Our Year of War Read online

  While the rust-red dust hung in the afternoon sun, the brothers stood together, quiet. It’s uncertain if the brisk military escorts or the busy television team, let alone the Vietnamese communist chaperone, picked up Tom’s distant gaze or noticed the tinge of mist in Chuck’s eyes. But the unblinking camera saw it all, a shadow over the pair, like a cloud crossing the sun. Then it passed, and the brothers let it go. The ghosts faded away. Tom and Chuck moved on.

  EPILOGUE

  The Old Sergeant

  Only the dead are safe; only the dead have seen the end of war.

  GEORGE SANTAYANA, “Tipperary”1

  Chuck Hagel wanted to see for himself. And thus in March of 2013, the newly appointed U.S. secretary of defense flew out to Afghanistan to see the sausage made. He intended to get a grip on what the Americans, the other NATO troops, and especially the Afghans were doing now and could do in the future. He asked the four-star U.S. commander to maximize the time in country: get out on the ground, meet the key actors, and gain a sense of the war effort.2

  Of course, the American four-star’s staff took that guidance, shoved it into the standard template for Very Important Person visits, and gave birth to an itinerary that underwhelmed. Two and a half days on the ground and this was the best the general could do? Same old, same old. The force headquarters scheduled a PowerPoint briefing. The corps headquarters listed another slide presentation. Even at Jalalabad, at the American Forward Operating Base Fenty, the division and brigade proposed to flog Hagel through a welter of computerized charts. Hell, he could stay in the Pentagon and scroll through a deck of bullet points and statistics. But the generals and colonels loved their formal pitches. If the American secretary of defense took the time to fly all the way to Afghanistan, he deserved a chance to meet some actual humans, walk around a few real places, and sniff some local smells.

  The Afghans chose not to show slides, but then again, that wasn’t their style. At least traveling by ground to the ministry buildings in Kabul promised to let the American secretary see something interesting on the way. The street markets teemed with life, and even from behind the tinted, bullet-proof windows of an armored sport utility vehicle, you could get a notion of the mood on the city streets. So there was that.

  Yet the drive never happened. Hours before the scheduled appointment at the Afghan ministry of defense, a determined Taliban bicycle bomber wormed his way through the facility’s barrier maze, reached the front gate, and blew his load. Nine Afghan civilians died and fourteen more Kabul residents were wounded, a real mess. To cap it off, once the suicide assailant exploded, frantic ministry guards gratuitously sprayed the area with bullets, maybe to ward off evil spirits or the like.3 None of it engendered confidence in Afghan security measures.

  The secretary’s personal protection team and nervous U.S. generals reacted, or perhaps overreacted, in a predictable way. They convinced the secretary to relocate his meeting with the Afghan defense minister, and later the interior minister (the police chief), too, inside the well-defended American compound. The Afghan ministers received notifications, not requests, to travel to the secure U.S. facility if they still wanted to talk to the American secretary of defense.4 So much for deference to the host country—America’s clients knew who they were. Both Afghan officials swallowed their pride and showed up on schedule. They needed U.S. advisers, U.S. equipment, and, especially, U.S. funding.

  Bad as it was, the bike-bombing posed no real threat to the visiting American dignitary. The press people, however, hyped it up anyway. They often did. Asked about the explosion, Chuck Hagel waved it off. “I was in a briefing,” he said, “but we’re in a war zone. I’ve been in a war. So you shouldn’t be surprised when a bomb goes off.”5 He was not.

  The hastily repositioned discussions with his Afghan counterparts sent all the wrong messages, and Hagel knew it. Take precautions, sure, but the Afghan ministers did their duties out and about. An American secretary of defense couldn’t lead his troops from a steel-plated desk or some subterranean bunker. Hagel had an itch to see the Afghan troops and their NATO advisers at Kabul Military Training Center. Thankfully, the U.S. three-star out there, an old infantryman himself, hated slide shows. This visit would be all about meeting Afghans in training. No PowerPoint.

  Hagel loved it. His personal security detail hated it. Too risky—potential mortars or snipers, maybe a rocket into the helicopter, and only the unreliable Afghans holding the ring at Kabul Military Training Center, a venue teeming with thousands of unvetted, armed local soldiers. What about a traitor? How about a hidden bomb? After the blast at the Afghan ministry of defense, why take a chance? Hagel listened, but then made his decision.6

  Go.

  SERGEANT MOHAMMED AMIN finished his operation order with a flourish, to include a British-style open-palm salute that would have done credit to the Coldstream Guards. The other Afghan sergeants in the class burst into thunderous applause. The ovation stepped on the patter of the interpreter, who waited until after the clapping to finish his translation from Dari into English.

  Chuck Hagel, seated in a place of honor next to Brigadier General Aminullah Patyani, sprang to his feet. For a few seconds, he moved like a lithe rifle squad sergeant. Hagel stood tall, an infantryman still despite his dark wool coat, khaki trousers, and a little too much gray hair. Well, the Vietnam generation always pushed the GI haircut regulations. The years melted away. Hagel’s eyes gleamed. He spoke with authority, soldier to soldier.

