She said she was finally able to gather the resources and
that the Afghanistan Relief Organization (ARO)—along
with more than a dozen other relief groups—was ready to
work with Army engineers on the construction of the
school, police station, and solar-powered well. All of the
agreements had been struck with the district governor and
CO MB AT O P S
53
other elders, and they should be able to break ground
within a week. Funding was finally in place.
“This is the news I’ve been waiting to hear for eight
months now,” said Harruck, his voice cracking. He
glanced over at me and nodded.
I didn’t hide my skepticism. “Dr. Anderson, I assume
the Doctoris for Ph.D.?”
“That’s right. My brother’s the medical doctor in our
family. My degree is in agricultural economics and rural
sociology. Call me Cassie.”
“Well, Cassie, you’re a smart woman, and you under-
stand the political situation here.”
“I’ve been working in this country for three years
now. So, yes, I’m keenly aware of what’s happening. The
ARO has made significant strides despite all the corrup-
tion.”
“I understand, but you don’t see this as a terrific
waste of resources?”
“Excuse me?”
“We’re going to provide all these services for the local
community, but when we leave, the Taliban will move
back in and destroy them, or exploit them, or hold them
ransom. We should neutralize the enemy first, build a
militia, then provide these people with an infrastructure
only after they can protect themselves.”
She looked at Harruck. “Your friend’s a bit of a
cynic.”
“His mission has become slightly different than
mine, but I think we can all work together to make this
happen.”
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GH OS T RE C O N
I raised my voice, if only a little. “Simon, do you think
by helping these people you’ll really build their trust?
We’ll always be foreigners.”
“I need to try. At least for the children.”
I took a deep breath. “I have a mission.”
“I understand. But would you be willing to talk to
Keating? Maybe just buy us some time?”
“That’s the one thing they’re telling me I don’t have.”
“Will you at least try?”
I shrugged, then turned to the door.
“Scott, I respect your opinion, and I’m going to need
your help. Let’s do this together.”
I couldn’t answer, and I’m glad I didn’t.
“Nice to meet you . . . Scott,” said Anderson.
My grin was forced, and she knew it.
I returned to quarters and sat around with the rest of my
men, who were cleaning weapons. Hume and Nolan
were busy dissecting the Cross-Coms for any more clues
and had speculated that high-energy radio frequencies
were probably to blame. I told them to keep working on
it and shared with everyone what Harruck planned to do.
“He’s just painting a bigger target on this town and
pissing off the Taliban,” said Brown. “The local govern-
ment’s corrupt. That’s a given. So these people have come
to trust the Taliban, who’ve kept their word. Now we’re
supposed to get them to trust us more by giving them
more stuff, and we’re supposed to think that once we’ve
bought their trust, they’ll help us capture the Taliban.”
CO MB AT O P S
55
“Exactly,” I said. “But what’s wrong with that pic-
ture?”
Treehorn started laughing. “The Taliban ain’t going
to let that happen.”
“Harruck actually said we might have to work with
them.”
“Are you serious?” asked Ramirez, who set down a
magazine and turned his frown on me.
“See, Harruck knows that if we build the school and
the rest of it, the Taliban will attack, so how do you get
them off your back?”
“You take out their leader, disrupt their communica-
tions, and demoralize them,” said Matt Beasley, who’d
been very quiet the past few days. I could now hear the
frustration in his tone.
“That might work, Matt, and you can bet we’re going
to try. But that’s not Harruck’s plan.”
Ramirez made the money sign with his fingers.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “They’ll try to cut a deal.”
“Well, then, what’re we supposed to do?” asked
Ramirez. “Harruck’s offering a handshake while we’re
putting guns to their heads.”
“Look, he can’t do that openly,” I said. “Imagine the
headline. Bottom line is the taxpayers need an enemy
they can believe in—just as much as a hero.”
“All this is making my brain explode,” said Treehorn.
“I need a bullet and a target. I’m easy to please. The rest
of it is bullshit.”
“Captain, I know Harruck’s your friend,” began
Ramirez, “but we weren’t sent here to build a school. If
56
GH OS T RE C O N
this is a good old-fashioned militia training op, I can
deal with that, too. But we can’t be tiptoeing around
and still get our job done.”
“I know. And there’s no reason we should get caught
up in all this. I want to go back out there tonight, gather
more intel, and proceed on mission.”
“We’ve got the drones but still no way to talk to
them,” said Hume. “Waiting on new gear. Could be a
few more days.”
I cursed. “Then we’ll do it the old-fashioned way.
Radios, binoculars, NVGs, it’s not like we didn’t train
that way,” I said.
“You going to tell Harruck?” asked Treehorn.
“No choice. We still need company support. He
wanted me to call Keating and delay our mission. I don’t
know about you guys, but I’d rather get the job done
and get the hell out of here as soon as possible.”
“So just lie to him,” said Treehorn.
I thought about that.
And I wondered if maybe I was just being a selfish
bastard, but my guys felt the same way, so I lied and told
Harruck no go. Our mission remained unchanged. We
needed to find and capture Zahed.
“Don’t you understand?” he asked me, raising his
voice when I returned to his office later in the day. “This
is eight months’ worth of work finally coming together,
and you want to screw it up just to nail that fat bastard
who’ll be replaced by his second in command! If we
don’t reach some kind of an agreement, nothing will
happen.”
CO MB AT O P S
57
“They didn’t send me here to debate the politics,
Simon. They sent me to get a guy, and you can’t blame
me for doing that. I understand your mission here. All
I’m asking is that you understand mine. If I can capture
Zahed and they get him to talk, he could turn the tide
for us.”
“Okay, yeah, I get it now. I understand how you’re
going to incite them and create an even more volatile situ-
ation, as evidenced by today’s attack. And at the same
time that I’m trying to earn the locals’ trust, you’re piss-
ing them off by hunting down one fool who in the grand