To me, the speech was little different from whatever President Bush would have given – that is, a capable defense of American interests based on an acknowledgment of evil in the world.

Which raises the question: where are the protests against this new wartime President?

Viewer Chad Smith wrote in to remind me of the infamous Rock Against Bush campaign – started by some low level punk rockers. Its goal, presumably, was to create an antiwar movement with Bush as the primary target of relentless, brutal (warlike, even!) scorn.

But hey – it was called Rock Against Bush, not Rock against War. And that tells you something. Rock Against Bush wasn’t a campaign to force the President to rethink war, it was a campaign to use war to crap all over Bush, an ideological enemy. So, it wasn’t about pacifism, it was about politics. Which is why – after crapping on Bush – they remain mysteriously silent over Obama, now. I say “mysteriously” because I’m stupid.

Look – a drone still kills people, whether it’s commanded to do so by a Republican or a Democrat. So, it comes down to consistency. If you’re critical of war under Bush, you gotta be critical of war under of Obama. I’ve been critical of our President over a crapload of things, but I support him in this troop build-up, the same way I supported the surge under Bush. So one must wonder: if there was a Rock Against Bush, why not a Rock Against Obama?

I’m glad for our troops that these sellouts found something else to do.

And if you disagree with me, then you sir, are probably a racist.

Tonight: Jim Norton, Tamara Holder, Oderus Urangus and Billy West

(that’s a line-up you’d only see at the police department)

Part of the discussion at Friday’s Q & A event centered on the appearance of hypocrisy by the filmmakers for using big-name stars in their film, considering the overall thesis of Zinn’s world view is that REAL history is made by the individual struggling against the elite in power.  Producers Chris Moore and Brolin agreed with the criticism but lamented that the only way to get the History Channel to air this movie would be if stars were connected to it.  Understandable.  But, the inclusion of big name, likable Hollywood stars like Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Morgan Freeman, Marisa Tomei and Brolin serve a greater purpose than just aiding the pitch meeting at the network.

Being a nation of Star-F%*#ers, we are inclined to sycophantically agree with whatever our idols say.  Or, at the very least, we hold our tongues while in their presence for fear that contradicting them might put us out of their good graces.  We are all yes-men to these stars.  We let them go off on their wild tangents and incoherent rants about America so that when they are done we can ask them what it’s like to work with George Clooney, or whether you call Barbara Streisand “Mom” or “Babs” when you are visiting for the holidays.

That is why when Josh Brolin referred to the Pat Tillman tragedy in Afghanistan as “fratricide,” no one in the audience at UCLA gasped or challenged that characterization.  When his co-producer, Chris Moore, relayed a conversation with a History Channel executive who allegedly said, “We’ve got five hundred hours of World War II programming while we have two hours of anti-World War II programming. So, the balance is still pretty off,” no one thought to ask him “What does being ‘anti-World War II’ even MEAN?” or, “Are YOU anti-World War II?”

This is also why our host for the event, History Professor Ellen DuBois, spent her time on stage (in front of many of her history students) gushing and giggling with Brolin and Moore, lobbing softballs in the spirit of James Lipton (she jokingly said “Welcome to ‘Inside the Actor’s Studio’” at the beginning of the Q & A portion) but then held her true opinion about Zinn’s People’s History of the United States from the audience.  In a candid conversation after the event, I heard her admit that she was never really a fan of the book and that she had some real problems with it.  It would have been nice for her to offer those gripes during the presentation.  It could have been “a teachable moment.”

It is also why, when promoting the film, Chris Moore said on the “Today Show” about the troops in Afghanistan, “And I’m sure every person there in Afghanistan is thinking about their family back here, thinking about the holidays, and I guarantee you all of them are thinking, ‘Why am I here? What am I doing here?’”  To that, co-host Meredith Vieira could only muster up this response:  “Well, the point I think of the documentary is for people to think, think for themselves, and to speak out.”  That’s some real hard-hitting journalism there, Meredith.

But Meredith and Prof. DuBois and the giggling 20-something UCLA students are all suffering from the same affliction.  They lose all powers of critical thought when in the presence of a movie star or a movie producer who is good friends with movie stars.  And that is why the event at UCLA was a sad example of superficial thought wrapped in a cloak of intellectual importance.

Andrew Breitbart was two feet from the open microphone, patiently waiting his turn to ask a question, when Professor DuBois cut short the Q & A session.  It would have been nice to hear his question.  I bet it would have been more interesting than, “As an actor, what was your process for this film?” or, “Could some of your movie-star friends come on my leftist radio station?”

