Speaker 1: Daoud watched nervously as the choppers descended from out of
Speaker 1: the dawn sky, their giant blades throwing ominously as they
Speaker 1: dropped closer to the ground, kicking up dust and beating
Speaker 1: back the green shoots of wheat now oscillating wildly before him.
Speaker 1: He turned sharply and made a quick retreat back into
Speaker 1: his house, bolting the door behind him. Then, peering out
Speaker 1: from the corner of a window, he watched as the
Speaker 1: first pair of camel colored combat boots hit the floor,
Speaker 1: soon followed by numerous others, and prayed to Allah that
Speaker 1: he would be left alone. Moments later, there came a loud,
Speaker 1: insistent knock at the door. The men, he assumed were
Speaker 1: Americans strangers, the people he'd been warned not to co
Speaker 1: operate with. They were joined at the door by a
Speaker 1: more familiar face, who put the strangers short, insistent words
Speaker 1: into Pashtu so that he could understand their demands. But
Speaker 1: Daoud was finding it hard to concentrate two distracted by
Speaker 1: the service rifles in their hands. Just a few weeks ago,
Speaker 1: men not unlike these killed a ten year old boy
Speaker 1: in Daoud's village. Just another of the tens of thousands
Speaker 1: of Afghan civilians that would fall victim to a war
Speaker 1: of which they had no control. Caught in the cross
Speaker 1: fire between Taliban insurgents and the invading U. S and
Speaker 1: British forces, while Daoud in his own home did his
Speaker 1: best not to seem guilty of anything. The interpreter explained
Speaker 1: that the soldiers wanted to use his home for the
Speaker 1: next few weeks, adding that they would pay good money
Speaker 1: for it, but Daoud couldn'toss agree. If word got out
Speaker 1: to the Taliban that he'd taken money from Americans, the
Speaker 1: consequences would not be worth thinking about. Captain John Way's
Speaker 1: sun sighed and looked about at his men, who were
Speaker 1: growing ever more skittish, stood out in the open, each
Speaker 1: passing second bringing them closer to the possibility of death.
Speaker 1: He and his men were Marines, members of the second Battalion,
Speaker 1: eighth Regiment, newly arrived in the region after spending two
Speaker 1: months acclimatizing at Camp Leatherneck, the marine's primary base in
Speaker 1: Helmand Province in South Afghanistan. The unit formed a handful
Speaker 1: of the four thousand new troops sent into Helmand as
Speaker 1: part of Operation Kanjar, the latest roll of the dice
Speaker 1: in the U. S Government's efforts to neutralize the Taliban's
Speaker 1: grip on the region. It was July twenty nine, and
Speaker 1: with all things going to plan, the war would be
Speaker 1: all but over soon. Daoud's village, Saujerdez, was one of
Speaker 1: many similar sized rural communities clustered around the Helmond River
Speaker 1: in the Gamser district of Helmond. Although surrounded on all
Speaker 1: sides by endless miles of desert, here the land was
Speaker 1: rich and green, quite different to how many of the
Speaker 1: Marines had imagined Afghanistan to look. To some, it reminded
Speaker 1: them of the verdant countryside that surrounded their training base
Speaker 1: in North Carolina, though they were under no illusions of
Speaker 1: just how far from home they really were. Out of
Speaker 1: the twenty most dangerous districts of Afghanistan, according to the
Speaker 1: US military, nine were located in Helmand Province, being as
Speaker 1: it was a vital asset for the Taliban on account
Speaker 1: of the vast, sprawling poppy fields that also love the
Speaker 1: banks of the helm And River. The fields, which they
Speaker 1: cultivated for opium to help fund their operations, had flourished
Speaker 1: thanks to an extensive canal and irrigation system that had
Speaker 1: been constructed back in the nineteen fifties and sixties, largely
Speaker 1: with the help of significant US government investment. The system
Speaker 1: had even been partially designed by the company Morrison Knudson,
Speaker 1: perhaps better known for building the Hoover Dam and the
Speaker 1: San Francisco Bay Bridge, just one of the many ironies
Speaker 1: that characterized this most messy of wars. The attempt to
Speaker 1: commandeer Daoud's home was part of a new tactic to
Speaker 1: go from village to village, setting up outposts and establishing
Speaker 1: a visible presence throughout the region to try and route
Speaker 1: out any Taliban strongholds while simultaneously engaging with the local
Speaker 1: population in the hope of winning their support. For those
Speaker 1: like Daou, it is a fraught existence, stuck between the
Speaker 1: harsh authority of the Taliban and the ambiguous motives of
Speaker 1: the invading forces. For those like Captain's Son and his men,
Speaker 1: it is just the beginning of what must seem an
Speaker 1: impossible task, the first of many they will face together
Speaker 1: in the next seven months of their deployment. On this occasion,
Speaker 1: it ends with Daoud being forced to give up his
Speaker 1: home for at least the next two weeks. After local
Speaker 1: elders convince him to hand over his property. Daoud has
Speaker 1: barely finished loading the last of his possessions onto a cart.
