William Christie 03 - The Blood We Shed

by William Christie

  Then were all off the ramp, O'Brien clutching an ash-white crew chief. I finally looked back to see that it was Captain Z on my legs. Probably a case of: I can't lose these lieutenants—I'm signed for them. Gunny Harris was on the Captain's legs, part of a daisy chain that stretched back into the fuselage.

  "You crazy fuck!" I shouted at O'Brien.

  He rolled around and looked at me. "What was I supposed to do?" he shouted back over the noise of the engines. "Let him dangle out there the whole ride back?"

  "He gets flight pay," I shouted.

  We both started laughing. Harder than the remark deserved, but it was more about how good it felt to be alive.

  "Jesus Christ," Jack exclaimed, looking around for the first time. "This is one seriously shot-up helo."

  He was right. The fuselage looked like the sides of a cheese grater.

  We got busy attending to the command group wounded. Surprisingly few; most just had their bells rung. Vincent was right, the sand absorbed most of their mortar blasts. If the Yemenis had been using VT airburst fuses we would have been in trouble. I probably would have been dead.

  Fighting to get IV's going in a shaking and wobbling helicopter, the corpsmen had to jab some Marines three or four times.

  As we gained altitude the blast furnace air turned beautifully cool. The word came down from the front that we were going to have to refuel in mid-air. Probably due to the greater than anticipated weight of a greater than anticipated number of passengers. Not to mention the ramp hanging down in the slipstream like an air brake.

  The two KC-130 Hercules transports were the unsung heroes of the operation. They'd been on station since before midnight the previous evening, refueling '53's and relaying communications when the inevitable radio failures occurred, leaving the scene only to refuel themselves in Saudi Arabia. An unromantic aircraft, usually sneered at by the silk scarf types, but little happened without them. I hope they at least got an Air Medal out of it.

  It was possible to look through the open tunnel from the fuselage to the cabin and get a glimpse of the view through the windshield.

  From one of its outer wing tanks, the KC-130 unreeled a long hose with a basket drogue on the end. Our '53 extended the refueling probe from the starboard side of the nose like a metal straw.

  Our pilot approached the drogue carefully, because it would be very unpleasant if the rotors cut the hose. It took three tries, then a little thump when he completed the coupling by inserting the probe into the basket.

  We all breathed a sigh of relief. Until a sound like the popping of a champagne cork, and a spray of fuel erupting from the ceiling. The wind from both doorgun windows turned that into an aerosol stream down the length of the cabin.

  There was nowhere to go. All we could do was sit glumly under the hard kerosene rain. The looks of dismay on the Marines' faces can only be imagined.

  Eventually the crew shut off lines and wound tape around the break, but we were still soaked in fuel. It was one thing to have hydraulic fluid dripping on us in mid-flight, but this was really a bit much.

  Jet Propulsion fuel isn't anywhere near as volatile as gasoline, but it was still fuel. The crew wasn't about to go screwing around with electrical wiring in the present situation, so the ramp stayed down. And no one was looking forward to the metal on metal sparks as we tried to land on the steel flight deck with it down.

  Once I wiped kerosene off my glasses and could see again, I unzipped my notebook, popped the cap off an alcohol marker pen, and wrote in big letters on one of the laminated pages: NO SMOKING. I held it up, and the Marines gave me that smirky look: real fucking funny, sir.

  The Red Sea came into view. One of the helo's plastic water cans was being passed hand to hand, and the troops were guzzling it like cold beer. The officers only drank after everyone else had, the Captain last. It was the same when eating chow in the field. Inviolate Marine Corps leadership ritual.

  For the first time since morning I looked at my watch. It was 15:48. Amazing. I had no idea it was that late in the day. Pretty soon we'd see whether our streak of surviving everything that could possibly go wrong would hold up.

  The Harriers had all landed. Then the Cobras, as we circled the ship to burn off fuel. Normally we'd all be buckling ourselves in and arranging gear. But there were more Marines than seats, and by now everyone was too tired and too jaded.

