“Everything I have experienced personally comes from Iraq. I don’t know how much you know about the people over there. When the U.S. toppled Saddam, there were a lot of Iraqis—mostly Shiites—who greeted us as liberators. Kids would be out in the streets and be all smiles. People would be cheering us, offer us food, whatever they had. They were so thrilled to not be under the thumb of a government that stole from them, killed them, tortured them, and ran their lives through fear and violence. We were treated like saviors by a lot of the populace.
“Then there were the Sunnis. Those were the Iraqis from the ruling Baath party, the same tribe as Saddam. It’s very tribal over there, by the way—very Hatfield-and-McCoys, if you know what I mean. Anyway, the Sunnis were the ones that were now out of power. So they hated America. They hated our country, our ideas, and our military. When we rolled into Baghdad, we removed a lot of Sunnis from power, but we didn’t punish them as a people. We weren’t extreme. It was the right thing to do by any sort of Western, Judeo-Christian standard. We weren’t extreme. But the fallout was that there were a lot of angry, hateful Sunnis willing to commit violence back at us when the opportunity presented itself. A lot of animosity festered.”
The waitress passed by. “One more, please,” said Derek. “A double whiskey on the rocks.” A deep breath. Derek looked around the table. “Have any of you heard of city named Fallujah?”
Several heads shook, so Derek continued. “Fallujah is... well, it’s a terrorist hellhole. It’s a Sunni town, right on the banks of the Euphrates—you know, the cradle of civilization. ”No irony there, thought Derek. “Not a lot of moderate thinking there, either, Fallujah. You go in and you see mean faces looking back at you. They didn’t feel liberated. They stared at you and their eyes blazed with fury. You felt that if you turned your back, they would slit your throat at a moment’s opportunity. That’s actually what they did to a couple contractors that got lost driving through the streets. A bunch of thugs nabbed and killed them. Then the crowd got into it and they started to have a party. The mob mutilated the bodies and dragged them through the streets to a nearby bridge, where they hung them up and burned them in a sort of Fourth of July celebration. All of this was captured on Al Jazeera and proudly broadcast over the Arab world. President Bush was really pissed and ordered the Marines to take over and control the town by force. The Marine brass didn’t want to do it—it wasn’t a strategic move, it was an emotional one; it would just unify opposition at a time when we were making significant diplomatic efforts with the tribal elders that ran the town. But when the Commander-in-Chief says to do something, you do it, so in went the Marines.
“That was in the spring of 2004. So the Marines go in the way Marines do, which is hard, and we start just fucking erasing the town. If you intend to win, that’s the way you need to fight. War is a brutal thing. You put your life on the line. You don’t dance around like you’re playing a game—you fight to win, and you put down the other guy. It’s deadly serious and a horribly frightening thing. So, suddenly, all the politicians back home sort of go, oh, crap... wait, stop, we didn’t know you were going to be like that. They didn’t want the face of real combat to be broadcast on Al Jazeera, showing Marines smashing homes and civilians getting caught in a crossfire and arms blown off of children as they scuttle back and forth between the bodies of their dead parents. The operation didn’t get finished. Everything got shut down. The Marines pulled back because of the politicians. The U.S. aborted. And that’s a bad thing. Once you start a fight, you need to finish it. If you don’t, then it will come around later looking for you in order to finish itself. And that’s what happened later in the year. The situation hadn’t improved. Actually, it had deteriorated drastically. Now the enemy had fortified itself and was itching to do harm.
“Inevitably, we got orders to go back in and finish the job, to clear the town, for good, this time. I was part of that action. We knew it was going to be rough.
“All the civvies evacuated the town. They knew what was coming. The only people left were the ones that were ready to fight, the ones that wanted to kill Americans—these were the hard-boiled ones, not the ones that used to dash around a corner to spray an AK-47 at you so they could tell their family how brave they had been. No more amateurs. All of them were gone. There were foreign troops, too. Men that came from other countries who wanted to hurt you—just for the sake of who you were. Guys from Syria, Chechnya, who knows where else. These were the worst kinds of sadistic, militant cockroaches not far removed from the sort that would fly airplanes into buildings.”