Speaker 1: When the Marines move in. He doesn't take the money,
Speaker 1: telling them instead to make it known that he had
Speaker 1: no choice in the matter, and in many ways he didn't.
Speaker 1: Not far from from Saujardes, another unit from the second
Speaker 1: and eighth of undertaking their first patrol outside the wire.
Speaker 1: Among them is twenty year old Lance Corporal Charles Seth Sharp,
Speaker 1: hailing from the town of Adairsville in northwestern Georgia, Sharp
Speaker 1: had been motivated to join the Marines, partly in an
Speaker 1: effort to bring structure and focus to his life and
Speaker 1: to make his family proud, but mostly by a desire
Speaker 1: to fight for those who couldn't fight for themselves. While
Speaker 1: stationed in Iraq the year before, Sharp made a strange
Speaker 1: request to his family, asking them to send him coloring
Speaker 1: books and crayons for Christmas. As he explained to his
Speaker 1: bemused parents, he wanted to give them toward the kids
Speaker 1: he'd met throughout his time there. Only a few days
Speaker 1: before heading out on patrol, Sharp had written a letter
Speaker 1: to his grandmother telling her that he was about to
Speaker 1: take part in a mission that his grand children would
Speaker 1: learn about in history class, but Sharp would never live
Speaker 1: to have grandchildren. That morning, on his first patrol, his
Speaker 1: unit came under attack, and he was shot in the
Speaker 1: neck by an unseen shooter and died soon after, becoming
Speaker 1: the first US casualty of Operation Kanjar. For many in
Speaker 1: the second Battalion and eighth Regiment, the time spent in
Speaker 1: Camp Leatherneck had been a frustrating one. All cooped up
Speaker 1: together under one giant tent nicknamed the Circus Tent. Having
Speaker 1: trained for months building themselves up for action, the last
Speaker 1: thing they wanted was to be sitting around kicking their
Speaker 1: heels in the desert. Sharpe's death was a harsh wake
Speaker 1: up call to the reality of combat and a brutal
Speaker 1: reminder of the true nature of the battle they were
Speaker 1: engaged in. The Taliban were not a simple enemy to
Speaker 1: be routed and crushed through sheer might and will. There
Speaker 1: were no military compounds to storm or governments to overthrow.
Speaker 1: Theirs was a much longer game characterized by stealth and surprise.
