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Inside an Afghan battle gone wrong: What happened at Wanat? (I)
Just before dawn last July 13, Taliban fighters attacked an outpost in eastern Afghanistan being established by U.S. Army soldiers and fought a short, sharp battle that left many American dead -- and many questions. But the U.S. military establishment, I've found after reviewing the Army investigation, dozens of statements given by soldiers to investigators, and interviews with knowledgeable sources, simply has not wanted to confront some bad mistakes on this obscure Afghan battlefield -- especially tragic because, as the interviews make clear, some of the doomed soldiers knew they were headed for potential disaster.
First, here's my account of what happened that day, drawn from the official investigation and other sources:
The 45 Americans, mainly from 2nd Platoon, Chosen Company, 2nd Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment, part of the 173rd Airborne Brigade, had begun building a patrol base in the Waygul River valley village of Wanat on July 8. There also were three Marines present, who were training Afghans, and 24 soldiers from the Afghan army. (The initial Army report said two Marines, but subsequent documents corrected this.) The platoon's leader was there the whole time, but the company commander was busy elsewhere and only arrived the day before the attack. None of their superiors visited the outpost during that time. Significantly, there was no overhead surveillance by unmanned aerial vehicles because of bad weather, according to Army documents.
At 4:20 a.m., just before sunrise, volleys of rocket-propelled grenades began to hit the base. There were approximately 200 attackers, according to the Army investigation. They began by concentrating on the American's heavy weapons -- a 120 millimeter mortar, a TOW missile system, and a .50 caliber machine gun. It felt like "about a thousand RPGs at once," Spec. Tyler Hanson later told an Army interviewer. With the first two heavy weapons knocked out, the Taliban moved in to fight just feet away from the Americans, making it difficult to call in air strikes against them. Enemy fighters threw rocks into their Americans' fighting holes, apparently hoping they soldiers would mistake them for grenades and jump out, exposing themselves to fire. Enemy fire was coming from every direction. "The whole time we were thinking we were going to die," said Spec. Chris McKaig.
Many did. When most of the fighting was over, about an hour later, nine American soldiers were dead and another 27 were wounded. Between 21 and 52 of the attackers were killed. The Americans held the outpost, which is impressive, considering their 75 percent casualty rate.
Those are the facts of the matter. They are not in dispute, except for the size of the Taliban force, which one account claims is smaller than the Army's estimate of 200. You can read a redacted version of the Army's 15-6 investigation at the "Wanat" page on Wikipedia. Also, here is a Army Times' outstanding view of the battleground.
It is an interesting case to study especially because of the discrepancy between what is known about the incident and what has been learned from it. In other words, the facts gathered by Col. Mark Johnstone in the Army investigation are compelling, but the conclusions drawn from those facts are not. Rather, the Army appears determined to shy away from the lessons indicated by those facts. Here is what the Army concluded -- basically that we did OK, we should have had a Predator overhead, and that we shouldn't have trusted those lousy Afghans. And then let's talk about how brave our soldiers were:
The soldiers did fight valiantly at Wanat. I am in awe of them. As one reported to the Army investigator, "I continued to lay suppressive fire with the 240 [machine gun] but it was difficult because I was unable to stand due to wounds in both legs and my left arm." When this soldier ran out of ammunition he realized that he was the only one left alive in his corner of the outpost, with the enemy so close he could hear them talking.
It takes nothing away from the soldiers to say that there are other lessons to be learned here. "You go through the 15-6 and your heart sinks, as you see all this," said one person who has reviewed most of the data gathered on the battle.
Indeed, one way to honor them would be to look at what might have been done better to help them. But the Army seems positively determined not to study the Wanat incident. A few weeks ago, two interviews about the battle were posted on Fort Leavenworth's very good series of Operational Leadership Interviews -- but then were removed.
Screwups are inevitable in war. But there are serious questions to be addressed here -- and I hope to do so over the next few days on this blog, drawing on the investigation itself and other sources who have raised concerns with me about the painful, and so far unlearned, lessons of the battle. As one Army source put it to me, "The paratroopers sent to Wanat knew they were in big trouble. Although the battalion HQ was only 7km away, these guys lacked class 4 [construction and fortification materials], ran out of water and had little material to build up their defensive positions." Indeed, some of the statements made by those who fought raise the question of whether their concerns are being heard by their superiors.
