Isle soldiers return to volatile area

In late September, Schofield Barracks soldiers headed to a deadly village in eastern Afghanistan, where they handed out calling cards that said, "We are back."

The several-day helicopter air assault mission to Wanat, where nine U.S. soldiers were killed and 27 were wounded in 2008, involved a force of 600, including Hawaii soldiers, U.S. Special Forces and Afghan commandos.

In recent months, Schofield soldiers with the 3rd Brigade Combat Team have been pushing back into a volatile region of Afghanistan’s Kunar province previously abandoned by U.S. forces — not with the type of permanent presence that routinely drew fire before, but with sporadic missions seeking to disrupt enemy operations.

In July, 3rd Brigade soldiers reoccupied Nangalam Base, previously known as Camp Blessing.

The missions are aimed at the western portion of the Pech River valley, a notoriously remote and violent region of Kunar province that is part of a corridor between Afghanistan and Pakistan favored by smugglers and militants.

There are about 3,500 3rd Brigade soldiers in Kunar and Nangarhar provinces.

It was near the Pech valley that five Pearl Harbor-based Navy SEALs and 14 other U.S. special operations troops were killed in 2005 in an ill-fated commando mission and subsequent crash of a rescue helicopter that was shot down.

The Korengal Valley off the Pech was the scene of nonstop firefights and the documentary film "Restrepo."

In July 2008 a Damien Memorial School and University of Hawaii graduate, 1st Lt. Jonathan Brostrom, was one of those nine soldiers killed at Wanat, also off the Pech, when about 200 enemy fighters attempted to overrun a much smaller American contingent.

There were too few Afghans to influence, and the remoteness of the mountain outposts made the Americans easy targets.

But the vacuum that was left in Kunar and the western Pech was filled by insurgents and recent concerns that attacks on Pakistani forces are being mounted from across the border in Afghanistan.

Maj. Dave Eastburn, a 3rd Brigade spokesman in Afghanistan, said by email that Schofield soldiers have conducted "countless missions and actually have guys operating regularly in the Pech," but the Wanat mission was the first time U.S. troops had conducted an offensive operation to the Kunar and Nuristan border region in more than a year.

"The reason we have some focus there (in the Pech) is to enhance the Afghans’ ability to operate unilaterally," Eastburn said. "They’re improving by leaps and bounds. However, the Pech is a challenge for anyone, so we’ll help them any way we can. It’s no secret there are transitions going on, so our job is to ensure we set our Afghan brothers up for success the best we can."

As part of a U.S. drawdown plan, 10,000 American troops are scheduled to leave Afghanistan by year’s end, with 23,000 more who were part of a "surge" force expected to leave next year.

Eastburn said Schofield soldiers are at Nangalam Base in the Pech serving as advisers to Afghan counterparts but that the Hawaii soldiers are not permanently based there.

No missions have been conducted in the Korengal Valley on the deployment, he said.

Wanat’s defiant reputation preceded the helicopter air assault conducted Sept. 20-22.

"I thought we were going to have a lot of contact," Sgt. Shawn Burke said in an Army-produced news story about the mission.

The force that went into Wanat, about 600, compared with 48 American and 24 Afghan troops who fought at Wanat in 2008.

Brostrom’s father, David, a retired Army colonel who lives in Aiea, said it appears 3rd Brigade leadership "did it the right way with overwhelming combat power, not just a reinforced platoon," as was the case with his son’s mission.

On the September mission, Schofield soldiers provided overwatch security and reported Apache helicopter missile strikes and gunfire as Afghan commandos and U.S. Special Forces swept through Wanat.

Brig. Gen. Gary Volesky, the Regional Command-East deputy commander, said afterward that the air assault mission dispelled the myth that some areas of eastern Afghanistan were off-limits to Afghan and U.S. forces.

"A lot of people are worried that Nuristan and northern Kunar was an area where the enemy had free movement," Volesky said in an Army news story.

There were no Schofield casualties on the mission. Eastburn said since the 3rd Brigade deployed from Hawaii in March and April, there have been 16 soldiers killed in the line of duty and 37 wounded.