By Bob Strong

My visit to the U.S. naval station in Guantanamo Bay Cuba began much like any other military embed. I sent an application to the Press Affairs Office (PAO) explaining who I worked for and the reason for my visit, and a couple of weeks later the trip was approved. The base is divided into two sections, the naval station which has been in existence since 1903, and the Joint Task Force (JTF GTMO) which is where the detainees are held. A special ID is needed to access the JTF section of the base and most residents of the naval station never go there. My visit request was directed at the JTF side, but I was able to work on the naval section as well.

GALLERY: INSIDE GUANTANAMO

I was met at the airport by two Sergeants, who would be my escorts for the entire trip. Although technically I could walk around the naval base unescorted, taking pictures on any military installation often attracts attention, and I ended up doing all of my work while accompanied by PAO personnel. After I arrived I was briefed on what could and could not be photographed, and reminded that all photographs and videos had to be reviewed and approved by military censors. This generally took place at the end of the day and was referred to as the OPSEC (operational security) review.

There is a long list of items not to photograph but ironically, I was permitted to take pictures of the NO PHOTOGRAPHY signs posted everywhere. When I mentioned that every inch of the base was easily identified on Google Earth, everyone in the office nodded their heads and sighed.

The meat of any photography visit to Guantanamo are the prison visits. There are two prisons at JTF that journalists are permitted to visit, Camp V and VI, and these are where most of the detainees are held. There is also a third, top secret detention facility called Camp VII or Camp Platinum where ‘high-value detainees’, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, are kept, but this is off limits to journalists.

On Day One we visited Camps V and VI. I was accompanied by my two PAO escorts, the JTF Deputy Commander, the U.S. Army Captains in charge of each camp, and several other soldiers. It was an impressive entourage. The Captain in charge of Camp V said there had been some unspecified disturbances lately and the prison was full, which meant there was no access to an upper level catwalk where photographers traditionally can shoot pictures of detainees. They opened one door to a cellblock and I was able to photograph a guard walking away from me past a line of closed cells. Not a good start.

At Camp VI next door I was shown an empty cellblock and a detainee room with standard issue clothing on the bed. The prisoners have begun hanging posters with written messages on the fence facing the cell door and it would have made an interested picture but predictably, it was off limits. We arrived at a cell where one detainee was reading a newspaper and I was permitted to take pictures. Because I couldn’t show the detainee’s face I needed to wait until he looked down or turned the page, but in the end I had something. I asked if I could shoot pictures of the recreation yard as I has seen before, but was turned down. There ended my prison visit.

After the prison visits, I still had two days of time to fill up, so we began looking to the naval base side for other options. We spent some time doing pictures of U.S. Marines at the rifle range, then found the fire department was training a group of Jamaicans to be the new firefighting teams. The firefighting pictures turned out to be pretty interesting, but not exactly front page news. Tuesday afternoon I asked to take a few pictures of the fence and “no photography” signs outside Camp Delta, the former prison which now houses the detainee medical clinic and administrative offices. Even with my PAO escort we were stopped and questioned by almost every person who drove past. No one could believe I was allowed to take pictures of the signs or fence. OPSEC is alive and well at Camp Delta.

The next couple of days were filled up with standard media visit stops. The overgrown former detention center at Camp X-Ray which is infested with furry little animals known on the base as Banana Rats. We did a quick tour of the harbor with the U.S. Coast Guard, the detainee library, the main shopping strip featuring a McDonalds and Subway, and a trip to the Northeast Gate to see the dividing line between the U.S. base and Cuba.

I had a pretty good look at life on the base. The prices were right; $2.60 for a full breakfast buffet and $4.60 for lunch and dinner. There are Jamaican and Cuban restaurants and a few bars to while away the evening hours, cable TV and internet, plus an outdoor movie theater showing the latest releases for free. Still, you are on a base which is only 40 square miles and the only way off the island is on a plane. When I asked Kelly Wirfel, Press Affairs Officer for the U.S. Naval Base what it was like to be stationed at Gitmo she said there was an old saying about living on the base. You can turn into a Chunk (overeating), a Hunk, (gym rat), a Monk (solitary), or a Drunk (no explanation required).

