by DAVID AXE

It started with a threat. At a checkpoint in Baraki Barak district, Afghan security guards protecting the American combat outpost stopped a driver. When they insisted on searching the car, the driver rankled. “Fine,” he said, “you won’t be here in two days, anyways.”

At the outpost, soldiers speculated. Maybe the driver meant he would try to get the Afghan guards fired. Maybe he was hinting at a planned attack on the outpost. Maybe something else, something more dangerous for the roughly 100 Americans in Baraki Barak.

Two days later, Able Troop’s 3rd Platoon rolled into a district village to check up on some mosque refurbishment projects. As 1st Lieutenant Kevin Ellerbrock chatted up the village mullahs, a worried-looking man approached the soldiers guarding the platoon’s vehicles, idling on the main road through the village. The man spoke only a little English and the soldiers spoke no Dari; the platoon’s interpreter was with Ellerbrock.

The man said he was a doctor. He gestured to the trucks. He spoke urgently. The soldiers decided the doctor was trying to say one of two wildly divergent things: 1) There was a bomb in the road, or 2) He had an appendicitis patient in his car, and the Americans were blocking the way. Just to be safe, the soldiers relayed the bomb threat to the rest of the platoon. But no one took it too seriously.

Night fell around six. The platoon climbed into its trucks and trundled down a dirt road back towards the outpost. In a flash, the second truck in the convoy exploded. The front axle sailed into the air; the vehicle sank into a crater. From a tree-line on the right, AK-47s chattered, RPGs streaked out.

The convoy halted around its disabled truck, the vehicle’s occupants dazed but unhurt. They lowered their ramp to make their escape. They could feel rounds cutting through the air. They raised the ramp and sat tight as, all around them, their comrades aimed their weapons at the tree-line and opened fire.

Later, platoon sergeant Donald Coleman laid the blame squarely on his own shoulders — and on the lack of interpreters. “All the signs were there,” he said. “We chose to ignore them.”

* * * * *

I was in the first truck in line. The Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicle, built in 2008 by International Trucks, was fitted with a three-ton mine-roller attached to the front bumper. The roller was only good against pressure mines. The bomb that destroyed the number-two truck was triggered by a command wire trailing back to the tree-line.

I was squeezed between our .50-caliber gunner, Private First Class Judas Sanchez, and our two dismounts, Sergeant Jason Ide and Private Matt Hoats, pictured, the medic. Within seconds of the blast, Sanchez charged his gun and opened fire. Tracers lanced into the trees, answering the winking AK-47s. Behind us, we could hear our attached Afghan soldiers firing their own AKs and rockets. The surviving American trucks added their .50-calibers to the clatter. Ide and Hoats poked their heads out the “bitch hatch” — a small opening in the MRAP’s roof — and popped off rifle-mounted grenades. Hoats swore: his grenades had fallen short of the trees. Ide would make fun of him all night for that.

“Ammo! I need ammo!” Sanchez cried. Ide passed up a box. Between bursts, Sanchez peered through an infrared sight mounted next to his gun. Ten minutes into the ambush, the Taliban were still fighting. That was unusually brave of them.

The observation post atop a nearby mountain spur turned its weapons and sensors in our direction. A TOW anti-tank missile from the OP burst in the tree-line. Hoats, monitoring the missile shoot with his radio headset, chuckled. Now 120-millimeter mortars from the outpost added their loud, sharp voices. And Apache helicopters appeared overhead, burping 30-millimeter cannon rounds into the Taliban position. Later, sources would indicate at least four, maybe five, Taliban died in the onslaught. It’s hard to tell, because the Taliban always drag away their dead.

Rockets missed us and exploded in the field on our left side, setting the grass and weeds on fire. A cow died in the crossfire. On the radio, someone noted that the dead cow, more than the gunfire, would really piss off the local residents.

I tried to capture the fighting with my video camera, but I was hemmed in by soldiers and gear crammed into our MRAP. Unable to peer outside, I turned my camera towards Ide and Hoats. I heard singing and realized my iPod — the new model with the external speaker — was still playing. I’d been listening to it at the moment the Taliban triggered the bomb.

I recognized the singer. I realized, in horror, that it was Avril Lavigne — just about the least appropriate accompaniment for a firefight. In my defense, the Avril Lavigne song came with my Scrubs Season 3 soundtrack. It’s not like I’m a huge Avril fan or anything. I fumbled with my iPod and switched it off. Sanchez opened up again on the Taliban one last time as, around us, the shooting subsided.

“They were expecting us,” Ide breathed as he settled into his seat.

* * * * *

The bomb that destroyed the number-two truck was probably a couple hundred pounds in weight. It was command-wire-detonated and buried in the soft earth in the middle of the road. Sometimes the Taliban buries secondary bombs to kill any soldiers climbing out of damaged trucks. This time, they did not.

In the hours following the attack, 3rd Platoon became the focus for the entire troop. A Counter Improvised Explosive Device investigative team arrived with a bomb-sniffing dog. A wrecker crew mobilized at the combat outpost and headed our way, only to turn back with a malfunctioning truck. It took more than five hours for the wrecker crew to get its gear working and reach the kill zone. By then, the crew of the damaged truck had taken refuge in a nearby house with a gaggle of frightened Afghans. Ide and Hoats climbed out of my truck to help recover weapons and secret technology from the damaged vehicle. They crammed it into sacks and tossed it on my lap.

