Honoring Those Who Died Over Twenty Years in Afghanistan

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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. With Memorial Day coming in the same month as the beginning of what President Biden says will be the full US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan by September 11th, let's take some time to acknowledge those who have died in this 20-year war and the current state of affairs with more war inevitably to come with or without Americans in the country.

With us now are two former army officers who have become public voices for their fellow veterans. Paul Rieckhoff, activist and veterans advocate, the founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America or IAVA, and now the founder and president of Righteous Media and host of their podcast, Independent Americans, and Allison Jaslow, the former executive director of IAVA who teaches in the Hart Leadership Program at Duke University. Welcome back both of you. Paul, Allison, welcome back to WNYC.

Paul Rieckhoff: Thanks, Brian. Good to be with you again.

Allison Jaslow: Thanks for having us, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Paul, how do we start to take stock of the war dead from this war? How many Americans and allied fighters and enemy fighters too, and even civilians have died in this war? Is there a number?

Paul Rieckhoff: We don't know, Brian, especially when you put the civilians and folks that have been caught in the crossfire and even the dead that could come after we pull out, but almost a million American service members have served since 9/11 and it's been a long haul. I frequently called it Forgottenstan because I feel like our brothers and sisters are often forgotten.

This weekend I was actually at Ground Zero with my five-year-old. I served there as a first responder. I live in Battery Park and in reflecting on the fact that it's almost been 20 years since 9/11 is almost incomprehensible, but for most Americans, they weren't really paying attention, but for our service members, they've gone over and over again. Tens of thousands have done five and six tours. It's not just the war dead, but it's also the wounded. It's the social impact, the broken families. It's the longest war in American history, but it's also not our number one national security threat anymore.

I think many of us feel that it's the right time to get out. There is no good time to get out. Whether we stay, it's going to be bad. If we leave, it's going to be bad, but we've gotten much more urgent national security threats. It's not 2001 anymore. It's 2021 and we've got extremism that's now been named by the Pentagon and the president as the number one national security threat. We've got a pandemic that's killed over 500,000 people.

When I was there on 9/11, we were worried about ISIS and Al-Qaeda. ISIS and Al-Qaeda didn't take over the Capitol, it was domestic extremists. I think veterans understand that the priorities have changed, but they also understand we need support, we need to withdraw in a way that is smart and respects our allies who if we don't protect will be left to die, and then we've got to deal with the long-term impacts like burn pits.

We've talked about it on your show over the years, Brian, toxin exposures that are very much like the Ground Zero sickness that we've seen among firefighters and cops and first responders. As many as a million veterans could face that in the decades to come. It's a long war, but for many of us, the fight is going to go on for much longer.

Brian Lehrer: To acknowledge the Afghanistan War dead, Allison, can we break it down at all with numbers by US or other NATO or Afghan government forces or Taliban and their allies, also demographics among Americans? Was it people of certain racial or ethnic backgrounds in this country who tended to die for the cause over there or by gender or branch of service, anything like that?

Allison Jaslow: I'll back up Paul and your first point there. Honestly, some of the numbers are a little fuzzy. You'd look at different sources out there, and I'm hesitant to actually quote numbers because I have a hard time understanding the true hard facts. What I will say is, Brian, I, as a veteran, I'm frustrated that too many Americans, excuse me, all they are, the war dead are is numbers, they're not faces.

There are people like Lieutenant Ashley White who was killed in 2011, and she was part of the cultural support teams five years before women were allowed in "combat roles". She was killed out with the special forces. She went every day was with Rangers and SF troops in Afghanistan, never made it home. Folks like Roz Schulte, another woman who was killed in Afghanistan in 2009, the first Air Force Academy woman graduate to be killed in action, who was out there doing intelligence and surveillance and reconnaissance operations but was killed by a roadside bomb.

Even people like civilians that were there on the ground. Actually, a brother of a dear friend of mine, [unintelligible 00:05:13] Hessler, was there with USAID when I was deployed in Iraq at the same time and was killed when a suicide bomber, you may remember this, Brian, walked into a hotel in Kabul. He was there doing USAID work as a part of our effort and involvement in Afghanistan.

I really can't emphasize enough that while the scope of our involvement over 20 years involving so many lives, American lives, Afghani lives, and the collateral damage that will happen, as Paul mentioned, going forward with what burn pits and the wounds that some vets will carry with them over time, I really wish we spent a little more time understanding the faces that go along with these numbers.

Because to me, that is one of the biggest challenges and why we ended up in a war for 20 years is because, for too many Americans, they have the luxury of having the distance and just being numbers and not having an emotional connection to them. Maybe we wouldn't have been in Afghanistan for that long if more of our fellow Americans knew us and the people who were carrying the burden of these wars.

