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Front Burner
National Guard shooting and the CIA’s secret Afghan army
00:23:26
<p>Last week, two National Guard soldiers were shot in Washington, D.C. after they were ambushed by a lone shooter near the airport. One was killed and the other remains in serious condition. The suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was shot and is still in hospital facing murder charges. The picture emerging of Lakanwal is of an isolated, deeply troubled man struggling to support his wife and five kids. </p><p><br></p><p>Lakanwal is a 29-year-old Afghan-national who had served as part of an elite CIA-trained and backed paramilitary group known as the Zero Units. Tasked with carrying out some of the most dangerous missions in the war on terror, the Zero Units have also been accused by rights groups of war crimes in their notorious night raids.</p><p><br></p><p>Kevin Maurer is a best-selling author and longtime reporter who spent many years covering the war in Afghanistan. He talks about how this shooting fits into the broader legacy of the war on terrorism and the ripple effects it’...
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Welcome to Data Done Right only with the Pure Storage platform. Get started@PureStorage.com.
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This is a CBC podcast.
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Hi, I'm Jamie Poisson. Last week two, two National Guard soldiers were shot in Washington D.C. not far.
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From the White House.
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Both members were in uniform police. One was killed and the other remains in serious condition. The suspect, Ramanula Lackenwal, was shot and is still in hospital facing murder charges. He is a 29 year old Afghan national who had served as part of an elite CIA trained and backed paramilitary group known as the Zero Units. Tasked with carrying out some of the most dangerous missions in the war on terror. The Zero Units have also been accused by rights groups of war crimes and abuse in their notorious night raids. Now around 10,000 of them live in the US after fleeing their home following the fall of Kabul and the Taliban takeover in 2021. And a lot of them have been struggling. The picture coming out about Lacknwall is of an isolated, deeply troubled man struggling to support his wife and, and five sons. Kevin Maurer is a best selling author and longtime reporter who spent many years covering the war in Afghanistan. He's recently spent some time looking at the Zero units and what they've been dealing with since resettling in the U.S. we're going to talk about who they are and how this shooting fits into the broader legacy of the war on terror and the ripple effects it's had abroad and closer to home. Kevin. Hey, thank you so much for joining me.
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Oh, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
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You've described the Zero Units as the CIA, secret Afghan army, this group of special Afghan paramilitary fighters you didn't really get to speak to or learn about when you were embedded with American forces. Right. And, and why is that? And, and what do we know about the kinds of things that they did?
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Well, I mean, I've, I saw them when I was embedded. I saw them at a Special Forces base and then I was at one of their bases, but I wasn't really allowed out of my room. And that's because they were a clandestine program. I mean, it's, it's sort of crazy to think that Ratcliffe confirmed the existence of the Zero Units after this shooting. Before that they, they never really acknowledged them publicly. So. So for me, they were ghosts. They were, they were people I saw but couldn't report on. Even when I talked to some of the soldiers, nobody really wanted to go in depth, but they were sort of a fascinating unit because of the fact that they were they had the highest speed gear, you know, they had the best trucks, and they, they really only operated at night. That's the only time I ever saw them.
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And from your reporting and the reporting of many others, what do we know about the kinds of things that they were tasked with doing in Afghanistan?
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They're the classic commando unit. They were on the front foot. They were going after the most dangerous targets, the highest priority folks on the CIA list, mostly working at night, killer capture missions, tracking terrorists, that sort of thing.
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And why did the CIA lean on Afghan nationals to carry out some of these very dangerous missions there?
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You know, they were really well trained by some of, some of, you know, the coalition's best soldiers. They worked closely with SIL Team 6 and the Rangers, but they, I mean, they didn't know the country. They were fighting for their country first, but they also knew the country. You know, the Afghans, as much as. I don't trust any Westerner who says they know Afghanistan. Afghanistan. Well, for the most part, we don't. And, and it's, it's no different than, say, someone in Canada or someone where I live in the United States. You know, we, we can pick up nuance. You can pick up accents. You kind of can place people. Same with the Afghans. They, they were really, you know, they were fighting for their country, but they also know their country much better than any kind of American transplant. So that's why they're so essential to hunting down terrorists.
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A
And just to be clear, unlike American soldiers who would be deployed for months or a year at a time, right, These guys were in active combat for something like 15, even 20 years. Right.
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A lot of the guys I've met in the course of reporting both the Rolling Stone stories and then also another project, you know, they're decades at least, of fighting. Almost all of them have been wounded. Almost all of them have lost. You know, brothers, not just unit mates, but their actual brothers. I know one soldier's lost, tossed two of his brothers. So, no, these, these guys paid a huge price in this fight.