Speaker 1: Their presence felt not by what you did see, but
Speaker 1: what you didn't. A movement in the tree line up ahead,
Speaker 1: or the improvised explosive device buried six inches under the
Speaker 1: ground and primed to kill. And even when they did
Speaker 1: finally make their presence known, they could just as quickly disappear,
Speaker 1: like phantoms, back into the landscape, each member often indistinguishable
Speaker 1: to the Marines from the many other people whose land
Speaker 1: they now stalked. As one Taliban commander was often fond
Speaker 1: of saying, the Americans might have the watches, but they
Speaker 1: had the time of all the conflicts in recent years,
Speaker 1: it is little wonder that from out of this one
Speaker 1: tales of ghosts would emerge. You're listening to Unexplained, and
Speaker 1: I'm Richard McLean Smith. The small group of Marines stamped
Speaker 1: their feet to keep warm as a hazy, pale sun
Speaker 1: crept up over the makeshift walls of Patrol Base Hassanabad,
Speaker 1: a rudimentary settlement on the outskirts of Hassanabad Village that
Speaker 1: was comprised of little more than giant reinforced sacks of
Speaker 1: gravel and a few canvas tents. On the orders of
Speaker 1: their sergeant, the eight men, comprising a unit from Golf Company,
Speaker 1: second Battalion, eighth Regiment, jumped into the waiting armored trucks
Speaker 1: and sat anxiously as the gate was opened. Moments later,
Speaker 1: they were out beyond the perimeter wall, huddled together with
Speaker 1: the nervous energy of the res recently deployed, the prospect
Speaker 1: of hitting an ied and ever constant in their minds.
Speaker 1: For some, this was little more than routine. For others,
Speaker 1: like twenty two year old Lance Corporal Adam Wilson, this
Speaker 1: was their first assignment beyond the wire. Wilson looked out
Speaker 1: through the truck's dusty window at the alien landscape beyond,
Speaker 1: a mix of scrub and wheat fields, a far cry
Speaker 1: from his home city of Xenia, Ohio, while up above,
Speaker 1: a compatriot tended the truck's single machine gun, surveying the
Speaker 1: horizon for any signs of a threat. Thankfully, with only
Speaker 1: a few hundred meters to travel, it wasn't long before
Speaker 1: they derived their destination, the truck skidding to a stop
Speaker 1: beside what looked like little more than a huge pile
Speaker 1: of mud. After quickly vacating the vehicle, the men took
Speaker 1: a moment to survey the place they would be calling
Speaker 1: home for the next sixty days. A small outpost set
Speaker 1: up about twenty meters high on the top of a
Speaker 1: strange dirt hill designated Observation Point Rock, or simply the Rock.
Speaker 1: Being the highest point for some considerable distance, the rock
Speaker 1: was an obvious place to put an observation post from
Speaker 1: which any incoming enemies could be spotted long before they
Speaker 1: had time to reach the patrol base. Despite its relative
Speaker 1: closeness to the base, the facilities were basic at best,
Speaker 1: with no electricity, running water, or even beds to sleep in.
Speaker 1: As such, it was necessary to maintain a steady rotation
Speaker 1: of personnel to occupy the post. Feeling thoroughly exposed and
Speaker 1: with the heat already beginning to rise, the Marines quickly
Speaker 1: made their way to the shelter of the compound above,
Speaker 1: where they were greeted by its outgoing occupiers, a group
Speaker 1: of Welsh Guards from the British Army. Lance Corporal Wilson
Speaker 1: couldn't help contrasting the fresh faces of his fellow Marines
Speaker 1: with this tired, despondent group of men hastily packing their bags,
Speaker 1: evidently in a hurry to vacate the place. Meanwhile, Corporal
Speaker 1: Jacob Lena, the unit's second in command, made his way
Speaker 1: along one of the few shallow trenches that had been
Speaker 1: carved out of the mound, and surveyed the scene. The
Speaker 1: post was centered around a single machine gun that poked
Speaker 1: out of a small hutch on the west side of
Speaker 1: the hill. Some old magazines were littered about the place,
Speaker 1: while the remnants of a small homemade gym could just
Speaker 1: be glimpsed from underneath some camouflage netting. Just then, Lena
Speaker 1: was startled by the bark of a dog, which revealed
Speaker 1: it moments later. Eager to meet the new arrivals, as
Speaker 1: one of the British soldiers explained it was a local