Brian Lehrer: Well, can't do faces on the radio, but we can do voices. Let's invite some phone calls, especially for veterans of this 20-year war or loved ones of those who have died in this 20-year war. What's going through your mind today? What will be going through your minds this 20th Afghanistan War Memorial Day? Give us a call at 646-435-7280. If you served in the Afghanistan War, if you are a loved one of someone who served and died in the Afghanistan War, give us a call at 646-435-7280. 646-435-7280.

I know this is a very general question, Allison, but how do vets feel about the war that they fought in and their colleagues died in as we leave it with the inevitability, it seems, that it's going to be a violent mess still?

Allison Jaslow: Well, first of all, we all have our own individual views. I think that there's passion across the spectrum. I think, for example, while I've been very frustrated with our continuing involvement there for a lot of reasons because we have threats in other places because I've seen buddies go over and over and over again. In fact, when the reporting about the Biden administration making the decision to pull out first happened, I saw a statistic that 30,000 troops have actually deployed to Afghanistan five times, five times.

That kind of stuff fires me up but I think that there are generals who have continued to validate our presence there too and have continued to ask politicians to support their involvement there. I think while there are a variety of us and many of us who are very frustrated with the continued involvement there, it really spans the spectrum, but I will speak from my personal experience. I'm happy that we're going to focus our efforts in other places and I hope that we don't do what we've done with both Iraq and Afghanistan wars and continue to underwrite a contractor presence there too without figuring out a way to pay for it or having an honest conversation in the public square about that.

Brian Lehrer: Paul, I can't help but think about John Kerry's famous quote in his questions to Congress when he testified as a Vietnam War veteran who had turned against that war effort in 1971. "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" Of course, today it could be men or women, but do you hear that echoed among Afghanistan veterans today like the whole thing was a mistake?

Paul Rieckhoff: We do, but I think more of what we hear, Brian, is that we lost our way. It's obviously very, very important and a bit of a mind scramble to think about the fact that Afghanistan and 9/11 are going to have their 20th anniversary this year. To answer your question from earlier, officially 2,312 American military personnel have died, but just like the story of 9/11 is much bigger than just the folks who died in the tower, the story of Afghanistan is much bigger than just those 2300.

I think what we find is when I was standing there, at Ground Zero on the day of 9/11, I think the country was united. We felt like we had a common enemy, there was a real sense of positive patriotism, not in the way it's been cannibalized and twisted lately, and that was squandered. Almost immediately but definitely once we wandered into Iraq, and now we have this never-ending what we call forever war. I think if there's a message from 9/11, that should carry into Afghanistan, it's to never forget, and not just never forget Afghanistan but never forget national security.

Right now, it feels like many Americans have gotten so focused on Trump, or what's happening in the Republican party or the latest controversy, they've taken their eye off the bigger national security ball, and then included the pandemic. The pandemic was for a long time our biggest national security threat and may still be, domestic extremism is more likely to attack my son in New York City than anything from Afghanistan or overseas, and then there are other threats that are emerging that I think most Americans are not paying attention to. A cyber attack has disrupted a gas pipeline, the Russians continue to flex in the Ukraine, our Coast Guard shot at some Iranian ships this week.

The message I hope people will remember is not just to remember our sacrifice, but remember that our sacrifice, why we signed up was to defend against enemies, foreign and domestic. Where we were sent was up to the politicians but those men and women who died, those many women who served, they want our larger story to not be forgotten. That's really about remembering that national security is the biggest stakes we have, no matter what's happening day-to-day.

Nukes are involved when you talk about national security, and the stakes are always higher, and people die. It's also an important issue for the mayoral candidates. This is not just a DC issue. We were hit as a city in New York on 9/11. We have to continue to be vigilant, we're now a prime target for domestic terrorists. This has to be a priority issue for all the mayoral candidates that you'll have on this show and in all the debates.

Brian Lehrer: Do you think, at least, Paul, that the US accomplished its goal of denying a safe haven to Al-Qaeda or others like Al-Qaeda, who could not now use Afghanistan as a base from which to plan and then carry out future 9/11 style attacks? I mean, I think that was the immediate stated goal after 9/11.

Paul Rieckhoff: I think you could make that argument but the question is always going to be can you sustain it? Just like in Vietnam, the Viet Cong knew they could wait us out, the Taliban knew all along that they could wait us out just like they did with the Russians. The question becomes, what's the long-term damage? What are the long-term threats? The distraction of the Iraq invasion really took away from that.