The Libyan rebel march to Tripoli – from the mountains to the coast

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In late July we pulled up to a Libyan rebel checkpoint outside the mountain town of Nalut and I got my first look at the fighting force. One rebel had his helmet on backwards, a few of them were armed with only knives, and random gunfire filled the air as men test fired their new weapons. It felt like the rebels couldn’t defeat a boy scout troop, much less Gaddafi’s well equipped army. As usual, I was dead wrong.

The rebels advance from the west began in the small towns at the base of the Nafusa Mountains in late July. The day we arrived, July 28, rebels had pushed Gaddafi forces out of a series of villages and set their sights on Tiji, a strategic garrison town on a main road leading to Tripoli.

With no electricity in the nearby towns, the Reuters team of reporter Michael Georgy, myself and a driver based ourselves in a hotel across the border in Tunisia. This meant getting up at 6am every day, crossing the Libyan border, and driving 3 hours to the front lines. We would usually get back to the hotel around 9 or 10 at night, eat and sleep.

For reasons unknown, the rebel push on Tiji stalled, so we decided to head east, to the mountain town of Zintan. We rented a house there, about an hour drive to the front lines. The house wasn’t exactly deluxe, but it had the basics and cut our drive time considerably. Most of the shops were still closed and food supplies were limited, so we brought in boxes of pasta, canned tuna and tomato paste and the driver would cook dinner at night.

Our first trip to the front brought us to a gravel pit on a ridge overlooking the village of Bir al-Ghanam. It was a Gaddafi-held town 3 or 4 kms (2-3 miles) away and his troops seemed to be well entrenched. As we looked at the tired group of rebels camped in the dirt, and the town off in the distance, I thought to myself, ‘if they try to advance they’ll be cut down like dogs.’ One day later, the rebels took the town.

When we drove through Bir al-Ghanam it was obvious that the rebels had received a bit of help in their advance. Craters next to burnt-out tanks and destroyed buildings pointed to NATO airstrikes, clearing the way for the rebels to sweep through the town.

After Bir al-Ghanam, the rebel advance became a sprint. They were moving forward 10 – 15 kms (6-10 miles) a day, facing little or no resistance from Gaddafi forces. As the rebels approached the coastal town of Zawiyah it became harder and harder for journalists to get near the front line. We were stopped at checkpoints and told we needed papers from the military council in Zintan. when we went to the council, nobody was there. Finally the restrictions eased and we were allowed to drive to the southern edge of Zawiyah.

It took the rebels almost a week to get full control of Zawiyah. One of their first targets was the large oil refinery on the coast, which fell in one day. It took four more days to clear the main square and main hospital. All the while Gaddafi forces were raining grad missiles down on the town from their positions several kms to the east, inflicting a heavy toll on rebel fighters and civilians alike.

On August 21, the rebels began their final push to the east. Tripoli was 50 kms (30 miles) away and we joined a convoy of 300-400 fighters as they advanced through a series of coastal towns. There was sporadic fighting along the route, with sniper rounds zipping over our heads at one point. The situation was chaotic, as the rebels barreled straight ahead down the main highway, only to halt in places and direct fire into forests or buildings on either side of the road.

We stopped to file our stories and at 6pm rejoined the line of cars heading towards Tripoli. What had earlier been a convoy of gun trucks had turned into a party of liberation. Civilians lined the highway waving flags and embracing rebel fighers. Rebels danced in the road and men rushed up to our van offering us cold water and cakes.

The next day we reached Tripoli. There had been reports overnight that Green Square had been taken and we were anxious to get there to report on celebrations. This turned out to be a bit premature as we soon found out. We moved from checkpoint to checkpoint to assess the situation ahead. The western part of the city seemed secure, but most of the rebels expressed concern about proceeding too far towards the center of town. We stopped at a military school which rebels had just seized. It was a good stopping point, secure and well defended.

After about an hour at the school, the rebels began to take incoming fire from a group of high-rise building about a kilomter (mile) away. It was impossible to tell exactly where the shooting was coming from, but the rebels answered with a hefty barrage of rifle and cannon fire.