Finally, the most revealing answer came from Mr. Moore when he was asked what criteria was used to select the actors for the film.  He informed us that they used three criteria.  1)  If they would serve the material well.  2)  If they were prominent enough to help sell the program and attract an audience.  3)  If they had shown themselves to be activists.  He went on to explain that as word spread about the project, the buzz grew and it became a cool thing to be associated with.  He would field calls from actors who wanted to get in and he would respond to them:  Go out and DO something.  Get involved, be an activist for a cause.  I wonder if Patricia Heaton’s activism on behalf of the un-born qualifies?  Or, Jon Voight’s activism on behalf of our Founding Father’s original vision for our country?  Or the late Charlton Heston’s activism on behalf of individual gun-ownership rights? Was that the type of activism you were talking about, Mr. Moore?

That’s right.  A Hollywood producer told all of us at UCLA that day that he would not cast an actor if they were merely a big name who could serve the material.  No, the actor had to go out and perform political activism.  Does anyone out there still doubt that Big Hollywood puts pressure on people to embrace leftist politics?  Anyone?  Class?

So when I saw the previews for the new film “Brothers,” I was doubly annoyed. Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, who starred in the egregiously offensive anti-American film “Rendition” (2007), as well as fellow liberal loudmouth Natalie Portman in addition to Tobey Maguire, “Brothers” had a trailer that seemed to scream out the entire plot: A soldier (played by Maguire) was presumably killed in battle in Afghanistan, which lead to an affair between his widow (Portman) and ne’er-do-well brother (Gyllenhaal) as the brother steps up to help her and her children recover from their loss.

The affair is then disrupted by the fact that Maguire is alive after all, his return heralded in the ads by horror-movie music that makes it look like the entire rest of the movie will center on him being a psychopathic animal, ultimately having a showdown with police in which he screams, “Shoot me!”

Yep, it looked like Hollywood had come back to kick our troops in the teeth again, following the 2007 onslaught of films like “In the Valley of Elah,” “Rendition” and “Redacted” that portrayed our soldiers and CIA officials in the worst possible light imaginable. All three of those films failed miserably, with “Rendition” earning a laughable $9.7 million despite the presence of Gyllenhaal, Meryl Streep, Reese Witherspoon and Alan Arkin – a box office performance that helped kill its own studio, New Line. The others did even worse business.

Meanwhile a fourth war-themed film, “The Kingdom,” took a more centrist tack and left audiences rooting for the Americans to fight their way out of a deadly situation in Saudi Arabia, even as the Americans’ presence was depicted as morally questionable on some levels.  Interestingly, “The Kingdom” was the only film of that group that could be remotely considered a financial success, earning about $50 million before scoring nicely on DVD.  The difference, in my opinion: Shockingly, Americans like to cheer rather than jeer their own forces in war films and don’t find it entertaining to see their country and its ideals trashed while having a night out at the movies.

But I must say, I was pleasantly surprised by “Brothers.” It’s a much better and richer film than its advertising makes it out to be, which is perhaps a result of its complex themes and plotting. It’s not anti-American, anti-troop, or anti-family – but to explain how or why would require giving away vital and late-blooming plot threads.

What I can reveal about “Brothers” is that it deals with heavy themes that are affecting families nationwide on a daily basis. Heroic men and women are stepping up and facing their marching orders every day, heading into two war zones that unfortunately have incredibly devious enemy forces and vast uncharted terrain. It is fact as well that the stresses involved in battling terrorists who employ guerrilla warfare tactics rather than any form of honor is resulting in large numbers of soldiers dealing with Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Tobey Maguire’s character is one of those unfortunate souls driven over the edge of sanity by what he sees in Afghanistan. The key point here in defending this film against the other prior Hollywood dreck is that this film unequivocally shows Maguire as a man in charge of a squad and does so with devotion and honor.

The evils shown or implied in this film are squarely planted on the shoulders of the Taliban forces who capture Maguire and one of his men after their helicopter crashes in the desert, leaving their superiors to unwittingly report them as dead. Maguire is compelled under absolutely shocking duress to commit an atrocity, but the film clearly shows it is a moment of madness, not relish, while ultimately offering him forgiveness and the restoration of his humanity.

And when Maguire is rescued alive and returned home, the slow-burning tension that does in fact lead to the advertised police showdown is portrayed with understanding, restraint and respect for what he went through. Gyllenhaal’s sarcastic, layabout brother transforms from mocking the war and Maguire’s commitment to the military to an honorable man himself. Portman is as devoted a wife after Maguire’s (presumed) death as she was in his life.

