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By Root 1423 0

physical separation of the two command elements. Regardless of his trepidations, however, Wood knew of the successes of NAVSOF teams, particularly in Afghanistan, and understood that their tactics, techniques, and procedures differed from those of conventional forces. Still, the details of the first two phases irked the fiery Marine Corps officer. He’d raised all his concerns with NAVSOF, but they seemed to have their strategy squared away—and the details of phases one and two were theirs to plan, not Wood’s. This just isn’t the way to put together an op, he thought. But it’s the only motherfucking way we can do it in this operational environment. Tom, whose father fought in Vietnam as a Marine—and who designated the Marine Corps University as his sole beneficiary should he die in Afghanistan—felt as if he was selling his soul to the “joint devil” just to get something as basic as air support (that he’d have with a snap of a finger and without any compromise in a MAGTF). Wood briefed the mission to higher command, directly to Kamiya himself. The major general asked just a few questions before approving the mission. Now the op just needed the final, decisive SIGINT hits, then Red Wings would launch.

“Bradley, we got something good here.” Kinser approached Corporal Justin Bradley, a six-foot-five-inch, 270-pound wall of concrete of a Marine from the mountains of northern Montana, on 22 June. “Just got word from higher that some big, high-speed op with Navy SEALs is goin’ down and we’re tasked with the inner cordon and security of the direct-action hit on some terrorist cell.”

“Sounds pretty cool, sir,” Bradley, the twenty-three-year-old leader of First Platoon’s First Squad replied in his typically relaxed drawl.

“I’m gonna hand-select the best of the platoon’s Marines for this—making twenty total, including me. It’s gonna be a fastrope insert somewhere in the upper Korangal or even the top of Sawtalo Sar, so we’re gonna have to get qualled [qualified] for fastrope.”

“But, sir, everyone in the platoon’s already qualled,” Bradley responded with confused exasperation.

“Army doesn’t recognize our quals. We’ll have to go to Asadabad to get the qual, then we push out from there for the op.”

By that evening, Kinser had collected his group of nineteen that included Bradley; Bradley’s close friend from boot camp Corporal Cody Fisher (squad leader of Third Squad); William “Red” Davidson, a feisty expert in Marine Corps martial arts never without a golf-ball-size wad of tobacco between his lower lip and gum; the reserved but witty Lance Corporal Christopher Burgos; the utterly selfless Navy Corpsman HM3 Luis “Doc” Anaya; and Lance Corporal Kevin Joyce, who hailed from the Navajo Nation town of Window Rock, Arizona, and was the grand-son of one of the fabled Code Talkers of World War II.

The team of twenty arrived at Asadabad late in the afternoon of 24 June, just as Westerfield prepared to snap the final pieces of Shah’s intel picture into place. Having deciphered the extremist’s identity, his associates, his financial backing, and his general patterns of movement, Westerfield just waited on the last critical SIGINT hits to reach his desk so he could process the information and then enable the recon team to get their eyes on the exact set of homes and/or farmhouses to positively identify Shah.

That intel came, by way of the Army’s SIGINT teams, late in the evening of 24 June: on 26 June, Shah and members of his small cell would move to a location denoted simply as “11,” a farmhouse set a few meters off the Super Highway on the edge of some trees at the opening of a broad, gently sloping field on the northwest aspect of NAI-4, almost exactly two hundred meters to the south of the designated helicopter landing zone “Swift.” This is perfect, Westerfield thought, within direct line-of-sight of OP-1, almost exactly one mile from, and 250 meters lower in elevation than, the observation post. They’ll look right down on it. “Gotch-YOU!” Westerfield uttered menacingly as he poked his index finger onto the yellow-circled 11 on his Predator