Speaker 1: stray that adopted. Calling it ugly Betty, Lena promised to
Speaker 1: look after it for them. Ordinarily, this would be the
Speaker 1: point at which the previous group took a moment to
Speaker 1: go over a few details about the local landscape, sniper
Speaker 1: spots to look out for, or any individuals they might
Speaker 1: want to be suspicious of, but the Welsh guards offered
Speaker 1: no such courtesy, preferring simply to clear out as quickly
Speaker 1: as possible. There was one piece of advice, however, that
Speaker 1: they were willing to impart. Should the men dig anything up,
Speaker 1: it might be best to put it back where they
Speaker 1: found it the Marines who made themselves busy settling into
Speaker 1: their new home as they quickly got down to the
Speaker 1: business of determining sentry shifts and figuring out the most
Speaker 1: comfortable places to get some sleep. With temperatures routinely hitting
Speaker 1: close to forty degrees celsius, finding ways to stay in
Speaker 1: the shade would also be vital. As the last of
Speaker 1: that first day's light ebbed away and the hazy, pink
Speaker 1: and bluish hues of dusk descended, the men could be
Speaker 1: thankful to have made it through the day without incident.
Speaker 1: That evening, Corporal Lena took first watch at the machine gun,
Speaker 1: gazing out at the complicated mix of homes, fields and
Speaker 1: fir trees dotted before him, the shadows growing longer and
Speaker 1: longer before dissolving momentarily, only to later re emerge under
Speaker 1: the gentle light of the moon. Not far to the south,
Speaker 1: Lena could just make out the old, rusted shells of
Speaker 1: two Soviet era tanks half buried in the earth, remnants
Speaker 1: of a past, both distant yet inextricably linked to Lena's
Speaker 1: own presence thirty years later, and only a few hundred
Speaker 1: meters away, The tanks were as alien to this landscape
Speaker 1: as Lina was, each of them brought here by the
Speaker 1: same winds that had left so many unwitting people sprawling
Speaker 1: in its wake. Lina scanned back across the fields, almost
Speaker 1: willing for something to happen, doing his best to stop
Speaker 1: his mind from wandering. It was always difficult being on
Speaker 1: watch in such places of isolation, trying to toe the
Speaker 1: line between staying alert to any possible threat while simultaneously
Speaker 1: trying your hardest not to allow the possibility of such
Speaker 1: a threat to overwhelm you. Lina was just eyeing the
Speaker 1: lip of a nearby ditch when a burst of static
Speaker 1: blared out of the outpost's radio, causing him to jump,
Speaker 1: catching himself. Lina turned to face it, anticipating an imminent
Speaker 1: communication from the patrol base. Then the radio crackled again,
Speaker 1: a muffled voice just about audible swimming around in the
Speaker 1: thick of it. Lena grabbed the device and fiddled with
Speaker 1: the controls, switching it back to the required frequency. He
Speaker 1: called up the bass and asked them to repeat the message,
Speaker 1: but the voice at the other end was confused. They
Speaker 1: hadn't sent a message. Lina looked again at the radio,
Speaker 1: then apologized for wasting the bass operator's time and turned
Speaker 1: back to the gun. Moments later, the radio crackled into
Speaker 1: life again, and once again Lina heard that strange muffled voice.
Speaker 1: Listening closer, he soon realized it wasn't speaking in English,
Speaker 1: it was speaking Russian. Perhaps the radio was picking up
Speaker 1: someone else's transmissions, he thought, giving the radio a thump,
Speaker 1: Or perhaps he was simply imagining things. Over the next
Speaker 1: few days, with little else to do with their time,
Speaker 1: the marine's attention soon turned to fortifying their position. Most
Speaker 1: pressing of all was the fact that, with the exception
Speaker 1: of a few well placed sandbags, nowhere offered significant safety
Speaker 1: from most potential lines of enemy fire. Though some trenches
Speaker 1: had been dug in and around the compound, none were
Speaker 1: deep enough to bring you lower than the parapet without crouching,
Speaker 1: and so it was one morning that Corporal Lena and
Speaker 1: Lance Corporal Wilson, along with one other compatriot, began the
Speaker 1: arduous task of rectifying the situation. The clatter of shovels
Speaker 1: scraping dirt rang out through the camp as the men
Speaker 1: battled against the rock hard ground and the ever rising temperatures.
