William Christie 03 - The Blood We Shed

by William Christie

  Fortunately I'd planned my navigation the night before. Getting myself and the entire company lost on top of everything else was too nightmarish to even contemplate.

  The GPS hit the tank trail intersection that marked the MCCRES course starting line right on the nose. Two of the battalion staff were waiting for us. The Air Officer, a helicopter pilot dragooned to a year of duty with the grunts. And the S-3A, or Assistant Operations Officer. Both captains.

  After a short consultation with Captain Zimmerman, the word came back that the platoons would run the course in regular order: 1,2,3.

  O'Brien stepped off with 1st platoon and the Air Officer as an evaluator. Every other company in the battalion had already run the course.

  Finally the S-3A called me over to his terrain model and gave me a formal operation order. A machine-gun squad, two guns, was attached to my platoon.

  There would be a simulated artillery barrage hitting the objective at a designated time. So I couldn't attack before or during it, and I couldn't wait too long after it ended. It was an artificial constraint to put me under time pressure. Fire missions were turned on and off by radio.

  The navigation was easy. I pulled out my map and protractor to plot good old-fashioned compass bearings and distances, just to back up the GPS.

  After all the orders I'd given and received in training, always under time pressure, I could do this in my sleep. With the past couple of days fresh in my mind, I went into more detail in the execution paragraph than I would have normally.

  Then I watched, with bated breath, as the squad leaders briefed their squads. Corporal Turner was immaculate. Hell, he'd probably taught officer candidates to do it. Corporal Jones was shakier, but still pulled it off all right. That was another class I'd have to teach to the whole platoon.

  We crossed the line of departure right on time. And then, right on time, I had to pee. It always happened. Not a whisper of an urge before. All I had to do was cross the line of departure for an attack. Nothing to do but hold it in.

  Corporal Turner's squad was in the lead, and I walked just behind him. Lance Corporal Vincent was behind me, close enough to hand me the radio handset. The S-3A was beside me as the evaluator.

  We were paralleling a tank trail, but I'd laid out my course to take us farther into the woods. The underbrush on base was particularly thick beside the trails.

  I halted the platoon just short of our first checkpoint. We were supposed to make a short security halt to see how smoothly the platoon could transition from a movement formation to a hasty 360° security perimeter.

  Corporal Turner's point man halted, and the rest of the squad fanned out to form a semicircle. Then Corporal Jones brought his squad up to complete the circle. No hesitation, no switching places, no gaps in the perimeter, no screwups. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  The S-3A said, "This is the smoothest movement so far."

  Instead of grinning like an idiot I should have recognized the evil omen. As soon as we got moving again and crossed the tank trail my

  GPS died. I showed it to the S-3A and he shook his head in sympathy. I held up a hand to halt the platoon and moved up to Corporal Turner.

  "The GPS is dead," I whispered to him. "I'll get on the compass and start bearing toward the tank trail we're running alongside. Tell your flank man to let you know when he sees it. He'll guide on the tank trail, and we'll all guide on him. Everything clear?"

  "Roger, sir," he replied briskly.

  I gave him a few seconds to run over and brief his flank man. I let the now-useless GPS dangle from the strap beneath my armpit, and flipped open my compass. Sometimes a low battery gave a GPS hiccups, but I'd never had one just die on me before.

  We moved out again without having wasted much time. The terrain was so flat that trying to compare the contours of the ground to the contours on a map was useless. A half degree off my compass bearing and we'd walk right by the objective. So the flank man would follow the tank trail, keeping just out of sight in the brush. And we would follow him.

  Finally Corporal Turner signaled and I turned the navigation over to him. But I'd still keep an eye on the compass.

  I'd been calculating the distance traveled by counting my paces. We'd deploy just short of another intersecting trail, cross it, and assault the objective—which was at the junction of the two tank trails.

  O'Brien and his platoon, having completed their attack, would be the aggressors for us.

  The point stopped. Corporal Turner moved up, looking agitated. I glanced at my watch; we were running out of time.