  As always, we approached from the stern, even with our landing spot over the water, then slipped in sideways until we were over the flight deck. The pilot literally brought it down inch by inch. I could see the regular crash crew out on deck, as always, along with a lot more sailors with fire hoses at the ready. No foam on the deck—they probably didn't want us slipping off.

  Both doorgunners were halfway out their windows, calling directions to the pilot and copilot. The crew chief at the back, watching that ramp.

  A metal clank and swaying as the bottom of the ramp made contact with the flight deck, then creaking as the helo settled down.

  As soon as all the slack had left the wheels the pilot shut everything down. The Navy could tow this bird to wherever they wanted it.

  Once again the medical teams rushed aboard. Then the white shirts of Combat Cargo led us off. O'Brien and I, the Gunny, and the Captain were the last ones off. My adrenal gland had stopped pumping now. I'd been tired at dawn. Now I could barely put one foot in front of the other.

  Sitting on the flight deck with engines off and rotors drooping flaccidly, that '53, which had been both savior and nemesis, looked almost benign.

  Down in the marshaling area it was back to mundane routine. The first thing we did was collect all the remaining ammo. It wouldn't do to have live rounds floating around the ship. A forgotten or souvenir bullet might end up being used to settle a score in the heat of a moment. And a Marine wouldn't be dumb enough to take a live grenade home and put it on a shelf, would he? If you think no you haven't been paying attention to me.

  A detail took all the ammo and pyrotechnics down to the fantail and threw it into the sea. Shipboard fire regulations required that only fully packaged ammo with unbroken seals could be stored in the magazines.

  All the papers and documents collected from the Yemeni dead were turned over to the intelligence officer.

  There was no Top Gun high-riving—everyone was too pooped. The Marines were swaggering, and rightly so, but with more calm and quiet pride than I'd thought them capable of. I guess everyone had grown up overnight.

  The next ritual would have been to start cleaning weapons. But with everyone reeking of fuel Captain Zimmerman sent the company to shower and change. And just to keep our streak intact, the ship's water was off. The engineering department had turned it off so they could work on something.

  Which well and truly summed up the Navy amphibious fleet for me. There was nothing dishonorable about being in support—three quarters of the U.S. military supported the one quarter in the combat arms. But when the support thought it was the be all and end all you had something like a ship's engineering department totally oblivious to the fact that a company of Marines had spent the better part of the last 16 hours fighting for their lives, most of it in hundred degree heat, and just might appreciate a shower.

  Instead Captain Z had his company lock up their weapons, uncleaned. Then he led them down to the mess deck, as if the meal line and everyone in it didn't exist, and stood with crossed arms while his Marines were served.

  The mess officer Corporal Asuego had drawn down on that morning was nowhere to be seen. When one of the messmen timidly told the Captain that they had to go by the meal pass system, he said, "Son, you've got two choices. Dish it out, or call the bridge and get me the Captain on the phone."

  I didn't know whether to admire the messman's dedication or pity his ignorance. The company was grimy; sweat and dirt-streaked. The torsos of our cammie blouses, that had been underneath the flak jackets, were soaking wet from sweat. The rest had been baked dry in the desert heat. Most of us were wear
ing dried blood. Unfocused "thousand yard stares" from fatigue, but also something grim and potentially vicious. If I hadn't been out there with them, I would have been really careful how I ordered the Marines to do anything.

  After some loud whispering back in the kitchen they dished it out, as much as the troops wanted. And after not eating practically anything for 16 hours, they wanted a lot. What the hell, the Navy was going to hate us anyway.

  I really felt awful. I thought it was the stink of the fuel, a smell that's never agreed with me.

  Frank Milburn was livid about missing the fight, not to mention spending all day with his platoon flying around, and throwing up, in the back of a '53.

  We were watching the troops being served, and he said, "You don't look so good."

  "I don't feel so good," I said. "I...." I stopped, as the mess deck spun around. Then everything clicked off.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I woke up in sick bay. One nice thing about shipboard sickbays, you'll never wake up in one and think you're in the afterlife. "Okay, what's the damage?" I croaked to the first person I saw, a cheerful looking black corpsman.