Based on a 2004 Danish film called “Brodre” and written by David Benioff, who also plumbed the horrors of Islamic extremism as part of the plot in his adaptation of “The Kite Runner,” “Brothers” offers a sympathetic view of a family torn by war and its heart-rending side effects. Directed by Jim Sheridan, the Irish native whose 2003 masterpiece “In America” offered a highly personal tribute to his adopted homeland and stands as one of the decade’s most underrated films, the movie offers a genuine catharsis of the mixed emotions millions of Americans feel eight years and two presidents into wars with no end in sight.

It’s a bit of tough medicine at times, but it ultimately works as a reminder that family ties are often the strongest connections we have. “Brothers” offers one big step towards respect and understanding for our troops.  It’s one Hollywood film that deserves notice and a little bit of praise.

Except Ms. Sheehan’s protest really wasn’t all that huge. It looked like Cindy and about seven or eight of her aging hipster friends had gotten some gas money together, made a few signs and a rented U Haul truck for a trip from the Bay Area up to Sacto. I sometimes confuse Cindy’s pals in Code Pink with the pink hats my mother’s old friends in the Red Hat Society wore. Except the Red Hat ladies are out for fun and the Code Pink gals seem to have gotten out of bed on the wrong side. To be honest, I felt a little sad for Cindy. I think I could get more people over to my house for an Amway meeting. I didn’t see how less than a dozen people doing anything would rate national news time. However, Ms. Cindy was getting more airtime on HLN than the entire 9/12 weekend demonstration did, and though we may disagree about how many folks were there, I think we can all agree it was a little more than twelve.

Maybe she was getting face time because there was a counter protest? One old veteran put on his uniform and came out to confront Ms. Sheehan. This guy of about 80 was giving the protesters a severe tongue lashing. To try to silence his dissent, Ms. Peace and Love put her bullhorn about an inch from his face and started shouting. The old guy batted it away was and was instantly demonized for “slapping” Ms. Sheehan. She was demanding to anyone who would listen that he be arrested for assault. Apparently on Planet Sheehan only she has the right to protest.

Then something odd struck me, she and her Code Pink friends weren’t really protesting the war. They were protesting the use of unmanned drones to kill enemy scumbags. To Ms. Sheehan’s credit, until then she had never quit protesting the war. What happened was that she quit getting coverage. When she would show up in Crawford with her ragtag band of merry pranksters they would be outnumbered by adoring media types ten-to-one. She got her sour puss on all the CNN and MSNBC chat fests. Then Obama, the anti- war President happened and all of the media went away. Her camp out at Martha’s Vineyard this past summer during Mr. Obama’s vacation brought one mention and that was on the evil Fox News.

Now her protest isn’t primarily against the President’s lack of action on his promises to the hard left — oh no! Nor is it against the war itself. Her protest is now Obama friendly! In order to get back in the limelight she isn’t protesting the war per se, she is protesting “drones.” I think she actually said something to the effect that the use of unmanned drones weren’t fair. I guess Ms. Sheehan thinks if we need to clean out some rat hole of terrorists we should do it in a more sporting manner.

Now that she isn’t protesting “the war,” which on Tuesday became President Obama’s war, she is back on the good list with the liberal media. I expect to see Cindy and company all around the liberal media on her tour protesting that mean old Air Force and their use of unfair drones. And I wouldn’t hold my breath for any anti-Obama rhetoric making the edit on the mainstream media outlets!

Olaf in Combat.

03 November 2009

British soldiers at war are an incredible group.  Courageous, competent, and committed in very difficult conditions.  An email came today from London, from a BBC correspondent who has been to Afghanistan saying that Staff Sergeant Olaf Schmid had been killed.

To see the article in the BBC was deeply saddening: Soldier Killed While Defusing 65th Bomb.

On a side note, the British soldiers are conservative.  Though this is not very important, it’s difficult to imagine that Olaf had only destroyed 64 bombs before being killed.  Just on this single mission, during which all these photos were taken, and during the surrounding few days, his crew must have destroyed several dozen bombs.  You had to be there.  By the time the mission in these photos happened, the crew was very experienced.

Courage is as common as boots among these soldiers, but Olaf stood out even in that company.  You could tell that Olaf knew his business from mean experience, and that he was ready for battle.  His mind was very quick.

His crew was competent and confident, and worked faster to clear bombs than any I had seen.  If not, the soldiers could never have completed this mission, because there simply were too many bombs.  They say all beekeepers get stung, but these are not bees.  These soldiers were facing an extraordinary number of bombs and booby-traps that are designed to kill the team.

According to the Oxford Mail:

During the course of his tour, he attended 41 tasks, rendered safe 64 IEDs and attended 11 finds of bomb-making equipment.

The married father-of-one lived with his family in Winchester. His wife Christina said: “Oz was a phenomenal husband and loving father who was cruelly murdered on his last day of a relentless five-month tour.”

Olaf was lost on his last mission.  The enemy are blowing up civilians everywhere, and taking a toll on our folks.

