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U.S. Strategy In Afghan War Hinges On Far-Flung Outposts
Wall Street Journal
March 4, 2009
Pg. 1
U.S. Strategy In Afghan War Hinges On Far-Flung Outposts
By Yochi J. Dreazen
SERAY, Afghanistan -- The attacks usually begin in the afternoon, just after the soldiers of Combat Outpost Seray return from patrol. One recent day, Taliban fighters shot at the base from a nearby mountain range. In response, Apache attack helicopters launched rockets at the mountain, kicking up plumes of mottled smoke.
"Day comes, day goes," said Spc. Trey Dart, taking shelter under a makeshift roof of green sandbags. "Firefights are just another part of the routine."
President Barack Obama is hoping to boost the flagging war effort in Afghanistan by sending 17,000 reinforcements. Most of them will be deployed to small, remote bases such as Seray, a walled compound of trenches and fortified buildings near the Pakistan border. Many of these new outposts will be in eastern and southern Afghanistan, the most violent parts of the country.
But will the troops in these tiny redoubts be able to carry out the often conflicting missions of fighting insurgents and building relationships with local villagers, or will these soldiers and Marines merely be easy targets?
Last year was the bloodiest yet in Afghanistan for U.S., North Atlantic Treaty Organization and Afghan forces -- as well as for Afghan civilians -- since the start of the U.S.-led war in 2001. American and Afghan officials expect 2009 to be worse; 30 American soldiers have already been killed in Afghanistan this year compared with 155 in all of 2008. The violence has been triggered by the resurgent Taliban, which is expanding its operations with revenues from the country's flourishing opium trade. There are currently about 52,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan, including about 35,000 U.S. troops.
To accommodate the new troops, U.S. forces in Afghanistan are already digging ditches, filling sandbags and building basic infrastructure at close to a dozen new combat outposts. Senior American commanders estimate at least a dozen additional bases will be built in the two regions by the summer.Gen. David Petraeus, who recently assumed responsibility for the war in Afghanistan, oversaw the construction of dozens of small bases in Iraq in 2007 and 2008 as part of the Bush administration's troop "surge." The bases helped reduce the country's violence by enabling U.S. troops to live among ordinary Iraqis and "hold" territory cleared of militants. In the early days of the Iraq war, militants would quickly regroup after U.S. troops departed.
Gen. Petraeus and his backers within the military believe smaller bases can do the same in Afghanistan. The counterinsurgency doctrine he has championed stresses the importance of protecting the population from insurgent attack and building strong relationships with local residents. Outposts like Seray offer a way of accomplishing both tasks.
"You can't commute to work in counterinsurgency," Gen. Petraeus told a security conference in Munich. He declined requests to be interviewed for this article.
Afghanistan, however, is different from Iraq. It remains a destitute country with few roads and virtually no modern infrastructure, meaning the outposts are unusually isolated. Outposts in Iraq were located in major cities, so they were able to protect the vast majority of the Iraqi populace. In Afghanistan, most outposts are in rural areas like Seray. Often, these outposts can be reached only by air. That has prompted fears the bases could theoretically be overtaken by insurgents before reinforcements can arrive.
Over the summer, militants staged a coordinated attack on an American outpost in nearby Wanat Valley, killing nine soldiers and wounding nearly 30. The small U.S. bases in the Korengal Valley near Seray are attacked almost every day. Many rural Afghans offer tacit support to the Taliban, while others actively take part in the fighting, according to U.S. and Afghan officials.
David Kilcullen, a counterinsurgency expert who has long advised Gen. Petraeus on Iraq and Afghanistan, supported the outpost strategy in Iraq. But he says the U.S. is making a mistake by deploying so many troops to remote bases in Afghanistan.
Mr. Kilcullen, a retired Australian military officer, notes that 80% of the population of southern Afghanistan lives in two cities, Kandahar and Lashkar Gah. The U.S. doesn't have many troops in either one of them.
"The population in major towns and villages is vulnerable because we are off elsewhere chasing the enemy," he said.
