A Combat Advisor in Afghanistan
An excerpt from "The New Ministry of Truth" by Maurice Naylon IV
The following is an excerpt from “The New Ministry of Truth: Combat Advisors in Afghanistan and America’s Great Betrayal” by Maurice Naylon IV. Professor Bruce Hoffman from Georgetown University called it “an honest, gut-wrenching account...the kind of no b.s. memoir one expects from a United States Marine. But it is also a thoughtful, analytical and intimate account of America's longest war--and the challenges and frustrations endemic to it." Here is a link if you’d like to purchase this thought-provoking book.
“After growing up in Buffalo, New York, Maurice L. Naylon IV (nickname: “Chipp”) attended the United States Naval Academy and was commissioned into the Marine Corps. In his nine years in the Marines, he served as an infantry officer in a variety of roles with a group of absolutely incredible people. Following his time in the service, he and his wife, Jenna, settled in Richmond, Virginia. In addition to serving as the chief editor for the www.newministryoftruth.us blog - a site for veterans to share their experiences - Chipp currently works as an accountant, a job he acknowledges is just about as far from the content of his book as he could possibly travel.”
“This is not a book about epic firefights. It’s not about battlefield heroics. No one will extract a blockbuster movie from these words. Rather, the purpose of this book is to use the story of a combat advisor’s deployment to Afghanistan to illustrate one of America’s gravest betrayals. For nearly two decades, the United States has sent its youth to fight and die in Afghanistan, all the while failing to define a clear political objective to be achieved by these military means. This failure came to a head as 2014 rolled into 2015, and the U.S. government declared an “end to combat operations.” These empty words failed to align with the reality on the ground; they simply forced our nation’s warfighters to shoulder the risk of combat without the ability to defend themselves. This is the story of that time, about America’s new “Ministry of Truth” and the service members sent to carry out its whims.”
“This is not a traditional war story or combat memoir; if you're looking for the daily grind of battle that so many Marines and soldiers faced during their time in Afghanistan, this isn't it. For those stories, read about Marines fighting in Sangin District, soldiers in the Korengal Valley, the battle for the Shahi-Kot Valley, and countless other accounts of truly heroic combat actions. For us, things were actually pretty good. Tasked with defending the largest coalition base in Afghanistan, we had plenty of amenities, more air support than we could hope for, and, all-in-all, a pretty "country club" deployment. Frankly, if we weren't in the middle of Afghanistan, Bagram Airfield may as well have been thrown down in the middle of any military town in America. This reality begs the question, what's the point of writing this? Why is this book important?
On one hand, selfishly, writing this has been an exercise in catharsis for me. Country club or not, seven months in a combat zone can be a stressful experience. More specifically, seven months of sending guys out on security patrols and deliberate operations round-the- clock, selecting the villages that become their objectives- and potentially the places they're killed- wears you out. For seven months, you can never "turn off," regardless of the Pizza Hut and Green Beans Coffee a few hundred meters away, as you always have someone outside-the-wire, someone in harm's way. And, as combat advisors working with forces from both the Republic of Georgia and Afghanistan, culture clash proved another recurring source of stress. On the other hand, the above stress was significantly compounded by realities and decisions unrelated to the individuals outside of Bagram trying to kill us on a daily basis or the forces we were advising, which leads to the primary purpose of this book. As the combat advisors to a battalion of Georgians charged with securing the interior and exterior of America's largest base in Afghanistan at the end of 2014, we found ourselves in a unique situation.
Broadly speaking, the war in Afghanistan included two categories of service members: those making decisions within the confines of a base, and those executing those decisions and fighting outside of a base. Our position and role on Bagram Air-field placed us at the nexus of the highest-level generals in the former category while conducting the security operations outside-the-wire at the lowest level of the latter category. On one day, I found myself eating lunch with the 4-star general in charge of all coalition forces in Afghanistan. On another day conducting a deliberate operation searching for IED caches in an Afghan village. Consequently, as 2014 rolled into 2015, and we saw the "end of combat operations" and beginning of the Resolute Support mission, I had keen insight into both A) the operational-level decisions being made by the generals, and B) the tangible and direct impact those decisions had on the guys fighting day-in and day-out to secure a base.
This proximity to the decision makers in Afghanistan, and the effects their decisions had, is why this book is so important. I am neither a smart man nor an eloquent writer, but I have a story that, in my opinion, needs to be told: the development of America's new Ministry of Truth in Afghanistan, and our country's betrayal of the service members sent to carry out its whims.
Surprisingly, the start of my time as a combat advisor began in the footsteps of the Top Gun cast, that is, hanging around the air station in Miramar, California. After filming epic "we were inverted" and shirtless beach volleyball scenes at what had been Naval Air Station Miramar, the early nineties Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) hearings saw a transfer of the base from the Navy to the Marine Corps. In some Jedi mind trick that I certainly don't understand, Congress decided that it would be more cost effective to call the base Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, as opposed to Naval Air Station Miramar. Same base, same pot of money, different name -the logic and cost savings are infallible.
But, my story isn't about Miramar (though it's a fitting place to begin my path towards the boondoggle that Afghanistan 2014-15 would be). In January 2014, I was serving as an infantry company executive officer (XO) with Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, a unit based a few miles up the road from Miramar at Camp Pendleton, the sprawling Marine base along the Pacific Ocean and I-5 between San Diego and Los Angeles. In this capacity, my company commander and I were down at Miramar with the whole company using the air station's rifle range to conduct our shooting qualification, an annual requirement for Marines.
Hanging out with Chris, the company commander, at the end of a day's shoot, he received a call from our battalion's XO (I was a company XO responsible for roughly 150 Marines, whereas the battalion XO is a more senior officer responsible for five individual companies and closer to 800 Marines). Listening to Chris's side of the conversation, I heard something along these lines:
"Yes, sir. I'm sitting right next to him, sir. Aye, sir, I'll have him see you in your office when we're back to Pendleton tomorrow, sir." Regressing to the mindset of a high schooler who's been caught doing something wrong, my immediate reaction to the side of the conversation I heard was, "Shit, what did I do?" Fortunately, I wasn't being court martialed for something I'd done. But, I was being offered an opportunity to go to Afghanistan. Apparently, our battalion's higher headquarters, 5th Marine Regiment (in practical terms, my boss's boss's boss) had been told by some general further up the food chain that the regiment needed to provide some infantry officers to support an individual augment, or IA, mission to Afghanistan.
Most military deployments consist of an organic unit, such as my battalion, heading overseas to complete some mission; but, at least in the Marines, another deployment path exists, more the red-headed-stepchild approach: temporarily formed teams of As thrown together to complete some mission that doesn't fit within the standard deployment cycle or job description of an infantry battalion. And, my mother's opinion aside, we IAs are typically not selected as a result of our outstanding performance, more often chosen for having the bare minimum requirements to meet the manpower tax imposed (no one wants to give up their unit's rock stars). Take me, for instance: I happened to be the most junior captain in the battalion, which, as I'd find out, made me a prime candidate for either A) this requirement, or B) staying back from our next deployment to be in charge of the Marines with medical and legal issues preventing them from deploying- the two options I'd soon find out lay ahead of me. Pressing Chris for more information, all he could tell me was that, yes, the XO had asked if I'd be interested in this upcoming IA deployment to Afghanistan, and no, he didn't provide any other details. I'd have to wait until the next day, when, returning to Camp Pendleton, I could swing by the XO's office to get the whole picture.”