According to the BBC:

Lieutenant Colonel Robert Thomson, commanding officer of 2 Rifles Battle Group, said: “Staff Sgt Oz Schmid was simply the bravest and most courageous man I have ever met.”

“No matter how difficult or lethal the task which lay in front of us, he was the man who only saw solutions.”

“He saved lives in 2 Rifles time after time and for that he will retain a very special place in every heart of every rifleman in our extraordinary battle group.”

According to the Oxford Mail,

Lt Col Robert Thomson, the commanding officer of the 2 Rifles Battle Group, said: “Staff Sgt Oz Schmid was simply the bravest and most courageous man I have ever met.”

“Under relentless IED and small arms attacks, he stood taller than the tallest. He opened the Pharmacy Road and 24 hours later, found 31 IEDs in one go on route Sparta. Every single company in 2 Rifles adored working with him.”

They really did.  Everybody liked to see not just Olaf, but his entire great team.  The mission succeeded that day.  For more about the lives, and missions of these excellent soldiers, please read Bad Medicine.

Please give the gift of independent reporting. Your gift goes far and is used for transport, lodging, living expenses, satellite communications and for repairing and replacing gear that fails due to the rigors of the battlefields.  Millions of people, in more than a hundred countries, see these photos and words.  Your generosity goes very far, and is greatly appreciated.

[This dispatch was written by me in December 2008 in southern Afghanistan. It was never published though I recently found it in the unpublished archives. The photos came from the same period.]

Published: from Nepal on 14 October 2009

On May 25, 1961, the President of the United States of America said:

“Finally, if we are to win the battle that is now going on around the world between freedom and tyranny, the dramatic achievements in space which occurred in recent weeks should have made clear to us all, as did the Sputnik in 1957, the impact of this adventure on the minds of men everywhere, who are attempting to make a determination of which road they should take. Since early in my term, our efforts in space have been under review. With the advice of the Vice President, who is Chairman of the National Space Council, we have examined where we are strong and where we are not, where we may succeed and where we may not. Now it is time to take longer strides—time for a great new American enterprise—time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.”

And thanks to bold and visionary leadership, the collective intelligence, courage and commitment of Americans from coast to coast, America had seemed to achieve little more than a stunning list of public failures on the way to space. Our rockets exploded on the launch pad. In the air. Burned up on reentry. Or disappeared into solar orbit. But our grandparents never allowed us to be defined by our faults or failures; only how we greeted adversity. Failure after failure after failure. We got up and launched again, into failure. Fine astronauts were lost. And yet today, in 2008, after a dozen Americans have walked on the moon, citizens from no other nation have managed to land on the lunar surface. What inspiration kept the people at NASA going, when their early years were marked seemingly only by failure? The scientists, engineers and space pilots were living the American dream, not a dream of mere perfection, but of valiant and worthwhile effort. President Theodore Roosevelt said in 1910:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

And so I write these words from Afghanistan, as a grandchild of many great men and women who built “America” and bequeathed it to us. The challenges facing us in Afghanistan, and this region in general, are monumental. We have been failing in Afghanistan. We have been losing the war. But losing does not mean lost. Failing does not mean failed. Yet if we are to succeed in this endeavor, we must be realistic that putting people on the moon was more straightforward than lifting Afghanistan from the stone ages.

“Taming” this land and its human inhabitants into a civilized country will require great investments in time, resources, imagination and intelligence. Bringing Afghanistan out of the Stone Age is not a decade-long project; we are already seven years into the war, and it’s only getting worse. Some people say it will take two generations, but more realistically, a century will be needed. Afghanistan is not Iraq. This is a very primitive, almost lunar place. Yes, cocktail party correspondents can surf their way through meetings in Jalalabad, or Kabul, or Mazar-i-Sharif, and come home with reports of success. But they are wrong. And the counterinsurgency “experts” who come here on short trips, and fly home to America or Britain with poison dripping from their lips, spitting words that we are winning, are doing Great Britain, the United States, and our allies a great disservice. Those who came to Afghanistan with open eyes and open minds, and who are not afraid to jeopardize access or careers by reporting truth, will have clearly reported by early 2006 that we were losing ground here. Who are these “experts” who didn’t see this thing for what it was, early on? And now even in 2008, some people bring home messages that this place is not as bad as it really is. Yes, it’s true that we lost but one U.S. soldier to combat in Afghanistan in November of 2008, but we should not let this number confuse us. The Af-Pak war has great potential to devolve into something far worse than what we saw in Iraq. The “experts” who did not sound the alarm by at least 2006, that Afghanistan by then clearly was slipping through our fingers, are no more useful than a fire alarm with dead batteries. A fire alarm with dead batteries is far worse than merely useless. Let the counterinsurgency “experts” step forward, and show us that they put to writing several years ago what is today obvious. We need to know who to listen to, and who to ignore.

