Middle Man (13 page)

T
he
poppy fields were still green, before the flowering, when I arrived in Farah Province at the end of my first tour. We found him sitting alongside the road from Bala Buluk to the capitol on my first patrol. He was thin, scrawny, with long hair and a beard: a hippie hitchhiker who got dropped off at the wrong exit. He was high from sampling the local product. “I don't mind needles, not afraid of needles,” he said. “But won't touch one around here. The Taliban soak them in curdled pig's blood. You have to be smart. Outthink them.”

We loaded him into our vehicle. He looked me up and down for about thirty seconds. “Simmons . . . Sam Simmons,” he said, with an emphasis on “Sam” making him sound like a drugged-out James Bond. He also sounded like a liar.

Someone asked if he was with the nutrition and farming NGO in the southern part of the province. The way Sam Simmons bent his head gave me the impression that he never heard of that NGO, but he said he was with them, or supposed to be. He claimed he had been robbed. “They took everything. Everything but my clothes, which they probably didn't want because they're in good shape.” They took his ID, too. “Who cares,” he said. “It's not like you need a driver's license around here.”

“You need a passport around here,” said Major Richardson from behind his makeshift desk at our base.

But Sam Simmons convinced Richardson to allow him to travel to the village where the Worldwide Sustainable Farming Information Network was teaching the people how to eat. I did not see Sam Simmons again for a few months, though I heard many references to him, which fell into two categories: Sam Simmons is welcome all over the district already; all the female NGOs have a yen for Sam Simmons. And Sam Simmons is strange.

To explain what happened there and the decision I made, I have to describe the situation and the other people besides Sam Simmons who were involved. Simmons and the others had been put out of my mind for many years. I don't regret that. Thinking about it would not have helped anything, and probably would have hurt because I sensed I got it wrong, and worrying about it would have made me question myself other times when I had to make quick decisions.

I had been reassigned to poppy eradication as punishment. It took no time at all to understand that the only thing I would be eradicating was time, which was the specialty of our CO, Major Richardson. He was a scholar who knew that Alexander the Great had been in the district before him and had gotten out. Major Richardson devised a plan to walk in Alexander's footsteps that involved busyness without results. He did not put it that way to me, but after many hours, mostly after dark, listening to him explain his interpretation of history, I came away with an understanding of his approach: Results would stop time, mark an end to a project; a halt in time was the opposite of an absence; in a halt, time might build up; a halt could lead to extra time. That would mean a failed mission.

A fight with another Marine began my journey to Farah. I was a corporal, soon to be busted down to private, stationed north of Kandahar. Lance Sylvester was a lifer from Nevada, a master sergeant, last into every fight but big on playing the big-time warrior. He was all about the gear and the look. We didn't like each other. Early one morning, our platoon engaged the enemy on a hillside, catching them off guard. Three enemy fighters were killed. Sylvester was the casualty assistance officer, so he was in charge of the bodies. Regulations forbid the taking of personal effects and no one expected to find anything valuable on those corpses. Even their guns were usually lousy. Everyone knew Sylvester pocketed the rare worthwhile find. He shipped the stuff home or sold it to guys in other units. This time he found a knife in a scabbard. I didn't see it, but I heard about it. So did our CO. Sylvester was called in, and when he came out I was summoned. My gear was searched and the knife was found. It looked like something from the Middle Ages, a crude version of a fancy dagger in a carved and polished wooden scabbard. Sylvester had been tipped about the CO's interest and had planted it on me.

I was busted back to private. I stewed for a day, contemplating ways to retaliate. Sabotage would not provide satisfaction and everyone would know I did it. I decided the best course of action was to deal Sylvester a good beating. First I had to accuse him in front of others of planting the dagger. I added a number of other nasty things, most of which were accurate. He was bigger than me, older, and outranked me. He had to respond. He tried to hit me. Once that door was open, the rest was easy. I broke his nose right away. That flustered him.

