Count two tangos outside the entrance, two more
approximately ten meters above. We also see a heavy gun
emplacement approximately twenty meters east of the
entrance with two tangos manning that position, over.”
“Roger that, Predator, can you send me the stream?”
“En route. Recording looks clean.”
CO MB AT O P S
271
“Can I call on you for fires?”
“Standby, Ghost Lead.”
I signaled for a halt and crouched down behind two
long rafts of stone, like fallen pillars from an ancient
palace. “Got a Predator up there,” I told the team in a
whisper, widening my eyes on Hume, who nodded and
shook a fist. “Waiting to hear if he can drop some Hell-
fires if we need ’em.”
“Ghost Lead, this is Predator Control. We are not
authorized to provide fire support. However, I’ve per-
sonally sent your request up the pipe to see if we can’t
get authorization. Do call again, over.”
“Roger that,” I told him, understanding his mean-
ing. The controller wanted nothing more than to drop
his bombs and help us out. His finger was poised over
the trigger. All he needed was an officer with the guts to
give the word.
“They might help us,” I told the guys after a long
breath. I signaled once more to move out.
We were coming in from the east side of the tunnel
entrance, so I told Treehorn to move ahead. His job
would be to take out the gunners in the machine gun
nest. He’d do that with the silenced sniper rifle he’d
brought along. Ramirez and his team would focus on
the two guys up top, bringing them down with knives
or with their silenced pistols. I’d take Smith and Jenkins
to a southerly approach of the main entrance.
We spent another thirty minutes moving into posi-
tion, the night growing more cool and calm, the wind
dying. In the distance, across the vast stretch of sand, a
272 GH OS T RE CON
Bedouin caravan trekked slowly toward Senjaray, the
group traveling in the more tolerable temperatures of
the night. A long line of camels laden with heavy bun-
dles wound off into the shadows.
And for a moment, I just watched them, rapt by the
image, as though we were living in a different century.
“In position,” said Ramirez.
“Got the gunners in sight,” reported Treehorn, rely-
ing on our conventional radio.
I replied to each, then gave the hand signals for Smith
and Jenkins to move ahead of me as we made our approach
toward the entrance. A crescent moon gave us enough
light to see the footprints in the path ahead. We were
taking a well-worn path that, despite the risks, would
keep us silent. Every rock, smaller stone, and pebble was
an enemy as we drew closer.
The path turned sharply to the right, hugging the
mountainside, with a sheer dropoff to our left. And there
it was, down below: Sangsar, as quiet as ever. A spatter-
ing of lights. The slight flap of laundry on the lines. I
lifted my binoculars and scanned the walls, spotted a cat
milling about, and a man, knees pulled into his chest,
sleeping near one gate, his rifle propped at his side.
Smith held up his fist. We stopped, got lower. He had
two, just ahead. He slipped back, as did Jenkins.
They looked at me: Okay, Captain, you’re up.
I took a deep breath and started forward, testing
every footfall, turning myself through sheer willpower
into a swift and silent ghost.
T WENTY-SIX
For me anyway, there’s a delayed emotional reaction
after killing a man. Like most combatants, I’ve trained
myself to go numb during the act and let muscle mem-
ory take over. I think only of the moment, of removing
the obstacle while reminding myself that this man I’m
about to kill wants to kill me just as badly. So, I reason,
I’m only defending myself. They are targets, a means to
an end, and the fragility of the human body helps expe-
dite the process.
That all sounds very clinical, and it should. It helps to
think about it in terms of cold hard numbers.
I once had a guy at the JFK School ask me how many
people I’d killed. I lied to him. I told him if you kept count
you’d go insane. But I had a pretty good approximation of
274 GH OS T RE CON
the number. I once got on a city bus, glanced at all the
people, and thought, I’ve killed all of you. And all the rest
who are going to get on and get off . . . all day . . .
Strangely enough, months after a mission, without
any obvious trigger, the moment would return to me in
a dream or at the most bizarre or mundane time, and I
would suddenly hate myself for killing a father, a hus-
band, a brother, an uncle . . . I think about all the fami-
lies who’ve suffered because of me. And then I just force
myself to go on, to forget about that, to just say I was
doing my job and that the guys I’d killed had made their
choices and had paid for them with their lives.
I would be just fine.
Until the next kill. The next nightmare. The next
guilt trip. And the cycle would repeat.
The all-American hero has dirt under his nails and
blood splattered across his face . . .
And so it was with that thought—the thought that I
would suffer the guilt later—that I raised my silenced
pistol and shot the first guard in the head.
A perfect shot, as assisted by my Cross-Com.
I had but another second to take out the other guy,
who, of course reacted to his buddy falling to the ground
and to the blood now spraying over his face.
He swung his rifle toward me, opened his mouth,
and I put two bullets in his forehead before he could
scream. His head snapped back and he dropped heavily
to his rump, then rolled onto his side, twitching invol-
untarily.
A slight thumping resounded behind us. One. Two.
CO MB AT O P S
275
Treehorn reported in. Guards at the heavy gun were
dead. “Roger that. You man that gun now, got it?”
“I’m on it,” he answered. “Big bad bullets at your
command!”
I waited outside the entrance while Smith and Jen-
kins dragged the bodies back up the path and tucked
them into a depression in the mountainside.
By the time they returned, Ramirez and his group
were coming down to join us. I held up an index finger:
Wait.
“Predator Control, this is Ghost Lead, over.”
“Ghost Lead, this is Predator Control, go ahead.”
“Do you see any other tangos near our position, over?”
“We do see some, Ghost Lead, but they’re on the
other side of the mountain, moving toward the Brad-
leys. You look clear right now, over.”
“Roger that. Ghost Lead, out.”
Now I would piss off Ramirez. I looked at him. “You,
Jenkins, and Smith head back up. Man the same posi-
tions as the guards you killed.”
“What? That wasn’t part of the plan,” Ramirez said,
drawing his brows together.