After a tragic shooting in Washington, D.C., Thomas and Aimen trace the story back to Afghanistan and to the CIA-backed Zero Units that carried out some of the coalition’s most clandestine kill-or-capture missions.
They discuss:
- The November 2025 D.C. shooting and the alleged link to a former Zero Unit operative
- What the Zero Units were designed to do and why they were so controversial
- Afghanistan's geography of terrorism and counterterrorism
- The lifelong psychological damage caused by black ops
- How the Doha Agreement sidelined the US’s Afghan partners
- The halfway house vetting pipeline through German
- The problem of PTSD, monitoring, and support for both Afghan allies and U.S. veterans
- Whether America can fight future wars if local allies believe they’ll be left behind
Join the Conflicted Community here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced by Thomas Small and edited by Lizzy Andrews.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices