William Christie 03 - The Blood We Shed

by William Christie

  "That's even more fucked up," I said. "Save it for the next one, in case we run out of water."

  The break ended with Thomas left for the trucks following the column. Someone said, "Welcome to the FMF, boot." The Fleet Marine Force being the operational part of the Corps.

  Enlisted Marines didn't hump to 24 mile MCCRES standard before they got to an infantry battalion. They did Hollywood humps with minimal equipment in Boot Camp, and the longest one in the School of Infantry was a ridiculously short 12-miler. My cynical guess was that otherwise a lot more privates would flunk out and the numbers wouldn't look so good.

  It was a shame. Kids who didn't have what it took ought to be sent home during Boot Camp, not get broken at their first duty station. But natural selection seemed to be the Marine Corps way.

  We only had two other drops for the whole company, putting us well under the limit.

  On one of the rest stops when I was at the front of the column, Captain Z said, "Doc Patel came to see me."

  I braced myself for an ass-chewing. "Yes, sir."

  "He said you were right, and he was wrong. He said you were calm, respectful, and professional, and you wouldn't turn loose of him until he gave in."

  Well, what do you know about that? "Just trying to keep us all from having to send out our resumes, sir. Or maybe even sharing the same cell block at Leavenworth."

  "That's what you get paid for, Mike. Taking care of your Marines and keeping my ass out of jail."

  We arrived at Landing Zone Albatross tired but in good form just prior to 2230 hours. Which was where we met our evaluators. Captain Z knew his. Not unusual; it was a small Marine Corps, less than 20,000 officers. Mine was 2nd lieutenant who'd been in the class before mine at Quantico. He'd also been to Army Ranger School, which I mention only because he dropped that into the conversation at the earliest opportunity. The Army sent every one of their infantry officers there, but the only Marines who attended as a matter of course were those assigned to the Reconnaissance Battalions and Force Reconnaissance Companies. Occasionally a school billet fell from the skies like manna and everyone fought for it like wild dogs. And sometimes an Infantry Officer Course class got one Ranger School spot. Mine hadn't. My evaluator's had, and he had to let me know he'd been the one chosen to go. I really sympathized with all the troops who didn't like officers.

  We'd be doing a lot less walking for the next two days. As the ground combat element of a Marine Expeditionary Unit, one company was the helicopter company; another the boat company with Zodiac rubber boats and fiberglass Rigid Raiders; and another the mechanized company. We were the mech company.

  The mech were AAVP-7's, which stood for Amphibious Assault Vehicle, Personnel, Model 7. Marines always called them amtracs or tracks. With a crew of three and twenty or so Marines in the back, it could do 30 miles an hour on land and 9 knots in the ocean on water jets, but was really neither fish nor fowl. Too big and high to be a good armored personnel carrier on land, and too slow to be a good landing craft on the ocean. But it was the only thing around that could do both.

  We linked up with our amtracs at LZ Albatross. There was no amphibious shipping available, as usual, so the battalion would be simulating a landing. In the morning we'd climb aboard the amtracs, drive into the ocean, turn around, and come back in to hit the beach. All the other units would be released from Albatross in what would be their normal landing order by either helicopter or landing craft.

  The amtracs drove us to the beach. Not the part we were landing on; we'd bivouac for the night farther up. The wind was whipping off the water, and it felt much colder than September. It was going to be a frosty night even with the dunes between us and the ocean.

  A 24-mile hump is no joke, and we were just settling down for some much-needed rack time when a summons from battalion came in over the radio. And all the officers trudged down to the beach road and sat shivering until a truck showed up to take us back to LZ Albatross. Where in classic military hurry-up-and-wait fashion we sat around some more before being ushered into a tent to watch infrared video imagery of our landing beach, taken by an unmanned drone.

  An hour and a half later we were in the truck heading back to the beach.

  "Well that was about a waste of fucking time," Captain Zimmerman grumbled.

  "Who would have guessed there'd be enemy on the landing force objective?" I said.

  "I know I'll sleep better knowing we've got all these high-speed recon systems," said O'Brien.

  "Oh, me too," said Milburn. "Minus the three hours we missed going to that worthless fucking briefing."

  It was really cold now. We rolled up in our ponchos and burrowed into the sand to try and hold in our body heat.

  And it was still dark when reveille passed among us in whispers. We packed up, shouldered our gear, and filed over the dunes to the tracks.

  I put the platoon inside our vehicles so they could eat chow out of the cold. Dawn was just about to break. The marshy beach smell clashed with the chemical vapors from MRE heater packs that had to be activated outside otherwise they'd gas everyone out of the back of an amtrac. My face was raw from the wind, and everyone was walking around with their hands in their pockets—an un-military act forbidden in garrison but permitted to Marines in the field. It wasn't as great as making love on the beach, but it was pretty good.

  I climbed up the side of my track, opened the vehicle commander's turret hatch, and stuck my face in, saying, "How are you this fine Marine Corps morning, Sergeant Bean?"

  "Good to go, sir. Ready to kick some ass and take some names."

  "You sound like you had your Wheaties this morning."

  "As a matter of fact, sir, I did." Grinning, he held up an individual serving box of cereal. "You want one?"

  "Only if you brought enough for everyone."

  "Sorry, sir."

  "Thanks anyway, then."

  I shut the hatch and climbed down, smiling and shaking my head. Amtracers took everything to the field, including ice chests and Coleman stoves. I heard our evaluator saying to Captain Z, "My God, I never heard a company wake up and move that quietly. I was packing my gear, I looked up, and everyone was gone. I never heard a thing. We almost got left behind."

  Then he demanded to know how Captain Z had trained the company to do it. I couldn't see Captain Z's face, but I know he was satisfied. It was the payoff for making us do it night after night in the field until we trained ourselves to be quiet and not unpack anything except a poncho.

  When it was time the amtracs fired up their engines and churned down the beach slope. The impact with the water was like hitting a sapling: a sharp jolt, then release as the ocean yielded to it. A few seconds later a sickening lurch as the treads grudgingly left the sand and the AAV turned into a boat, leaving you wondering if it was going to float. It did. Plumes of spray kicked up behind us when the water jets were exposed by the waves. I could see everything through the bulletproof glass vision blocks in my cupola, but the troops in back had only each other and light green walls to look at. An amtrac had all the sailing characteristics of a slightly-pointed brick, rocking forward and back with the waves while also rolling side to side. Not too good on the stomach.

  When we were far enough out the amtracs turned south for a bit, and then headed for the beach. I'd been worried about the wind but it had died down and the Atlantic was fairly calm. No one in back had puked yet, always a good sign.

  As we approached the beach four Harrier jets flashed across our front making simulated bombing runs. All it needed was background music. I twisted in my seat, ducked down, and signaled the troops that we were about to land.

  The amtracs hit the beach on line. As soon as the treads bit back into the sand the drivers raced for the cover of the dunes. The warning horns blared, the rear ramps dropped and the Marines charged out, splitting right and left to come around each side of the vehicle.

  The machine-guns and rocket launchers set up atop the dunes, and we fired and moved across the sand through
the scrub trees. Two Cobra attack helicopters screamed overhead, chasing after the aggressors. We pushed them off the beach; they piled into their amtracs and bugged out across the Intracoastal Waterway.

  While we finished clearing the beach our attached engineer squad checked the sand road for mines. The command and control Huey helicopter with Colonel Sweatman, Major Jonesy, and the helo squadron commander passed over along with the CH-46 and CH-53 medium and heavy transport helicopters taking Golf Company to do their air assault.

  As soon as the engineers told us the road was clear we piled back into the tracks and crossed the Intracoastal Waterway. The method was to drive down the bank, stop, look both ways for oncoming civilian boat traffic, splash and hope all the drain plugs were still screwed in tightly, then up the opposite bank and onward.

  We linked up with our platoon of four M1A1 tanks, who ordinarily would have followed us ashore in a big high-speed hovercraft called an LCAC, pronounced el-cack, or Landing Craft Air Cushion.