That's how I got transferred to the poppy fields of Farah Province, where the farmers were concerned only with making enough money to feed their enormous families. That meant cooperating with whichever side allowed them to grow poppies and sell the opium. Flexibility gave the farmers control of their fate. The U.S. and Taliban each had reasons to want to stop poppy cultivation, but the U.S. wanted the farmers to love them, and the Taliban wanted the money from the opium trade, so they both made this one tiny exception to their really, truly, absolutely serious principles, the ones they were willing to sacrifice everything for.

Lieutenant Howard Spera could see that our mission made no sense, but he was not wise enough to keep that insight to himself. On my first night in the area, he explained to me, “We want the Taliban to leave the area, but they will never leave as long as there is opium being sold because they like and need the money it brings them. To get rid of the Taliban, we have to get rid of the poppy fields. And if we get rid of the poppy fields, the people will all join with the Taliban.”

“So what is our mission?”

“We will educate the farmers about other crops to plant, pay subsidies for each poppy field they destroy without harvesting the opium, and protect them from the Taliban.”

“Will that work?”

“Officially or really?”

So I became an inmate in the time-eradication program, riding from village to village to meet with the elders and farmers to discuss their lives and hand over money and advice. The villages consisted of one-story mud brick houses and dusty streets that always made me feel like I had been dropped into a cowboy movie. The sun, the silence, and the dust blended into an ominous concoction smelling of ambush and showdown. A lizard scurrying out of the shadows was enough to make us halt and rescan the doorways and rooftops. Shortly after I arrived, an NGO and a Marine were killed in one of the larger villages. Major Richardson conducted meetings at which he explained that the next time there was an ambush in one of the villages, he would set fire to all the poppy fields. That was the last ambush in a village during my stay in Farah.

Lieutenant Spera was a thin guy from Macon, Georgia, with sandy hair and glasses. He had attended Georgia Tech and married a waitress from one of the local beer halls the week after graduation. She was four years older than him. His parents hated her. “The idea of her is what they hate. Not her.” He was the type who thought there was a difference between the two.

Like a lot of naïve people, Spera was brave. He practically begged the villagers for information about the enemy, and upon receiving any he led us out to follow up. That meant he led us into ambushes because the people who gave him the information either reported the conversation to the Taliban or were instructed by the Taliban to drop the information in the first place. Spera was well trained and clever, and an ambush without surprise is not too effective. Spera was a good teacher. Major Richardson did not like him.

“You're putting the men in jeopardy,” he said.

“They're Marines. They signed up to be in jeopardy. They're trained for jeopardy. Besides, it's the Taliban putting them in jeopardy.”

“Our mission is to pacify the area. You're causing conflict.”

Lieutenant Spera asked to be transferred.

Richardson said, “I can't afford to lose you. You're the best fighting man I have.”

Lieutenant Spera related all this to me out in Ahmed Wali Benizad's poppy field, where we watched Ahmed Wali and relatives wade through the poppy stalks, carefully making little cuts in each bulb so the creamy goo could begin to ooze out. He had twelve kids and a mass of other dependents too numerous to count. The only way to stop him from growing poppies would have been for the U.S. and Taliban to team up on the issue. Ahmed Wali wasn't a smart guy, but he knew that wasn't likely to happen. He cultivated us as relentlessly as he cultivated his poppies.

“They're like children in a divorce,” I said. “Playing one parent off against another.”

Spera did not like hearing that. “We were never married to the Taliban. We were married to the Mujahideen. The Taliban defeated them. So it's like one parent and one stepparent.” Spera intended to become a lawyer when he finished straightening out the military.

Ahmed Wali smiled and waved to us. Over the next few days, he and his entourage would be scraping the oozing opium into plastic bags. In his compound, where they could sit, one man would construct baskets from the stalks, fill them with opium, and fold them up like party favors.

We were supposed to go away at that point so we didn't interrupt the process of selling the opium. Lieutenant Spera had other ideas. He brought me and two other privates with him to spy on the buyers. We didn't try to hide, just sat in two jeeps far down the road, watching through binoculars. Two trucks stopped outside Ahmad Wali's compound. And Sam Simmons climbed down from the lead truck.