A short time later, a Gaddafi anti-aircraft gun opened fire on the front gate of the compound. The initial volley left two men dead and the rebels responded with a deafening barrage of assault rifles, rockets, and other heavy weapons. When the shooting stopped, the Reuters van which had been parked nearby had several bullet holes and a flat tire.
We changed tires and headed back out of the city.

The incident highlighted the very tenuous hold the rebels have on Tripoli. There are pockets which are relatively secure due to the presence of local rebels, but there remain large areas which are under no one’s control. It took the rebels almost one week to clear Zawiyah which makes me think the battle for Tripoli could go on for quite a while.

Of course, I have been wrong before.

The first field we came to was a couple of hundred meters across, filled with pink poppy flowers in full bloom. There were several men working the field and Imran asked them what they were doing. A farmer looked up from pulling weeds and said they were working on their onions. Indeed, in a poppy field the size of a football stadium there were a handful of green onion shoots pushing out of the soil. Not exactly the perfect cover, especially after the farmer admitted to planting the poppies in the first place.

As we walked from one poppy field to the next, Imran was not amused. Finally, he gathered a group of farmers together to give them some bad news. “President Karzai has said it is illegal to grow opium poppies and that they must be destroyed. I give you 48 hours to cut down your plants or I will return with Afghan police and Afghan soldiers and we will force you to destroy these fields.”

The farmers protested. What about the money we have already spent to prepare the fields and irrigate the land? Why not let us harvest this year’s crop and we will not plant next year? Imran was firm. “My hands are tied”, he said. “If I let one farmer harvest his crop then I must let everyone harvest their crops. Everyone must be treated in the same manner.”

After leaving the farmers to mull over the fate of their fields, we continued on to the house of Haji Amir Mohammad Agha, a former mujahedin fighter and maximo power broker for this part of the Arghandab Valley. Imran and the U.S. soldiers expressed their concern over the presence of the poppy fields and asked for his counsel. “That land and those fields belong to another tribe, and are therefore none of my business”, he said. He went on to lament the damage that drug abuse can bring, even in a small rural village. “My eldest son is in prison for drug related offenses. Although I beat him regularly, he would not listen, and chose a path of self-destruction.”

After tea, we left and proceeded south, through the part of Jelawar which was under Haji Amir’s control. The soldiers peered over eight foot mud walls and again found field after field of well-tended poppies.

The temptation to produce opium is very seductive in a country where the per capita income is around $700 per year. The price of a kilogram of dried opium has jumped 306 percent this year, to $281 a kilogram from $69 last year according to a U.N. report released earlier this week.

As we reached the 48 hour deadline given to the farmers by Captain Imran, I got in touch with the U.S. military to see if I could join them as the poppy fields were cut down. There’s been a slight change of plans I was told. Instead of destroying the crops in Jelawar, the government has decided to buy the opium from the farmers. This theoretically would prevent the drugs from falling into the hands of the Taliban while giving the farmers a return on their investment.

With the opium harvest less than a month away in Jelawar, the fate of this year’s crop seems to be hanging in a three-way balance, with the U.S. and Afghan military in favor of destruction, the farmers pleading monetary necessity, and the Afghan government floating somewhere above the fray, trying to please everyone.

Last summer this fertile valley was scene to some of the fiercest fighting of the war. During a two week embed at Combat Outpost Nolen, a three-man Reuters team of Rob Taylor, Christophe Vanderperre, and myself, witnessed a daily barrage of small arms fire, rocket propelled grenades and watched as soldiers injured by
improvised mines were flown away in medevac helicopters.

The soldiers were with the U.S. Army’s 1-320 Field Artillery Regiment, and last July they had just arrived in Afghanistan to assume control of four small outposts in this lush, rural valley. In the first two weeks of their deployment they had suffered multiple amputations from ied explosions and one man had been killed by sniper fire.

Their commander, Lt Col David Flynn, called the area surrounding their base “a veritable minefield.”

Fast forward eight months. The 1-320 is preparing to leave Afghanistan and return home. But they are leaving a remarkably different place. I’ve just returned for another embed and am struck by the changes.

Route Philly, the main road leading to COP Nolen was so heavily mined last summer that the troops were forced to cut across grape fields and climb mud walls in 125 F heat to reach their post. Today Route Philly is neatly graveled and leads past multiple checkpoints manned by Afghan national police on the way to the base.