  We also paused to receive and give the order for the next attack, on LZ Dove. Really a formality for the evaluators, since it was a repeat of our rehearsal the week before.

  We headed north until we ran into Route 172, the hard surface road that cut across the training area, crossing on one of the thick concrete pads built into the asphalt to keep heavy tracked vehicles from tearing it up.

  Then the whole column stopped. Over the radio we heard that one of Frank Milburn's vehicles had gotten too close to the trailside embankment and thrown a track. It was going to take a while to fix that, so Milburn crammed his whole platoon and all their gear into one amtrac. We left the busted vehicle and its crew sitting on the trail. I kept repeating to myself: no omen, no omen.

  The 60mm mortar section, with two tanks, continued up the tank trail that led to LZ Dove. The rest of the company, the other two tanks in the lead, made a hard left to head west and then east, following the boundary of the training area with the intention of coming in behind LZ Dove.

  Captain Z was gambling that the most we'd run into, and that only if the aggressors were on the ball, was an anti-armor team with a couple of Humvee-mounted TOW anti-tank missile launchers. He was prepared to lose the lead tank and roll right over them, no stopping so we could be into the attack before a radioed warning would do any good.

  Much more naive, I couldn't believe that the aggressor commander wouldn't have a more substantial force blocking a major avenue of approach into his flank and rear.

  I was wrong. Just a four-man observation post that demonstrated why there had to be leaders to hold Marines' feet to the fire. They were way behind the lines, nothing was happening, so they were stretched out on a bank in full view of the tank trail, just fucking off. When we showed up they were so surprised they almost fell into the trail and got run over, then compounded the sin by firing their rifles at a column of armored vehicles passing broadside, announcing their presence even if by some slim chance we hadn't seen them.

  Now we had to move fast. We were behind enemy lines, we were compromised, and every second was more time for the enemy to get ready for us. All we had in our favor was the sometimes amazingly long time it took information to work its way up the chain of command and then back down to the right place. Friction of course.

  We exited the amtracs, leaving a Stinger missile team to protect them from air attack. We had to cross another asphalt road, Marines Road, to arrive at the rear of LZ Dove. The road was where I expected to be engaged.

  We were spread out and ready to fire as the point sprinted across. Nothing happened. They signaled all clear and the platoon went across.

  As we were picking our way very quietly through some boggy ground laced with thick growth, the point radioed all clear again, which meant we'd walked right through the back door into the LZ.

  We emerged from the brush with a sand bank in front of us. I signaled the platoon to get on line, then shucked off my helmet and stuck one eye above the bank.

  Under the trees on the edge of the LZ, less than fifty meters away, were the four aggressor M-l tanks. Like the German Tigers of World War II their only vulnerability to most infantry anti-tank weapons was a shot in the rear, where the armor was thinnest. And there I was looking up the asses of four M-l's.

  The whole aggressor company was facing the other way, and we were sitting undetected behind them.

  In my mind I kept chanting: don't fuck up, don't fuck up, as if it was my mantra. I took the radio handset from Lance Corporal Vincent and got ahold of Captain Z. "Echo-2 in position, over." Only the battalion radio net was encrypted, so we had to be careful about people listening in.

  "You see them?" said Captain Z, meaning the enemy tanks.

  "All right in front of me," I replied.

  "Understood," he said, and I could hear the excitement in his voice. "Echo-1 isn't in position yet, over."

  "Roger, out." O'Brien was still maneuvering on the other side of the tank trail. But I had priority of fires, so I got back on the radio. "Echo-4, this is Echo-2, over."

  Sergeant Lenoir, the mortar section leader, came up on the net. "This is Echo-4, over."

  I could hear the tanks and tracks that were with him gunning their engines. They'd driven up the road sounding like the full mech company, then stopped short. And while the mortars were setting up the vehicles kept making noise, fixing the aggressors' attention on the expected direction of attack.

  The movies would have you believe that all you need do was whisper into a microphone and moments later artillery would be falling on the landscape like raindrops. It was actually an involved process, since getting them to land in the right spot was critical.

  I said into the radio, "Fire mission, adjust fire, grid, over."

