Time is running out to evacuate Afghan translators with US troops

Human intelligence operations in Iraq and Afghanistan were dangerous. Speaking to sources with information on al Qaeda and the Taliban, without identifying them as working with Americans by their visiting U.S. installations, was challenging. It required clandestine meetings — out in the desert, deep in an orchard, or in a city slum. The risk of ambush at such meetings, despite efforts to vet sources, was significant. 

Most “case officers” who handled sources would not be mistaken for James Bond, myself included. The CIA gave us protective details and the military provided support when asked: an infantry patrol to mix in with, snipers for overwatch, quick reaction forces, aircraft overhead.

Many who joined the CIA after 9/11 interrupted vanilla careers and did not speak Arabic or Pashto. More of us might have been taught, but an urgent priority was to support combat operations. Most new case officers deployed to war zones as soon as we were certified as knowing the rudiments of espionage, without lengthy training to become proficient in difficult languages.

The imperfect work-around was to pair us with translators. My first translator was a patriotic Arab Muslim American, a doting husband and father, a kindly former cab driver with a sense of humor. Before we’d go on some missions, he’d tap the pistol strapped to my chest rig and quietly say, “Remember, boss, your last bullet is for me.”

He said it privately, so this wasn’t bravado. He knew what would happen if he fell into enemy hands as a Muslim working for America. He trusted me to kill him quickly, rather than let his head be taken, God forbid with his family watching via Al-Jazeera. Had it been necessary, I hope I’d have had the heart to do it. 

Translators who worked for the CIA were “U.S. persons” because they needed to be security-cleared. But most of the translators, and the many others who have worked for U.S. military units and embassies in war zones since 2001, are locals. With America pulling out of Afghanistan, and the prospects of the Kabul government uncertain at best, these friends of ours face the fate my translator feared. More than 18,000 Afghans who have qualified for Special Immigrant Visas still await their visas.   

There is apparently no real plan to process our former teammates and their family members’ visas, and our Kabul embassy shut down its visa line because of the coronavirus. This is unacceptable; first responders, health care professionals and front-line workers did their jobs throughout the pandemic, before vaccines became available. Nobody is drafted into the Foreign Service. 

We must act now to evacuate these men, women and children — to U.S. military bases overseas, if necessary, as an intermediate step. Our government too often claims an inability to solve difficult problems. The usual excuses of cumbersome interagency and National Security Council processes, creaky bureaucracies and stubborn congressional partisanship will not cut it in this life-and-death matter.

Reasonable minds differ on whether our military should remain in Afghanistan — I believe some troops should remain — but few who served there are confident in Kabul’s ability to hold back the Taliban for long. All who served know how the Taliban treats Afghan security forces who fall into their hands: gruesome death by torture and desecration of their remains. Imagine what the Taliban would do to their wives and children.

Our government has a mixed record of standing by those who cast their lot with us in wartime.  African Americans who fought for the Union Army were subjected to Jim Crow laws when Reconstruction was ended to resolve the disputed election of 1876; South Vietnamese who served shoulder-to-shoulder with Americans were abandoned when Saigon fell in 1975.  (President Ford saved some who, along with their families, are fellow Americans today.)

In contrast, in 1944, President Roosevelt met his Pacific commanders in Hawaii to resolve whether, in advancing upon Japan, U.S. forces should first liberate the Philippines. The Philippines and its American garrison fell to the Japanese in 1942; prisoners of war suffered terribly while local guerrillas fought the occupation forces. But there were valid strategic reasons, argued well by Adm. Chester Nimitz, for bypassing the Philippines and taking a direct route through the Central Pacific to Japan.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur had been ordered by Roosevelt to leave Corregidor in the Philippines before it fell, to defend Australia and retake the Southwest Pacific. MacArthur promised embattled Filipinos “I shall return,” and argued that the U.S. had a moral obligation to liberate our allies. As related in Ian Toll’s “Twilight of the Gods,” the general argued that to fail loyal Filipinos “would not be understandable” to Asians and “could not be condoned or forgiven.”  FDR agreed. 

Today, if we fail to save from certain death the Afghans who served alongside us for 20 years, who will step forward the next time we inevitably need similar help? Adversaries such as China are watching what happens, as are America’s nervous allies and the fence-sitting neutrals.

So, too, is history.  This is a gut- check, no-fail moment for America, for who we wish to be as a people. A big reason our most admired military units — Marine grunts, Navy SEALs, Air Force para-rescue jumpers, Coast Guard rescue swimmers — are so respected, even beyond the armed services, is that they don’t abandon anyone. The Army’s Ranger Creed puts it this way: “I will never leave a fallen comrade to fall into the hands of the enemy, and under no circumstances will I ever embarrass my country.” Well listen, Pilgrim, as a John Wayne character might have said, we’re about to do both. 

MacArthur also famously spoke about “duty, honor, country.” It’s clear what our duty is now, to uphold the honor of our country: save the Afghan Special Immigrant Visa applicants.

Kevin T. Carroll is a partner in Wiggin and Dana’s Litigation Department in the Washington and New York offices, and a leader of the firm’s National Security and Congressional Investigations practice groups. He served as an Army and CIA officer, senior counsel to the House Homeland Security Committee, and senior counselor to the Secretary of Homeland Security. The views expressed here are his own.