We can succeed in Afghanistan, but we cannot pretend this will ever be the Sea of Tranquility.

Our new President will need to demonstrate wisdom and resolve in dealing with Af-Pak. The peril might not yet be obvious, but the consequences are far too grave to ignore. Enemies of humanity are trying to pull India and Pakistan into war. Ignorance is their primary weapon, and Afghanistan is merely one battlefront. Most of these kids will remain illiterate, and the children of their children likely will not be able to read. Even if they were literate, there are few books available in languages such as Dari or Pashto. This kid in Zabul Province is already lost. Afghanistan will be doing well to get his sons and daughters into a school, but more realistically it will be his grandchildren that might first be reached. We must be realistic. America did not succeed in putting people on the moon by hiring mathematicians who could not expertly use the slide rule or correctly perform the math. America succeeded in part by hiring the best mathematicians, along with the best scientists and engineers of all sorts, who possessed powerful intellects, realistic imaginations, and a volatile intolerance for anything less than pure truth. They didn’t drink anyone’s Kool-Aid.

And so President Kennedy said, “First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.” And they kept pushing through a painful series of dramatic failures, until, within that same decade, in 1969, the first words spoken from a man on the moon came beamed home to earth:

“Tranquility base here, the Eagle has landed.”

And soon astronaut Neil Armstrong was stepping off the ladder, and he said, “That’s one small step for a man. One giant leap for mankind.”

Hard never meant impossible.

The war is intensifying month by month while support for this mission plummets. Your help is crucial to my staying in the war. 2010 will almost certainly prove to be the bloodiest even as coverage dries up. More troops are coming in. The fighting for those who are here is already as tough as any seen in Iraq. Do you trust the Government to tell the truth? Please donate today.

Kandahar City, Afghanistan

Slowly, surely, the city is being strangled.  Signaling the depth of our commitment, security forces are thinner in Kandahar than the Himalayan air.  During the days and evenings, there were the sounds of occasional bombs—some caused by suicide attackers, and others by firefights.  The windows in my room had been blown out recently and now were replaced.  We came here to kill our enemies, but today we want to make a country from scratch.

A world away from Afghanistan, over in Holland, was approaching the 65th anniversary of the allied liberation from Nazi occupation, and I had been invited to attend by James “Maggie” Megellas.  Maggie, who had fought his way through Holland and is today remembered there as a hero, is said to be the most decorated officer in the history of the 82nd Airborne Division.  Now 92, Maggie has recently spent about two months tooling around the battlefields of Afghanistan, and though it would be an honor to finally meet him, there was the matter of extracting myself from Kandahar City and getting through about forty minutes of dangerous territory to the military base at Kandahar Airfield.

And so a friend and I donned local garb and loaded into the car.

Criminals and Taliban were on the lookout for westerners to kidnap, and unknown to us an intelligence report had just been issued that men in a stolen Toyota Corolla were on the prowl in Kandahar City.

The camera was mostly kept down but occasionally I lifted for quick shots.  Kandahar City, like other main Afghan cities, belies the fact that most Afghans will never have one minute of electricity, nor will they ever see a westerner.

Afghan police love to jet around at high speeds in their trucks, often with powerful machine guns mounted on back.

Shortly after this photo was taken, my friend, who had been a South African cop for 16 years, spotted two men in a white Toyota Corolla who had locked onto us.  They drove swiftly by for a look-see, then hit a Y intersection ahead on the right.  They tried to get back in, but traffic slowed them by about ten seconds.  I was watching over my shoulder when they dangerously bolted back into the traffic a couple hundred meters behind us.  The camera was on the floorboard.  I had picked up a pistol and rested it on my right thigh.  My friend rolled down his window and I rolled down mine.  They were moving in.  In less than a minute, someone probably would die.  The car was speeding closer when per chance a green Afghan police pickup rocketed by the pursuers.  The green police truck was mounted with a machine gun, and a long belt of ammo was dangling, while a policeman kept his hands on the gun.  I hid the pistol.  The pursuers slowed.  We continued at about 40mph as the police swooshed by.  The police pulled off the road a few hundred meters ahead of us and the white car fell back more, until it passed the police and began to speed up, but that was it.  The pursuers were caught behind too many trucks and fell away.  I put down the pistol and picked up the camera.

None of the paved roads in Afghanistan were built by Afghan vision with Afghan resources.  If not for the many foreign invaders, this land would be road-and runway-free.