For some reason, all the fighting had made me hungry. I reached for Hoats’ bag of snacks and shamelessly wolfed down two packets of crackers and some candy-coated peanuts. I had to pee, so I found an empty bottle and improvised. A cold, cold wind blew in from the gunner’s hatch. Sanchez did not complain. I did.

It was time to leave. But we had to turn the convoy around to avoid the fresh crater. Our driver, Private First Class Mike Meersman, eased our MRAP off the narrow road to make a u-turn. The 15-ton vehicle with the three-ton mine-plow sank like a stone into the irrigated field. The combined efforts of two towing MRAPs — and of several shivering soldiers chopping down a tree that stood in our way — couldn’t get us back onto the road. The wrecker, already hauling the ruined number-two truck, had to loop around to rescue us, too.

In addition to killing a cow, we destroyed a field, a culvert and a tree in the kill zone, and damaged a bridge on our way home. Our State Department rep back at the outpost, Ron Barkley, assured me the local farmers would take plenty of pictures of the damage and file claims.

It was past three in the morning when we got back to base. The battle had lasted 20 minutes. The recovery took some eight hours. By the end, I was cramped, cold, hungry, thirsty and bored. I can only imagine how 3rd Platoon felt.

Climbing out of our MRAP, I muttered something appreciative to Ide and Hoats then shuffled to my tent. I peeled off my armor and boots, dumped my cameras on my little wooden desk, guzzled a bottle of water and fell into bed with my cell phone. In my head I listed all the people I should call, to tell them I love them.

(Photos: David Axe)

Did you see the new movie The Men Who Stare at Goats? Remember Stephen Lang’s character General Dean Hopgood — the grinning, white-haired officer who championed Jeff Bridges’ character’s notion of psychic warriors? Well, Hopgood’s based on a real guy, an Army Major General Albert Stubblebine, now retired. Stubblebine was a big proponent of the real-life psychic-soldier programs that inspired the fictional Goats. He’s also a 9/11 skeptic.

The movie connection has gotten Stubblebine’s supporters all excited. And trust me, you don’t want to get these guys riled up. David Leffler, an advocate for a military meditation strategy called “Invincible Defense Technology,” defends Stubblebine on the IDT Website. Stubblebine “is satirically portrayed as attempting to walk through walls without success,” the site reads. “While there may be some truth to this, in reality, [Major General] Stubblebine was an intelligent pioneer in the development of human resource technologies. He understood the latent potential of the human mind that warriors would eventually be trained to harness.”

And what, according to Leffler, does this potential represent? To recap, Invincible Defense Technology practitioners access, via meditation, what they describe as an invisible “Unified Field” that connects all people.

Like energetic radio waves, accessing the Unified Field through techniques of consciousness causes “field effects” in the surrounding social environments. Therefore, the field effects of the Unified Field enhance the orderliness of social relations. Orderliness reduces friction and its social equivalent: enmity. With no enmity between them, former enemies become allies, and the nations become invincible because there are no enemies to fight.

Uh huh. For the record, this military meditation emerged from the same Iowa-based Maharishi School of Management, which teaches a lot of things, but certainly not management. Among the school’s practices: Yogic Flying, a supposed form of brain-powered levitation. Check out this video to see some Yogic Fliers in action.

Looks a lot like bouncing to me.

(Video: National Geographic)

by DAVID AXE

More sample art from LOVE & TERROR, the forthcoming sequel to my award-winning 2006 graphic novel WAR FIX.

(Art: Ray Dillon)

by DAVID AXE

More sample art from LOVE & TERROR, the forthcoming sequel to my award-winning 2006 graphic novel WAR FIX.

(Art: Ray Dillon)

by DAVID AXE

More sample art from LOVE & TERROR, the forthcoming sequel to my award-winning 2006 graphic novel WAR FIX.

(Art: Ray Dillon)

“It appears that this individual was radicalized in his hometown in Minnesota,” [FBI Director Robert] Mueller said. Federal authorities have said that [Shirwa] Ahmed was one of as many as two-dozen young men of Somali descent who disappeared in the past two years from their homes in the Minneapolis area after being recruited by the Shabab, a militia suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda that has waged a war against the Somali government.

Suicide jihadists feature in my 2006 graphic novel WAR FIX.

From Skewz:

We had yet another amazing conversation with David Axe …

[T]he Bush Administration unwittingly assisted in the expansion of pirate activity several years ago. The Islamic Courts emerged in Somalia with some popular support to provide security and stability in the war-torn country. Their appeal was similar to the Taliban’s more than a decade ago. Once in power, the Bush Administration assumed the Islamic Courts had a substantial relationship with Al Qaeda. It was later determined that this was not the case. But before that intelligence could sink in, the Bush Administration supported landlocked Ethiopia’s take over of Somalia. Ethiopia got access to ports, and Washington removed a perceived problem.

