Much Going On in Afghanistan

Hello, all!

Well, it’s been quite awhile since I’ve posted to my blog or sent an email out to everyone, so I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone. Quite frankly, I just haven’t felt like blogging lately (I know, that sounds counter-intuitive), even though there has been much to tell. In short, things are going quite well here in Afghanistan and I can’t complain. God has given me much favor with my command and with the soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines and civilians to whom I minister (yes, it is a very different battlefield these days).

First off, I was asked by the CJTF (Combined Joint Task Force) 82 (82nd Airborne Division) Chaplain to head up the Sunday Evening “Traditional” service. Yes, that doesn’t sound much like me, but we have tweaked it so that it really is. Because of my weekly travel schedule I agreed to take the service, as long as I could do so as part of a team, and two other chaplains have joined me. So far it has been a very good arrangement and we have re-titled the service from “Traditional” to “Unplugged.” The connotation is that we have “unplugged” the electric guitars, the noise and the hype (of the Chapel NeXt Contemporary service, which I enjoy) and focus on a mix of hymns, modernized hymns and contemporary worship, along with expository, through-the-Bible teaching, as opposed to “topical” preaching. We annotate the title with “Sunday Evening Meditations,” implying the softer, gentler atmosphere. I preached the first Sunday and we had three people respond to the invitation to invite Christ into their lives! Next week we do Baptisms and two people (so far) have opened themselves up to following the Lord’s command to get dunked. My co-preachers seem to have similar styles in preaching and I actually enjoy listening to them (those of you who know pastors know it is hard for them to listen to others, quite often).

Several weeks ago we had an incident in Puli-Alam, a city about an hour helicopter flight south of here. The text of it, to which I will not be able to do justice here, reads like a Hollywood WWII hero story. Two men in the story have been put in for the Silver Star (with “V” device) and Bronze Star (with “V” device). The simple breakdown of the event is this: Taliban Insurgents had assaulted two main buildings in the city, one of which was the governor’s mansion. They had been repelled by US Forces from the governor’s mansion, but when our EOD guys arrived on scene, several fighters were still holed up in the second building. This building was brand new construction and was fortified with walls that were 2-3 feet thick and almost impervious to the bunker-penetrating, shoulder-fired rounds and 20mm guns our guys were using. When the Major in charge of the cordon around the building chose to send a team in, he didn’t choose from among the many infantry guys available – he chose one of our EOD teams, a testimony to how well respected our guys have become in the area.

The team leader, an E-7 (SFC), took his team, which included his number two man, an E-5 with several years of police experience (including SWAT) in Idaho before going active duty, and two privates. The team followed in support of Afghan National Army soldiers and their French mentors. As they proceeded from floor to floor in the 4-floor structure, they encountered a total of four remaining Taliban, each of whom were in rooms that required an assault from almost impossible angles and distances, leaving them often in the “fatal funnel” and vulnerable to fire. Let me dismiss the ANA and French with the simple statement that they did not kill any of the enemy forces, but rather either fled the building repeatedly when ordered to make the assault (ANA) or simply cowered in well-protected positions while giving orders to make the assault (French). This left the US EOD team to carry the bulk of the workload. They took out two of the insurgents on the way upstairs, then had a brutal and near-deadly encounter with the third.

As they made entry into the hallway where the third insurgent lay ready, #1 was occupied looking elsewhere while number two saw the insurgent pop out into the hallway and, seeing him, fired his final round in his mag, just missing insurgent. His description was one that should make you believe there is a God. He had no time to replace his empty magazine so, pulling from police experience, he made a fast transition to his 9mm pistol as the insurgent fired his AK-47 at him from close quarters. He said it was like being in Pulp Fiction, with concrete from the wall next to him spraying in all directions around him as bullets flew by, missing him entirely. One round from his newly unholstered 9 dropped the insurgent, saving both of their lives. Thank God for the police experience.

Then came the assault on the stairwell up to the fourth floor, where the final insurgent had a perfect firing position behind a thick wall, pie-ing down the stairwell. One ANA perished after his team fled, leaving him exposed on the stairwell and, again, Frenchmen hiding under the stairs. My team repeatedly attempted to flush him out, using grenades to no avail. The wall was too thick and exposing oneself in the stairwell meant certain death, as any movement up the stairs was met with a hail of 7.62mm fire. American ingenuity saves the day, however. The team leader had a brainstorm and fashioned an innovative tool for insurgent neutralization. What can you do with a claymore mine, duct tape and a long stick? It fit perfectly up the 4” gap between stair levels and, from an angle where he could barely see the muzzle of the insurgent’s weapon, #2 guided #1 as he raised the lollipop (emphasis on the “pop”) into position. If you ask the team leader about the explosion that followed his call of “Claymore, claymore, claymore!” he will tell you simply, “Claymores are really loud inside a building.” Up on the house top “click, click, click” and the ensuing explosion sent the insurgent to his reward (probably not the one he envisioned). When the amazing story is published one day, I will definitely post it.