An American convoy of MRAPs approached from the front and a soldier in the lead vehicle shot a pen-flare, causing everyone to pull off the road.  The convoys are more menacing from the outside and in fact I kept the camera down and this is exactly why Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is concerned about adding too many troops.  Can’t argue with his reasoning; convoys and troops truly are menacing despite that U.S. and British soldiers are very disciplined.  It must look far worse to Afghans.  Most Afghans never talk with foreign soldiers and those who do normally only see us in passing.  In fact, most soldiers never leave base.  Our forces at KAF (Kandahar Airfield) have a base so large that this commercial jet is about to land there after flying dangerously over this unsecured road.

After arriving at Kandahar Airfield, the Dutch Air Force took me, and long after midnight we boarded a Canadian C-130 and flew to Dubai.

From Dubai, the Dutch soldiers got onto a chartered flight to Eindhoven, Netherlands.

Over the Arabian Gulf, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, skirting Iraq.

Finally into Holland, we landed at the Dutch Air Force Base at Eindhoven, where families and others were waiting for Dutch soldiers.  Someone shoved a rose and a gift into my hand and I smiled, protesting that I am only a writer, and tried unsuccessfully to return the rose and the gift.

There was a short taxi ride to the hotel.

And right there in the lobby was a throng of World War II veterans whose first trips to Europe had been either under parachute into combat, or by gliders into combat.  (As would be revealed over the next five days.)  So I sat down with Guadelupe Flores because he was sitting alone while people crowded around other vets.  His grandson Matt came over.  I hadn’t even fully checked in yet.  Guadelupe said he was from Texas originally but now lived in Ohio, and he’d just arrived.  “Did you parachute in this time?” I asked.  Guadelupe only chuckled, “Not this time,” and chuckled some more.  Please have a look at Guadelupe’s left eye.  This is the last picture before he got the black eye, which is a funny story.  (Guadelupe was on the Army boxing team, he would later say.)

Maggie Megellas was there along with a large group of American university students who had broken off with small groups of veterans.  A man said that General Petraeus’ staff was here and General Petraeus was coming to stay at the same hotel.

Finally I got to the room and there was an email from Afghanistan:

I’ve heard we had to be on the lookout for a group of kidnappers, targeting expats in Kandahar. Apparently they are using a stolen white Toyota Corolla station wagon and a red Toyota Surf. Wonder if we “met” them yesterday?

Actually there had been two suspected vehicles that seemed like they might be working together, but I didn’t mention the second vehicle.  Every day in the war is a close call.

The Market Garden remembrance was to begin in the morning.

THIS IS PART ONE OF A SEVEN PART EXPOSÉ.  READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE.

1 2 3 4  5 6 7

******

July 2009, Sangin, Afghanistan.

05 October 2009

In July, British soldiers and I boarded a CH-47 helicopter at Camp Bastion for the flight to FOB Jackson at Sangin where fighting is brutal.  The helicopter was so stuffed with men, gear and supplies that the cargo was not even strapped down.  We steadied the long stack with our hands and prayed that the pilots not begin flying violent evasive maneuvers.  The tail gunner partially lifted the ramp to prevent bundles from tumbling into the skies, and that was it for securing the bundles.  Just a week before, a giant MI-26 helicopter was shot down on final approach to this same landing zone.  All aboard died in flames, as did two children on the ground.

This is, interestingly, the same landing zone where I would make the photos for “The Kopp-Etchells Effect” dispatch, which was published in many languages around the world.  Many readers have weighed in with ideas about the causes of the glow.  Some say the cause is St Elmo’s fire or the triboelectric effect, or perhaps the piezoelectric effect.  The actual cause does not seem to be surely known, according to J. Gordon Leishman, D.Sc.(Eng.), Ph.D., F.R.Ae.S., Minta Martin Professor of Engineering, Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Maryland.  I don’t know.  Maybe it’s caused by angels.  It definitely is beautiful.

We landed and British Soldiers from “2 Rifles” swarmed in to help unload cargo.  Since I made this photo, at least two British CH-47s have been lost in combat operations, one of which was just north of here.

We need more gear and more forces now.  We can outfight these enemies and we can win the war, but at this rate a favorable outcome is difficult to imagine.  This war shows signs that it will become more intense than Iraq at its peak.  As with my twelve dispatches from 2006 warning that we were losing this war, the warnings over the past couple of years seem to be falling on incredulous ears.  We will lose the war unless we get more troops and more gear soon.

This weekend we lost eight more soldiers in a firefight.  I learned about it while they were still fighting, but did not report it until just before the media broke the story the next day.  Still unreported, to my knowledge, sources tell me that FOB Keating was destroyed and that troops were under siege for up to 24 hours before Air Force Para-rescue got them out.  (Subject to confirmation.)  The fighting will only intensify.  We can beat these guys, but not under current conditions.

