Special to WorldTribune.com
A congressional hearing held last week on the 2011 helicopter crash in Afghanistan that killed 30 American service members, including 17 elite troops from Navy SEAL Team Six, was a farce, say family members of the fallen warriors.
“This was a joke,” said Billy Vaughn, father of Navy SEAL Aaron Vaughn in an exclusive interview on American Heartland with Dr. Grace.
Related: What happened to SEAL Team Six? The most serious scandal of all
“There was no one there to testify that had actual knowledge of the shootdown,” said Karen Vaughn, mother of the deceased warrior.
“Very little happened today,” said Mrs. Vaughn, “They asked softball questions of retired military personnel, none of which were in their positions at the time of the shootdown of Extortion 17,” she said.
During the Feb. 27 hearing, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Gary Reid, retired from the military since 2007, read a statement indicating that the mission conducted on the evening of Aug. 6, 2011 followed proper procedures and all the decisions made by American military leaders were sound.
Reid defended the use of the Chinook helicopter and the selection of a large contingent of elite warriors placed on one aircraft. He also applauded the use of Afghan soldiers on missions in Afghanistan as part of successful operations, calling them “invaluable.”
The Afghans that boarded the Chinook that evening had been properly vetted, he said. In addition, he reported that there was no possible ambush because Afghan officials were not involved in mission planning.
“We do no believe Extortion 17 was the victim of a pre-planned enemy ambush, nor do we believe the enemy had advance knowledge of our flight route and landing zone location,” said Reid to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security.
“This information was not provided to anyone outside the SEAL and Army aviation task force commands. Because the mission was developed and approved after the Ranger assault had begun, there was no coordination with Afghan officials,” he said.
Reid also exonerated the rules of engagement. “We do not believe the rules of engagement restricted our forces from engaging the enemy during this operation,” he said. In his view, this was just another tragedy during the course of war.
In other words, everyone did everything right and yet 30 warriors died. If this is brilliant execution of a mission we need to know what Reid defines as failure.
Family members of the fallen vehemently disagree with the Pentagon’s assessment.
The Vaughns said the hearing was in fact just a whitewash. They said only Rep. John Mica, Florida Republican, asked good questions that were in line with the issues raised by the parents and that other members of Congress in attendance merely used the time allotted to make statements, including discussing deaths of fellow constituents. They were basically grandstanding not investigating.
“It was defeating, depressing and very disappointing,” said Mrs. Karen Vaughn. This was not the intense, probing investigation the parents had been promised.
“They clearly insinuated that those of us who have questions about this shootdown have not dealt with our grief properly. It was that insulting,” she said. “We got more conflicting stories,” said Vaughn.
The families were told at the hearing that there was no black box on the CH-47. Yet, military investigators had previously told the families that the black box of the aircraft had been washed away in a flash flood and was unrecoverable — a story that is patently absurd since there have been no flash floods in the area where the aircraft went down.
“If this is true why does it take two and half years to get the right answer?” asked Vaughn, noting that in 13 other helicopter crashes in Afghanistan a recording device was indeed found.
The hearing was also unsatisfactory regarding the Muslim prayers chanted over the bodies of the fallen, damning their souls to hell. Mr. Reid said he didn’t understand the prayers but had been told “on good authority” that the cleric is “commemorating all of our fallen and condemning the enemy.”
“If it were not so serious, it would be a comedy,” said Vaughn, decrying Reid’s lack of expertise on the prayers. “These people are a freaking joke the way they sit there and carry on. It’s just unreal. And they expect you to take it. They expect you to walk away and be quiet,” he said.
Vaughn also points out there is conflicting information on the seven Afghan soldiers who boarded the plane; they were swapped at the last minute by seven Afghan soldiers whose names were not on the flight manifest.
Vaughn was told one week before the hearing that this information was classified by the military and he would never get the answers. Yet, at the hearing Reid said the Rangers accidentally took the wrong set of Afghan soldiers on their operation and therefore the Navy Seals took the Afghan soldiers who had been originally slotted for the Rangers. It was just a swap.
“And that’s the story they expect us to swallow. Why didn’t they say that two years ago?” asked Vaughn. “This is another conflicting story that no one has ever heard.”
The Vaughns also expressed their belief that committee members were apathetic and disengaged. “Half don’t show up, half ask a question and leave,“ said Mr. Vaughn. “They don’t have the time to do their job properly and they don’t care about their job. And Republicans are just as bad the Democrats. They are not helping getting to the bottom of anything.”
By contrast to the hearings that have taken place on Benghazi, at this hearing those who were in the chain of command in the evening of the crash were not even called to testify.
Regarding the Benghazi scandal, it was only when those on the ground were called to give their account that the truth was discernible. In that incident, four Americans died and Congress has conducted an intense investigation that continues to this day. However, when it comes to the deaths of thirty heroes — a contingent of which had been involved in killing America’s foremost enemy Osama bin Laden — Congress has been lackadaisical.
This is not the way to treat the families of war heroes who have legitimate questions.
This hearing was simply disgraceful: our brave warriors who died defending our freedoms deserve a far more probing inquiry. In fact, the reason there are so many conflicting versions of the story is because the true account of what happened that night might be the biggest scandal yet to plague the Obama administration.
Families of the deceased such as the Vaughns, the Stranges and the Hamburgers have repeatedly told the media they are convinced their boys were killed in retaliation for the killing of Osama bin Laden and that they were ambushed — meaning, all those responsible in setting up the ambush have yet to be found and punished.
“This was a pat on the back to shut up some parents who were questioning senior military leadership in the Obama administration,” said Mrs. Vaughn.
“Nobody in power in this country really cares,” she said.
Grace Vuoto is the Editor of Politics and Culture at World Tribune, host of American Heartland with Dr. Grace on WTSB Radio and is the founder of the Edmund Burke Institute for American Renewal.
What investigation? Families blast hearing on Navy SEAL Team Six crash as ‘whitewash’ added by World Tribune on
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