Before leading the Wanat mission, Lt. Jonathan Brostrom, who died during the fight, told his best friend in the battalion that "he thought it was a bad idea and knew he was going to get 'fucked up,'" according to that friend's sworn statement.
Taking corrective steps is, of course, what the chain of command should be doing, but doesn't appear to have done. "I would not characterize this as anything more than the standard fighting that happens in this area in good weather that the summer provides," Col. Charles Preysler, commander of the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team, told Stars & Stripes about a week after the battle. In other words, nothing to see here, move on.
If the brigade commander and others in the chain of command don't want to think about the lessons to be learned here, then perhaps the Army Inspector General should-a good IG is more about instruction than punishment. Failing that, the vice chief of staff of the Army, Gen. Pete Chiarelli, might direct Lt. Gen. William Caldwell at Fort Leavenworth to have some experienced officers aid the Center for Army Lessons Learned in a review. I have heard that a historian at Leavenworth's Combat Studies Institute had been working on a history of the battle, but I've also been told that his study for some reason has been put on hold.
In the next several items, I will discuss specific lessons that might be learned about resources, planning, support and other life-and-death issues.
(Hat tip to Michael Zubrow of CNAS for research aid.)
Photo via Panoramio
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“Weapons speak to the wise, but in general they need interpreters.”
—Pindar, Olympian Odes
Thomas E. Ricks covered the U.S. military for the Washington Post from 2000 through 2008.
Comments? Tips? Email ricksblog [at] cnas.org
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On ground intelligence
I wonder (as an outsider) if we don't rely so much on the technology that we are blind and isolated on the ground we stand. Coordinated attack from outside a parameter - there must have been some indicators that weren't caught before and after this units insertion. It has been how many years and we haven't developed these basic capabilities to know what is going on - this is a endemic problem. This is the lack of clothes on the emperor and forces. In Iraq we were blind on how we spent money; in Afghanistan are we going to spend this infusion of blood similarly blind.
wanat
Didn't the enemy attack because a wedding party was destroyed?
Please press on...!
I am SO glad to see someone pressing this one... please keep it up!
What kind of OP was this? How temporary?
I see that this is just the first post of several, so maybe these will or can be touched on later on, but two things stand out to me here:
1. I'm still not totally clear on the nature of the position that was attacked. Initial press reports referred to it as an outpost or COP of some kind that was under construction. Later on this was corrected to OP or PB. But soon after the incident, if I remember right, COL Preysler specifically denied that it was a COP of any kind, using the term "vehicle patrol base," and suggested that the position was only temporary, defended only by vehicles and wire. That doesn't sound like construction. So what was it? Was C/2-503 IN building a new permanent OP/PB to hand off to 1-26 IN? Was it a one-time thing, i.e. do forces in Kunar/Nuristan often establish PBs for a few days and then leave them completely? Or was it a site that the unit used habitually for temporary VPBs, i.e. they'd stopped for a VPB there at other times and were just doing it again?
2. What is the status of the site of the engagement now? Press reports after the incident suggested that 2-503 had "retreated" from the Wanat site or "abandoned it," which COL Preysler denied. If it was a temporary VPB, that of course makes complete sense. But if it was a VPB site that the company used habitually, I'd be curious to know what happened to it just a few days later when 2-503 RIPd with 1-26. Has 1-26 (or 6-4 Cav, or 1-32 IN, or whoever - I don't know if the AO boundaries are still the same) continued to set up these temporary VPBs at the Wanat site since it took over the AO? And either way, what has enemy activity in the area looked like since then? It hardly seems reasonable to think that a 200-strong force could just appear out of nowhere and then disappear.