The waitress returned with several drinks and Derek’s whiskey. He took a sip and closed his eyes as the liquor went down his throat. He could see Fallujah in his mind. The dirty streets. Everything the same color, sandy brown. Sand was pervasive; in your eyes, your ears, your nose, your mouth... it was all you tasted. The smell from open sewers and trash piles. Open windows that might have a sniper as often as be empty. Roadblocks of rubble and burning tires that were meant to channel Marines into prepared positions and killing zones.
A platoon of young American men—each Marine someone’s son, brother, father, friend—all marching forward, all Derek’s responsibility.
Into the abyss.
“We went back in November. My company had to flush out a particularly dense section of the city in between the Euphrates and a tactical boundary called Phase Line Henry. It meant going building to building, block to block. Lots of snipers. Door-to-door is tedious, dangerous work. Sometimes the houses are empty. Other times there’s a tip-off that there are bad guys inside.”
“Like what?” interrupted Manmeet, spellbound.
A wry smile spread sourly across Derek’s face. “Someone shoots at you.”
“Oh,” Manmeet said, embarrassed.
“Even if it’s set up to be an ambush, there are other signs, believe me. There was this one house where my First Squad found fresh human shit in the courtyard. Remember, we knew there were only bad guys left in town. And when you know they’re there, you have to take them out.
“So that’s what we had to do with this house. It was built sort of like all the other houses in the city—a square, two-story building made out of cinderblocks—only it had a cement dome with some skylights, which was kind of unusual, and it was on the small side. My squad leader, Staff Sergeant Ricks, decided there couldn’t be too many enemy fighters inside, so he decided not to wait on a tank. Instead they stacked up some guys outside the door in order to breach.
“Most Iraqi houses are laid out in a similar fashion. There’s usually this little courtyard in the front, surrounded by a stone wall and gate, and then you go inside and there’s kind of a foyer, I guess you’d call it. There’s a living room on the right, a common room straight ahead, the kitchen and bathroom in the back, and then stairs that lead to an upstairs corridor and a bunch more bedrooms. This one was like most of the others, only it had a staircase with a cinderblock edge, kind of like an enclosed hand rail, that wound up the inside wall to the upper level so that it surrounded the atrium from all sides with a catwalk.”
Derek closed his eyes for a moment. He could see the building in front of him as if he were standing right there, surrounded by the dirt and grime of the city.
“Now, there are a couple techniques for Close Quarters Battle that you can use, but Ricks decided to ‘run the rabbit’ or basically run full-speed across the house to distract the enemy while the next Marine in the stack comes in and shoots. So he slings his rifle and pulls out his pistol. Everett, Jiminez, Parks, and Gleeson are behind him. Ricks charges in. As he’s crossing the entry room he sees an insurgent hiding behind the front door and pops the guy a couple times. This is up close, Manmeet. You understand?” Derek reached across and grabbed the front of Manmeet’s shirt with his fist. “Probably no further apart than this here. Blam! Ricks unloads a 9 mil round into this dude’s face. Never mind that he was an enemy combatant in the middle of leveling an AK at Ricks. He was still a human being.” He let
go of Manmeet and eased back into his seat, taking another sip of his drink.
“The rest of the stack comes in and they get ready to repeat the rabbit drill going into the common area. But there are insurgents waiting for them. Ricks goes through the doorway and sees another dude with an AK who starts firing at him. Ricks unloads his pistol clip at him but the guy doesn’t go down. Maybe he’s wearing body armor. Maybe he’s on drugs. Ricks backs up and pushes Everett back into the foyer as the AK bullets fly all over the place, and the rounds somehow miss the first two but hit the guys behind them. Jiminez gets his shooting hand shattered. Parks gets hit in the shoulder and chest. The wounded guys stagger outside and start coming under fire from insurgents on the rooftops of nearby buildings. They dive around the corner of the courtyard wall. Other Marines hear the shooting and rush over to help. Everett and Ricks decide to throw a grenade into the common room, then go in right after it and shoot whoever’s left.”
Derek was vaguely aware that his voice had become monotone, robotic. He wasn’t looking at the pub table anymore. All he saw was the house and his Marines going in.