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I know you that you've spoken to many of them who have since resettled in the United States. And, and what have they told you about why they wanted to be in these units and, and part of the American war effort in general? Like, what was in it for them?
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It. Most of them are true believers. Most of them believed in, they were creating a better Afghanistan. Most of them believed in that mission. And then practically it was just a better unit. It was well run, they were well taken care of. Their equipment was good, they were well paid. It was a good position to have in the military.
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And how would you get into this unit that was so elite, that was backed by the CIA, where you were working alongside and being trained by SEAL Team Six? Like, how did, how do you get in it?
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Well, this is the, kind of, the interesting part because the administration has made a big deal of saying this guy wasn't vetted. They don't know who he is. You know, it's just patently not. That's false. They knew exactly who he was. Because you couldn't just join the Zero unit. Most, most, all of the guys were referred. So your brother was in the Zero Unit. And then, you know, he, he would refer you. And then once you got in, you went through a probationary period. You know, you didn't just go immediately on these missions. You stayed at, stayed behind, you trained and you worked your way up. So, you know, they, it was a difficult unit to get into, which is why it was so well paid and such a coveted spot.
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So you've talked about how they're really responsible for a lot of these capture and kill. Capture, kill missions. Fighting isis, fighting the Taliban, that they would often happen at night. The Zero units have also been accused of war crimes. Right. By civilians and also groups like Human Rights Watch, especially when it comes to these night raids. And, and can you take me through some of the things that have been reported on the, the civilian deaths and impact from these special operations?
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Sure. I mean, look, there's been some amazing reporting on some of the activities of the, of the zero units. ProPublica, New York Times both did excellent stories on this. The CIA, I'll tell you, it was a Taliban propaganda campaign that they couldn't be the Zero units on the ground, so they started to do a campaign to discredit them amongst the Afghan people. And that the CIA couldn't fight that propaganda campaign because they were a clandestine unit. There's some truth to that. There's also some truth to the fact that, you know, you kick in someone's door at three in the morning and bring in, you know, you, and you arrive with machine guns and all this other stuff. It's jarring, it's, it's dangerous. And so I, because I was never on the ground with them, I can't say for sure they are war criminals or they're not. I, I can say this though. I've been around a lot of tier one units, commando units. It's a very dangerous and an ugly business. War is an ugly Business. I think Afghanistan got really, really, if you look at some of the reporting, even with American units and Australian units, it was 20 years of dark war. And I think some bad things have happened, but I can't speak to these because I don't. I wasn't there and I, and, but I've asked the question and the answer I always get was that the Zero units never operated without American escorts. They never went unilateral.
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Yeah, I remember. I think it was ProPublica that 2022, quite extensive investigation that found that the zero units operations led to hundreds of Afghan civilian deaths and that the raids were frequently carried out in these remote villages where many innocent civilians were caught in the crossfire. Right. And the secrecy around these units and their CIA affiliation is why some have said they were able to carry out these kind of abuses. Right. Or why they weren't investigated more. And what do you make of that?
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I make that the CIA denies it. I make that the guys that I went with deny that they did any, any war crimes. They don't deny, though, that they got into a lot of fights and killed a lot of people. I don't. It's a shadow that hangs over these units. And, and I think, and I think it's, it's. It's hard for me to decisively say either they are, you know, they are war criminals or they're not. I guess at the end of the day, it, it's probably somewhere in the middle and, and like all war, it's gray and gross and, and hard to. To. To. To, you know, hard to parse out that easily.
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So let's go to August 2021. The capital Kabul falls to the Taliban and America pulls out of Afghanistan.
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I'm here to announce the completion of our withdrawal from Afghanistan and the end of the military mission to evacuate American citizens, third country nationals and vulnerable Afghans, the last C7.
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And with them they take 81,000 immigrants and almost 10,000 of them are members of these zero units along with their families. And this is all part of this biden era Operation Allies. Welcome to resettle Afghans who are vulnerable under Taliban rule because they worked with the Americans.
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No country in history has done more to airlift out the residents of another country than we have done. We'll continue to work to help more people leave the country who are at risk.
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And Ramanula Lackinwall, the suspect in the D.C. national Guard shooting, is one of them. And what sorts of challenges did the Zero unit members generally face after they resettled in the US you spent so much time with them.