Senior U.S. commanders in Afghanistan acknowledge the need to better protect the country's cities. Last month, Taliban suicide bombers and gunmen mounted a coordinated assault on three government buildings in Kabul that killed at least 20 people and wounded close to 60 more. One target, the Afghan Justice Ministry, was located just a few hundred yards away from the home of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
At the same time, they've made clear that remote outposts will be a central part of the emerging American strategy.
"We've got to protect the population, but we also have to have a capability to interdict the movement of insurgents across the border," Gen. David McKiernan, the top American commander in Afghanistan, told reporters in Washington recently.
Advocates say these bases can also prevent militants from making their way into Afghanistan from sanctuaries in Pakistan's lawless tribal areas. Seray overlooks a lush valley in Kunar Province, which is a major transit route for the Pakistan-based militants who cross into Afghanistan to attack U.S., NATO and Afghan targets, according to U.S. and Afghan security officials.
The base at Seray was built in April 2007, after a U.S. offensive code-named Big Axe, which was designed to prevent fighters from Pakistan from making their way to the Korengal Valley, according to Col. Christopher Cavoli, who commanded the unit that set up Seray.
Col. Cavoli's troops, hoping to win over Afghans who live near the base, launched an expensive effort to pave a road through the valley. The road, which will be the first in this corner of Afghanistan, hasn't yet been completed.
Five soldiers were killed in a pair of roadside bombings as they drove away from the base in a bloody one-week period over the summer. A handful of other soldiers have been wounded at Seray in recent months.
Staff Sgt. Christopher Lenington, one of the senior noncommissioned officers at Seray, said soldiers here are "sitting ducks" for the Taliban, who regularly climb the mountains overlooking the base and fire down into the dusty compound. A sign by the base's small helipad reads: "This is where the bullets land."
"They can fire just about any weapon from any surrounding hill and hit us," said Sgt. Lenington, a St. Louis native who likens his soldiers to his children. "It's really a horrible place to put a base."
Col. Cavoli, whose men built the base, said the dangers are an unavoidable byproduct of stationing American troops near important Afghan roads and rural population centers.
"Being out among the people carries risks that can't be avoided," he said recently. "We knew it was a dangerous place to put a base. The last place I got shot at in Afghanistan was Seray."
The soldiers from Charlie Company of the 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade, First Infantry Division, live in windowless wooden shacks whose roofs are covered with layers of thick green sandbags. The buildings are connected by sandbag-lined walkways that resemble World War I era trenches. There are no showers or bathrooms.
In the evenings, the soldiers watch movies or play competitive tournaments of "Call of Duty 4," a combat videogame. In December, they put up a makeshift Christmas tree with cigarette butts and bullet casings as ornaments.
A scarecrow in an Army uniform stands by the main gate, next to a handwritten list of what to do during a firefight. On the list: "Avoid getting shot or blown up (Rockets and bullets have right of way here)" and "If you are going to yell, make sure you're yelling strong manly stuff."
In late December, the military dispatched psychiatric counselor Maurice Sheehan to visit outposts including Seray. He interviewed the base's soldiers for signs of suicidal tendencies or other psychological problems.
"This place is a pressure cooker," says Mr. Sheehan, a Navy captain who now works for the U.S. Public Health Service, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. "The fighting, the isolation, it all adds up."
Private First Class Rodney Hufford lost most of his pinky when he was shot in the hand in September. Months later, he still has trouble sleeping.
"It's the nightmares, mostly," he said.
On the morning of Sept. 18, Taliban mortars and rocket-propelled grenades began crashing into the base. Spc. Dart threw on running shoes and sprinted to one of Seray's four watchtowers. A bullet flew through an open window and hit him in the back, just below his flak vest.
The firefight lasted for more than five hours. By the time it was over, Pfc. Hufford had been shot in the hand and Staff Sgt. David Shaw, a noncommissioned officer, had been shot in the arm. The nerve damage to his arm forced him to leave the infantry.
Pieces of shrapnel also hit the base's adopted dog, Odie, opening gashes on her leg and face. A medic treated the wounds, and today, Odie goes out on patrol with the soldiers, trotting out ahead of the heavily armed troops. She barks loudly whenever any Afghan approaches.
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