  "You've got a really bad concussion, Lieutenant," he informed me. "At first the doctors thought you had a fractured skull."

  Too thick for that, I thought.

  "They were amazed you walked around with it for so long," the Doc continued.

  Nothing like the power of adrenaline. As soon as the word got around that I was awake I had to undergo a very long and annoying battery of neurological tests. The doctors were surprised and, it seemed to me, a little disappointed that my memory and reflexes seemed to be all right. I think they were looking forward to drilling a few holes in my skull.

  Because I'd been unconscious, twice, I had to spend three days in sickbay under observation. My roommate was Paul Federico, who'd picked up a bad infection from the mortar fragments he'd also picked up.

  Captain Z was my first visitor, in checking all his wounded. "What are you doing screwing off in here?" he demanded.

  "Just felt like I needed a little vacation, sir."

  "God-damn, Mike, you're already on a cruise. What more do you want?"

  "Terrible how some people are never satisfied, isn't it, sir?"

  "You caused quite a stir on the mess deck. Should have at least had chow before you passed out."

  "I wish I did too, sir. You should see the pablum they're giving me."

  "Serves you right."

  "Care for one of these, sir?" said Federico, offering him a glass jar. Lee Harvey Oberdorff had already smuggled in some jalapenos.

  Captain Z examined the jar carefully. "Thanks, Paul, but if I eat one of these I'll end up standing in the middle of a passageway and shitting into the rooms on both sides."

  Laughing made my head hurt really bad.

  Staff Sergeant Frederick showed up next, telling me about attending the mission debrief in my place. Clearly it was going to take a while before he forgave me for that.

  "It was a fucking nightmare, sir. They went on for about an hour about you violating the rules of engagement. You know, when you used the claymores to blow through the walls of that house? I was starting to sweat, big time, then that intel Gunny did the PowerPoint of all the pictures he snapped inside the house. That, and the Cobra gun camera film of us on the streets, shut them up."

  "How did we look?" I asked.

  "Studly, sir. Very studly."

  "So they didn't give you any more heartburn?"

  "The BLT staff was on our side, sir. The MEU staff was dishing out the heartburn. Like why you didn't ask permission to use the claymores. They kept asking me that, and I kept saying I didn't know. So you better stand by for some shit on that, sir."

  "I didn't ask them because they would have said no. They were circling around up in a helo, not stuck at the end of that hallway, and besides it violated the rules of engagement. Most of the time, Staff Sergeant, it's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission."

  "I'll leave that to you, sir. I don't ever want to go through one of them fucking debriefs again."

  "Don't worry. The MEU staff is just positioning themselves. If Washington thinks we fucked up, I'm the scapegoat who panicked, exceeded his orders, and killed some poor civilians. If we're heroes, everyone's reservations will be forgotten."

  "Fuck, sir."

  "Ah, you thought lieutenants just played polo and drank gin fizzes at the Club? Didn't realize all the shit we have to take on a daily basis, did you?"

  "Grass is always greener, sir. I'll stick to being a platoon sergeant."

  I snuck out of bed and visited my Marines. Damn near half the platoon had some kind of wound. Most were minor and would recuperate on ship. The more serious cases would be flown off to Djibouti, then on to Germany.

  Sergeant Harlin was going to make it; he was flying off.

  Corporal Cushing, the SMAW gunner who'd taken a round in the chest in the village, had died on the operating table. He and Peterson were our only dead. The corpsmen had done brilliant, heroic work, but the Interceptor flak jackets with the ceramic ballistic inserts were worth their weight in gold. And the 16 pound weight, even in the desert. Without them we'd have been burying a lot more Marines.