  Now I moved up too. And stared in disbelief at the huge cleared area, blackened by forest fire, that was blocking our way. We hadn't been guiding on the tank trail after all. It was between us and the trail. And we didn't have time to go around it. Son of a bitch!

  Corporal Turner looked like he wanted to shoot himself. I wanted to shoot him.

  I ran over to the machine-gun squad leader. "Set up your guns to cover our move across the clearing." From Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's classic book Infantry Attacks. Never make an uncovered move.

  He looked at me as if I was speaking Mongolian. I time to neither explain nor strike him with the butt of my rifle.

  I ran back to Corporal Jones. "Come up to the edge of the clearing and cover our move. When I signal come across on line at the double time and bring the machine-guns with you."

  "Aye, aye, sir," he replied.

  Second squad and I sprinted across the clearing. Then I signaled for 1st Squad to follow. We went back into column and had to move fast to get where we were supposed to be in the first place. Hopefully we hadn't lost anyone, or Sergeant Harlin in the rear had been able to round them up. It was as if we were crawling and the time racing by.

  Without a second to spare, but still not late, I finally brought the platoon on line and signaled the assault. I actually thought we were going to make it.

  We started fire and movement. You begin on your belly, get up and make a short rush forward to the next cover, then fire to cover your teammates making their rushes. Then we ran into a wall of wait-a-minute thorn bushes. And instead of crashing through and resuming fire and movement the platoon stayed on their feet and continued the assault standing up, as if they were going over the top in World War I. Sergeant Harlin, the squad leaders, and yours truly were all yelling, "Fire and move! FIRE AND MOVE!!" at the top of our lungs, but were totally ignored.

  While I was still reeling from this, Corporal Jones and 1st squad swerved to the left, broke away from the rest of us, and vanished from sight. I was running after the platoon shouting, "Jones, shift right! Get back with the platoon! Jones!" To no avail.

  All this happened right before the eyes of Colonel Sweatman, Major Thom, and Captain Zimmerman. It must have been a sight to behold, a lieutenant chasing vainly after his platoon, yelling his lungs out.

  Then it was over. Corporal Turner came up to me. "Sir..."

  "We'll talk about this later," I said evenly. It's amazing, just when you're sure you've exhausted all your self-control, you find a little more. "Put your squad in the defense, 3rd platoon should be showing up soon." I pointed out the line I wanted. And then, "Sergeant Harlin?"

  He looked exactly the way anyone would if they had a block of TNT with a burning fuse super-glued to their hand, and were waiting for it to go off. "Yes sir?"

  "See if you can find Corporal Jones and 1st squad."

  A few seconds later Corporal Jones came running up with his squad. Out of breath, but he had his spin ready to go. "I don't know how we did it, sir, but we took the objective."

  To this day he probably has no idea how close he came to getting his lights punched out. I had to jam my hands into my pockets. "Corporal Jones, if you know what's good for you, you won't say another fucking word right now. Just get away from me and go tie in with Corporal Turner." Then I couldn't help it, I shouted, "And stay tied in this time!"

  Humiliation doesn't even begin to describe it. My face felt like it
was on fire. Hemingway said that a man could be destroyed but not defeated. Well, I wasn't destroyed, but I sure as hell was defeated.

  It wasn't going to get any easier, so I marched over to the senior officers to take my medicine.

  Colonel Sweatman said, "Hey, Lieutenant Galway, there'll be attacks like these. Go back to your platoon."

  "Aye, aye, sir," I said.

  Then Captain Zimmerman took me off to one side. I prepared myself for the mother of all ass-chewings, and maybe even getting fired. Instead he said very calmly, "The Marines bagged out on you; you can't let them get away with that. After this last attack is over, I want you to run it again and keep making them do it until they get it right."

  All I could manage was, "Aye, aye, sir." You never knew.