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Well, I'll start with that. They were instrumental in the evacuation. They all left their bases. They got around the airport there, and they helped hold the airport and did a lot of missions leaving the airport to go get Americans and can bring them to the airport for evacuation. Once they got here, though, they were sort of jettisoned into this system because they were a clandestine unit. They had trouble getting paperwork to prove that they were actually employed by the CIA. There's a really good organization named Famille that has done great work on really trying to help them over overcome some of these obstacles. But like every One of those 81,000 Afghans, they. They face the same thing. Culture shock, language barriers, educational barriers, and then being able to legally work and support their families. All of that pressure was immediately upon them.
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Did any of them consider staying in Afghanistan?
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All of them would tell you they'd stay. They just weren't. They were ordered to get on the plane, and they arrived with almost nothing. Um, but they all would go back in a heartbeat. Most of the guys I talked to would go back in a heartbeat to continue the flight for. For Afghanistan.
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When they got to the United States, like, what kind of support did they receive from the CIA or other government departments to help ease that transition?
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You know, based on my reporting, the.
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The.
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The support from the CIA was slow coming, I think. I think they built some. Some of the support structure of at this point, but it's never been that robust. Most of the support they initially got was from this kind of fledgling nonprofit. Gita Bakshi set up this nonprofit almost from scratch. It started out just really helping get food and moving guys around, and it's really evolved into helping them move through the immigration system. But I don't think we can sleep on the fact that it was such a jarring evacuation and the fact that These soldiers fought 10, 15 years for a country that no longer exists. And I think that weighs on them too, that failure of not being able to defend their country. I think that puts a tremendous amount of pressure on them.
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What did they say to you when you talked to them about that kind of stuff? You know, I imagine that they must have so much trauma from all this time in Afghanistan.
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I mean, they have considerable trauma. I mean, I think. And I think that the trauma is almost compounded because of the fact that, you know, they all have the Afghan. The old Afghan flag up in their. In their apartments. A lot of them have it tattooed on their bodies, and it's a flag that doesn't exist. It doesn't represent that country anymore. And I think the amount of regret and guilt they feel is palpable.
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Lockenwell himself, himself, we do know now that he had been having a difficult time since moving here and that he was feeling abandoned by the CIA after serving them for over a decade. Not. Not to excuse the actions, but. But what kind of things did you learn in your reporting, especially talking to other unit members that. That knew him about. About him and his experience in the.
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US all of them condemn what he did. It almost goes against what their training was and what their mission was. But the friends of his that I've spoken with talked about how hard he was having. He was deeply depressed. He would have these manic episodes. He was desperate to get out of Bellingham, Washington. He wanted to move to a bigger Afghan community. He was having trouble getting over the language barrier, could not. He lost his job over some immigration paperwork, was trying to make ends meet. The. The pet. The portrait they paint is a guy who's under tremendous pressure and is not handling it well and was starting to break down.
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And in September. Am I right to say his nephew tried to help him find housing somewhere with more of an Afghan community because he wasn't feeling safe where he and his family were settled in Bellingham, Washington?
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That's right. I reviewed an application that is his nephew had submitted around that allegedly he was also assaulted by. By someone that he felt like his life was in danger to paranoia and that I think that compounded some of the other issues.
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And he had sought help from other Zero Unit vets too. Right. Can you tell me more about that?
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Yeah. I mean, he was part of. He was on a group chat that the CIA had set up. The CIA has a program that is supposed to help help these guys in the transition. And he had. He had reached out for help on that program and. And hadn't really received the support he needed. And so, you know, this looks like a. You know, without putting all the pieces together, the initial. The initial portrait is of a guy who was. Who was breaking down and slipped through the cracks.
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The AP had a pretty extensive piece on him as well. Right. They. They talked about sometimes how he would spend weeks in his darkened room not speaking to anyone, not even his wife or his kids, or a couple of times when his wife left him with the kids for a week to travel to visit relatives. The children would not be bathed or clothes would not be changed. They would not eat well. Their school had raised concerns about the situation. So not. Not a good. Not a good situation, you know, Authorities are still trying to figure out what Lackawanna's motive was. However, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson sent NBC this statement on Saturday putting the blame on the previous administration, saying this animal would have never been here if not for Joe Biden's dangerous policies which allowed countless unvetted criminals to invade our country and harm the American people. We talked about the kind of vetting required for. So, you know, you talked about this a little bit already, but I wonder if you could just elaborate on this for me a little bit more and, like, the kind of process that he would have to undergo to be granted a special visa to move to the.