However, the law of unintended consequences ruled the day. The Islamic Courts fell, the Ethiopians got locked into an Iraq-style occupation which led them to finally retreat, and the one check on the pirates (the Courts) disappeared. The Islamic Courts were not fans of the pirates and worked to dismantle the pirate network. With that adversary gone, the pirates flourished.

Listen to the podcast.

Current.TV is a website and cable news network where viewers can submit content. I just added this video I produced about piracy and its effect on the Somali humanitarian effort. Click through and vote for my video to broadcast.

The ships that make the two-day run from Mombasa, Kenya, to Somalia carrying vital humanitarian supplies are frequent targets of pirate attacks — and have been for more than a decade. How have ship’s crew adapted? Same way the pirates have adapted over the years: with simple technology and no-nonsense tactics.

On Wednesday, the small cargo vessel Semlow, an old veteran of the Somali humanitarian route that was hijacked by pirates and held for 110 days back in 2005, prepares for a Sunday run to Mogadishu carrying hundreds of tones of split peas and other foodstuffs. Captain Edward Kalendera gives me a tour of the bridge. In the small, wood-paneled map alcove on the starboard side, he points out the green-and-black screen of a simple ranging radar. Kalendera says he uses it to spot incoming boats. If he decides they’re hostile, he can turn tail and open the throttle.

According to experts in Mombasa, you need to exceed 20 knots to outrun pirates. It’s not clear that rickety old Semlow can make that speed.

Stealth is a more reliable tactic. Kalendera lays out a detailed chart of the waters around Mogadishu and traces the most dangerous zone with his finger. When Semlow breaches this zone, he said, it will be night — and he will rig the ship for silent running. That means turning out all the lights and minimizing noise. Rigged like that, Kalendera says, a pirate can pass within yards and not even know Semlow’s there.

But if they are detected, and there’s no chance of outrunning the attackers, there’s one last measure. Kalendera crosses the bridge to the port side and opens a door to the closet-size radio room. He pops open a tiny cabinet. Inside is a white plastic device shaped like a garage-door opener. This, he says, is the panic button. Press this, and it alerts Semlow’s owners, by radio, that the vessel is under attack.

Now, alerting the owner won’t save the ship from being captured. But it will speed the process of ransoming the ship and crew, and hopefully head off any desperate, violent acts by impatient, panicky kidnappers.

Read the whole series here.

(Photo: me)

Kennedy Mwale, 32, pictured, is a freelance tour guide in Mombasa’s old port, a claustrophobic melange of Arab and Portuguese architecture with one small stone pier. A week ago Monday, three small cargo ships were tied to the pier. Scores of shirtless stevedores lugged bags of cement and tossed them into the ships’ holds. The stevedores might earn a couple dollars for hours of hot, back-breaking work. That’s just enough to survive in Mombasa. Mwale, by comparison, earns up to $15 for an hour tour.

Five years ago, Mwale escaped Mombasa’s maritime economy. He had been a fisherman, plying the waters as far north as the Somali borderland in search of tuna and other big fish. But with piracy taking root in lawless Somalia, fishing and sea trade were becoming riskier and less profitable by the day for the small operators. One of the final straws for Mwale was a close call, in 1999, with a band of 14 pirates that sneaked up on the 11-man refrigerator ship where Mwale was the chief engineer. (The reefer ships follow behind the fishing boats to store fresh catches.)

They came at night, as the ship was anchred near Mdoa island, surprising the sleeping crew and their one Somali bodyguard. When the pirates failed to wrestle away the guard’s rifle, a standoff ensued. The pirates demanded the crew’s money and possessions, plus all the diesel fuel stored on deck — and wanted the ship sailed to the Somali port of Kismayo. If the crew didn’t comply, the pirates would start killing people, they said. The crew coughed up all their cash — just a few dollars for most, but around $700 in the case of the ship owner’s secretary — and handed over possessions including a new boom box stereo. But the captain refused to give up the diesel or to sail to Kismayo. He would not allow the ship to enter in to captivity, nor strand it at sea. The captain had only as much leverage as was afforded by his one armed guard, but it was enough. The pirates compromised. They agreed to go to Mdoa and continue negotiations.

That apparently was a clever bit of strategizing on the captain’s part, for he had called at Mdoa earlier, seeking the ruling committee’s permission to fish Somali waters. The committee had endorsed the expedition. And when the pirates rolled in with Mwale and his shipmates in tow, the committee immediately branded the captors criminals and had the local militia seize their weapons and return everything they’d stolen. They gave back the boom box, but denied taking anything else. The penniless Kenyans now were free to sail home.

This story has a happy-ish ending, but for Mwale, it was another near-miss in a career full of them. Every day the arguments mounted against working at sea. Already, three of his friends had been killed by sharks. And with piracy making profitable fishing a dicey venture, Mwale soon decided he’d had enough. He went ashore, for good, and for five years was unemployed on Mombasa’s sweltering streets.

Today, as a tour guide, he survives, and surely does better than many of the city’s 700,000 residents. Not that freelancing for curious tourists is an easy way to make a living: it’s just a Hell of a lot safer than grappling with Somali pirates.

Read my whole series here.

(Photo: me)