The last two missions I did with British 2 Rifles ended in firefights.  Due to bandwidth difficulties, only a small part of the video was uploaded.  Those two firefights were melded into one short video.  These are just typical hum-drum day-in day-out missions, nothing like what happened this weekend in Nuristan.

Please click Firefights.

The war is intensifying month by month while support for this mission plummets. Your help is crucial to my staying in the war. 2010 will almost certainly prove to be the bloodiest even as coverage dries up. More troops are coming in. The fighting for those who are here is already as tough as any seen in Iraq. Do you trust the Government to tell the truth? Please donate today.

By Camilla Fuhr Nilsson
Published: 30 September 2009

“These things we do that others may live” is the current motto of the US Air Force combat search and rescue team, or Pedro as they are called when deployed to Afghanistan. They fly into the battlefield with their smooth Pave Hawk helicopters and evacuate the wounded infantry soldiers and Marines. On a recent evacuation of two Danish soldiers in the middle of a battle with the Taliban, the Viking ancestors made a memorable difference to the 129th American Air Force Pedros crew.

It was a hot day in June even though it was still early in the morning. The traditionally dry heat of the southern Afghan desert, combined with the humidity of the green vegetation known as the Green Zone around the Helmand River, made the Danish infantry soldiers from the Danish Royal Husars drip with sweat as they patrolled in the green fields with heavy equipment and body amour. The squad, also known as Charlie Coy, soon got engaged in a heavy battle with Taliban fighters. Two Danish soldiers were shot by the Taliban and the medic called for evacuation—the so-called medevac. The American Pedro team 129th responded to the call.

Callsign Norsemen

Major Mat Wenthe, the detachment commander of the team, recalls the 25th of June rescue:

“The weather was fine that morning, so we only had to worry about the battle when we landed. The Danes were on the ground when we arrived. The B1 bomber was on station in the air already and the Norseman call sign on the ground and in the forward operating base nearby. There were two different call signs. One was talking about the TIC—troops in contact—and another was talking to us. On one side there was a TIC and the soldiers were receiving fire. So we knew what we had to deal with.”

The ongoing battle between the Danes and the Taliban meant that the Major and his team had to land in what they call the hot LZ. That means the landing zone is still a battle zone and there is a huge risk they’ll be caught up in the middle of bullets and mortar bombs flying through the air. Approximately twenty percent of the rescues are in a hot landing zone and the rest of the missions are fairly routine.

“There was enemy contact still going on. When we arrive to a pick up zone, we usually ask where the enemy is and what and where the casualties are. That way we’ll have an up-to-date assessment of the situation. And we knew we would be landing in a TIC,” Major Wenthe explains.

Alpha Bravo Charlie rescues

The three different categories of casualty assessment are Alpha, Bravo and Charlie. The call from the Danish medics was an alpha which means the wounded are in a critical condition and require urgent rescue. So even though the Danish soldiers were in the Charlie Coy squad, their casualties were Alpha.

Because of the situation on the ground, the Pedro 36 crew on one of the helicopters asked for smoke from the soldiers on the ground.

“The Norsemen secured the LZ. We were able to move in and pick them up. There were two casualties—one soldier was hit in the shoulder and one in the leg. The guy with the gunshot in the leg walked to the helicopter by himself which we thought was pretty amazing actually. We were all pretty impressed,” Mat Wenthe laughs, recalling the situation.

The other crew members from that flight nods–recognizing the event. They remember the Danish Viking, who made his way to the helicopter by himself.

“Dude that was wild”, says Tommy, a PJ—a pararescue jumper.

“Seriously I don’t know why the Danes are better at it than the other countries, but they are better in the way they call in the rescue, the way they speak out there, calm and everything.” He shakes his head, almost in disbelief.

The crew wanted to limit time on the ground and was off in 30 seconds.

“We try to get out fast to be safe. The PJs jump out and grab the patients, and we are on our way,” Mat says.  “As we were leaving the area, the Danish Platoon Commander—I think he was—on the ground said to us: ‘Thank you Pedro, take good care of my men.’ They didn’t think we were gonna get them because it was a hot landing zone.”

Worst case scenario training

The Pedro crew is originally trained to pick up US Air Force pilots who are being shot down. They train for worst case scenario and how to evacuate a landing zone in the middle of firefights.

“It’s definitely a morale boost to the people on the ground, that we’ll land in any kind of situation and any weather. We are the only air force that guarantees we’ll try. So on the ground, that makes the pilots know that we’ll be there, and we apply that to the medevacs we do here. The troops on the ground know we’ll help them engage from the chopper if needed,” Mat Wenthe says.