  Once Milburn was done I double-timed the platoon down the tank trail and cut back into the woods. The first thing I did was make them practice guiding on a road the right way. I think this wounded Corporal Turner's pride more than if I'd publicly ripped his ass. But you couldn't just decide to ignore orders and designate yourself the unit's human compass. Or if you did you'd better not screw it up.

  I made them fire and move through those wait-a-minute thorn bushes five times. By the time they were done the bushes were beaten down to the ground, and the Marines were as red and ripped as I was after the first attack.

  Then the word crackled over the radio that the trucks had arrived, and I ran them all the way back down that sand tank trail to the original line of departure.

  While the platoon was loading themselves aboard the trucks, I happened to overhear a piece of a casual conversation between two of Milburn's NCO's near the front of the vehicles.

  One said, "Yeah, I heard the lieutenant screaming from all the way up here...."

  A slap to the face would have been easier to take.

  The truck ride back to mainside gave me a lot of time to think. In his classic of military theory, On War, Clausewitz wrote that everything is simple in war, but even the very simplest thing is difficult. He used the word "friction" to illustrate the abrasive effects of terrain, weather, and human nature upon events.

  I got it. I was raw from all the friction.

  Nothing but doubts. I'd watched a lot of my fellow officers learn what they were taught and act like that was all they ever had to learn. While I made it my mission to read everything on infantry tactics I could get my hands on. Was I one of those guys who excelled at the theoretical and sucked at the practical?

  One thing I did know—I was a major part of the problem. I was running around like a chicken with its head cut off, blowing my stack every other second, trying so hard to do everything perfectly that the anxiety was leaching its way into everything I did.

  But I wasn't prepared to take all the blame. The case could be made that my Marines were fucking hopeless, and that it was time to concentrate on just getting by and looking good. An attitude that I suspected was at the root of all my problems. But I didn't get paid to look good, I got paid to prepare my platoon to survive in combat. And I wasn't going to watch them die because doing it right was too hard.

  So I made a resolution sitting in the cab of that truck. I was going to do it right. I wasn't going to give up, and I was never going to lose my cool again.

  Waiting back at headquarters was another surprise. My new platoon sergeant, Staff Sergeant Albert Frederick.

  It was an interesting introduction, him pressed and starched; me funky from the field, face still streaked with green and brown war paint. We were both guarded initially, not sure of what we had in each other.

  Staff Sergeant Frederick was black, medium height, and built like a greyhound—0% body fat. He was coming over from the School of Infantry, where he'd been an instructor. He'd also done Desert Storm as a new troop, and Somalia as an NCO.

  He was one self-contained Marine. Not cold, but not about to use two words if he could get by with one. He really had presence, though.

  And he cut right to the heart of the matter by asking bluntly, "What do you want from your platoon sergeant, sir?"

  I didn't have to think very hard about that. "I want to know everything that's going on, not just what you think I ought to. Whatever it is, I can take it. I want the benefit of your experience all the time, even if I forget to ask for it or look like I don't want it. If I'm about to do something stupid I want you to let me know, not let it happen. I also want you to know that I'm going to give your opinion a hell of a lot of weight, but the final call is still mine."

  "I understand, sir." And to let me know he approved, he stuck out his hand and we shook on it.

  "Now, what do you want from your platoon commander?"

  "To work through me to the platoon, and not around me, sir. And just tell me what you want done, not how to do it."

  So we knew who was verbose, and who wasn't. "You got it," I said, and we shook again. "Okay, first thing. I want you to help me unfuck this platoon."

  "Problems, sir?"

  "Well, I've been in command for less than a month, and I'm pretty sure they're the worst rifle platoon in the entire Marine Corps."

  I didn't miss the minuscule hint of condescension that escaped from his poker face. Young lieutenants were like divas, they had a tendency to be so dramatic. And staff sergeants were like the calm, efficient, experienced stage managers who kept them from flying off the handle.

  I took him through a thumbnail sketch of my experiences to date, ending with, "I'll let you make up your own mind, but there are two moves I'm going to make right now. And I promise these are the last ones without your input."