At Nolen, the tent we slept in has been replaced by a new dining hall, complete with a wide screen television. The rustic outhouse has been upgraded to porta-johns.

But the most striking change comes when you leave the base and continue deeper into the farmland towards the Arghandab River. Flynn leads a party of incoming U.S. officers and we continue on foot down the gravel road through what was once a no-man’s land of insurgents and buried land mines. The village of Charqolba Olya, a mere 200 meters away, was used as a fire base by insurgents last summer, offering them a vantage point to shoot small arms, rpg’s and mortars at the base. Today the same compound is called Strongpoint Lugo, and is manned by U.S. and Afghan soldiers.

Walking further we pass more police checkpoints, each several hundred meters apart, and reach Strongpoint Manley and one kilometer later we arrive at Combat Outpost Durham. These new bases are tidy, but far from luxurious. More importantly, the U.S. and Afghan army units stationed here hold vital ground.

The expanded military presence in the valley came about after months of hard fighting last summer and fall, as well as a concerted effort to take advantage of a lull in Taliban activity during the winter months.

So for now, there is peace in the valley. And an uneasy wait for the next season to begin.

Insurgents had ringed the small military base, deep in a traditional Taliban stronghold north of Kandahar city, with pressure-plate and remote-controlled explosive devices, creating a homemade minefield.

Soldiers on patrol stayed off the roads and cut through grape fields and pomegranate orchards in an effort to avoid a lethal misstep. In just one four-day period of intense fighting, three men died and 20 were injured.

Today, a wide gravel road winds past COP Nolen, leading to four new military outposts established in the past six months.

On a recent battlefield tour, U.S. Army Lt Col David Flynn, who is in charge of the western Arghandab, escorted officers from a unit that will replace him and his men on a walk that would have been suicidal a year ago.

“We were the surge force and we were going to make a difference here,” said Flynn, although he argues that it took more than just numbers to change the dynamic of the fight.

An aggressive push against insurgents last August, plus a series of controversial airstrikes that reduced some Taliban-held villages to little more than rubble, paved the way for 13 new U.S.-Afghan military bases in the Arghandab Valley.

Flynn says the targeted villages had been abandoned by civilians and laced with homemade bombs that were fatal to his soldiers and would be a risk to anyone returning to the area.

“When I got report that special operations had found homemade explosive with no people in the village, the recommendation came up to drop ordnance on the sanctuary that was Tarok Kalache,” he said of one village.

Afghan police checkpoints now dot roads between small villages, overlooking budding grape vines and fruit trees — although in some orchards and vineyards only stumps are left.

NEW HOMES, NEW SECURITY?

A walk through what was once the village of lower Babur revealed a narrow strip of rubble surrounded by orchards and forest on both sides, testimony to the force of U.S. bombing.

But a mosque has already reopened, and a pile of bricks had been delivered the previous day for building new homes.

Flynn says the U.S. has committed hundreds of thousands of dollars to rebuilding and is confident his team have not been duped by local powerbrokers in allocation funds and land.

Cultural and linguistic barriers, and complex relationships that are overlooked or misunderstood by outsiders, have often channeled foreign money into questionable hands in the past.

A short distance from the new mosque is Strongpoint Stansbery, one of the small military posts that Flynn says are vital to maintaining security in the Arghandab.

“The outposts are there specifically to ensure security in the village and to ensure there is no intimidation of the contractors,” he said.

Despite the current air of stability and increased security, no one is sure what will happen when spring is fully under way and insurgents return from waiting out the winter to start the traditional “fighting season.”

Flynn says they have been slow to return, cause for cautious optimism.

“People have told us this time last year the Taliban were already in the village, and its not happening this year, and its partly due to the fact that we are inside their sanctuaries that they used last year.”

But critics say that calm does not equal victory, because with all foreign combat troops due to pull out of Afghanistan by 2014, all the insurgents need to do is play a waiting game.

(Editing by Emma Graham-Harrison)

Stockholm district police spokesman Janne Hedlund said a woman had called Canadian police after the plane had taken off from Canada, saying a man on board had explosives with him.

Canadian police informed the pilot and, as the plane was in Swedish airspace, it was diverted to Arlanda airport, the main airport for the Swedish capital.

