Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
New York Daily News
January 27, 2008 By James Gordon Meek, Daily News Staff Writer
CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. - A Marine special operations outfit in Afghanistan was trying to help the CIA wage a secret war against Al Qaeda infiltrators along the Pakistan border last year when they mowed down 19 civilians, the Daily News has learned.
"They were looking to freelance themselves out" to the agency, said a source familiar with the Marine unit's activities.
Two officers in charge of Company F of the Marine Special Operations Command are now facing a rare court of inquiry to find out why their convoy opened fire on civilians the morning of March 4, 2007, after a suicide car bomb exploded harmlessly next to a Humvee.
No one has been charged. But Maj. Fred Galvin and Capt. Vincent Noble are under investigation for orders they gave.
Weeks of tedious and often closed classified hearings have revealed much about the tragic killings, which the Marines claim were the result of a "complex ambush" of their convoy.
But witnesses at the hearings and other sources have also made new disclosures about sensitive U.S. "black," or covert, operations along the Afghan-Pakistan border and how the Marines tried to get in on the action despite orders not to.
Galvin's company - the first Marine special ops unit ever deployed to combat - moved into Jalalabad Airfield in Nangarhar Province in February 2007.
"There were rumblings that these guys were cowboys," said a counterterror operative working at the base then.
The Marines set up quarters alongside CIA and Navy SEAL teams at Jalalabad, said two sources with direct knowledge. However, Galvin was ordered to do "special reconnaissance" on drug traffickers and other insurgents instead of going after the top-priority targets.
"They heard about all the sexy stuff going on but they weren't allowed to play," said a source familiar with the unit's activities.
Galvin quickly capitalized on his CIA contacts, the source said.
Army Maj. Thomas Gukeisen of the Fort Drum-based 10th Mountain Division brigade overseeing Nangarhar testified he was angry when he learned the Marines were seeking out better missions fighting Al Qaeda without telling their Army hosts.
Gukeisen said the Marines secretly met at a camp in Naray - ground zero for cross-border Al Qaeda infiltration - with Green Beret operational detachment-alpha teams called ODAs, and with "OGAs," a military euphemism for the CIA that means "other government agency."
"They were doing intelligence-driven missions with ODAs and some OGAs," Gukeisen testified.
Gukeisen said he suspected at the time the Marines were "trying to hide something from us."
The Army's Task Force Spartan could veto any secret mission in their area of operations. But the Marines concealed from them 25 missions in their first three weeks in the country.
Gukeisen's boss, ex-Task Force Spartan commander Col. John Nicholson, said he didn't know any Americans were near the border on March 4 when he learned civilians perished on Highway 1.
The Marines' intelligence officer, Capt. Robert Olson, told the court the unit was "doing a site survey" for a place on the border to base a rescue force. That suggests they intended to operate right up against - or on - Pakistani soil, the sources agreed.
Pakistan officially does not allow U.S. troops to enter its tribal areas, where Al Qaeda has regrouped.
But Gukeisen admitted American soldiers do conduct "cross-border reconnaissance."
January 27, 2008 By James Gordon Meek, Daily News Staff Writer
CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. - A Marine special operations outfit in Afghanistan was trying to help the CIA wage a secret war against Al Qaeda infiltrators along the Pakistan border last year when they mowed down 19 civilians, the Daily News has learned.
"They were looking to freelance themselves out" to the agency, said a source familiar with the Marine unit's activities.
Two officers in charge of Company F of the Marine Special Operations Command are now facing a rare court of inquiry to find out why their convoy opened fire on civilians the morning of March 4, 2007, after a suicide car bomb exploded harmlessly next to a Humvee.
No one has been charged. But Maj. Fred Galvin and Capt. Vincent Noble are under investigation for orders they gave.
Weeks of tedious and often closed classified hearings have revealed much about the tragic killings, which the Marines claim were the result of a "complex ambush" of their convoy.
But witnesses at the hearings and other sources have also made new disclosures about sensitive U.S. "black," or covert, operations along the Afghan-Pakistan border and how the Marines tried to get in on the action despite orders not to.
Galvin's company - the first Marine special ops unit ever deployed to combat - moved into Jalalabad Airfield in Nangarhar Province in February 2007.
"There were rumblings that these guys were cowboys," said a counterterror operative working at the base then.
The Marines set up quarters alongside CIA and Navy SEAL teams at Jalalabad, said two sources with direct knowledge. However, Galvin was ordered to do "special reconnaissance" on drug traffickers and other insurgents instead of going after the top-priority targets.
"They heard about all the sexy stuff going on but they weren't allowed to play," said a source familiar with the unit's activities.
Galvin quickly capitalized on his CIA contacts, the source said.
Army Maj. Thomas Gukeisen of the Fort Drum-based 10th Mountain Division brigade overseeing Nangarhar testified he was angry when he learned the Marines were seeking out better missions fighting Al Qaeda without telling their Army hosts.
Gukeisen said the Marines secretly met at a camp in Naray - ground zero for cross-border Al Qaeda infiltration - with Green Beret operational detachment-alpha teams called ODAs, and with "OGAs," a military euphemism for the CIA that means "other government agency."
"They were doing intelligence-driven missions with ODAs and some OGAs," Gukeisen testified.
Gukeisen said he suspected at the time the Marines were "trying to hide something from us."
The Army's Task Force Spartan could veto any secret mission in their area of operations. But the Marines concealed from them 25 missions in their first three weeks in the country.
Gukeisen's boss, ex-Task Force Spartan commander Col. John Nicholson, said he didn't know any Americans were near the border on March 4 when he learned civilians perished on Highway 1.
The Marines' intelligence officer, Capt. Robert Olson, told the court the unit was "doing a site survey" for a place on the border to base a rescue force. That suggests they intended to operate right up against - or on - Pakistani soil, the sources agreed.
Pakistan officially does not allow U.S. troops to enter its tribal areas, where Al Qaeda has regrouped.
But Gukeisen admitted American soldiers do conduct "cross-border reconnaissance."