Afghans Vote Amid Chaos, Fear, Violence Low Turnout at Polling Centers in ‘Disorganized,’ ‘Flawed’ Election
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Volume 78, No. 117B ©SS 2019 CONTINGENCY EDITION Sunday, September 29, 2019 stripes.com Free to Deployed Areas Afghans vote amid chaos, fear, violence Low turnout at polling centers in ‘disorganized,’ ‘flawed’ election BY RAHIM FAIEZ AND KATHY GANNON Associated Press KABUL, Afghanistan ccusations of fraud and misconduct, scores of Taliban attacks, threatened to overwhelm the results of Satur- day’s vote for the next president of Afghanistan, denying the winner legitimacy and frustrating efforts to restart peace talks to end 18 years of war. When polls closed Saturday, Afghanistan’s Interior Minister Massoud Andarabi said there had been 68 Taliban attacks across the country, most of them rockets fired from distant out- posts. At least five people were killed, includ- ing one police, and scores more were injured. SEE VOTE ON PAGE 4 A woman waits to be identified before voting in Afghanistan’s presidential election on Saturday. PHILLIP WALTER WELLMAN/Stars and Stripes Army reveals initial standards for new fitness test BY COREY DICKSTEIN service leadership as an age- and gender- demands,” grey for ones with “significant Stars and Stripes A perfect score on neutral assessment of soldiers’ ability to physical demands,” and black for ones with conduct physical activities that they would “heavy physical demands.” WASHINGTON — To ace the new Army the new Army Combat face in combat. The six-event test is slat- Soldiers with jobs in the gold category, Combat Fitness Test, a soldier would need Fitness Test is 600, ed to become the Army’s official physical which includes specialties such as dental, to deadlift 340 pounds, launch a medicine evaluation in October 2020. logistics and public affairs, are required to ball 12.5 meters backwards, complete which was fi rst After conducting testing at more than 60 achieve a minimum score of 60 points in 60 hand-release pushups, finish the new achieved last month battalions in recent months, Army leaders each event to pass. Sixty points are award- sprint-drag-carry event in 1:33 minutes, grouped military occupational specialties, ed for deadlifting 140 pounds, for reaching execute 20 hanging leg tucks and run two by Maj. Timothy Cox or MOS, into three levels with different 4.5 meters on the standing power throw, miles in 13:30 minutes. scoring requirements based on the typi- for completing 10 hand-release pushups, The Army on Friday revealed its initial in an unoffi cial test cal physical demands of those jobs. They for finishing the sprint-drag-carry in three minutes, for executing one leg tuck sets of standards that soldiers must achieve at Fort Bliss, Texas. identified the groups of MOS by colors to pass its new-age fitness test billed by — gold for ones with “moderate physical SEE STANDARDS ON PAGE 6 NATION MILITARY GADGETS Depositions scheduled, Fort Bragg residents iPhone 11 improves battery subpoenas issued in share housing concerns life, camera, but remains an impeachment inquiry at town hall meeting incremental upgrade over ‘X’ Page 7 Page 6 Page 20 A’s, Rays complete baseball’s 10-team postseason field » MLB, Page 25 PAGE 2 •STARS AND STRIPES• Sunday, September 29, 2019 MILITARY 2 former soldiers charged in Fla. slayings Pair traveled internationally to fight in wars, linked to soldier suspected in bomb plot BY MEAGAN FLYNN stocked with assault rifles and The FBI says it found the details The Washington Post ‘ so, week six of African jail. just body armor, saying he wanted to of the plot in numerous Facebook contracted cholera. kill his pregnant wife, Vice re- messages he and Lang exchanged The listing said, “For Sale: Lot ’ ported. Lang was dishonorably in the weeks and days leading up of Guns,” and Serafin Lorenzo Alex Zwiefelhofer discharged from the Army and, to the Lorenzo killings. was interested. Facebook post from Kenyan jail after spending time in jail for the On April 4, 2018, the two men The 53-year-old who went by incident, couldn’t get a job, he told met at a Greyhound bus station Danny liked to buy expensive Vice. in Florida and together headed items and resell them for a profit, So, he went back to war. Months to Miami, prosecutors say. Lang they learned the gunmen were join Lang as a fighter in another and the cache of guns he found later, in September 2016, Zwiefel- brought the cache of guns from two ex-Army soldiers bent on extremist unit in Ukraine, where on ARMSLIST.com offered the hofer would go AWOL from the home in Arizona. Once checked joining right-wing paramilitary Lang currently lives, according bargain he was looking for. There Army too, prosecutors say and into the La Quinta Inn, they were four Glocks, a couple