  There was some good news about the two Marines who'd fallen in the ambush at the intersection. Lance Corporal Nolan had been kissed by five or six rounds that shot his canteens and gas mask off but didn't even touch him. With the nearest cover a long way off he decided to play dead. It saved his life. PFC Getz took two rounds that were both stopped by the ceramic ballistic plates in his flak jacket. Another hit his helmet and did nothing but knock him out cold. He woke up with only a concussion of his own and some deep bruises. Everyone was talking about taking him to Atlantic City once we got back.

  Sergeant Turner had a bullet in his hip, lodged near the femoral artery. He was going to Germany for surgery.

  I had some business to take care of before he went. I honestly didn't know whether Peterson had been shot in the heat of the moment because Sergeant Turner thought there was no other way to get him off that fence, or Sergeant Turner had embraced a heaven-sent opportunity to pay off an asshole who had continually provoked and disrespected him.

  That was one question I was never going to ask. I knew Peterson and I knew Sergeant Turner. And I knew who I was going to back. I pulled my chair very close to his bed so I could speak into his ear. For the first time in my life I was about to embark on a criminal conspiracy.

  "Just listen to me," I told him. "I don't want you to say a word, because if anyone asks me I intend to say that you never spoke to me about this. You will say nothing of what happened that night in the village except to the Colonel, the Captain, or as part of the process of a formal investigation. Anyone else: the First Sergeant, the Gunny, or your five best friends, you either don't want to talk about it or I've told you not to pending an investigation.

  "You were trying to pull Peterson off the fence. It was total chaos, pushing and shoving. You're not sure how he got hit. That's it. Now, if—and only if—someone tells you that Peterson had an American 5.56mm hole in his head, you will say that in the middle of the struggle to get him off the fence your weapon accidentally discharged. You don't know if you had your hand on it or the safety was off and the trigger snagged on your gear. You never thought that the bullet hit Peterson. But if it did it was a tragic accident; at night, under fire, and in a very confusing situation.

  "I don't know if there's going to be an investigation. But if there is, what I just said is all you say. Period. Nothing more; no added details. You got that?"

  He nodded.

  "You want me to repeat it again so we're straight?"

  He shook his head.

  "As far as I'm concerned you did what you had to do, and it probably saved all our lives. I'm not going to leave you hanging. All right?"

  He nodded again, and we shook hands.

  When the doctors finally let me go they ordered me to get my ass b
ack to sickbay if I experienced any paralysis or mental lapses. And especially headaches, depression, or abnormal irritability. "I'm a platoon commander," I said. "What's abnormal?"

  My roommates, with typical sensitivity, had modified our quarters to accommodate my brain-rattled condition. There was a Welcome Home Mike sign, of course. And everything was neatly labeled with post-it notes, in case I'd experienced any memory loss. My rack was labeled: RACK—SLEEP HERE. My pillow was labeled: PILLOW. The sink: SINK. My boots: BOOTS, and, helpfully, LEFT and RIGHT.

  "This is so thoughtful of you," I said, trying not to mist up. "And you even broke out the dictionary to spell everything right."

  One of the strange things about combat is that you never knew what had really happened until it was over and everyone gathered to put all the individual pieces together.

  The other two houses in the village had been dry holes. Force Recon shot two armed men in one, taking one wounded in the process. They turned out to be part of the family who lived there, the rest of whom quickly surrendered. Anyone expecting the war on terrorism to be clean and simple and evenly divided between combatants and noncombatants with the ability to harm one and not the other was due for a major wake-up call.

  First and 3rd platoons also had fights on the streets, but they hadn't gotten ambushed. A group trying to close in on Milburn had probably found itself between us and taken advantage of it.

  All the terrorists—or whoever the hell they were, we wouldn't know until the prisoners were interrogated and the intelligence evaluated— had been in my house. The least likely one. Friday the 13th luck again, I guess.

  Captain Z could hardly believe how many bad guys we'd taken out. "An attacker's supposed to have a 3:1 advantage in numbers over the defenders, Mike. You barely had 1:1."

  "I didn't have any idea how many were in that house until it was all over, sir. And if I'd called for help you would have had to come in either the front door or at ground level." I explained what the ground floor had been like.