“The grenade goes off and the stack of guys moves in to clear. As the smoke dissipates they come under fire. There are bad guys up on the catwalk protected by that cinderblock railing. They have a commanding field of fire and spray the room. Everett gets shot in his legs and goes down screaming. Gleeson gets it in the shoulder. Ricks gets hit in his chest but his body armor catches the bullet and he staggers into the kitchen in the back, dragging Gleeson with him. Another round nicks his face just under his helmet and blood gets in his eye and he can’t see.
“More Marines come to the house as the platoon moves up. A sniper takes down a PFC who was taking cover behind the wrong wall. Sergeant Fields grabs three more guys and they plan to flood the room, putting suppressing fire on the catwalk so that they can pull out Everett, who’s writhing in pain and his own blood in the middle of the common room. The insurgents were leaving him there instead of killing him, you see? To see who else they could draw in and take shots at. They were about to find out. Fields and the guys go in firing, and the bad guys fire back and throw a grenade of their own down into the common room. Boom. Fields goes down with multiple wounds. Carpenter gets hit in the leg and has his foot all torn up, but keeps his wits and somehow manages to drag himself and Fields to cover in the back bathroom. Smitty runs for cover and makes it to a bedroom without getting hit. Everett is still howling, and Smitty decides that he can’t just leave his buddy there, so he charges back through even though he’s positive he’s going to get shot. He’s able to grab Everett and drag him to the bedroom while Ricks provides suppressing fire from the kitchen.”
“Four wounded and at risk of bleeding out, and another Marine unharmed but trapped with them behind a kill zone in this fucking house. That’s when I got there.”
Derek could hear the gunfire echoing off of the walls of the nearby buildings. He took a gulp of whiskey. This one, the double, was gone now too.
“My Marines are good fighters, you guys. They’re warriors. They use solid tactics and they execute them brilliantly. We drill on this stuff all the time. The U.S. has the best-trained military in the world. My reason for pointing this out is that combat isn’t like some video game. It is very, very dangerous, even for the best. The Marines are the best. Shock troops, the tip of the spear. Someone has to do it. And going in first means you’re exposing yourself to incredible harm and risk of death, usually against a prepared enemy. Yet you do it anyway. That’s what fighting is like, knowing that at any moment you’re going to meet your Maker. But you do it, because your friends are doing it too, and you need to keep them alive. And you need to win the fight decisively because if you don’t, the enemy will come back later and hurt someone who is not as prepared and not as tough as you are.”
Despite the din of the bar around them, a feeling of palpable silence surrounded their table. Derek played with his empty whiskey glass.
“What happened next?” Lucy asked.
Derek glanced at her and their eyes met for a long moment. He looked away. Taking a deep breath, he closed his own and went back to the story.
“Well... we had to get them out. I had to get them out.
“We get pelted with sniper fire as we run into the foyer. I have two Marines with me, Hudson and Robinson, both part of my 2nd squad. It’s quiet inside the house except for the screaming of one of the wounded guys. There’s a big pool of blood from where Everett had been laying.
“I decide that tossing in a couple flashbangs might distract the shooters and make them expose themselves so we could nail them. We flip two in and then rush in right after with rifles aimed high. We come under immediate fire—the insurgents were too high up and too protected behind the catwalk, so all we did was alert them that we were coming. We all pile back into the foyer. I call out to the other men and Ricks answers from the kitchen. I ask if there are any other ways out of there and he says no—there are some windows, but they have inch-thick iron bars on them. I tell Hudson to stay in the foyer and get ready, and Robinson and I go outside to look at the windows.
“We pass the bedroom. Smitty yells out through the window that he doesn’t know if Everett is going to make it, he’s torn up bad and has lost a lot of blood and is really pale. Robinson, a great big black dude, somehow finds a sledgehammer and we start beating on the bars outside the bedroom window. It takes about five minutes and we are able to bend them apart a little—maybe just enough where a man could probably squeeze in and out. But they’re really, really snug and there’s no way someone who is wounded would be able to twist through the bars.”
The iron bars are contorted in front of him. They are tight together. Too tight.
