Mark AND I HAD little time to prepare and faced some serious, possibly show-stopping challenges, the first being that Foxtrot had no communications gear. Without communications, the team could bring little to the table in terms of helping Shirzai or reporting intelligence to Headquarters. Fortunately, steps were already being taken to address this issue, as well as that of Foxtrot only having two members. A CIA paramilitary team similar in composition to Echo’s was being assembled in Washington and would be sent out to join Mark and myself. The incoming team would have the commo gear and the technical skills to operate it, not to mention that they all were expert warriors, trained to carry out intelligence operations in a combat environment. The catch was, the paramilitary team would not be ready until sometime after the planned infiltration date, and it would have to join us in Afghanistan at a later time. From my standpoint, not having the team from the get-go was less than optimal, to put it mildly.
There was some good news, however. The Department of Defense had approved sending another “A” team—ODA 583 from 5th Special Forces— to join with Foxtrot, and it would be in Pakistan in time to accompany us on the initial insertion.
While I was very happy to hear this, it did not solve the communications problem. The ODA had its own gear for military commo, but it would not have the gear Foxtrot would need for CIA operational and intelligence reporting. Communications remained a problem needing to be addressed.
Then I learned there might be a solution to our commo problem. A two-man advance element from a U.S. military Special Operations task force was in Islamabad and had commo gear that was compatible with Agency crypto. This was great news. I decided to walk over and meet them to discuss the situation with the goal of getting my hands on their gear.
On the way to see them, I spotted three people walking along the sidewalk, two of whom I recognized as being former “Shelter Now” hostages of the Taliban, and who only a day or two earlier had been rescued by U.S. forces. I knew the Agency had worked hard on their behalf and had arguably played the key role in getting them out of harm’s way.
As I passed them, I paused to say, “Welcome back,” and to tell them I was glad to see they were safe and sound. They clearly were delighted to be where they were and out of danger, and they told me it was all thanks to God that they had been safely returned. I thought about that for a second but decided not to debate the point, and continued on my way.
After looking around for a bit, I finally found the two military Spec Ops operators, Gary and Mike. Gary came across as a slow talking, laid back country boy, but his rank of Command Sergeant Major told me the “laid back” aspect should be viewed with circumspection. Mike was a Sergeant First Class and looked like he could have been Al Pacino’s double in the “Godfather.” I liked them instantly but they said the only way Foxtrot could have the gear was if they went with it. Clearly they saw this as their ticket to Afghanistan. I could not fault them for that.
In my COS assignment in Latin America I had worked on a project for several months with a similar team from the same task force. From that experience, I knew these guys were professional soldiers through and through, and I would have loved to have them detailed to Foxtrot. The problem was that the approval for them to deploy into Afghanistan, a war zone, could not be granted locally. It would require Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld’s signature. To get that level of approval out of the Pentagon within four days would be a challenge to say the least. I was not optimistic about the chances of success, particularly given DOD’s track record of taking many weeks to get the approval for the first Special Forces team to join up with the NALT in northern Afghanistan. Despite the skepticism, Islamabad station immediately submitted the request up the channels.
In later discussions with Station’s communications officer, I learned that even if Gary and Mike were able to join Foxtrot, because of some software differences with their commo gear, Foxtrot still would not be able to send, or receive, any CIA text or other data. We would be limited to secure voice communications with Headquarters. Considering that we were going to be in a warzone and working at a tactical level, secure voice communications to Headquarters probably would not be all that helpful. But it was better than nothing until the paramilitary team from Washington joined us and brought in the right gear.
To help augment our less than robust communications capability, Islamabad station issued Foxtrot a commercial email system that we could route through an INMARSAT antenna. This system would allow Foxtrot to send emails via satellite to the station, which could then relay the emails over secure staff channels to Headquarters. Unlike normal Agency communications, this backchannel system was not secure, but it did have PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) commercial encryption that, according to the commo officer, was actually fairly secure. I was skeptical that the Agency would authorize use of this type of system, but I was assured it was an approved system. The catch was that it could be used only for unclassified communications. I could not imagine that anything worth sending would be unclassified, but under the circumstances I thought, OK, whatever.
After talking to Gary and Mike I returned to the station, where Mark and I had to deal with another problem. Mark didn’t have a weapon. Understandably, he wasn’t thrilled about the idea of stepping off a helicopter in the middle of the night in Kandahar province without one. We were told all of Station’s weapons had been issued, but then a pistol, a Browning 9mm High-power, was found in a safe drawer. There was only one magazine, however, and no holster or ammunition. Mark and I searched the supply room, literally climbing on top of cabinets to check out the upper-level shelves. Our search paid off and we found a box of 9mm ammo but still no holster or extra magazine. Luckily, I had brought a concealed carry pistol belt from the States just in case, and I gave it to Mark. Had we not found a pistol for him, I would have given him not only the pistol belt but my pistol as well. He still didn’t have a rifle, but at least he would be armed with something beyond a hope and a prayer when we first arrived in Afghanistan. We figured we would be able to get him an AK-47 from Shirzai’s fighters pretty quickly after that.
Late that afternoon Mark and I loaded onto an Air Force C-130 and flew down to Jacobabad. During the flight I thought about the abbreviated deployment timeline and all the equipment and personnel deficiencies that Foxtrot faced. It hit me that the decision to send in a CIA team to join Shirzai seemed almost an afterthought, something someone had forgotten about and then remembered at the last minute. Certainly, it was a shoestring operation by any standard, and we would be flying by the seat of our pants. I knew at that point that if it was going to make a contribution in Afghanistan, in spite of its many challenges, Foxtrot had to become—for lack of better words—“the little team that could.”
In the final approach to the airbase my thoughts shifted to more immediate concerns as the pilot put the plane through some hard turns and quick changes in altitude. I had flown nap of the earth before on approaches to drop zones when I was in the 82nd Airborne Division, but the evasive maneuvers the pilot steered the plane through exceeded anything I had ever experienced. When I saw the Air Force loadmaster lose his cookies, I thought, Yep, this is some serious flying.