We did get and kill Bin Laden, that was the rally cry when I was there hearing Bush with the bullhorn. That was that time so that's a part of this as well but I think that the eternal job is to keep America safe and I think we've now understood that there's many ways to keep America safe. At one point, we had over 100,000 troops in Afghanistan. Having 100,000 troops on the ground is not the only way to fight our enemies. It could be using strategic weapons where you don't have a footprint, it could be distributing the vaccine.

There's ways to use our hard power and our soft power that maybe can keep America safe than just dropping bombs on people and trying to force democracy at the tip of the gun. That's what I hope is a takeaway from the last 20 years and I hope veterans can be a part of leading that discussion. You see them now from both parties on the national security side, on the Armed Services Committee.

You see people like Pete Buttigieg and Tom Cotton and others who've served in Iraq and Afghanistan are now leading the discussion. I think one day, you'll likely have an Afghanistan and or Iraq vet serving in the White House. I think that will be a really important point and helping the country understand the last 20 years, that includes Afghanistan but it's not only about Afghanistan.

Brian Lehrer: Allison, if you agree with what Paul just said, would you say at least, that the Americans and others who died in this war did not die in vain? I mean, when we compare it to Vietnam, 58,000 plus, just Americans, there were millions of Vietnamese people who were killed by most estimates, but 58,000 plus Americans in the Afghanistan war, it was I believe, under 2500 Americans, that's still a lot of people to die in anything and there shouldn't be any war, another thousand or so allied NATO forces, did they at least not die in vain? Would you say that?

Allison Jaslow: Brian, what I would say to that is they died serving their country, doing what their political leaders, their military leaders, and what their countrymen asked them to do. I think the point to really drill in on this is what has happened to service members living and those who didn't make it home, unfortunately, is that what we really failed to do is have a constant dialogue about these wars. I think that's how you avoid so-called mission creep or losing our way as Paul said.

It's been 10 years since this May since we killed Osama Bin Ladin. 10 years, May 2, 2011. We authorized the wars in September of 2001 in the heat of the moment, and never did we reauthorize in 20 years time almost now, these wars and have a thoughtful discussion about why we're there the purpose we're serving, whether fighting this threat was getting in the way of us fighting other threats, because it is our military's job to keep the nation secure on a broad scale, which, as Paul noted, not only has to do with threats like China and North Korea but also dealing with threats here at home, unfortunately.

I feel like where service members have been failed and their families have been failed, is not having that discussion. That political leaders have, in my view, been too unwilling to risk their political life, while still asking and watching service members over and over again, risk their real lives and families risk their livelihoods and loved ones. I think that's where the real failure has been but I stand by anybody who, unfortunately, didn't make it home and who has served, they served doing what the rest of us asked them to do. We need to hold ourselves more accountable as to whether we are doing right by them.

Brian Lehrer: With Paul Rieckhoff, founder, and Allison Jaslow, former executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, Hasson N Paterson, you're on WNYC. Thank you so much for calling in.

Hasson: Brian, good morning, a longtime listener, and you have taken my phone call before, I appreciate it. First, I want to thank both your guests for service to the United States. I hope they're safe and healthy and their families safe and healthy during this pandemic. That's number one wish that I have for them. Paul made a great suggestion. We don't ask why we go into these wars. I'm from that area of the world. I came from Afghanistan. Nothing has happened. The biggest mistake President Bush II made. put a [unintelligible 00:17:37] in the charge of running the government. We made a lot of rash decision.

He is right. We have domestic, early days, some of my friends that are born in this country from the same area joined the army and they used to tell me that. We have Rambos, people that want to kill Muslims. Look at the last administration, a lot is SEAL and Navy SEAL, and I have friends in the Navy SEAL. Being get this SEAL, what they call it, I don't know what they call it, Paul knows better than me, back.

If you violate the rule of the law, I'm coming from a family that they serve in their country's army. You take an oath to defend your country, to defend your flags. I hear it from the last president, "Oh, you cannot kneel against national anthem," national anthem has nothing to do with any soldier that goes to any country serves. United States soldier they go all over the world and I'm proud of every single one of them because this is my adopted country right now.

They fight for the freedom of this country. They don't care who I am. Whether I'm socialist, whether I'm Trump supporter or not Trump supporter, we allowed our soldier being used for that. I'm on the side of Paul. I wish Paul run for the office. I wish Paul become a senator so we can make the changes. Thank you. God bless our soldiers, wherever they are, wherever they come from, and I hope we clean armies from the Rambos. We need to serve our country. That's the biggest oath a soldier takes, take a bullet for his country. I'm proud of them. Thank you and have a great day.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you so much for your call. Let's go right on to Ellen in Manhattan. You're on WNYC. Hi, Ellen.

