WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for Marvel's The Punisher, now streaming on Netflix.


Viewers, and Frank Castle, believed they knew what led to the tragic deaths of his wife and two children: They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, caught in the crossfire of three rival gangs while innocently enjoying a sunny day in Central Park. OK, it wasn't exactly "simple," as we learned over the course of Daredevil's second season that the meeting of the Kitchen Irish, the Mexican Cartel and the Dogs of Hell was a failed police sting designed to ensnare a drug lord known only as the Blacksmith. The event gave birth to The Punisher's one-man war against the criminal underworld, and led to the discovery that the Blacksmith was actually Castle's former commanding officer, Col. Ray Schoonover.

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However, Marvel's The Punisher upends our understanding of the so-called Massacre at Central Park, revealing a conspiracy previously only hinted at by Schoonover -- one that stretches back to Castle's tour of duty in Afghanistan, and ensnares a former National Security Agency analyst and an obsessive Homeland Security investigator, for starters.

Let's break down the Kandahar conspiracy, and how it led to the deaths of Castle's family.

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Colonel Schoonover's Words

Introduced during the second season of Daredevil, Col. Ray Schoonover (Clancy Brown) was a decorated Marine and Castle's former commanding officer who testified to the vigilante's heroism in Afghanistan. His devotion to country and the men under his command proved to be a thin veneer, however, as Schoonover was revealed to be the Blacksmith, the mysterious drug lord who had established a heroin trade in New York City to rival Madame Gao's. Castle (Jon Bernthal) eventually confronted his former mentor to save Karen Page (Deborah Ann Wohl) and to take revenge against the man who was indirectly responsible for the loss of his family.

Clancy Brown as Col. Schoonover on Daredevil

Even as he was dragged to his execution, Schoonover taunted Castle, dropping the first hints to the truth behind the massacre: "You think this -- all of this? -- is about a bad drug deal? That's what you think. You're losing your touch, Frank. Your kids, at the park, bah, who cares? That's never what this has been about. It's what happened with you -- with all of us -- in Kandahar. You think they'd ever let that go?"

What Happened in Kandahar?

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While under Schoonover's command, Castle and his best friend Billy Russo (Ben Barnes) were part of Operation Cerberus, an elite team tasked with covertly capturing, interrogating and executing "high-value targets," under the direction of the mysterious CIA agent known to the men only as Agent Orange ("I point, you shoot," he instructed them). Dubbed by the locals as "the American Taliban," Cerberus was troubling on its face, as it didn't officially exist, and functioned outside the law and, so it turns out, without Congressional authority. But that barely scratches the surface of what unfolded in Kandahar.

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Entwined with those morally and legally problematic aspects that possibly could be rationalized as the costs of war, there was also an illegal heroin operation that makes the stated purpose of Cerberus seem almost quaint by comparison: Schoonover, Agent Orange (Paul Schulze) and Col. Morty Bennett, the Kandahar base's head of mortuary services, were secretly packing the bodies of dead servicemen with heroin, and then shipping them back to the United States, to fund Cerberus. Carson Wolf (C. Thomas Howell), special agent in charge of U.S. Homeland Security's New York City office, was also involved in the drug trade, presumably overseeing the arrival of shipments stateside.

The Bible-quoting Marine Gunner Henderson (Jeb Kreager) accidentally stumbled upon their scheme, but he wasn't the only one.

The Execution of Ahmad Zubair

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Ahmad Zubair was a member of the Afghanistan National Police partnered with U.S. Homeland Security Agent Dinah Madani (Amber Rose Revah). While investigating U.S. soldiers involved in the drug trade, Zubair apparently got too close to the Kandahar operation. Portrayed by Agent Orange as another "high-value target," Zubair was apprehended and tortured, and then interrogated by the CIA agent in front of six masked members of Operation Cerberus. Repeatedly asked "Who else knows?" in Pashto -- a language apparently unknown to the servicemen -- Zubair was threatened by Agent Orange when he proclaimed his innocence in English. Then he was executed on the agent's order, by Castle.

Zubair's body was buried in the desert at night by Castle, who first dug the bullet out of his skull, and others, as Henderson questioned whether their actions seemed like a coverup. It was, of course.

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The Tape

The interrogation, and execution, of Ahmad Zubair was secretly recorded by Henderson following his discovery of the heroin operation. That tape eventually landed on the desk of National Security Agency analyst David Lieberman (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), who was unable to ignore what he saw and simply forward the video to his superiors, as his wife had suggested; he sent copies to Madani and Castle. Lieberman should've listened to his wife, though, because his actions led to him being framed as a traitor and gunned down in public by Carson Wolf.

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Saved from Wolf's bullet by a phone conveniently placed in his shirt pocket, Lieberman went into hiding, becoming known as Micro. Presumed dead by the authorities and his family, Lieberman was one of the lucky few, as that tape left a string of bodies in its wake. You see, Agent Orange, also known as ambitious CIA veteran William Rawlins, and Wolf believed Castle had sent the video to Lieberman, even though he was also incriminated by the recording. "It damned us all," Castle later admitted.

The Massacre at Central Park

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While uncovering the true identity of Micro, who had not only discerned The Punisher was still alive but also tracked him down, Castle learned of his connection to Wolf. And it's Wolf who ultimately provides context, and confirmation, for Schoonover's words and an understanding of why Castle's family was killed.

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Subdued and tortured in his own home, before seemingly gaining the upper hand, Wolf divulges that the Massacre at Central Park was nothing more than a cover for Castle's intended assassination, all because it was believed he sent Micro the video. "We knew exactly where you'd be, exactly where to go to get you," he says. "You bored your squad shitless talking about your homecoming tradition. Picnic in the park, Frank? You really were your mama's apple pie, weren't you?" Maria Castle and the kids were merely "misdirection," designed to disguise the true target. "We figured if there were enough dead bodies, nobody would really care to look close enough to any given one of 'em."

The Bloody Coverup

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The conspiracy to hide the covert activities in Kandahar began to unravel as soon as it was hatched, leading to increasingly extreme measures to maintain its secrecy. The execution of Ahmad Zubair was not only captured on video, it was doggedly pursued by Homeland Security investigator Dinah Madani, who was determined to learn what happened to her former partner. Not even a transfer from Afghanistan to New York City, or orders from her new supervisor Carson Wolf, would deter Madani from her pursuit of the truth. Wolf's murder, accompanied by the discovery of $30 million in his bank account, only increased her resolve.

Of course, Madani's interest is perhaps the least of the consequences of the repeatedly botched coverup. Maria Castle, Lisa Castle, Frank Castle Jr., an undercover agent and countless gang members died during the Massacre at Central Park, but Frank Castle survived, and as a result was transformed into a tireless vigilante. David Lieberman was tarred as a traitor and seemingly executed, only to go into hiding, where he could pick at the frayed threads of the conspiracy. Still, Rawlins wasn't finished.

Presented with the opportunity for promotion to deputy director of the CIA, Rawlins became even more desperate to bury skeletons. After all, three can keep a secret if two of them are dead. There were seven men in the room when Zubair was executed; the only one remaining who isn't in on the conspiracy is Gunner Henderson. Or so Rawlins thought. He dispatches a death squad to rural Kentucky to kill Henderson, and in the process learns Castle is still very much alive, and is coming for him -- and anyone else connected with the murder of his family.


Now available on Netflix, Marvel's The Punisher stars Jon Bernthal, Ben Barnes, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Amber Rose Revah, Deborah Ann Woll, Daniel Webber, Jason R. Moore, Paul Schulze, Jaime Ray Newman and Michael Nathanson.