . . “Some of this will go up because we are going to go after their sanctuaries and safe havens as we must. . . . But there is no question the situation has deteriorated over the course of the past two years in particular and there are difficult times ahead,” he said.

Three years after the C-SPAN interview, we are back down at the bottom of the hill, with the same rock ready for pushing. 

Despite all this, I’m encouraged. I think we have outstanding commanders in place, whose thinking is bold and innovative and who are adapting fast to a situation that has bedeviled Western military men for more than two millennia.

Which brings me back to Major Jim Gant and Capt. Michael Harrison from our previous post. Can their successes be replicated on a wider scale? Is working with tribalism instead of against it part of the answer?

And can we do a little better this time, rolling that rock up the hill?