Speaker 1: As Wilson paused for some water, Lena dug his shovel
Speaker 1: in once more, only for it to clang against something
Speaker 1: buried a few inches under the surface. Lena threw down
Speaker 1: his shovel and pulled a thin, tangled strip of metal
Speaker 1: from the ground. Then he blew off the dirt and
Speaker 1: held it up to the light. It was hard to
Speaker 1: tell what it was exactly, an old piece of shrapnel,
Speaker 1: most likely, suggested Wilson. Lena nodded in agreement as he
Speaker 1: tried to read some strange markings that had been etched
Speaker 1: onto the side of it. It looked like Cyrillick. He
Speaker 1: thought back to that strange radio transmission from the night before,
Speaker 1: but thought better of telling Wilson about it lest he
Speaker 1: sound like he was going crazy. Half an hour later,
Speaker 1: with the men having hardly made a dent in the trench,
Speaker 1: Wilson slammed his shovel into the ground, unearthing a small
Speaker 1: sunken space about two feet wide beyond it. Spotting something
Speaker 1: within it, Wilson reached inside and pulled it out, then
Speaker 1: recoiled in horror. It was unmistakably the leg bone of
Speaker 1: a human. Wilson's colleague grabbed it from him and goofed
Speaker 1: around with it, but neither Wilson or Lina saw the
Speaker 1: funny side. Remembering suddenly those final words the British had
Speaker 1: said to them, if you dig anything up, you should
Speaker 1: probably make sure to bury it, Lina grabbed the bone
Speaker 1: and put it back where Wilson had found it, having
Speaker 1: got back to the task at hand. Moments later, Wilson
Speaker 1: found another fragment of bone. Then Lina did too. In fact,
Speaker 1: the more they digged, the more bones they uncovered. It
Speaker 1: soon became clear why the previous occupants had preferred not
Speaker 1: to dig any deeper. They were camped on a graveyard.
Speaker 1: As news of the gruesome discovery made its way through
Speaker 1: the group, it was hard not to be a little
Speaker 1: unsettled by it. Even in the height of war, such
Speaker 1: things rarely fail to make the skin crawl. Perhaps it
Speaker 1: was all the talk of the bones, or perhaps it
Speaker 1: was the strange remoteness of the location and the unending
Speaker 1: cycle of boredom that comes with occupying such a post.
Speaker 1: Either way, something of the place was beginning to seep
Speaker 1: into the men. Two weeks later, Corporal Austin Hoyt celebrated
Speaker 1: his twentieth birthday. That night, it was his turn to
Speaker 1: take machine gun duty. Growing up on a farm back
Speaker 1: in the States, he was used to the quiet and
Speaker 1: had thought nothing of being stationed at the rock for
Speaker 1: sixty days. But back home the quiet was something to
Speaker 1: be cherished and revered. Here, it was only ever a
Speaker 1: vacuum for the worst thoughts to infiltrate. It was a
Speaker 1: quiet that spoke not of wistful hopes and dreams, but
Speaker 1: only of things lying in wait. When suddenly the quiet
Speaker 1: was broken by a horrific scream, Hoyt scrambled for his
Speaker 1: night vision binoculars and scoured the perimeter fencing below, assuming
Speaker 1: someone had been caught in the razor wire, but the
Speaker 1: fencing was completely empty and untouched. Blurring the binoculars to
Speaker 1: the ground, Hoyt gasped at the sight of a large
Speaker 1: humanoid shadow darting out across a nearby field. Moments later,
Speaker 1: it was gone. Just then Wilson and Lena burst into
Speaker 1: the machine gun post, clutching their M four rifle. They'd
Speaker 1: heard the scream too. With no choice but to head
Speaker 1: out and investigate, the three of them cautiously made their
Speaker 1: way to the perimeter fencing and stepped out beyond the wire,
Speaker 1: but after a thorough scout at the surrounding area, the
Speaker 1: men found nothing. After only four weeks. Lance Corporal Zonik
Speaker 1: can't quite put his finger on it, but it's clear
Speaker 1: that something in the mood of the men has shifted.