  “I’ve been a sergeant. My brother was a sergeant. Wars are won by sergeants.”

  The translator picked it up, word for word.

  “Your country, your families, depend on you.”

  Again, the conversion to Dari rolled out, steady and strong.

  “I thank you. And I salute you.”

  And the secretary delivered a crisp salute worthy of George Patton in his heyday.7 Somewhere in drill sergeant heaven, William Joyce nodded. His top Fort Bliss trainee, the one on whom people relied, and would always rely, did not forget what really counted.

  What would become of the Afghan sergeants? For that matter, what of the Americans, the NATO troops, and all the rest? The final outcome of the long, brutal war in Afghanistan would not be determined by anything or anyone at the Kabul Military Training Center on that fine Sunday morning of March 10, 2013. Probably, it was already lost, yet another Vietnam on top of the shambles in Iraq. The old sergeant knew. The younger ones would learn. Maybe someday, America would, too.

  General William C. Westmoreland greets President Lyndon B. Johnson on the runway at Cam Ranh Bay, South Vietnam, on October 26, 1966. Westmoreland commanded in the field while Johnson determined strategy from Washington. Both men misunderstood the war. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  On August 4, 1898, Omaha, Nebraska, celebrated “Indian Day” with a major parade. A U.S. Army soldier from Fort Crook took this picture. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  General Curtis E. LeMay commanded the Strategic Air Command from 1948 until 1957. Tough, smart, and blunt-spoken, LeMay flew lead on some of the most dangerous missions in World War II. He had one focus—winning wars. To frustrate Soviet Union bomber commanders, LeMay moved Strategic Air Command headquarters to Omaha, Nebraska, smack in the middle of the continental United States. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Private Charles Dean Hagel of the 42nd Bombardment Squadron posed for this picture early in his World War II service. Hagel’s jaunty cap tilt typified the aggressive spirit of the U.S. Army Air Forces. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  The B-24J Liberator wasn’t as famous as the iconic B-17 Flying Fortress, but the United States produced more than 19,000 and used them in every theater of World War II. On his missions in the Pacific, Sergeant Charles Dean Hagel manned the vulnerable tail gun turret. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Four generations of Hagel men pose in the early 1950s. From left to right stand great-grandfather and U.S. Army supply contractor Herman, grandfather an
d World War I veteran Charles Leo, father and World War II veteran Charles Dean, and young Tom, Mike, and Chuck. Son Jim is not pictured. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  Charles Dean Hagel is buried in Columbus, Nebraska. His death on Christmas Day of 1962 shook the Hagel family. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  With her husband’s untimely death, it fell to Betty Dunn Hagel to pull the family together. She did. In November 1964, she posed with her sons Tom, Chuck, Mike, and Jim. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  In 1967, Chuck and Tom Hagel began their U.S. Army training by meeting their drill sergeant, a no-nonsense noncommissioned officer distinguished by his imposing “Smokey the Bear” campaign hat. Pictured here, Staff Sergeant John Arthur Hooker served as a drill sergeant at Fort Polk, Louisiana, in 1967. He later joined the 9th Infantry Division and was killed in action in Vietnam on March 10, 1968, at the age of twenty-nine. Hooker epitomized the professional NCO corps, the “backbone of the Army” who trained new soldiers and then led them in combat. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  On the first day of U.S. Army Basic Combat Training at Fort Bliss, Texas, new recruits Chuck and Tom Hagel reported to the “reception center.” There they shed civilian clothes and most of their hair. Thousands of young men did likewise in 1967. In this photo from Fort Ord, California, the body language speaks for itself. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Both Hagel brothers learned that strenuous exercise characterized the daily regimen of Basic Training. Here, army trainees carry out rifle calisthenics at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, in 1968. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Chuck Hagel arrived in Vietnam about six weeks ahead of brother Tom. Here, he displays his M16 rifle, the standard infantry weapon for Americans in country. He also has an egg-shaped M26 fragmentation grenade on his upper left shoulder. Chuck was assigned to Company B, 2nd Battalion, 47th Infantry, a mechanized outfit that went into action aboard boxy M113 tracked armored personnel carriers. The M113s provided speed and firepower, and Chuck’s unit served as the preferred American reaction force whenever things went wrong. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  The battalion operations officer’s M113 track of 2-47th Infantry displays the battalion’s black panther emblem on its front. In an interesting coincidence, Charles Dean Hagel’s 42nd Bombardment Squadron used the same image during World War II. So did African American radicals in Omaha in 1968–70. Behind the soldier lighting a cigarette can be seen the M2HB .50-caliber heavy machine gun, capable of shooting a lethal stream of 1.5-inch-long bullets out to about a mile. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  This mushroom cloud is not an atomic blast, but what nearby soldiers saw when the huge U.S. Army ammunition dump at Long Binh Post exploded on the morning of January 31, 1968, during the opening hours of the great Tet Offensive. Chuck Hagel and his unit were right near ground zero. As a U.S. senator and secretary of defense, Chuck hung a similar picture in his office. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Soldiers and M113 armored personnel carriers of 2-47th Infantry deploy for action to clear Viet Cong defenders from Widows Village on January 31, 1968. Although the Americans secured the wreckage of the village that same day, fighting in the local area went on for days. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  As the Tet Offensive began, Tom Hagel reported for duty with the scout platoon of 3rd Squadron, 5th Cavalry. Tom and his unit fought around Saigon, then moved up north to counter enemy regular troops menacing U.S. firebases near the demilitarized zone. The squadron took significant casualties and inflicted even more in a series of sharp engagements. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  World War II paratrooper Major General Julian J. Ewell (center) took command of the 9th Infantry Division in February of 1968. Here, Ewell listens to 1st Brigade commander Colonel John Geraci. Colonel Ira A. Hunt Jr., the division chief of staff, stands to the right. Smart, aggressive, and uncompromising, Ewell bent his considerable energy to one end—killing Viet Cong. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  In 1967, an F-100 Super Sabre fighter-bomber unleashes a clutch of 2.75-inch rockets on a Viet Cong position in the jungle. Note the drifting mist, rocket smoke, and the wild trajectories of some of the projectiles. In Vietnam, American close air support had a devastating impact on the foe, but it was a big hammer, not a precision implement. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  In March of 1968, Tom Hagel joined Chuck in Company B, 2-47th Infantry. Chuck would be wounded twice, Tom three times. Each saved the other’s life. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  Patrolling in the deep jungle of Vietnam was debilitating and deadly. This 1969 photograph depicts a scene that would be only too familiar to both Hagel brothers. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  In Vietnam, a 9th Infantry Division soldier reads the Stars and Stripes, which brought news from home, good and bad. Note that this issue refers to protests. Both Chuck and Tom Hagel read the Stars and Stripes in country. Most U.S. troops did. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  In the late 1960s, U.S. Army active duty soldiers and national guardsmen often deployed to quell civil unrest in America’s inner cities. Here, troops get organized in Washington, DC, in April of 1968. Omaha, Nebraska, witnessed all too many similar scenes. The Nebraska Army National Guard moved in to restore order on July 4, 1966, when racial tensions boiled over. The National Guard returned to Omaha in April 1968 and again in June 1969. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  First Lieutenant Jerome “Skip” Johnson of Chicago, Illinois, served in Company B, 2-47th Infantry in 1968. He started as a platoon leader, then rose to be executive officer (second in command) and finally company commander. In April of 1968, Chuck and Tom Hagel watched Johnson quell a potential racial confrontation in the wake of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Three U.S. Air Force C-123 Provider aircraft spray Agent Orange and other defoliant chemicals on swathes of the Vietnamese jungle. The potent liquid killed the plant life but also produced lingering unwelcome effects on all exposed, including American troops. The 9th Infantry Division’s area of operations around Bear Cat received multiple applications of these powerful toxins. After the war, both Chuck and Tom Hagel worked to help those affected by Agent Orange. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  U.S. Army armored personnel carriers shared the road with Vietnamese civilians. In 1968, these three tracked vehicles of the 5th Battalion, 60th Infantry—the other mechanized outfit alongside the Hagel brothers’ 2-47th Infantry in the 9th Infantry Division—wait to move near the city of My Tho in the Mekong Delta. The nearest vehicle is an M577 command post carrier, notable for a “second story” to permit soldiers to work inside while standing up. The M113 to the left has an ammunition box on top, its ramp up, and the small troop access door open. The M113 broadside in the center of the scene carries a 106mm recoilless rifle, a useful bunker buster. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  Chuck and Tom Hagel, both acting NCOs, take a break atop an M113 armored personnel carrier. The brothers wear berets given to them by Royal Thai Army soldiers working with the U.S. 9th Infantry Division. The M60 machine gun between the Hagels was known as the “pig” for its loud snorting sound as it ripped through 7.62mm ammunition belts like those draped over Tom. Whether mounted on tracked vehicles or carried on foot patrol, the M60 could deliver effective fire out to about a half mile. At close range, it was especially lethal. (U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel Archives, University of Nebraska at Omaha)

  In May 1968, south Saigon became a war zone during the enemy offensive known as Mini-Tet. This overhead view shows a column of U.S. M113s waiting to move out. Two M48 tanks (lower right) are part of the task force. The 2nd Battalion, 47th Infantry, including Chuck and Tom Hagel, went into action in this area on May 9, 1968. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  As a wounded soldier on the ramp awaits evacuation, riflemen of 2-47th Infantry shelter inside an
M113 near the critical Y-bridge in Saigon during the May 1968 Mini-Tet fighting. (U.S. Department of Defense)

  With their helicopter on the ground, a UH-1D Huey flight crew looks up as U.S. Air Force fighter-bombers pound south Saigon during Mini-Tet. The enemy intentionally dug into civilian neighborhoods. (U.S. Department of Defense)