The Operators: The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America’s War in Afghanistan (52 page)
Read The Operators: The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America’s War in Afghanistan Online
Authors: Michael Hastings
Page 67
: …
Casey is at the headquarters
: Author interview with Major Casey Welch, April 17, 2010.
Page 68
:
There’s some Italian guy with an office
: Ibid.
Page 69
:
A NATO bomb kills seventy Afghan civilians
: “Afghan Alcohol Ban after NATO Staff Were ‘Too Hungover’ to Give Explanation for Air Strike That Killed 70 Civilians,”
Daily Mail
, September 9, 2009.
Page 70
:
“We must avoid the trap”
: ISAF Revised Tactical Directive, July 6, 2009.
Page 70
:
The previous general
…
had a set of tactical directives
: ISAF Revised Tactical Directive, September 2, 2008.
CHAPTER 13. THE HORROR, THE HORRORPage 71
:
“What we’re doing is moving to a more classic counterinsurgency”
: Eric Schmitt, “U.S. General Maps New Tactic to Pursue Taliban and Al-Qaeda,”
The New York Times
, February 18, 2004.
Page 73
:
One hundred thousand flights were canceled
: Omar R. Valdimarsson, “Icelandic Volcano Lava Flow Stops, Ash Eruptions Diminish, University Says,” Bloomberg, May 22, 2010.
Page 73
:
The airlines were estimated to lose $1.7 billion
: Ibid.
Page 73
:
Seven hundred fifty tons of ash had spewed into the air
: Stuart Biggs and Jeremy van Loon, “Icelandic Volcano Unlikely to Change the Weather,” Bloomberg, April 19, 2010.
Page 73
:
It was the first time the volcano had erupted since 1821
: Henry Fountain, “Eruption Wasn’t That Powerful, but Effects May Linger,”
The New York Times
, April 15, 2010.
Page 73
:
A reporter for
The New York Times
spent a few days in Kabul with him
: Dexter Filkins, “Stanley McChrystal’s Long War,”
The New York Times
, October 14, 2009.
Page 74
:
A writer from
The Atlantic
had enjoyed a good stay
: Robert Kaplan, “Man Versus Afghanistan,”
The Atlantic
, April 2010.
Page 74
: Time
magazine had put him as runner-up for Person of the Year
: Joe Klein, “Person of the Year: General Stanley McChrystal,”
Time
, December 16, 2009.
Page 74
: 60 Minutes
spent the most personal time with him
: “McChrystal’s Frank Talk on Afghanistan,” CBS News, September 24, 2009.
Page 74
: …
a “Jedi Knight,” as
Newsweek
called him
: Michael Hirsh and John Barry, “The Hidden General: Stan McChrystal Runs ‘Black Ops.’ Don’t Pass It On,”
Newsweek
, June 26, 2006.
Page 75
:
“First, I wondered why”
: Author interview with State Department official, State Department, May 2010.
Page 75
:
“It’s not going to look like a win, smell like a win, or taste like a win”
: Author interview with General Bill Mayville, Paris, April 18, 2010.
Page 75
:
“The main thing I learned”
: “The Surprising Lessons of Vietnam,”
Newsweek
, November 6, 2009.
Page 76
: …
McChrystal watched a man on a video feed in his headquarters for seventeen days
: Dexter Filkins, “Stanley McChrystal’s Long War,”
The New York Times
, October 14, 2009.
CHAPTER 14. WE’RE ACTUALLY LOSINGPage 77
:
Or the president himself, who had visited the front only once
: Alissa Rubin and Helene Cooper, “In Afghan Trip, Obama Presses Karzai on Graft,”
The New York Times
, March 28, 2010.
Page 78
:
On June 26, Gates asks McChrystal
: Nancy A. Youssef, “McChrystal Says He Won’t Pull Punches on Afghan Proposals,” McClatchy Newspapers, July 12, 2009.
Page 78
:
“I was back to save the war”
: Author interview with Andrew Exum, May 2010.
Page 79
:
He’s planned a vacation
at the Basin Harbor Club
: Author interview with Steven Biddle, April 2010.
Page 79
: …
“scare the hell out of them”
: Author interview with Andrew Exum, May 2010.
Page 80
:
“It hurt,” one soldier lamented
: Alissa Rubin, “U.S. Forces Close Post in Afghan ‘Valley of Death,’ ”
The New York Times
, April 14, 2010.
Page 80
:
“It confuses me why it took so long”
: Ibid.
Page 81
:…
they’ve stocked up on influential reporters
: Tara McKelvey, “Too Close for Comfort?”
Columbia Journalism Review
, September/October 2009.
Page 81
:…
“it jeopardizes the mission”
: Author interview with Stephen Biddle, April 2010.
Page 81
:…
“out of my sandbox”
: Interview with White House official, October 2010.
Page 82
:
“We were just for show”
: Interview with assessment team member, May 2010.
Page 82
:
Jones has a message from the White House
: Bob Woodward, “U.S. Says Key to Success Is Economy, Not Military,”
The Washington Post
, July 1, 2009.
Page 82
:…
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
: Ibid.
Page 82
:
“My strong view”
: Jon Meacham, “A Highly Logical Approach,” interview with President Obama,
Newsweek
, May 15, 2009.
Page 83
:
“retired general time”
: Richard Wolffe,
Revival
(New York: Crown, 2011), p. 244.
CHAPTER 15. PETRAEUS CAN’T DO AFGHANISTAN, AND WE AREN’T GOING TO GET BIN LADENPage 83
:
“Is this a modern Crusade?”