“I take off my body armor and helmet. Robinson yells at me, asks what the fuck I’m doing Sir and I tell him I’m going to get my guys. I suck in and squeeze through the bars and into the house. All I have with me is my rifle.
“Everett is in bad shape. I check him and can see the entrance wound from where he got hit. He’s quieting down now, just moaning. I can’t let him die. So I call out to Ricks and Carpenter, that we’re going to lay down suppressing fire on the catwalk at the same time, and Smitty is going to haul Everett out through the common room and over to where Hudson is waiting. Carpenter is hurt too but he can still shoot.”
The bedroom is smoky and smells of cordite. Derek sees the open doorway out of the bedroom. He looks over at Smitty and they make eye contact and they both understand. The clock is ticking for Everett. He is quiet now, unconscious. Derek’s heart is beating madly in his chest. The soft moaning that fills the air is now from another wounded Marine somewhere else in the house.
“The catwalk is very high up. It’s a really bad angle. I have to think of how I can shoot at them. The only thing I can come up with is to lie on my back, which is going to make it really hard for me to take cover myself. I do it anyway. It’s much easier to see the ceiling. I raise my rifle and get ready to push myself through the doorway.”
Full mag in the rifle. Derek tests the traction with his boot and it slips on the blood trail from when Everett got dragged to cover. He shifts over slightly to get better footing. Derek closes his eyes. Get control of your breathing. Get control of your aim. Relax. Even breaths. Get ready to push. Derek nudges himself into the common room. The moaning sounds like Fields. Fields is 20 years old.
Eliminate the threat.
“I shout Now! and we all start shooting bursts so the insurgents keep their heads down. Smitty has Everett by his armpits and starts hauling him back out as fast as he can, trying not to trip over me as he goes by. He gets to the foyer without getting hit and we all stop firing and duck back into cover.
“Two guys out. Five of us, now, left in the house.
“I talk to Robinson outside through the window with the bent bars. I feel like we got lucky with the surprise of suppressing fire and don’t really want to have to do this a bunch more times. It also
means someone would have to come back in with multiple runs, since neither Carpenter and Fields, who are both in the back bathroom, can walk or run. Robinson wants to take the sledgehammer and at least try to open up some of the other windows, but there is sniper fire now alongside the other parts of the house. Then we hear over the radio that the QRF—the Quick Reaction Force—is moving up to give us support. Robinson says he has an idea, to use one of the vehicles to pull the bars off the windows. He runs off. I turn back and keep my rifle trained on the doorway. We’re sure the insurgents know that we’ll have reinforcements coming, and part of me thinks they’ll rush the rooms in a big banzai charge.”
There is shouting in Arabic somewhere else in the house. There is urgency in the voices.
“Robinson comes back. He tells me that PFC Lane is going to hook up a chain to one of the windows and see if he can yank the bars free with a Humvee. I tell him to go around and tell the others what’s going to happen. I keep my rifle on that doorway, I just know the bad guys are going to figure out something and come storming at us with AKs blazing. Robinson returns and tells me they’re all ready, but that Carpenter is in bad shape and Fields is unconscious. I squeeze back out through the window and we work our way around the side of the building, trying to keep in cover from sniper fire, until we get to the back corner where the bathroom is. Lane has just finished rigging a chain around the metal bars and is getting in the Humvee. He floors it and the bars fly loose, taking bunches of cinderblock chunks with them and leaving a big hole where the window used to be. Robinson and I run in and see Fields with red stains all over his arms and legs. It’s so dark that you can’t even see the pattern in the camo. Carpenter still has it all together but can’t stand because of his own wounded leg. Robinson helps up Carpenter and they stagger out together through the hole in the wall made by the Humvee. I start lifting up Fields and see the bandages that Carpenter had been trying to apply all coming loose. A Corporal that was with Lane in the Humvee comes in and helps me get Fields up between us. We both pull him out of the house and start hauling him across the street to where we’ve got some cover from another Humvee from the QRF that’s just arrived. We put down Fields and a Corpsman starts taking a look at getting him together enough for a ride back.
Armchair Safari (A Cybercrime Technothriller) Page 35