COP, VPB or OP
1
Five days from the time they
Five days from the time they started to build the post and they still didn't have building supplies? This sounds... typical. Read the description of the area this took place in. No paved roads. Steep mountains on all sides. The company had asked for civilian contractors to improve the new post but the equipment had been delayed. This isn't Iraq we're talking about here. Iraq roads are the Autobahn compared to Afghanistan roads. When the report says no paved roads I suspect the road leading to this location might be little more than an improved goat trail. I base this on my experience in Afghanistan (I'm on my second tour here now) and the reading of the report. The construction supplies would probably have been slated to be brought there by truck. Probably from Jalabad. This takes much more time than you would think. Yes, they could have brought building supplies there by airlift, but there are a limited number of cargo helicopters available and I doubt that, prior to the attack, a platoon sized outpost would warrant that sort of priority. Further, if weather prevented UAV from flying, I doubt they would send up manned helicopters. It also would have slowed down moving supplies by road. There were signs that the post was going to be attacked. Should they have been taken more seriously by Company level leadership and above? The Company Commander was there at the attack so it sounds like he was taking it seriously. What about Battalion? If the Company Commander is looking into the threat why would Battalion get involved until they are asked? To do so before they are asked would have been micromanagement and a Battalion Commander should have bigger things to coordinate than the fortification of a platoon outpost. The locals were neutral bordering on hostility so intel probably wasn't the best. Local police deliberately kept intel from them and showed signs of actively working with the Anti-Afghan forces. This accounts for how so many AAF were involved in the fight without us knowing. 503rd was doing the best they could under the circumstances. It's war and war is messy. Unless you want to dispute whether building the outpost was wise and/or nessessary in the first place it does not look as if there is much to see here. Move along.
A couple other things
Have just read the linked PDF of the AR 15-6. It answered my first question: as COL Preysler said afterward, there was no COP at Wanat, only a the VPB. The company planned, however, to expand the VPB into a full COP, and had actually closed the nearby COP Bella. So it's not as though this was a temporary position.
The AR 15-6 also makes me wonder about some other things.
1. What role did the platoon-sized ANA element play in the engagement? Early press reports seemed to suggest, based on the lack of ANA fatalities, that the ANA element did not carry its weight in the engagement. The AR 15-6, though, says that the ANA and their ETT returned fire very effectively, and that the reason they suffered no fatalities was that the enemy force was hitting the side of the VPB that they manned only with SAF, no RPGs. Still, it seems pretty clear that the ANA soldiers did not move to assist the U.S. soldiers under heavier fire at other parts of the VPB.
2. The AR 15-6 mentions that the entire platoon were in their fighting positions, "awake, alert, and in full battle rattle," when the attack began, many of them having woken up and taken their positions just minutes earlier in preparation for an early-morning patrol. What would have happened if the enemy had attacked an hour earlier? It sounds like the results could have been pretty bad.
3. Who were the attackers? The AR 15-6 describes them only as AAF, except a) when it mentions that one corpse, dressed in both civilian clothes and camouflage fatigues, was a foreign-born Arab, although it does not specify his nationality, and b) when it makes it crystal clear that the ANP contingent in Wanat village were complicit in the attack. The fighters in the attack force seem to have had an extraordinary amount of ammunition and to have been quite well organized in terms of fixing the U.S. troops on the VPB from several different locations with RPG fire. Also, they kept attacking the VPB for hours after many PGMs had been dropped on their positions (38 in total) - munitions were still being dropped danger-close at 0730. How do foreign fighters integrate with Afghan Taliban in N2KL? And are they all that tough? And how do they fight at night like that - do some of them have NODs?
4. The AR 15-6 mentions that there is "likely" a video of the attack taken from the enemy perspective to be used for propaganda purposes. Has such a video surfaced?
Investigative journalism
Investigative journalism lives.
Operational Leadership Interviews
Tom - Do you have copies of these documents you can post?
Interviews
You can find the Operational Leadership Experience interviews at the Combined Arms Research Library web site. There are about 1,200 of them, some useful and some not. There are a lot of interviews with TT members that are very good.
Tintin - Ricks said that the
Tintin - Ricks said that the interviews he referenced had been removed from the CAC library. Typically, when I find some useful research, I save a copy. I was hoping Ricks did the same.
Wanat
Where is the common sense here? As a former Green Beret Captain in Vietnam and author of the novel "Slow Walk in A Sad Rain," and a father whose son was in the Korengal for 15 months, I feel like I have a dog in this fight. What was trying to be achieved here? Win hearts and minds? Do better than the British and the Russians? Was Wanat strategic as a stepping stone towards ...?
Those were sons placed liked tethered goats waiting for the tiger after smearing scent (early meetings with the elders)to let the tiger know bait would be placed there. Where was the intell to let the CO make an informed decision? Was there pressure from above to get some "results?" If you could not "station" air support (weather conditions, length to target, etc.)why not premarked targets by artillery? Oh, I forgot they were in the village which leaves out plan B.
I monitored a smiliar incident in Iraq where a group of soldiers were placed in an isolated village at a crossroads with their only "fortification" a strand of concertina wire and their APC. Completely exposed, the young soldiers were wiped out.