: Author interview with Major Casey Welch, April 17, 2010.
Page 85
:
Ocean 11 wasn’t allowed to leave France
: Author notes, April 18, 2010.
CHAPTER 16. THE ELECTIONS, PART IPage 89
:…
adding that he felt “betrayed”
: Author interview with General Stanley McChrystal, April 18, 2010.
Page 95
:
“I don’t know how much sense”
: Author interview with U.S. official, May 2010.
Page 95
:
The election will cost about $300 million
: Jon Boone, “The Great Afghan Election Swindle,”
The Guardian
, October 20, 2009.
CHAPTER 17. TEXTS TO BERLINPage 96
:
Matthew Hoh works for the State Department
: Author interview with Matthew Hoh, November 2010.
CHAPTER 18. THE ELECTIONS, PART IIPage 100
:
“
How is your trip progressing”
: Author’s text messages, April 18–19, 2010.
Page 102
:…
Holbrooke offers him a job
: Author interview with Ambassador Peter Galbraith, February 17, 2011.
Page 103
:…
he tells Galbraith to knock it off
: Ibid.
Page 103
:…
it’s clear to those UN officials gathered
: Author interview with UN officials, January 2011.
Page 105
:…
“those who are out to get you are out to get me”
: Document obtained by author, The United Nations Dispute Tribunal, Galbraith V. Secretary General of the United Nations, April 23, 2010.
Page 105
:
At two thirty
A.M.
, Galbraith gets a text message from Eide
: Ibid.
Page 106
:
You might as well resign; you’ve lost the faith of the president
: Author interviews with White House and State Department officials, January 2011.
Page 106
:
“Richard Holbrooke expected everyone in the White House”
: Author interview with White House official, May 2011.
Page 107
:…
armed gunmen storm a guesthouse in Kabul
: Jon Boone, “U.N. Workers Killed in Afghanistan Attack,”
The Guardian
, October 28, 2009.
Page 107
:…
an e-mail getting bounced around among Afghan elites
: E-mail obtained by author, November 2009.
Page 107
:…
“Elections: What’s the Point?”
: State Department, Kabul, October 2009,
Wikileaks.org
.
CHAPTER 19. TEAM AMERICA ROLLS THE RITZPage 107
:
“The people do not want change”
: Ibid.
Page 108
:
The lobby of the Ritz-Carlton
: Author notes, April 20, 2010.
CHAPTER 20. ON PRINCIPLEPage 109
:…
“networked security” and “humanitarian action”
: Gale A. Mattox, “Germany and Elections: Dodging the Afghanistan Bullet,” American Institute for Contemporary German Studies.
CHAPTER 21. SPIES LIKE USPage 116
:
Matt Hoh has seen enough
: Author interview with Matthew Hoh, November 2010.
Page 127
:
“Nothing new could ever be expected”
: Philip K. Dick,
A Scanner Darkly
(New York: Penguin Press, 2008), p. 64.
CHAPTER 22. “I’M PRESIDENT. I DON’T GIVE A SHIT WHAT THEY SAY”Page 128
:…
“To resign oneself to monotony”
: Richard Zenith and Fernando Pessoa, “Masquerades,”
Harper’s Magazine
, December 2009.
Page 130
:…
on the verge of “mission failure”
: Bob Woodward, “McChrystal: More Forces or ‘Mission Failure,’”
The Washington Post
, September 21, 2009.
Page 130
:…
“Hey, maybe it’s better that it’s out there”
: Author interview with Major Casey Welch, April 17, 2010.
Page 130
:…
the leak undercuts the strategic impact of the twenty-one thousand troops already sent
: Author interview with White House official, May 2010.
Page 131
:
“they may change their minds and crush me someday”
: John F. Burns, “McChrystal Rejects Scaling Down Afghan Military Aims,”
The New York Times
, October 1, 2009.
Page 131
:…
“letting just half the building burn down”
: Evan Thomas, “McChrystal’s War,”
Newsweek
, September 25, 2009.
Page 131
:…
Petraeus calls a
Washington Post
columnist
: Michael Gerson, “U.S. Has Reasons to Hope in Afghanistan,”
The Washington Post
, September 4, 2009.
Page 132
:
Stephen Biddle writes an essay supporting
: Stephen Biddle, “Is It Worth It?”
The American Interest
, July/August 2009.
Page 132
:
The Kagans do the same
: Fred Kagan, Kimberly Kagan, and James M. Dubik, “While Afghan Forces Are Trained, U.S. Forces Must Stay,”
The Washington Post
, September 13, 2009.
Page 132
:
As does Anthony Cordesman
: Anthony Cordesman, “A Chance to Avoid Defeat in Afghanistan,”
The Washington Post
, August 31, 2009.
Page 132
:
Exum fails to disclose
: Andrew Alexander, “Undisclosed Conflict in a Review of Jon Krakauer’s Book on Pat Tillman,”
The Washington Post
, November 15, 2009.
Page 132
:
The same book is also reviewed in
The New York Times: Dexter Filkins, “The Good Soldier,”
The News York Times
, September 8, 2009.
Page 132
:…
publishes a glowing
New York Times Magazine
cover story
: Dexter Filkins, “Stanley McChrystal’s Long War,”
The New York Times Magazine
, October 14, 2009.
Page 132
:
For guidance, the guys in the White House
: Peter Spiegel and Jonathan Wiesman, “Behind Afghan War Debate, a Battle of Two Books Rages,”
The Wall Street Journal
, October 9, 2009.