  That pleased him. We walked over to the barracks and I introduced him to the NCO's and team leaders. Sergeant Harlin was now bumped down to 1st squad leader. Normally Corporal Jones would become a team leader, displacing one of the lance corporals. But instead I made him platoon guide.

  This was an extra NCO, a platoon sergeant or squad leader in waiting, who otherwise handled supply and logistics. So Jones could run Staff Sergeant Frederick's errands and walk around with his short timer's attitude and his thumb up his ass until his discharge.

  I presented Staff Sergeant Frederick to 2nd platoon and left them to get acquainted. I didn't see him again until late afternoon. He reappeared looking grim.

  I said innocently, "So, what do you think?"

  "I apologize, sir. I thought you were...exaggerating."

  "No, you thought I was full of shit, and I don't blame you. Didn't take them long to change your mind, did it?"

  "No sir, you gave me the straight gouge. No two shits about it, they're a real SWAT team."

  Sometimes you just knew when something was going to be good. "SWAT team?"

  "Shitheads, Weasels, Assholes, and Turds!" he announced.

  I can't remember a laugh quite so cathartic. At least I wasn't on my own anymore.

  Then we talked tactics. A commander and second in command usually adopted Jekyll and Hyde personas. If the commander was a nice guy his deputy acted like the hammer. And vice versa. I'd already had to start off as the dick, so he would have to be Dad to the platoon.

  "A really pissed-off, hard-to-please Dad until we get them straightened out," he said.

  My motivation renewed, I said, "Okay, let's put our heads together. What about an equipment inspection?"

  "It's a place to start, sir."

  So I was going to be the enthusiast, and he the realist.

  CHAPTER SIX

  That Friday the battalion held a memorial service for our dead from the grenade accident. The whole unit in the base gym in forest green Service Alpha dress uniform instead of our usual cammies.

  The Corps lives by uniformity—in the spring the whole base rolls up their cammie sleeves on the designated day, and in the fall they come down. But the pair of lieutenants assigned to escort each family were in Dress Blues. I'm sure you can guess who was one of them.

  Blues are the world's most spectacular uniform, but the only way they could be more uncomfortable
was if they came with a popsicle stick to ram up your ass to make you stand straighter. To keep from leaving a trail of heat casualties in the summertime we wore lightweight white trousers instead of the usual sky blue wool with the red blood stripe.

  Staff Sergeant Frederick came to the service with an attractive black lady in her early thirties. I walked up to introduce myself, and the Staff Sergeant said, "Lieutenant Galway, I'd like you to meet my wife, Annette."

  I shook her hand lightly but firmly. "It's a real pleasure."

  "Mine too," she said. "Albert's told me all about you."

  Staff Sergeant Frederick didn't look too pleased at having that information revealed. Of course I couldn't let him off the hook. "You'd better not tell me," I whispered loudly. "I don't think we're ready to share our feelings just yet."

  That brought her hand up to her mouth. "Just kidding," I said quickly, and she let out a nervous little laugh. "It's very good of you to be here."

  "Actually," she said, "I'm down from Newark for a visit."

  Since no one offered I wasn't about to ask why she was living in Jersey. I introduced her to the Captain and the other lieutenants.

  It was a rainy day, so they held the service in the base gym. And it was a little incongruous to have Marines in full dress uniform performing a solemn ceremony on a basketball court. Not that it took anything away from it. The military reserves its greatest formality for the cemetery: taps, firing party, the folding and presentation of the flag. This was more like a testimonial to the dead, with the whole battalion in attendance.

  When it was all over Dave Peters, the battalion adjutant, and I drove Lance Corporal Barlow's family to the Wilmington airport. They were nice people. I didn't mention their son's bizarre habit, which he'd exhibited on three separate occasions. Barlow had gone out in town on liberty, gotten zombie drunk, then returned to the barracks and broken into Sergeant Palermo's room. Where he proceeded to take a shit in his squad leader's rack. He then curled up on the floor and fell asleep, only to wind up sporting a couple of black eyes after Sergeant Palermo returned home.