This BS of hearts and minds is USAID from Vietnam under a new disguise. Here are some more of the idiot rules: if taking fire from a house in a village and civilians can be seen in the house, you cannot return fire (so "civilians" are placed on the rooftop for all to see including air support); if you see a group of men with rifles at night in a single line but have not taken fire from them, even though you are deep in enemy territory and they are headed in a direction that might be a possible ambush site on you the next morning, you cannot call in fire on them.
This isn't warfare, it is designer madness. Furthering careers by covering up screwups doesn't bring back lost sons and daughters. This is a ruthless enemy that throws acid in the face of little girls. Stamp them out. Bottom line.
Questions For You and Your Son
2
if you see a group of men
if you see a group of men with rifles at night in a single line but have not taken fire from them, even though you are deep in enemy territory and they are headed in a direction that might be a possible ambush site on you the next morning, you cannot call in fire on them.
That makes a kind of sense when you're in a place where there are multiple militias and they haven't all definitively chosen sides. Some of them might wind up friendly or at least neutral to you. But if you get the reputation for firing at everybody you see before you find out who the are, the word will spread real fast about you that "they ain't from round here".
So, what are you doing in a place where you can't tell the players without a scorecard and you don't have a scorecard? Would it make sense to get one of the local militias to invite you in? Of course, that brings you in with strings on you.
I guess things shake out simpler if you just assume everybody's your enemy. At least then you don't get unpleasant surprises. But in that case, what are you doing there? Probably not COIN.
I want to suggest that very likely these stupid rules came after analysis of terrible mistakes. And after people recognise a mistake, what's more likely than the opposite mistake?
So what arrangement could actually work?
In the case of the group of armed men, if you know you're in enemy territory and you can't peel any of the enemy away, then sure kill them and try to collect a few prisoners who might tell you something worth hearing.
If it happens to be the case that your enemy is a loose alliance, and if you could get some fraction of them to change sides, or even get them to split into two or more sides that fight each other -- that would be worth a whole lot more than just removing one group of riflemen. If you could find a way to do it.
So anyway, it's nighttime and you've spotted a group of riflemen moving and they haven't fired on you. And there's no good way for you to find out who they are before you shoot at them. Isn't that a problem? And maybe you're deep in enemy territory where you might as well assume they're all against you, and you don't even know anything about how they're getting along with each other, and what good are you likely to do there?
Maybe the rules you follow ought to depend on the mission. If you're there to show them they don't have any safe havens, that anywhere they go you can still savage them, maybe you ought to kill the women and children and desecrate the corpses. If that's the mission. It depends on what result you're going after.
thank you, Tom
As a civilian, I'm barely able to keep up with the military lingo in the comments, but I am grateful that Tom has done the the digging and the leg work to put this series of posts together.
With the death of newspapers, there needs to be some place where informed questions can be framed based on careful reporting.
Tom, thank you for digging
Tom, thank you for digging and asking questions, but no more FIASCO-sized tomes. Please. Jesus.
Rockparatrooper, now is a really good time to register any inadequacies in equipment, people, etc... and get your fellow citizens fired up to influence the coming DC budget battle. None of us wants to see the mission get twice as hard, and get half the resources.
What we Need - The Rock talked these Issues in their Briefs
3
How do we know the RUSSIANS aren't involved?
I mean it all seems mirror image of what US was doing with Russians in afghanistan just 15-20 years earlier!! How do we know that afghans are NOT being armed...just like russians maybe we would be not wanting to admit it in public???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
ANY THOUGHTS?
Hello Krish. Russia has an
Hello Krish. Russia has an interest in our success in Afghanistan, due in part because the region is a haven for foreign fighters entering into Chechnya; the opium trade and its increased incidence of addiction in Russia is of grave cencern to Russia as well.
Incidentally, Russia assisted our special operators in toppling the Taliban, by making avaiable to us their alliances with the northern groups. We will need their help again, in securing alternate or secondary supply routes into Afghanistan due to our route out of Pakistan becoming too vulnerable.
There is no covert Russian aid, only Russian criminal elements involved.
Tyrtaios, it seemed like a temptation
it seems it would be TOO tempting to Putin given the mirror image situation.
I seem to Remember (from "Charlie wilson's war"), when Russians discovered american involvement in Afghanistan, they Downplayed it for their own people's news/consumption.
But clearly, US needs Russian help in supply routes etc. and it IS forthcoming.