  Sergeant Lenoir responded, "Fire mission, adjust fire, grid, out."

  "Grid 858308, over." The spot on the map I wanted to hit.

  "Grid 858308, out." Sergeant Lenoir read it back to confirm he'd heard right. One missed digit and the first round might land right on top of my platoon.

  "Company in the defense; Danger Close; HE-VT last round Willie Pete; at my command, over."

  He read it back again. Danger Close mean that we were less than 400 meters from the target. A Variable Time fuse explodes a High Explosive mortar shell in the air overhead. Very effective against troops in fighting holes. The last round fired from each of the three tubes would be White Phosphorus, always called Willie Pete. These would blanket the area with white smoke, and let me know for sure that there were no more incoming mortar rounds still in the air as I began my assault. Of course nothing would be fired for real, but we were also being evaluated on our calls for fire.

  The aggressors might be monitoring our intra-squad net, so I crawled down the line to tell each Marine with an anti-tank weapon which tank I wanted him to shoot at. Some of the platoon were carrying the AT-4 84mm one-shot disposable anti-tank rocket launcher. And there were the two SMAW rocket teams from the weapons platoon assault section with their 83mm bazooka-like weapons.

  Before I was done Sergeant Lenoir reported, "Guns up," and Captain Z told me that 1st platoon was in position.

  I pressed down the transmit button, "Fire, over."

  "Fire, out." And a few seconds later, "Shot, over."

  "Shot, out," I said. Sergeant Lenoir was letting me know that the single spotting round was in the air, and I should watch for its fall.

  About thirty seconds later, "Splash, over."

  The round had hit. "Splash, out." And then I gave an imaginary adjustment. "Direction three two zero six. Left fifty, drop fifty, fire for effect, over."

  When the imaginary rounds were in the air, I said over the intra-squad radio, "AT-4's and SMAW's only; fire at will."

  They popped up over the bank. I got my feet under me, ready to signal the assault, when to my total disbelief Corporal Maple, sighting over his AT-4, began shouting at the top of his lungs, "Tank! Direct Front! Fifty met...."

  "Shut up and fire, goddammit!" I yelled.<
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  Infantry operations always walk a razor's edge, and I thought we'd just sliced our feet off. I couldn't signal the assault until our mortars were done firing. All I could do was squat there and wait for the tank crews to swing their turrets around in our direction.

  But it didn't happen. Our luck held; no one paid any attention to all the yelling going on behind them. Sergeant Lenoir radioed, "Mission complete." I signaled the assault, and the platoon poured over the bank.

  Despite Maple's outburst we got right on top of the tanks before anyone inside woke up to our presence. As we swept by, one of the tank commanders was screaming hysterically, "Keep your fucking hands off my tank! Keep your fucking hands off my tank!"

  We reached the edge of the LZ and threw ourselves down, looking out over the open sand. First and 3rd squads fired across the LZ at the aggressor positions on the other side, while Sergeant Turner and 2nd squad began working their way around the edge. Over the intra-squad radio I called my two machine-gun teams, who were firing back up on the bank. "Gun team one, keep your fire on the far side of the LZ. Team two, stay in front of 2nd squad."

  I'd learned to direct instead of control. There's a big difference. And the more training we'd done together, the more mutual confidence we'd gained, the easier it was.

  Once Sergeant Turner worked his way around the LZ I sent 1st squad behind him. Then a radio call from me and two of our tanks raced into the LZ, turbines screaming, making white smoke. Which I thought was a nice dramatic touch.

  That ended it. The evaluators jumped in to separate the two sides because the aggressors were very upset. I heard one wailing plaintively, "I can't believe they did that to us!"

  They climbed into their amtracs and left. Ours came into the LZ. And I stayed busy. "Corporal Asuego, take your squad back up to that bank as security. Don't fall asleep; they might try to sneak in a counterattack. Make sure you push out an observation post with eyes on the road—and that means just being able to see the road, not sitting in the middle of the fucking thing...what's that, Reilly? Your Marines get three MRE's a day, I don't care when they eat them...no, I don't know when we're moving again, but don't take off your clothes and start working on your suntan."