of groups involved in armed con- to that complaint. flicts worldwide. The gun listing Lang is now in custody in would encounter Lang upon ar- planned to hit up an Army sur- 9mm pistols and nine high-pow- riving in Ukraine. plus store for body armor, meet ered rifles. The Florida seller, a was true in one respect: They Ukraine, Radio Free Europe re- were leaving the country — to go ported Thursday, citing Lang’s But after a while, Lang and with a yachting company to tour guy named “Jeremy,” wanted just to Venezuela to fight the govern- associates and local fighters. Zwiefelhofer decided they want- some boats that would make ideal $3,000 cash. ment with the resistance, pros- Zwiefelhofer was arrested ear- ed to change course. In June candidates for theft and finally, “Leaving the country soon,” ecutors say. The guns were going lier this month in Wisconsin, and 2017, they headed to South Sudan put up the fake gun listing to set Jeremy’s listing said. “Looking with them. They allegedly just both are now awaiting extradition to fight al-Shabab, a jihadist ter- up the deadly robbery, according to sale [sic] all my guns as I can’t wanted the Lorenzos’ $3,000 to to Florida. rorist organization allied with to the complaint. take them with me.” fund the journey. Zwiefelhofer and Lang were al-Qaeda. They made it to Kenya By the time police discov- Less than 24 hours after in- On Wednesday, federal pros- used to fighting together. with one other former Army sol- ered the Lorenzos’ bodies in the quiring, Lorenzo and his wife, ecutors identified the ex-soldiers They met after joining the same dier — only to be captured by the church parking lot, Zwiefelhofer Deana, 51, were on the road from as Alex Zwiefelhofer, 22, and battalion in the Right Sector, a Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army and Lang were long gone. Brooksfield, Fl a., late on the night Craig Lang, 29, in an indictment far-right Ukrainian nationalist trying to cross the border without Zwiefelhofer ultimately re- of April 9, 2018, to meet Jeremy charging them with a host of fed- paramilitary group dedicated to papers. Stuck in a Kenyan jail, turned to Wisconsin. But Lang at an address just off Corkscrew eral crimes tied to the double ho- battling Russian separatists on writing from a smuggled “prison hadn’t given up on the plan to Road in Estero, about 190 miles micide in Estero, just south of Fort eastern Ukrainian soil. Itching for pocket phone,” Zwiefelhofer com- go to Venezuela or even back to south. At 10:44 p.m., Lorenzo Myers. The 33-page complaint combat, they were enamored by plained in a July 2017 Facebook Ukraine, prosecutors said. After texted: “I’m at the church.” traces the soldiers’ zigzagging the group’s stated goal of remov- post: “so, week six of African jail. lying low for a while, Lang met up Minutes later, the Lorenzos paramilitary campaigns across ing Ukraine from Russian or Eu- just contracted cholera.” with his ex-Army soldier associ- were dead. the world, starting in Ukraine ropean Union influence. “These He and Lang would ultimately ate, identified as “M.S.M.” in the Police wouldn’t find Lorenzo and, in Lang’s case, finally to Ven- people f------ want change,” Lang, get deported back to the United indictment, who agreed to go with and his wife in the church park- ezuela, revealing how some mili- who had completed two tours in States, each arriving at separate him to go south. ing lot until the next morning. tary veterans have been drawn to Iraq and one in Afghanistan, told airports. But more jail awaited Lang and M.S.M. managed to Next to Lorenzo’s body was a bill extremist causes overseas. Vice in a 2016 story about why Zwiefelhofer upon his arrival in fly to Bogota, Colombia. The re- of sale for 15 firearms — and a Lang was also named in a sepa- right-wing Americans were join- Charlotte that August. sistance group Lang allegedly cellphone that would send the rate federal indictment this week ing the Right Sector. The Ukrai- Zwiefelhofer and Lang were wanted to join had a safe house FBI down a wild path stretching as the alleged “mentor” to Army nian government had banned the busy plotting their next overseas in the mountains of olombia, and halfway around the world leading Pfc. Jarrett William Smith, who group from the battlefront. war-zone mission, according to they were planning to cross the to the alleged perpetrators. is accused of providing recipes Lang joined in 2016 after his the complaint. This time, prose- border to fight the Venezuelan Starting with little more than for explosives online and talking life fell apart in the U.S. In 2014, cutors said they planned to hijack government. Lang got on a bus, the online gun listing and the about killing Antifa protesters he went AWOL from Fort Bliss a yacht in Miami and sail south M.S.M.