However, this much is true: When Taliban "took" afghanistan officially..the Clinton state department congratulated them and set up diplomatic relations...openly first..then backtracked later.
In context of the last paragraph, I don't know what the US is doing in places like Wanat. The Taliban is a twisted lifestyle. How will they eradicate THAT in isolated meaningless places like Wanat, by sending in troops??? I mean what exactly is the purpose??? We are not going to bring Mcdonalds/starbux there. We r not building roads there. Plus the target shifts in US dialogue: from Alqada to Taliban and back.
Poor Leadership is What Went Wrong
Interestingly, though it was pointed-out use of overhead reconnaissance wasn't provided for the men establishing the outpost at Wanat due to bad weather, my concern is why security was not put out to warn of such an attack?
I suspect the reason being one of a lack of trigger-pullers being available. That being the case, the commander of the 173rd failed in assigning his men a mission within their capability - a mission young Lt. Jonathan Brostrom firmly grasped and voiced his discomfort with. This is known as employing your men within their capabilities, a leadership principle.
There seems to be a pattern here. As pointed out by the author, Tom Ricks, instead of learning valuable lessons, i.e. the Cpl Tillman affair (don't split your forces in cross-compartmented terrain), and this recent Wanat debacle, the Army seems more intent on patting everyone on the back for a job well done; chalking it up to the way things are, and covering-up or ommitting pertinent details.
My only conclusion is we have too many senior commanders that have never been under direct fire as young lieutenants themselves and don't grasp the reality of small unit warfare that Afganistan lends itself to.
Incidentally, the Afghan fighers closed in and hung on to these soldiers by their belts knowing that supporting arms could not be employed? Where did we see that before - Vietnam? It's called lessons learned.
Will we never learn?
Why do we need any strategy in Afghanistan at all other than "Let's get out of here!"? Have we not YET learned that these foreign adventures lead to disaster both military and financial? How many more Vietnams, Iraqs...Afghanistans is it going to take? Why do we keep telling ourselves, "Yeah, that last one was a real mess. But this time we're going to win." It's the textbook definition of insanity!
The sad fact is JimmyBobby,
The sad fact is JimmyBobby, eventually we'll realize we don't need to defeat the Taliban to contain al-Qaeda (if they're even operational anymore). After Big Dave Petraeus gets his surge and inflicts enough pain on the Taliban to get them to the bargaining table, we'll withdraw our conventional forces, but only after enough inept commanders hang more of our young trigger-pullers out to dry.
Scary.
so you are predicting that teh US, after burning through some ammo, will declare victory, make peace with a Taliban in whatever shape they are, and then leave just as meaninglessly as they came. with conditions (the lifestyle) pretty much the same. this is sick and scary.
No Victory only accomodation
I'm sure Big Dave Petraeus understands there will be no decisive battles since the Taliban know any concentrations of force against us would be a catastrophe, so they'll deny us that until we end up exhausting ourselves on minor targets created by crappy battlefield intellgence, something else in common with Vietnam.
Obviously our strategy is to bring in more trigger pullers to bring pressure on the Taliban so they'll rethink their position, which worked in Iraq for us with the surge. But, history shows, more troops didn't work in Vietnam, because, just like the Viet Cong and NVA, so long as the Taliban have resources flowing and can survive our attacks, they'll figure they can outlast us - a strategy of theirs that they've been employing for centuries, and worked against the British and Russians in recent memeory.
Hopefully, we will find some political process with the Taliban, withdraw our conventional forces, and recommit our intelligence and spec ops toward any terrorist groups reforming. We are up against a formidable general though - General Time and "he's" running the show. I'm concerned commanders are going to feel the heat to show results and put small units in untenable positions.
Coping with Wanat
I am the sister of one of the fallen soldiers from the Wanat battle. I am thankful that people still care about this. Its comforting to know people want to know the truth and these guys will not be forgotten and that their sacrifice will not be in vain. Thanks for the support.
Want
A company-sized attack on a an outpost defended by a platoon of light infantry is repulsed. That's a victory folks. There's nothing to learn except that the attacker would have been punished more had there been better intelligence.
Oldranger, are you digressing
Oldranger, are you digressing back to the old body count mentality, that if we kill 4 or 6 to 1, it's a victory? If that were the case, Vietnam would be a victory. And as you note, there wasn't better intelligence - there never is.
This war will be like a thousand knife cuts, eventually it could bleed us to death. And there are always tactical lessons to be learned, and shared.