Ellen: Hi. I'm calling because I don't know if you saw, but there are a lot of Afghanistans who helped our troops there. Are they going to be brought home as refugees? Because there was a television program about it and so I'm wondering if these people also are advocating for that?

Brian Lehrer: Yes, Paul, I think both of you are interested in this issue, right? Refugee status for people from Afghanistan who helped Americans in the war effort?

Paul Rieckhoff: Two great calls, Brian. Yes. This is actually the number one issue I hear about from veterans who've served in Iraq and Afghanistan and throughout the post 9/11 conflict. Right now, we are leaving our allies to die. They're being killed right now because we are pulling out and we do not have a plan to take care of our friends. The ones who stood up for us for the last 20 years, who jeopardized their family safety, they stood with Americans and believed in us. We are now pulling out and leaving them behind to die like we did to many in Iraq and in other places around the world.

This is where I think Biden has really fumbled the ball. He had to have a plan in place. We talk about what we call the Guam Option. Look, if you can't bring them all to New Jersey, because you need to vet them, you can find someplace like Guam or somewhere else where you can get them out of the line of fire and start to process them. We have a moral obligation. It's also a national security imperative because if we don't protect the people who stood up with us in Afghanistan, people won't stand up with us in the next war.

We need the indigenous people. We need the local people to stand with us. It's essential, but I think it also cuts to an important issue, Brian, we're not protecting our allies and we're not protecting our troops and veterans, either. The bigger issue of the last 20 years is our military has been abused. That's why Allison and I consider this a social-justice issue. Many people in America have been pushed down, have been unheard, have been abused, and left behind. That includes our military because we're facing suicide, homelessness, mental health issues.

If we talk about protecting our troops, 21,000 of them were sexually assaulted in the military in 2018. This is a priority issue that we need to talk about as well. Senator Gillibrand and others have been really out in front on this, and maybe finally, we can get change done in this Congress, but our troops aren't even safe in their own militaries. We've got to have a real come-to-Jesus moment here, a gut-check time where we talk about how we take care of not just our allies, but our sons and daughters that we've sent off to war for 20 years over and over and over again, while most Americans didn't serve and didn't sacrifice and didn't even see their taxes raised.

I think that's the real reckoning that needs to happen. As we have many reckonings across this country, we need to think about the reckoning of having an all-volunteer military that's been totally abused for 20 years.

Brian Lehrer: Allison, I think we can't end this segment without talking about at least one specific thing that we're leaving behind there, and that is exemplified by the horrific attack on the school the other day, time to kill as many girls as possible, specifically, just for the crime of being girls going to school, that the Taliban leadership denies responsibility for and points to Islamic State.

If the Taliban is in charge of the country, their relationship to these kinds of attacks seems more complex. I'm curious how you see it, and how you're seeing leaving that situation to potentially get worse on what seems to us over here, crazy or so radically extreme, killing children, girls, just because they were girls going to school and it violates these extremist religious views?

Allison Jaslow: I think my reaction to that news sounds probably similar to yours and I'm sure many of your listeners. It's just absolutely heartbreaking to see it, to see the pictures. I saw one of the- a father in a morgue with his daughter in a body bag. Those images are never pleasant for anyone to see. It's difficult in the context of the fact that our involvement there when we always were trying to highlight the positive things that we were doing on the ground, the US involvement in there played a big role in actually advancing women's rights and getting more women into schools or young girls into schools, so in that context, I think it's a real heartbreaker as well.

The reality, I think, about our involvement there is, we've rationalized reasons to stay for a very long time. At a certain point, there's only so much that we can do or to where we're also getting in our own way, and that our mission creep across the globe is threatening national security of the United States. As Paul said beforehand, there's a real imperative to have clear-eyed vision of what our real national security threats are or our most pressing ones, and make sure that we have a strategy that meets those needs.

There's always going to be a lot of tough stuff that's happening across the globe, and I think we're going to look at other ways to diplomatically address some of these things hopefully going forward. To answer your question, clearly, it breaks my heart and it's hard to watch, but this is a tough world we're living in and the President of the United States has to make tough decisions. I'm inclined to believe that this was a good one that the Biden administration made and unfortunately, he had to step in for a Congress that's been failing for years to make tough decisions as it relates to this war.

Brian Lehrer: Well, those children are more people for us to grieve for on this Memorial Day.

Allison Jaslow: Indeed.

Brian Lehrer: Allison Jaslow, the former executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, who now teaches in the Hart Leadership Program at Duke University, and Paul Rieckhoff, founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, and now the founder and president of Righteous Media and host of their podcast, Independent Americans. Thank you both so much.

Paul Rieckhoff: Thanks, as always, Brian.

Allison Jaslow: Thank you, Brian.

 

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