Hedlund said police were trying to establish contact with the man and explosives experts were on hand.

When the plane first landed, the passengers stayed on board, but police later decided to evacuate them.

The passengers walked slowly in line to waiting buses. Armed policemen could be seen taking up position near the plane, although fog made it difficult clearly to see what was happening.

A police spokesman at the airport said evacuation would be done in as calm a way a possible.

The police were taking the threat seriously, but were still investigating whether the man had explosives.

He said they would be able to check whether he had explosives during the evacuation.

Pakistan International Airlines spokesman Syed Sultan Hassan told Reuters that 243 passengers were on board the flight. He did not give numbers of crewmembers.

“The pilot only informed us that he’s landing there due to security reasons. All passengers and crew members are well,” he said.

“Our central control is in touch with the plane and Stockholm but as far as security checks are concerned they’re saying they are not going to tell us until they complete the process.”

At the airport, the plane was standing with its engines idling at the end of a runway, about 2 km (1 miles) from the airport terminal building.

Several police cars were parked near the plane and a larger group of police vehicles plus fire engines were parked further away.

Hedlund said that the man had passed through all the security checks before getting on the plane.

An airport spokesman said the plane was flying from Toronto and he thought the destination was Karachi. Stockholm airport was otherwise operating normally, he said.

(Reporting by Patrick Lannin; Additional reporting by Faisal Aziz in Karachi; Editing by Alison Williams)

(For more news visit Reuters India)

Stockholm district police spokesman Janne Hedlund said a woman had called Canadian police after the plane had taken off from Canada, saying a man on board had explosives with him.

Canadian police informed the pilot and, as the plane was in Swedish airspace, it was diverted to Arlanda airport, the main airport for the Swedish capital.

Hedlund said police were trying to establish contact with the man and explosives experts were on hand.

When the plane first landed, the passengers stayed on board, but police later decided to evacuate them.

The passengers walked slowly in line to waiting buses. Armed policemen could be seen taking up position near the plane, although fog made it difficult clearly to see what was happening.

A police spokesman at the airport said evacuation would be done in as calm a way a possible.

The police were taking the threat seriously, but were still investigating whether the man had explosives.

He said they would be able to check whether he had explosives during the evacuation.

Pakistan International Airlines spokesman Syed Sultan Hassan told Reuters that 243 passengers were on board the flight. He did not give numbers of crewmembers.

“The pilot only informed us that he’s landing there due to security reasons. All passengers and crew members are well,” he said.

“Our central control is in touch with the plane and Stockholm but as far as security checks are concerned they’re saying they are not going to tell us until they complete the process.”

At the airport, the plane was standing with its engines idling at the end of a runway, about 2 km (1 miles) from the airport terminal building.

Several police cars were parked near the plane and a larger group of police vehicles plus fire engines were parked further away.

Hedlund said that the man had passed through all the security checks before getting on the plane.

An airport spokesman said the plane was flying from Toronto and he thought the destination was Karachi. Stockholm airport was otherwise operating normally, he said.

(Reporting by Patrick Lannin; Additional reporting by Faisal Aziz in Karachi; Editing by Alison Williams)

Taking pictures of people who are suffering and in pain is never an easy experience. From the jump seat in the back of a Blackhawk medevac helicopter, a constant stream of injured, dead and dying men and women passed in front of me during a recent week-long embed. The wounds were as varied as the patients; an Afghan soldier with kidney stones to a Marine whose legs had been nearly severed by an IED blast.

The medevac helicopter crews were part of the 101st Airborne Division based at Camp Dwyer, a dusty Marine base in Afghanistan’s Helmand Province.  During my one week embed with Charlie Company, I would generally work from 6am until it got dark around 7:30pm. The busiest times of day seemed to be in the morning and then again in the afternoon, but calls were received 24 hours a day. About 50% of our patients were Afghan nationals, both military and civilians; with injuries ranging from amputated limbs blown off by IED’s to stab wounds from domestic disputes. The military medical facilities offer the same level of care to locals and soldiers alike, in no small part to gain a bit of good will in this hostile and volatile province.