Unfortunately, tragedy also occurs in war. Last Saturday I received the news that we had lost one of our EOD operators in Farah, in the Western region of the country. Sitting overwatch on a convoy, the entire group started taking fire. SSgt (Air Force) Bryan Berky hunkered behind his gunner’s shield and returned fire for several minutes. His teammates inside the MRAP heard the fire cease and looked back to find him slumped in his gunner’s seat. A bullet had found the one-in-a-million slot between his gun and the gunner’s shield and felled the well-liked soldier. He leaves behind a wife and 10-month-old son. I had the privilege of officiating at the Memorial Ceremony with a team that showed deep love, compassion and resilience in the face of great loss, just two weeks prior to their redeployment.

Two nights ago, we at BAF received a rocket round on the Islamic “Night of Power,” the last night of the month of Ramadan fasting, during which Muslims believe the Qur’an was transmitted to Muhammad. The rocket found its mark in a housing area, killing one soldier in his quarters and injuring several others. I was the first chaplain to the scene after the deceased and the injured had been removed to the CASH. After about three hours of ministry to the bereaved unit, I was exhausted. The soldier killed leaves behind six children, four from his current marriage and two (both of which he was about to adopt) from his wife’s previous marriage. The irony pointed out by all is that he was to have left on his R&R the following day and was looking forward to getting home to his family – especially to “making another one,” as he told his fellow soldiers about his desire to have another child. I understand his youngest was a newborn.

We take the good and the bad here – there are no pure, unadulterated stories of sunshine, rainbows and puppy dogs. It is war, unlike our media and government would like to admit, and there are great losses amidst the heroism and the simple, daily joys. Warriors struggle with the question, “Why?” as we all do, just more often. We kick the Taliban’s collective (butt) and it gets presented at home as a “loss of momentum” or a “quagmire.” Yet soldiers (and our fellow servicemembers) soldier on with valor and bravery indescribable. They do their duty, serve their country and take the fight to the enemy, even while people in comfortable chairs, lying on thick pillows at night and entertaining themselves to death daily with Hollywood idiots like Kanye West and Matt Damon, continue to lose heart – and convince others to do the same. While the wine spills there, the blood spills here and the warrior wonders if our victories will be turned to defeat in the hands of corrupt and spineless politicians and the minority of citizens who cower to them and hang on their every daft word.

But as I said, we soldier on. The morale here, despite some silly rules, an incredibly restrictive ROE (Rules of Engagement) and a country that seems hopeless in terms of its promise for an honest government, literate populace and future unity, goes forward quite well. If you look into the eyes of these warriors here, you don’t see a glimmer of defeat, but of teeth for the fight, of a will for the enemy’s demise and of a great longing to finish this thing and get home to their families and the promise of the American Dream, however they interpret that. Every kid of 19 or 20 here is a hero beyond their age and every aged leader in their 30’s and 40’s and beyond is a war-time sage. Some have given all, but all are giving some. And the ministry behind it all continues among dozens of chaplains, incarnationally emplaced throughout the battlefield, suffering with the soldiers, offering them hope and encouragement – guiding them at times when the stresses and indignities of war seem overwhelming.

Pray for us. Pray for our leaders. Pray that our country stops entertaining itself to death. Pray that the Afghan people will get a vision for a better future – and the moral stomach to fight for it. And, humbly, I ask you to pray for me, that I might continue to do my work here well, because each of these men and women deserve someone to hear their hopes and fears, their tragedies and joys, their loftiest dreams and their darkest nightmares. There are so many of them and so few of us, comparatively. Pray that we are in the right places, at the right times, as I was in Sharana, four months ago, when I got the privilege of meeting and talking with SSgt Bryan Berky and his teammates, spending some time kicking their butts in HALO (see, all that practice with my kids came in handy) and perhaps offering some words, or maybe a presence, that brought comfort to them before he gave his last, full measure.

Thank you for your prayers!

Blessings in Christ Jesus, our Lord,
CH (MAJ) Chris Bassett