Anti-Terror Operation, Zhawar Kili Valley, Afghanistan

On January 7, 2004, a group of helicopters took off from Kandahar Airport in Afghanistan. The three Marine CH-53 helicopters were each carrying 25 men of a Navy SEAL joint task force bound for the Zhawar Kili Valley. The joint task force was composed of a 17-man SEAL platoon, a 50-man Marine security detachment, 2 Air Force sergeants from the combat control team, 2 explosive ordinance disposal technicians, an Army chemical-biological specialist, a Navy linguist-interpreter, and 2 FBI agents.

The FBI agents had no real reason for being on the operation, since their stated purpose in Afghanistan was to collect evidence for trials of terrorists. The muslim-brainwashed FBI was seeking that evidence in violation of the Patriot Act, that denied terrorists’ show trials where the government would spend millions of dollars trying a terrorist while giving him weeks of free publicity and then lowering the national morale by releasing the terrorists.

The improvised company-sized SEAL SWAT team was bound for Zhawar Kili Valley, which is a long-term Taliban and al-Qaeda training and supply base. The Zhawar Kili Valley is studded with cave entrances lining the walls of the valley floor. Numerous “smart bombs” had been dropped in the valley without any affect. The SEAL SWAT team was on a Vietnam-style search and destroy mission.

The unit landed at the head of the valley, and began to sweep back down toward the mouth. They found over 70 sophisticated, inner-connected tunnel complexes, reinforced with steel I-beams and brickwork. The tunnels were over 3-500 yards deep. Inside the tunnels, they found neatly stacked boxes of tens of thousands of tons of ammunition and explosives. They also found tanks, artillery, anti-aircraft guns, and crew served weapons sufficient to equip 2 infantry divisions. Such equipment was sorely needed by the troops of the Northern Alliance, the only reliable American ally in Afghanistan.

Among the thousands of crates and millions of tons of ordinance, there were other facilities used by the terrorists. The tunnels were wired with electric lights and included classrooms, training facilities, and jailhouses. There were even safe-house accommodations, where stacks of passports, mounds of phony IDs, many bags of heroin, and stacks of freshly laundered clothes were found.

The huge terrorist training and logistics base was then, and is now, being used by al-Qaeda terrorists. In the Zhawar Kili Valley, al-Qaeda terrorists are trained, equipped, and given false documents and then filtered across the Pakistan border. The head of the valley is only three miles from the Pakistan border. Along the rim of the valley is a small village.

The Zhawar Kili Valley should have been occupied, and made into a base camp by a force, composed of a least 1-2 battalions of American Army or Marine infantry, and several special forces teams, as well as a couple of artillery batteries. Sniper teams and forward observers could have then moved out 3-5 miles in every direction to bring fire down on the al-Qaeda troops that use that valley. In the meantime, convoys of trucks and pack mules from America’s Northern Alliance allies could come into the valley and pick up the ordinance and equipment after American troops had picked over it.
The supplies in the Zhawar Kili Valley included hundreds of RPGs that should have been issued to every American squad and team in Afghanistan and Iraq. America could have saved nearly a billion dollars a year simply by using the ammunition, weapons, and equipment found in the Zhawar Kili Valley.

Of course, none of the above was done by the Centcom headquarters that commanded the SEAL SWAT team unit. Without even performing an adequate search for enemy documents and other intelligence information, the nervous SEALs and their protégés decided to blow up the entrances of most, but not all, of the caves. Naturally, al-Qaeda could easily blow the entrances back open for any cave they wanted to, while no doubt, thanking the Americans for not confiscating their supplies.

Heavy vehicle tire tracks running into the valley from the Pakistani border indicted that the Pakistani Army frequently hauled supplies into the Zhawar Kili Valley, in 18-wheelers with semi-trailers. Why weren’t those convoys ever ambushed?

When a few squads of al-Qaeda terrorists started to arrive in the area (totaling not more than 20-30 men) the SEAL SWAT team, although larger, well-armed and covering all approaches to the valley, got nervous and decided to bug out.
By January 14, 2004, there wasn’t an American to be found in the Zhawar Kili Valley. During those two weeks and thereafter, America wasted over $10 million of taxpayer money by dropping over 400,000 pounds of ordinance into the valley. The effort neither killed any enemy terrorists, nor effectively impeded use of the valley. Neither did they deny the enemy continued access to, and use of, the ordinance and equipment in the Zhawar Kili Valley.

The Zhawar Kili Valley Operation was very wasteful of American resources. Certainly, highly trained SEAL counter-terror forces were not required for the mission of inventorying and sealing in part of the enemy’s wealth in the Zhawar Kili Valley.

For more detailed information on how to plan and carry out special operations missions, read: Parade Grounds of the Dead and Hitler’s Commandos, as well as Desant Warfighting.

If you want to find out more about how anti-terrorist operations should be planned and carried out, look up QuikManuevers’ Anti-Terrorism, Special Warfare, and Military Combat Leadership e-books.