On the 25th of June the team took the two soldiers to the hospital in Camp Bastion—the large base in the middle of the desert. The day after the rescue, the Pedros received a letter from the Danish platoon.

“The letter came thanking us for what we did. Normally it’s about the injured when we receive a thank you, but this letter proved that we can make a difference on the ground too. It made an impact on us, that he wrote that we had made a difference after we left the battlefield, because that’s not our primary goal.”

The letter stated that the Pedro crew had bravely inspired the men, because they landed under difficult circumstances in the middle of a firefight between the Danes and the Taliban. A bravery that made the Danish soldiers motivated and strong enough to win the fight.

“It was awesome to see that what we do inspired other people on the ground. And the fact that it was the Danes, you know the Vikings, huge, tall, and blonde, that’s pretty bad ass. We’ve been hearing what they do out there, and to receive that letter from the Vikings was good,” says Mat Wenthe, and looks like he met the original Vikings on the 25th.

Viking reputation still stands

The American crew still recalls all the events surrounding the rescue because the soldiers were Danish, and because they had heard the reputation the Danish men had on the battlefield, both historically and in Helmand.

“They are pretty laid-back when they are out there. So we always picture them as huge and blonde and badass wearing helmets with horns,” Major Wenthe says with a smile.

Some of the contents of the thank-you letter the American crew received has now been translated into Latin. They plan to make a badge with the inscription “Fortis incito”—“to inspire bravery”—when they return to the States. But from this tour they’ll always remember the Norsemen they rescued on June 25th.

The present Pedro team—129th—arrived to Camp Bastion on June 5th and has since had 400 rescue missions and helped save 215 allied soldiers’ lives. Their task is to evacuate soldiers to the field hospitals in the south of Afghanistan in under an hour in all kinds of weather.

The two wounded Danish soldiers are both doing well. The soldier that was shot in the leg was quickly back on the job. The other soldier—the one with a severe gunshot in the left upper arm—has lost a piece of the triceps muscle, hence his strength is not as strong as before the injury.

Both the Danish Norsemen team seven and the American 129th Pedro crew have now redeployed to their respective countries. The callsigns has been changed to avoid endangering the lives of the Danish soldiers.

The war is intensifying month by month while support for this mission plummets. Your help is crucial to my staying in the war. 2010 will almost certainly prove to be the bloodiest even as coverage dries up. More troops are coming in. The fighting for those who are here is already as tough as any seen in Iraq. Do you trust the Government to tell the truth? Please donate today.

It’s exactly why every now and then a Hollywood celebrity will say that they “support our troops but not the war” or that “these men and women shouldn’t be dying in vain.” Is anybody still fooled by those one-liners anymore? Similarly in our president’s case, it’s why he continually says that he supports our troops without giving them so much as a shred of his time. I’m sure that the men and women putting themselves in harms way will understand though. After all, he’s got a meeting with one Mr. David Letterman.

For those who haven’t yet heard, Obama has met with General Stanley McChrystal (the good man in charge of leading our honorable troops to victory in Afghanistan) only once, yes, ONCE in the last seventy days. So it seems apparent that while Obama has no time to devote to the men and women of our armed services (the same people who ultimately make him look good), he has plenty of time to devote to promoting himself.

As Barack Obama devotes more time to personal press than any other president in history (in record time to boot), it’s becoming more and more glaringly apparent… Our president is more Paris Hilton than General Patton.

Just like the toolbags of Hollywood, Barack Obama’s favorite topic of the day is himself. Also, like the folks of Tinseltown, all of the problems plaguing our world today are problems that he and he alone can fix. How would he fix them, you ask?

By regurgitating rhetoric to every broadcast journalist, press-hound or comedian that will sit in front of him, of course!

*Note: The above statement does not apply to those with the last names Hannity and/or O’Reilly.

Sure, when Hollywood turns their backs on our troops, it’s wrong, and it ultimately does hurt morale. When all is said and done, however, I doubt that there are platoons of Marine’s sitting around Afghanistan sulking butt-hurtedly over Sean Penn’s most recent asinine comments. When it comes down to it, in the big picture of war, the people of Hollywood just don’t matter that much.

In contrast to that, there is a direct correlation between our president willfully choosing to ignore those fighting for our freedoms and their success in carrying out their/our mission. Which in turn means that fighting in the military with Barack Obama as Commander in Chief is not the ideal place to be.

In light of this, I’d like to recommend to you, Mr. President that you sack up and start focusing on the things that really matter. If you read below, I’m sure you’ll find that there are many people here who agree (that’s your cue to comment).

Don’t worry about the mainstream media, sir.  You can put them on the back-burner for a little while. I promise you that David Letterman will still love you in the morning.