Spera begged Major Richardson for permission to bust Simmons. Richardson dithered. If we busted the buyers, Ahmed Wali would have a hard time selling his next crop. He would turn to the Taliban for help. Time would restart. Spera complained to me and a horrible impulse to help overwhelmed me: I made a suggestion.

“We don't have to bust them. They take the opium across the border into Iran, right? What if we let the Iranians know they were coming? The Iranians would do the busting and no one would blame us.”

“And we'll follow them so they can't back off when they see Iranians at the border. They'll be trapped.” I did not like that part. It left an opening for Spera's bravery. Spera loved it and sold it to Richardson. We hired two Kuchi guides. The Kuchis are a tribe of nomads who often pass through the borders west and east, Iranian and Pakistani. The plan was for two platoons to dog the buyers all the way to the mountains where the Taliban protection would break away. The Taliban didn't want to go too near Iran, and once the buyers entered the mountains, they would figure they were safe by virtue of their superior position.

Spera, another Marine, and I joined the Kuchis ahead of the buyers. The other Marine was a skinny, book-loving kid who had made the mistake of telling Spera he grew up in the mountains of Vermont, which made him an experienced mountain man in Spera's eyes. The Kuchis explained that there were two passes the drug runners usually used. Lieutenant Spera wanted to accompany them through the passes to the border. Excitement was blinding him. “This is what I came here for,” he said.

I shivered. Dan waited for marks to make comments like that so he would know they were thoroughly cooked. Coming from an officer, it was scary. I pointed out that the border might not be clearly marked and we should not enter Iran, but Spera was beyond listening. He was in love with the adventure.

“The Kuchis know every inch of this territory. They know where the border is.”

“The Kuchis don't care where the border is,” I said.

The Kuchis nodded, agreeing with both of us.

We parked the jeeps far off the track where the boulders jutted out, forming a shelter that would keep them hidden. The Kuchis led us up toward the border along something resembling a path, which grew steeper and rockier as we went. Before we reached the top, we were able to look back and see the drug runners unpacking the bags of opium from the vehicles and repacking them on camels that had been brought to them. The Kuchis recognized the camel herder: He was one of them. Sam Simmons shook hands with the leader of the Taliban escort and counted out his payment. Someone had to help Simmons mount his camel. The Taliban watched the camel caravan until it reached the point where vehicles could no longer navigate. We watched the Taliban and, far back in the distance, the rest of our squad.

An hour later we reached the crest. If that was the border, it was a great place to sneak into Iran. The Kuchis said they knew where to find people who would alert the border guards.

Again, Lieutenant Spera misunderstood them on purpose. He claimed they said there would be guards at the border. Ten minutes later, the Kuchis told us to wait. They went ahead.

“Let's go back,” I said. “We're going to be trapped.”

But Spera wanted to be a guy who met with the Iranians and made a deal with them.

“There are no Iranians,” I said.

“This is Iran.” At least he acknowledged that.

“I mean border guards. The drug runners are being met by their partners or customers. That's who the Kuchis will see first. The contacts on the Iranian side of the border. We're going to be trapped.”

He was arguing with me when the first shots dropped all around us. We scrambled behind rocks for cover and began working our way back to the top. I could not see who was firing at us. Might have been drug guys or even Iranian border guards. It might have been the Kuchis, though there were certainly more than two firing. RPGs landed near us. At the top, lying flat, looking back toward Afghanistan, I could see some of the drug runners turning their camels around and others firing blindly up toward us as cover. I could not see Sam Simmons.

Once we were over the crest, the firing from the Iranian side subsided. The firing from the drug runners was inaccurate and they were moving away from us. The original trap was going to work. Our men were taking positions at the bottom of the trail, where they would kill or capture the drug runners. Lieutenant Spera stood up and began firing down at the drug runners though they were too far away to hit.