There are many on the USASOC, U.S. Army Special Forces Command (USASFC), U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command (USACAPOC), and SWCS staffs who deserve special mention. From USASOC: COLs Ives Fontaine and Charles Cleveland, Chiefs of Staff, the major proponents of the project; Mr. Charles Pimble, Secretary of the General Staff; Ms. Connie Wicker; Ms. Jane Sutherlin and Ms. Karen Glass, Acquisition and Contracting; COL Steve Schrum, Mr. John Green, Ms. Sally Hurt, Mr. Dan Brand, Mr. John Watkins, Mr. Ed Nelson, and Ms. Sarah Fields, Deputy Chief of Staff, Intelligence; COL Philip McGhee, LTC Christopher White, Ms. Susan Ritter, Ms. Rose Reid, and Ms. Robin Jones, Deputy Chief of Staff for Resource Management; Mr. Dorsey Mellott, MSG Charles Koonce, and Ms. Shelley Marné, Deputy Chief of Staff for Information Management; COL Randy Cochran, Deputy Chief of Staff, Special Operations Aviation; Mr. Randall Wilkie of the Army Compartmented Element; LTC Jack Ziegler, MAJ Robert Cairns (manuscript reader), MAJ Andrew Nichols, and Ms. Sally Smith, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans (DCSOPS); MAJ John T. Corley and MAJ Eric Patterson, TDY to DCSOPS for Project Insight; and Major Robert Hardy, SFC T. Dennis, and SSG J. Simon, HHC, USASOC. From USASFC: COL Manny Diemer, Deputy Commander; COL John Knie, Chief of Staff; Mr. James Hargraves (manuscript reader) and Mr. Chris Crain of the G3; and MAJ Jim Rosenberry and MSG Charles Hopkins of the G1. From USACAPOC: LTC Christopher Leyda, G3, and MAJ David Fox and SFC G. Doles, CENTCOM desk. From SWCS: COL Richard Helfer, Chief of Staff; MAJ Brian Banks, Staff Judge Advocate (manuscript reader); COL Andy Anderson; Major David Beech; CW3 William Bryant; and Mr. Jerry Steelman, editor, Special Warfare magazine, Department of Training and Doctrine. To all the soldiers and airmen of USASOC who contributed their time, personal photos, and records to the USASOC history team, thanks for being true professionals.
Within the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), Tampa, Florida, thanks go to Mr. Kirk Moeller for the practicalities of “how to get contract personnel into the theater of operations” and points of contact in Afghanistan. In the USSOCOM History Office, Dr. John Partin, Command Historian; Ms. Gaea Levy, archivist; and the USSOCOM historians who worked in Afghanistan—COL Richard Stewart, LTC Thomas Searle, and MAJ Matt Dawson, CJSOTF-Afghanistan—for meeting the USASOC team in Qatar and getting it to Bagram to begin work. At JSOC, COL Andrew Milani, Mr. Steve Cage, and Mr. James Kelliher (manuscript readers); Mr. Mario Forestier; and Mr. D.J. Friederichs. At SOCCENT headquarters in Tampa and overseas in Qatar, we appreciate the help from the J3 section that arranged the USASOC trip to Afghanistan.
Special thanks go to Carol Rippey and Tad Sifeis, Armed Forces Information Service, Alexandria, Virginia, for providing electronic copies of the Early Bird covering September 2001- May 2002. These proved invaluable to the history writers.
Thank you to Mark Boyatt of SYTEX, Inc., Fayetteville, North Carolina, for providing three outstanding retired Army special operations personnel with advanced academic credentials and the requisite experience to serve as contract historians for this project.
Finally, accolades are due for Dr. W. Glenn Robertson, Combat Studies Institute (CSI), Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and editors Patricia H. Whitten who edited and laid the book out and Robin D. Kern who assisted with layout and worked on the covers, Research and Publication Team, CSI, for producing a quality Weapon of Choice.
