WESTVILLE, IN. – A Gold Star family spokesman has recounted the harrowing homicide of his nephew who was a U.S. Marine Lance Corporal serving in Afghanistan under Operation Enduring Freedom.
Widely reported by various other news outlets, Joshua Birchfield was twenty-four years old when he was killed on February 19, 2010, in Afghanistan’s Farah Province by an opium-laden, Pentagon-paid Afghan security guard.
The scene of Joshua’s death was just after the crack of dawn in a dry riverbed where he and his squad members were conducting a combat patrol to identify Taliban in an area of road reconstruction. In a short distance, a “friendly” Afghan security force was huddled around a bonfire with a security guard standing atop one of several guard huts. They, too, were assigned to look out for Taliban, notorious for planting IEDs – roadside bombs.
News and military reports are mixed in how they describe the details of the security guard’s movements, but the scenario drawn is that the guard who shot Joshua descended from the rooftop and hid behind the hut with a scoped rifle. The number of shots fired was not included in news and reports reviewed, but one struck Joshua in the forehead just above the right eyebrow. Joshua died within minutes as his squad members scrambled to launch green, red and white flares indicating they were U.S. Marines.
After sixteen years, it is still difficult to grip the truth as it slips and slides between memories, news reports, a U.S. military investigation and an Afghan trial court where an “iron curtain” separated the Gold Star family from the story that would unfold on the witness stand. Occasional trial status reports from the U.S. Military left the family awash with questions and doubts.
Family spokesman, Jerry Birchfield, said, “We wanted a trial for murder in the United States, but it was never clearly understood why that couldn’t be done.”
The Birchfields’ U.S. Congressman, Joe Donnelly, became involved in the case through Joshua’s now-deceased father, Bruce Birchfield, and told ABC News, “Security contractors clearly failed us with fatal results.”
But the “buck” did not stop there.
Washington D.C.’s General Accountability Office (GAO) issued GAO-21-255 on July 29, 2021 – eleven years after Joshua’s death – criticizing the Department of Defense for insufficiently overseeing U.S. security defense contractors who were responsible to properly vet, hire and train Afghan security subcontractors and security personnel.
And the U.S. Congress would express concerns that America’s security defense contractors could be compromised in their duties from having cozied up to Afghan businesspeople and government officials to make profits.
Birchfield said the family stands firm that Joshua was murdered. He said, “As I recall, we were told that when the shooter was caught while running from the scene, he said he always wondered what it would be like to kill an American. But when he entered his plea to the court, he said he was just shooting at the ducks.”
But a U.S. Naval Criminal Investigation Service report (NCIS) concluded Joshua was “killed in action,” or in combat, according to news reports, although the U.S. Marines and Afghans were to be vetted by security contractors before working side-by-side.
And the Afghanistan trial court would convict the Afghan security guard for “negligent homicide” and sentence him to fifteen years in prison.
In 2011, Congressman Donnelly crafted H.R. 2923, legislation called “The Josh Birchfield Security Contractor Oversight Improvement Act.” It attempted to force the DOD to assign and station one single authority to monitor and control the hiring practices for any foreign national assistance in any foreign country of U.S. conflict. But politics and Donnelly’s failure to garner bipartisan support overshadowed his noble intent. It died in the Armed Services Committee.
For two years proceeding Joshua Birchfield’s alleged murder, Afghan “insider attacks” surged, killing roughly one hundred fifty American military personnel due to two-faced loyalty to the U.S. and the Taliban and grievances that their religion and culture were disrespected.
Joshua was buried in his hometown of Westville, Indiana, where one thousand mourners gathered to wish him farewell.
“Josh was a very popular guy,” Jerry Birchfield said. “If you met him, you liked him. The Marines said he was the cut-up in the group. The jokester who made everybody laugh.”
Josh was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force in Twentynine Palms, California.
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