Hillah, Iraq.
Preparing for missions is a matter of time: you either have too much or not enough. Team meeting in the afternoon, and then mission briefing at 1930. Eat chow. Wait. Look at clock. Wait. There is nothing much to do as all my gear is in the C-Hut. Finally, mission briefing time, and things step into high gear.
Three targets tonight, all off a main road. Three assault elements, with our Anglico vehicle to provide security at an overpass, ready to fire illumination rounds for the team arresting the bad guy colonel we missed a few weeks back. Quick hit on an easy to find target. I note the objective area grids, the illumination from the moon (near full, 97%). Over to the C-hut, prep my FAC material, then go to my hooch. Mix up Gatorade.
Wait. Wait. Read email. Wait. Wait. Check clock. Read magazine. Wait. Finally.
I strap on my gun belt. The pistol is on safe, but still loaded with one in the chamber and two extra magazines. I place it on the bed. Put on dogtags. I replace my cotton tshirt with an Underarmour, and my cotton socks with Thurlos. Relace boots, tuck Underarmour into pants. Cinch belt tight, then strap on pistol. Tuck pen into cargo pocket. Get rifle out of locker, and check the chamber. No round in chamber. Good. Put on cammie blouse, get rifle, get notebook, shut and lock door.
In the C-hut, the atmosphere is the same as before any big game. Marines going through their own personal rituals to prepare. The rituals get you ready physically, as well as you mentally in the game.
FAC pack, and check my night vision devices. Gatorade in FAC pack. Hadji headwrap around neck, then body armor. Velcro body armor tight, then zip up the vest. Flashlight still works. Back into vest. Turn on GPS, and let it get warmed up and locked on. Gloves on. Helmet in one hand, FAC pack on shoulder, and rifle in the other hand. Out to car.
Everything has a place. Rifle on seat. Helmet next to gunner stand. FAC pack goes in front of AC unit. I pull out Gatorade bottle and jam it between my seat and the AC unit. Night vision goes into helmet. I am SAW gunner tonight. I take an M-16 magazine out of the ammo box, insert it into the weapon, chamber a round. Weapon checked on safe. Dust cover closed, and slide the weapon on top of the AC unit. Over to the Command Post now, and get coffee brewing. Rinse my cup, fill it. No milk because I forgot to bring some from the chow hall. Sugar. Stir. Back to vehicle, and place the cup on the roof over my door.
Get SAW and magazine out of the C-hut, and back out to the vehicle. Get into seat, draw SAW in after me. The linked ammunition is peeking out of the top of the magazine. Open the weapon, slide back the bolt, which locks in place. Lift the feed tray to see there is no round in the chamber. Good. Bolt forward and weapon on safe. Grab coffee from roof. I am ready.
I don’t worry about getting shot on a mission. In fact, I don’t even think about that much anymore. I know my country does not want me to die for it. However, my country may want me to kill for it, which is an entirely different matter. If I have to shoot, it will be a complicated decision. I don’t have the luxury of being up against bad guys in uniform. The enemy here is an irregular. He has no uniform, and he is most likely carrying an AK-47. Just like virtually every other Iraqi, as they almost always choose the AK-47 for their personal defense. What I worry about most is being in a position of having to shoot someone, because the rules are very complicated. Mostly, I hope that when the time comes, I won’t make the wrong decision.
The rest of the team is ready to go, and I make the bet with the gunner on whether we will see Action or No Action tonight. The gunners almost always choose Action because it keeps their spirits up and they know that they will probably lose the bet and the debt will be instantly forgiven.
We are the first car out in line in the marshalling area, which is a matter of professional pride, and quite possibly the last bit of control we can exert on the mission for the evening. Mission plans are only good for a disappointingly short time, but your adaptability is a measure of your effectiveness. We sit for a while. The sounds of preparing for war are magazines being inserted into weapons, and rounds being chambered. It is radio checks, and the idling of large motors.
I sip coffee and think on the writings of Keegan and Ambrose. They put war into perspective. I appreciate their perspective. I appreciate a belt fed machine gun more.