While all authors sincerely appreciate the help rendered by everyone mentioned above, errors of fact and identification, and the nonattributable observations and reflections section in Weapon of Choice are my responsibility as senior writer and editor.—Dr. Chuck Briscoe
Introduction
The purpose of this book is to share Army special operations soldier stories with the general American public to show them what various elements accomplished during the war to drive the Taliban from power and to destroy al-Qaeda and Taliban strongholds in Afghanistan as part of the global war on terrorism. The purpose of the book is not to resolve Army special operations doctrinal issues, to clarify or update military definitions, or to be the “definitive” history of the continuing unconventional war in Afghanistan. The purpose is to demonstrate how the war to drive the Taliban from power, help the Afghan people, and assist the Afghan Interim Authority (AIA) rebuild the country afterward was successfully accomplished by majors, captains, warrant officers, and sergeants on tactical teams and aircrews at the lowest levels. If Army special operations forces (ARSOF) operations and the operational employment of teams in Afghanistan by various Joint Special Operaions Task Forces (JSOTFs) create doctrinal debate, the appropriate venue within which to resolve those issues is at the U.S. Army Special Warfare Center and School. Combat operations in Afghanistan remain classified by the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM). This is a carefully “sanitized” rendering of selected combat operations, and used pseudonyms for military personnel in the grade of lieutenant colonel and below (unless the individuals had received so much media exposure that this simple security measure would be meaningless). Likewise, the “eyes” of ARSOF personnel below the grade of colonel have been “blacked-out” in the photos for operational security (OPSEC) reasons. Chapter introductions and the vignettes have been written so that individuals with little previous knowledge of the military can understand and appreciate the contributions of the small Army special operations units that succeeded in driving the Taliban from power in Afghanistan.
The selected historical vignettes tell the ARSOF story. Many of these soldier stories demonstrate the capabilities of special operations forces (SOF)-unique equipment, while others point out the skills and bravery of the soldiers and aviators. The strength of ARSOF resides in its highly trained, very motivated soldiers. While technology plays a part in ARSOF, the soldiers make the difference. There has been a conscious effort to ensure that the stories of all ARSOF elements are presented. Thus, to provide a fair representative sampling of different activities within the security constraints, not all interviews became vignettes. One hundred-percent coverage of all participating teams was impossible. The examples selected were the best of those available to demonstrate a capability, illustrate an activity, or clarify a combat mission. The sensitive classified parts have been sanitized based on specific security rules, hence special forces elements do not always mean special forces teams, and pseudonyms are used predominantly. A limited-access U.S. Army Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) classified annex of sources will contain true names and specify documents and briefings to corroborate the material included. The controlled classified annex will not be available to researchers who do not have the appropriate security clearances and a clear “need to know.”
This historical project is not intended to be the definitive study of the war in Afghanistan. It is a “snapshot” of the war from 11 September 2001 until the middle of May 2002. Since the published word promotes analysis and provokes discussion, the first official account of this successful unconventional war should come from Army Special Operations because they spearheaded the ground campaign that forced the Taliban from power in Afghanistan. The vignettes are based primarily on recorded interviews, after-action reports, personal notes of participants, and tactical operations center (TOC) logs. Open secondary sources were also used, but for this operations history, the recorded interviews of soldiers from tactical teams to various JSOTF and Special Operations Command Central (SOCCENT) staff personnel proved to be the most valuable. Where minor differences were found between accounts by a tactical team and headquarters records and cross-referencing corroborated data provided by the “team on the ground,” that was adopted. In the interest of producing a timely product while the war was still “fresh,” discrepancies that could not be resolved satisfactorily were handled by the project director who evaluated importance, relevance, and whether they contributed to or confused the issue.
This is a current history of war. The decision to have professional historians with ARSOF experience capture the history of current operations in Afghanistan is proof that the book is not intended to be a public relations piece. War and combat have never been “all sunshine and roses.” Just as campaign plans and units orders tend to “go to the winds” once the fighting starts, reluctant and ill-prepared leaders are replaced, confusion and incomplete