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U.S. i mean, he was vetted by the administration. One. He was vetted by the CIA to join. Now, I've seen people push back on that and say, well, it's different to vet somebody who is going to fight for you versus someone who is going to come into the country. But he was vetted multiple times before he received asylum. That's a permanent designation, and it's reviewed by the FBI, dhs, the CIA. They did biometrics, fingerprints, all that stuff. This narrative that somehow he. He slipped. He, you know, he was unvetted and came here is. It's just not accurate. It's propaganda. They're trying to paint this in a way, using terms like animal. You know, I just. It's demeaning and it's. It's not true. I think they know, and I know from my sources, official sources, they know they vetted him. They know that. That he. He. He got the asylum because they checked him out and he didn't have any kind of derogatory record. So I, I pushed back firmly on this, on this idea. He wasn't vetted. He was vetted. They knew who he was.
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People have been talking about how this isn't like a completely isolated incident. Like, while he wasn't a Zero unit member, Jamal Wally, an Afghan national and former interpreter for the US Military, was killed after shooting at two police officers during a traffic stop in Fairfax, Virginia, earlier this year. And the whole thing was captured on body cam. And he, and he goes on this rant essentially, in this video, where he talks about how much he's been struggling to make a life here after sacrificing the one that he had back home in Afghanistan. You people brought me to this goddamn.
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Country and I'm dying every single day, and I have four children. And we wholly survive because Europe. Okay. Yeah.
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Because I can't get a job, I can't get a disability. And what kind of risk do you think these veterans pose, especially if they continue to feel isolated and unsupported by the country that they chose to help?
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I don't think they pose a massive risk. I mean, if you look at the numbers, they're, they're, they're, you're going to have, what is it, the 10 rule 10 of anything is not, is, is, is not great or is bad. I think it's, I don't think they pose a risk. I think, though, that I, I think we don't understand the level of how, how high the hurdle is to, to assimilate. You know, this isn't, they're not assimilating to another, you know, they're not assimilating to another country that even is remotely like Afghanistan. They're different culture, a different language, different values. I, I, I just think we have to be open to the idea that we have to, you have to build systems to help these, these Afghans resettle and build a life.
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A
Since the shooting, the Trump administration has introduced a bunch of sweeping immigration restrictions, including pausing asylum decisions. How long does your administration plan to pause asylum into the US I think long time.
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Can you, can you give any. We don't want, we don't want those people. We have enough problems. We don't want those people.
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Is that a year, two years.
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No time limit.
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Reexamining green card applications for people from countries, quote of concern and halting visas for Afghans who assisted the US War effort. And what could this, this mean for the thousands that are living in the US who worked with American forces in the war on terror and are still waiting for their visas?
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B
I mean, it's going to, it's going to create already a very arduous process, is now going to be longer for people who are waiting and for those who have been granted either special immigrant visas or asylum. You know, they're just going to get revetted again. We must now reexamine every single alien who has entered our country from Afghanistan under Biden. I understand the move. I guess. I guess my question to the officials is this move wouldn't have found, you know, lock and wall. He would have passed the, because he passed the vetting already. So I'm not sure how this makes it safer, but it's, you know, it's an action, I guess.
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Yeah. Do you think this is also going to make it harder for those who have their visas and who are trying to make this new relationship with their new home?
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I mean, that's a fear. That's a fear with some of the, some of the folks I've talked to are concerned about being under the microscope again. I think there's, there's some resentment to one, one guy and this action painting everybody with a pretty broad brush and putting them all under scrutiny that they probably don't deserve the majority of them.
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Thinking about the big picture here, what do you think the shooting and everything that we've talked about today tells us about the ways the impact of America's war on terror and foreign policy in general can eventually be felt closer to home?
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I think this is just another data point in, in, I think the tragedy of that 20 year war. And I think if you look at, and I said this in the set in the Rolling Stone in my second piece on Rolling Stone, the one that came out on Monday, it's just part of the legacy of foreign policy. Like we have a long history in the United States of, of abandoning allies. And this seems to be Radcliffe's comments in particular seem to be on, you know, the abandonment of the Kurds, the abandonment of the Montagnards. As I wrote, it feels to me like American loyalty has an expiration date. And sooner or later we get, we as the Americans find something else to go and we get angry with the allies. It's a tragedy. And it's another tragedy in a 20 year, you know, war that ended in tragedy.
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Kevin, thank you very much for this.
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Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.
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All right, that's all for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you tomorrow.
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For more cbc podcasts, go to cbc ca podcasts.