I know where everything is. In front of me are grenades and flares. Immediately by my right knee is my helmet with NODs. Then my FAC pack. Rifle overhead, and I touch the Gatorade over my shoulder, and check the magazines in my pouch. I touch the handle of the Big Honkin’ Buck Knife. I switch the channels of the radio for practice. I can tune to all the important frequencies by touch and counting clicks of the tuning dial.
The plan changes and we reshuffle vehicles. I get out to walk a bit, and notice my GPS batteries are low. Dig a new set of batteries out.Finish coffee and stow cup. I wait. Listen to the Marines tell stories and laugh. Then finally it is time to go. Pistol off safe. Open weapon, lay in ammo, close weapon. Check safe.
Through the gate and the smell is there. My war smells like wood smoke and livestock. Excrement. Stagnant water and decaying garbage. Petroleum and burnt rubber. Sweat. Rolling down the road looking at the mud huts with satellite dishes. The two extremes of the world in an unlikely union, and no wonder there is trouble. Seeing all that the wealthy can afford, and wanting it so badly yet there is nothing for it as they can’t afford shoes. They have no floor, but they have satellite television.
Eyes always moving. Looking for people looking for me. I never noticed the spectacular number of places to hide. Every roof, every gate. Out of the city and an easier ride.
We rolled down the main highway towards our objective area. Iraqi freeways are strange. There are a pair of two lane highways, much like North American interstates. But Iraqis drive on whichever side they like. If you don’t like the side you are on, cross the median to drive on the other. They also don’t make on or off ramps. You just drive off the freeway, across the dirt, up the side of the overpass, and off you go, which is exactly what we did. The convoy split into assault elements, and Anglico parked in the middle of the road.We had planned for a lot of contingencies, but we never discussed what to do with traffic, which came almost immediately. We stopped cars, searched them briefly, and then made them sit there. I was beginning to wonder what we were going to do with cars when an even more distressing call came over the radio: one of the Special Forces car was in a ditch and in danger of rolling all the way over. We jumped in our humvee and went to the scene.
The Special Forces humvee, followed by two SWAT vehicles had achieved surprise on their objective, but unfortunately the bad guy wasn’t home. They did suggest that maybe he was over at that house over there, so SWAT lead the way out of the area. However, SWAT missed a turn on the driveway (more of an extremely rutted dirt path) and ended up on top of the edge of the canal that separates that farm from the next. They barely had enough room for their Toyota pickups. There wasn’t enough room for the humvee. The humvee actually ended up sliding into a large pool next to the canal.
The humvee was sitting at an angle of greater than forty five degrees. All the guys got out, and now we had a real problem. The vehicle was slowly settling into the mud at the edge of the pool, and soon was sitting on the frame. The Special Forces opted to use our humvee to go hit the other target. I got out (we had an empty seat), two SF guys got in, and they found their own way out, followed by SWAT. Meanwhile, the El Salvadorans and the remaining SF guys set about getting theircar out of its predicament. They tried to use another humvee to pull it straight back out, but that only served to get it closer to rolling over. The Anglico humvee returned (the house they went to had been abandoned for quite some time), and the Marines and I went out to the main road, crossed the canal, and then carefully back down the field on the other side of the canal. We threw over our tow strap, which the SF guys made fast to the side of the stuck humvee. We took tension on the line, and fixed the immediate problem of the humvee rolling over into the pool.
Now we had a classic engineering/Special Forces problem on our hand. How do we get a humvee hung on the edge of a canal out, using only the material found on board? We tried pulling it backwards with one humvee and a tow strap, but the strap parted pretty quickly. We tried pulling the humvee upright with the Marine humvee and backwards with another humvee, but that only seemed to hang it more. Ultimately, we got two humvees to pull while the Marine vehicle kept it from rolling over, while a Special Forces guy backed the vehicle out of the hole.
By now all the other assault elements had returned (all dry holes. Bad intel again), and we formed up to go home.
Most of our experiences in combat have had very little to do with guns and bad guys, but a lot to do with dealing with all the problems that seem to come up.