Speaker 1: Taking a machine gun watch that night, as all the
Speaker 1: stars of the desert emerged one by one from out
Speaker 1: of the sky, he soon finds his mind wandering to
Speaker 1: thoughts of family and loved ones back home. Phoning home
Speaker 1: is a rare event at the best of times for
Speaker 1: military personnel, but being stationed out here, it will be
Speaker 1: months before he is able to speak to any of
Speaker 1: them again. For many service personnel posted all over the
Speaker 1: world far from home, especially with so many being barely
Speaker 1: out of their teens and in young relationships and marriages,
Speaker 1: it can be all too easy to let the separation
Speaker 1: each you up, and equally so for those left back
Speaker 1: at home, whether in loving relationships or deteriorating ones. Not
Speaker 1: knowing if they might ever speak to their partners or
Speaker 1: relatives again, many prefer not to call home at all
Speaker 1: to avoid the pain of hearing their loved one's voices.
Speaker 1: Others are reluctant to make any promises of future calls,
Speaker 1: just in case they are unable to fulfill it. Zolnik
Speaker 1: took a swig of water to perk himself up, and
Speaker 1: slapped away at another giant moth that was buzzing about
Speaker 1: his head, when suddenly he felt the unmistakable sensation of
Speaker 1: a cold breeze across his face, follow by what sounded
Speaker 1: like a voice whispering to him from out of the darkness.
Speaker 1: Zolnich spun round, looking about. Who's there, he said, but
Speaker 1: there was no reply. It was only then that he
Speaker 1: noticed just how cold the air had suddenly become, and
Speaker 1: then the whispering voice came again. Zolnik jumped. God, damn it,
Speaker 1: that isn't funny, he said, still looking about. Then the
Speaker 1: sound of footsteps approached, crunching in the dirt outside. Zolnich
Speaker 1: froze at the sound of them as they drew near,
Speaker 1: then moved up to the top of the mound above
Speaker 1: the machine gun post. Assuming with relief that one of
Speaker 1: his colleagues had finally come to join him, Zolnich grabbed
Speaker 1: his end for and ran out of the hutch. Hoyt
Speaker 1: is that you? He said, as he looked up to
Speaker 1: the top of the mound, but no one was there.
Speaker 1: Doing his best to suppress the rising fear, Zolnik ran
Speaker 1: back inside and pointed his gun toward the stretch of
Speaker 1: land at the base of the mound and hurriedly scanned
Speaker 1: it back and forth through his thermal scope, when suddenly
Speaker 1: he spotted the white thermal outline of a figure standing
Speaker 1: about a hundred yards from the outpost. Moments later, Lance
Speaker 1: Corporal Hoyt arrived to relieve Zolnich of his duty, finding
Speaker 1: him clearly rattled by something that someone there, insisted Zelnich,
Speaker 1: but when he looked again, the figure was gone. Hoyt
Speaker 1: took a look through his own scope and then through
Speaker 1: the night vision binoculars, but saw nothing. I guess they're
Speaker 1: gone now, said Hoyt, before patting Zolnich on the shoulder
Speaker 1: and telling him to get some sleep. Over the next
Speaker 1: few days, Zoonich seemed unable to shift something from his mind.
