Most people in Afghanistan operate in the gray area, the fringe of being one side or the other.  They're hedging their bets.  As an American it's hard for me to understand this, the choice seems pretty clear, help us and free your country or help them and take your chances.  It's confusing to me and at times infuriating.  However, it's not that clear to the people that we encounter.  There's a saying that the Afghans have, you can't buy an Afghan's loyalty but you can rent it.  Often times its dependent upon who's there at the moment, us or the Taliban.  The locals will wait on the sideline and see who's winning.

Our main effort as ETTs is to ensure that the ANA provide the security required for the people to carry on a normal life.  Normal is a relative term and doesn't resemble what we think it does.  

This Kandak has a huge area and very little force.  In military terms they call this and economy of force mission, I call it too much ground and not enough dudes. I think my description is more accurate, but it doesn't brief as well. 

Here's a illustration of what the Afghans and ETTs face everday.  We roll up to a town where we've heard there's a small clinic possibly giving aid to the enemy.  The town is in the foothills at the end of a wadi, the wadi starts in Pakistan and ends here, like a sewer pipe.  I say sewer pipe because this is where the sewage empties into Afghanistan.  Sewage in the form of chechyens, arabs and various other foregin fighters.  We know they're foreign; not by any high tech signal intelligence intercept. That looks cool in the Bourne Identity or some other Hollywood flick.  No, we know this because we go through the trash that they leave behind and can tell from the type and quantities.  This is low tech warfare at its finest; we look less like James Bond and more like Paparazzi going through Paris Hilton's garbage in the morning for a story. A strong stomach is more useful than a Predator UAV. The sewage spills out here.

We're in the town because we wounded somebody several days ago in a fight; several of the ETTs have been to the town before and remembered a well stocked clinic.  Logic tells me and the others, "Hey, I'm shot I should try to find a Doc."  So here we are.  

The ANA put in local security and we start across the wadi.  The ANA scamper like goats and the Americans plod like beasts of burden.  An ANA officer once tried putting on our equipment and about passed out in the attempt.  The wadi is used as farmland just as anywhere flat with water usually is here. Tiered to retain the small amounts of rain and runoff.  These tiers serve as excellent fighting positions for the enemy if they choose.   We plod across.  Each time a bird or animal jumps out from a berm I envision ACM.  This ends about 3/4s of the way across the wadi and now I'm focused on just moving.

Finally after what seems like decades to me, we reach the town and check to make sure our security is still in place.  At times Afghans are similar to a teenager who's consumed several cases of Redbull, their attention span is very short.  The security's still there and we advance to the clinic.  

The fabled clinic. It looks like any other Afghan Khalat, mud walls with a steel gate.  This gate however is different. It’s dimpled by gunfire.  Afghans repair bullet holes in their gates by placing a bolt with a washer on it, through the hole and then tightening the nut on the back side, there's no welding out here.  If there were the chemical tanks would've been taken long ago to be used as IEDs.  If you see an acetylene tank it's a good indicator he's a bad guy. 

The bigger the bolt the larger the caliber of weapon used to knock on the door.  AK-47- size of a pencil or pen, PKM -is a quarter, DSK -is your fist and SPG9 you're out looking for the gate.  This gate is pockmarked with various size bolts and washers, Frankenstein's monster.  

We knock with our gloved hands and it's answered by an older man.  He speaks fairly good English, he's educated and he can identify my rank a good indicator that he's had a run in with ETTs before.  I ask if we can come in and take a look around, he hesitates for several moments and replies in English,"Yes".  

The ANA follow him in and we come enter into a very nice courtyard, centered in it is a garden and off to the side is a very nice Hilux, pickup truck.   The ANA start searching and I ask how he is.  The conversation is going well almost purely in English.  He tells me he's the doctor and was educated in Kabul.

We're walking as we talk, into a well stocked pharmacy.  Strange in a small town like this, given its location at the end of the wadi we all feel pretty strongly that he’s helping the ACM. There are plenty of beds almost as many as people who live in this village. The whole place is in good condition.  

The terp tells me the doctor is really nervous.  I'm dependent on the terp to tell me these kinds of things.  He knows the culture. Gestures or verbal ticks I take as nothing he recognizes for what they are, stress. A good terp is the best thing you can have with you; he's your early warning.  You trust your terp with your life. He already trusts you with his and his families just by working with you.  Being a terp pays well but if the ACM finds out it may be one night letter telling them to quit, then execution.  We can't function without them.     

 I ask the $64,0000 dollar question, "Was ACM here"? 

Suddenly, the doctor fails to understand me.  A minute ago he was pretty fluent and now he's looking at me like I have two heads.

The terp translates and the doctor says, "Yes, they were". There were seven of them here until they saw us coming up the road and they fled back up the wadi and one was wounded severly.  We missed them. 

"What happened to the gate"? I ask and wait for the interpretation.  I know the doc understands me but this is the game we're going to play.  I think I know the answer.

"The ACM shot it, they've been here several times", he responds.  He knows that I can recognize what happened to the gate.

"Do you support the ACM"? I enquire.  We've both now stipulated that we're going to dance around.

"Yes", he replies; plainly ending the dance, more suddenly than I expected.

"Why" I ask

Then we get to the gist.  "They're here at night and you aren't, if you were here at night I'd support the government."  He says this to me through the terp and acts as if I've asked one of the most obvious questions.  Which in retrospect I have. 

"If I don't help them they will cut off my head".  He's right, they will and we're not here to stop them.  

"Do you have a Thuraya"?  Thurayas are the ubiquitous sat phones in Afghanistan, there's no cell phone service here.  "Could you call us next time they come"?  I realize I've just asked this man to sign his own death warrant.  

"No, they will kill me".  The point is obvious I'm just too dense to realize it up front

"I understand, but any help you can give would be great".  I state

"I did, I told you they were here, what else do you want from me"  

He's right, the doctor has done more than 80% of the people would do, he told us they were here and left.  We can't protect his guy at night and they will cut his head off.  He won't even get the dubious honor of having it done on the internet, it'll just be done in the dark of night and we'll get a report about it after several days.

That's the central issue here, how do you protect them?  Those who defend everything, defend nothing. We aren't here at night and the ACM are.  When we roll in they roll out.  It's whack a mole on steroids!  We try to build the ANA and ANP, the last two ANP chiefs were shot in the face in broad daylight by ACM

The doctor is indicative of a great number of the population.  It's not that they hate us they just don't know if we're going to win.  We will, we just have to show them in tangibles.  Promises are empty.  Deeds not words.  If the ANA says that they'll protect them then they have to 100%. 

It's a battle of inches, slow, plodding, and deliberate.  It's low tech.  We dig through the trash to find them.  It's happening here.  Predator, Reaper and all of the other cool billion dollar weapons systems help very little.  As T.F Farenbach wrote, "It is a battle of wills in the dirt".