One morning I was in my tent when the call went out over the radios, “Medevac Medevac Medevac” I joined the crew as we sprinted to the helicopter and within minutes we were airborne. The noise inside was deafening, and earplugs brought the level down to a dull roar. After about 15 minutes, the pilot increased our speed to around 175 mph (280 km/h) and we dropped to tree-top level for our final approach. The helicopter rotors kicked up a cloud of dust as we touched down and the flight medic jumped out to help board the wounded.

A group of Marines were already running towards the door carrying a litter with an injured comrade. The soldier was conscious as they placed him onto the floor and one Marine reached out to shake his hand before leaving. A moment later, a second litter arrived with a more serious casualty. The Marine had no vital signs and the flight medic immediately began CPR while the crew chief pumped air into his lungs.  They worked on the wounded man for the entire flight back to the hospital, about 20 minutes, and as soon as they arrived, a nurse jumped onto the gurney and continued to pump his chest.

We returned to headquarters and I asked the flight medic about the second Marine. He shook his head and said he had probably died before we even got there. I found out later that the Marine who died was 19-years-old, and had been deployed only one month earlier.  The crew began to clean the blood and bandages from the rear of the helicopter in preparation for the next mission.  I walked back to my tent to download my pictures, wondering how any image could tell such a story.

0600 July 30th, 2010.

I woke up and watched as two squads of U.S. Army soldiers exited Combat Outpost Nolen, a small base in the heart of the volatile Arghandab Valley. One squad would try to demolish a wall that insurgents used as cover to fire AK-47’s and RPG’s at the base almost daily. The other squad carried concertina wire to surround a couple of nearby abandoned houses in an attempt to deny insurgents locations to plant Improvised Explosive Devices (IED’s).

Moments later, the base was rocked by a huge explosion. A column of smoke and dust rose just 20 meters outside the walls and we heard the cries of a soldier in agony. Troops rushed into the base and called for a Medivac helicopter. I threw on my flak jacket and helmet and ran outside the gates to the scene of the blast.

I rounded the corner into a courtyard and saw one soldier sitting on the ground being treated, his face pockmarked with shrapnel wounds. A sergeant yelled at soldiers to secure the landing zone for the Medivac helicopter.

A stretcher was brought to an area behind a nearby wall, and moments later a group of soldiers emerged into the courtyard, carrying a seriously wounded GI. As the litter passed I look into the eyes of the wounded soldier. His face was pale gray, covered in dust, and his eyes were wide open, watching as he was carried to the helicopter landing zone.

I followed at a distance. No more pictures. The stretcher was laid on the ground near where I was standing and for the first time I could see the extent of his horrific wounds. His left leg was missing below the knee and soldiers worked to dress the bloody stump. Bandages were being stuffed into the wound in an attempt to stem the bleeding. On his right leg was a tourniquet, up high near the hip, and there were multiple wounds down to his foot. Amazingly, the soldier was still lucid and I heard him ask someone to make sure he had his wallet.

A radioman called out that the Medivac helicopter was three minutes away, and someone popped a red smoke grenade to mark the landing zone. The medics continued to work on the wounded soldier, cutting away his clothing and wrapping his left leg in layers of bandages. The Medivac helicopter came in fast and low, the rotors kicking up a massive cloud of dust. The wounded soldiers were rushed aboard and it lifted off seconds later, en route to the main trauma hospital at Kandahar Air Field.

The dust settled and a silent numbness seemed to settle over the small outpost. One soldier walked to his room and slammed the door shut. Tragically, they have all seen this before. Since arriving in the Arghandab Valley one month ago, soldiers with the 1-320 Field Artillery Regiment have stepped on six IED’s resulting in the loss of one life and nine amputated limbs. One soldier was shot dead by a sniper while on guard duty and a one million dollar M-ATV armored vehicle was destroyed when it stuck a landmine on the main road less than 300 meters from the base. The paths and fields outside their base are rigged with so many buried landmines that the Colonel in charge labeled it a “No Man’s Land”.

And yet, in spite of the dangers, the soldiers still go out on patrol. Carefully walking in the footsteps of the man in front of them, hoping that the military dog and metal detector will alert them to a pressure plate activated bomb hidden beneath the surface, and never knowing which step might be their last.