Speaker 1: With his condition rapidly deteriorating, the sergeant made the decision
Speaker 1: to have him transferred out. As one day bled into
Speaker 1: the next, the men on the rock seemed to become
Speaker 1: more and more untethered from the strictures of life on
Speaker 1: patrol Base Hassanabad, beards were left unshaven as some of
Speaker 1: the men took to sitting about shirtless in the oppressive
Speaker 1: desert heat. It was sometime around thirty days into their
Speaker 1: posting that Corporal Lena was back on night watch at
Speaker 1: the machine gun, with ugly Betty sat by his side
Speaker 1: to keep him company. It had just passed one thirty
Speaker 1: a m when Betty sat up suddenly and began barking
Speaker 1: furiously into the night. Lina grabbed the night vision binoculars
Speaker 1: and scanned the fields below. As Betty's barks grew louder
Speaker 1: and more insistent, Lina caught sight of a figure dressed
Speaker 1: in Perihano tamban about two hundred meters away, standing completely still,
Speaker 1: that appeared to be staring directly at him. Lena grabbed
Speaker 1: hurriedly for his thermal scope to pinpoint the figure's position,
Speaker 1: but when he looked again, the figure had gone. Taking
Speaker 1: the night vision binoculars again, he gasped at the sight
Speaker 1: of the same person, now standing one hundred meters closer,
Speaker 1: on the verge of firing a warning shot. Lina grabbed
Speaker 1: his M four and looked down the thermal scope to
Speaker 1: find the figure again, but once more they had completely vanished.
Speaker 1: In a panic, Lina was just about to alert the
Speaker 1: others when he felt the heavy tap of fingers on
Speaker 1: his shoulders, the sergeant signal to let him know that
Speaker 1: he is standing behind him. With a sigh of relief,
Speaker 1: Lina spun around, only to find that he was completely alone.
Speaker 1: In horror, he grabbed once more for the night vision
Speaker 1: binoculars and hurriedly scanned the surrounding area as Betty continued
Speaker 1: to bark, but once again Lena found nothing. Despite his
Speaker 1: fears that he'll be judged at best unfit for duty
Speaker 1: and at worst insane, after forty days of strange, inexplicable experiences,
Speaker 1: Corporal Lena finally decides to confide in his colleagues, telling
Speaker 1: Wilson and Hoyt about everything that had been going on.
Speaker 1: Having expected them to poke fun at him, it is
Speaker 1: with some surprise when both of them revealed that they
Speaker 1: too had been experiencing ghostly inexplicable events. Then Hoyt thought
Speaker 1: back to the night that Zolnik had seemed so spooked
Speaker 1: right before he decided to transfer out. Clearly it had
Speaker 1: been happening to him too. The men agreed to keep
Speaker 1: it between themselves for the time being, eager to see
Speaker 1: out the remainder of their posting and get back to
Speaker 1: the main base. Through it all, they could be grateful
Speaker 1: for making it through unscathed, with or without the mysterious
Speaker 1: goings on. On their last night at the post, it
Speaker 1: fell to Lance Corporal Wilson to tend the machine gun.
Speaker 1: Sat up there alone in the cool night air, Wilson
Speaker 1: repeated over and over to himself that it was just
Speaker 1: one more night, and by tomorrow it would all be over.
Speaker 1: No more whispering voices, no more ghostly figures glimpsed out
Speaker 1: of the corner of his eyes. When suddenly all hell
Speaker 1: broke loose. Wilson barely had time to react as the
Speaker 1: cacophonous sound of machine gun fire rang out all around him.
Speaker 1: Stumble back into the hutch. He was joined almost immediately
Speaker 1: by Corporal Lena, yelling for him to tell him where
Speaker 1: the fire was coming from, but Wilson didn't know. It
Speaker 1: all happened so fast. Then an almighty wush went up
Speaker 1: into the air, the sound of a rocket propelled grenade
Speaker 1: being launched close by. Lena shouted for Wilson to get down,
Speaker 1: and together they braced for impact, and then nothing, only
Speaker 1: the silence of the desert save for the melancholic ring
Speaker 1: of a distant cow bell. Wilson and Lena staggered to
Speaker 1: their feet, utterly confused, and stared out into the night.
Speaker 1: After sixty days, Corporal Jacob Lena, Lance Corporal Adam Wilson,
Speaker 1: and Lance Corporal Austin Hoyt returned to Patrol Base Hassanabad
Speaker 1: and rejoined the rest of their compatriots from second Battalion,
Speaker 1: eighth Marine Regiment. All three of them returned home alive. Others, however,
Speaker 1: who had spent time with them on the Rock, were
Speaker 1: not so lucky, leaving Lena to wonder that perhaps it
Speaker 1: was their uncovering of things in the earth there that
Speaker 1: had placed a curse on them. In many ways, However,
Speaker 1: the men had been cursed a long time before they
Speaker 1: ever made it to Observation Point Rock, caught up in
Speaker 1: an unwinnable war, their valiant efforts forever fated to be
Speaker 1: beaten back against a complex tide of history and circumstance.
Speaker 1: By the time the reports of the strange goings on
Speaker 1: at the Rock were first published, in a twenty oh
Speaker 1: nine Times article written by Tom Coglan, the rumours were
Speaker 1: old news among many of the troops that had the
Speaker 1: misfortune to come by it, and over time a picture
Speaker 1: began to emerge of oblique and haunting history. One local
Speaker 1: scholar suggested that the hill had once been an ancient
Speaker 1: fort built some time in the eighteenth century, under which
Speaker 1: a series of tunnels had been constructed, before later becoming
Speaker 1: a sacred shrine to many of the local communities. At
Speaker 1: some point in the nineteen eighties, it is thought to
Speaker 1: be occupied by soldiers from the Soviet Union, who fought
Speaker 1: a long and bitter battle alongside the People's Democratic Party
Speaker 1: of Afghanistan, the ruling power at the time, against a
Speaker 1: number of militia groups intent on overthrowing them. Some claim
Speaker 1: that early in the conflict, Nasim A Kunzada, the fearsome
Speaker 1: commander of one such militia group, captured the rock along
Speaker 1: with the soldiers occupying it, and had the more beheaded
Speaker 1: on the spot, then later buried where they fell. Others
Speaker 1: have suggested they were in fact members of the Afghan
Speaker 1: police force in time, helped with funding from the United
Speaker 1: States government, who, like the Soviet Union were keen to
Speaker 1: be the dominant influence over the area. The Soviet Union
Speaker 1: and the PDPA were eventually defeated by the militia forces.
Speaker 1: By then, however, those forces had merged into a fragile
Speaker 1: coalition often lumped together under the term mujahadeen. It is
Speaker 1: from this group of people, in one way or another,
Speaker 1: that Osama Bin Laden al Qaeda, and ultimately the Taliban
Speaker 1: would emerge, and well, you know the rest. In the
Speaker 1: Soviet Afghan War of nineteen seventy nine to nineteen eighty nine,
Speaker 1: it is estimated that around fifteen thousand Soviet soldiers were killed,
Speaker 1: with anywhere between half a million to two million Afghans
Speaker 1: also thought to have been killed. Since two thousand and one,
Speaker 1: war in Afghanistan has claimed the lives of roughly two
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty thousand people, among them four hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty seven UK Armed Forces personnel and two thousand, three
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy two US military personnel. An estimated seventy
Speaker 1: one thousand Afghan and Pakistani civilians are also thought to
Speaker 1: have lost their lives as a direct result of the war.
Speaker 1: This episode was written by Richard McLain Smith Unexplained as
Speaker 1: an AV Club Productions podcast created by Richard McLain Smith.
Speaker 1: All other elements of the podcast, including the music, are
Speaker 1: also produced by me Richard McClain smith. Unexplained. The book
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