My Men are My Heroes

by Nathaniel R. Helms

  Lima’s Marines were still riding in their AAVs when they arrived at their departure area near the bridge. Ruff supervised their dismount and watched while his NCOs got them into the appropriate order and led them off to battle.

  Ruff says they were receiving “a little bit” of fire. The battalion logs show that the Marines were taking automatic weapons fire, mortars, RPGs, and sniper fire. After Lima’s Grunts got organized into a solid line, the tracks moved up behind them to provide suppressive fire from their heavy weapons. It was a gutsy move by the track crews: Despite their size and bulk, AAVs are not tanks and are not intended to defeat heavy fire from mortars and RPGs. The proof was already burning just to the north of the southern bridge where two AAVs were still cooking off.

  Lima was assigned a 700-meter stretch of Moe to secure. India Marines leapfrogged across Lima’s line to form another line farther north. Kasal fidgeted all night waiting for Kilo to get orders to join in, but India’s position was as far as 3/1 moved until dawn. All night, dug-in enemy pounded them with mortars, RPGs, and harassing fire. It was a tough place to be, even for seasoned veterans, and most of the young Marines in 3/1 were facing combat for the first time.

  The tracks faced west and east to protect Lima’s flank and rear along an exposed line that meandered beside Route Moe for about a mile. Fortunately the AAVs met only sporadic fire as they rolled into town behind Lima and India’s protective screen. An occasional RPG raced past, and a few more skipped along the road or flew overhead without doing any damage. More fire came from small arms. Ruff was on foot moving up and down the company line encouraging his Marines, keeping them under cover, and directing whatever fighting was going on.

  Kilo spent the night south of the bridge listening to the clamor of war, itching to get into the fight. Kasal and the other staff NCOs and officers kept busy making sure the company was ready to enter the cauldron the next morning. They passed out ammunition, went over the rules of engagement, checked the men’s equipment, and checked and rechecked their maps and orders. Kasal slept when he could—a few minutes here, a few more there—something he says didn’t bother him all that much. Almost two decades as a Marine had taught him how to catch catnaps that kept him alert.

  When they moved into the city just after dawn, Kilo’s job was clearing the street to the west of Route Moe. That road was now almost 4 kilometers of wall-to-wall enemy with automatic weapons, RPGs, heavy machine guns, and a few automatic cannon that could cause real pain. So-called Saddam Fedayeen (freedom fighters)—young Sunni supporters of the regime trained to fight as guerillas infested the town. The buildings and walled squares where the insurgents were hidden was an ungraceful collection of one- and two-story boxes made with thick walls and roofs to keep out the unremitting heat.

  The buildings made great fighting positions. Iraqis could move from window to window without being detected or hit, and even from house to house through a maze of connecting alleys. An Nasiriyah was a perfect warren for the Saddam Fedayeen.

  Kasal was in the thick of it from the first light of day. “We had to clear out all the buildings within a block in the whole length of the street, including the southern bridge across the Euphrates all the way to the bridge at the north end of the city,” he says. “What we did was clear houses, city blocks, everything. I ran from position to position directing fire, helping Marines, inspiring Marines. It was the first time any of my Marines had been in combat.”

  As the fighting grew fiercer, Kasal got busier. Thankfully it was in the mid-80s and not as hot as it would be later, but running in the sun wearing the impermeable MOPP suit and weighted down with at least 80 pounds of body armor, ammo, weapons, and other gear made it sweltering just the same. Adding to everyone’s discomfort was the constant incoming small arms, RPGs, and mortar fire that splashed on the baked ground, spreading white-hot shrapnel and snapping bullets through the smoke-filled air.

  Occasionally the Marines would spot their tormentors. Most of them were wearing civilian clothes or all-black ninja-style suits that marked their antagonists as the ruthless Fedayeen—Saddam’s youthful hired thugs emboldened by drugs and Baathist rhetoric. The Marines’ Rules of Engagement (ROE) prohibited them from simply killing anyone they saw moving about. A Marine had to see a weapon or some activity smacking of hostile intent before he could open fire. Obeying the ROE was a vexing, complicated situation for the young Marines, and it required constant leadership to enforce—especially after Marines started taking casualties from Iraqis who fired on them, then put their weapons down and walked away. The enemy knew what it was doing.

  Corporal Nicoll was a rifleman on a fire team in Kilo when it went into the city. A fire team has four men and is usually the smallest maneuver element in a rifle company. He remembers his first combat as surreal. “They were playing AC-DC’s “Hells Bells,” Nicoll recalls of the trip in. “Somebody played it over the loudspeaker. It was hurry up and wait, hot as shit. We wore MOPP suits and spent our time breathing exhaust fumes. Three days is a long time all packed in there. People would get claustrophobic and start hitting the walls, freaking. We were glad to get out and fight.

  “We sat outside of An Nasiriyah that night,” Nicoll continues. “They told us what had been going on. I talked to Staff Sergeant [Christopher] Pruitt, my platoon sergeant. We were just watching the tracers and artillery. We were far enough from An Nasiriyah not to get shot at. I wanted to do it, get it over with. I kind of knew I was going to do okay—I knew I was going to because I was with my boys.

  “We drove into the city on tracks. We started taking fire so we pulled off, the doors dropped, and we all got down on the street and shot people as they popped out. It was amazing. There were people all around us. One gunner left a pile of dead bodies, six or seven bodies right in front of us. It was incredible.”

  When 3/1’s Grunts identified shooters, they took them out with M-16s, SAWs, M203 grenade launchers, hand grenades, and shoulder-launched multipurpose assault weapons (SMAWs)—the Marines’ favorite building busters. Backing them up was Weapons Co. armed with Ma Deuce, 81mm mortars, 40mm automatic grenade launchers, and TOW and Javelin antitank missiles that would definitely do damage when they found the enemy. Weapons Co. in turn was backed up by the powerful gunners on the AAVs and Abrams tanks.

  Unlike the enemy, the Marines of Kilo were lying in the street, totally exposed to the Iraqis. It was a tough place to be a Marine and an even tougher place to be a Marine first sergeant. Devoid of cover, Kasal, Ruff, and the other leaders moved from position to position completely exposed to enemy fire. Worse, their constant movement identified them as leaders, earmarking them for special attention. Kasal and Ruff both say they never gave much thought to being exposed because it was the only way they could direct their men.

  “If I would see something wrong, I would run over and correct it—misaimed fires, uncoordinated fires, whatever,” Kasal says. “I would go with a squad to clear a building, help evacuate wounded—basically try to be everywhere, directing, guiding, encouraging, inspiring. The only cover we had was what we could find: a wall, a fence, the side of a building. Sometimes I was just out in the middle of the street.”

  That’s the way it went as they progressed through the city clearing buildings, securing the route, and ensuring an uncontested passage for the units that followed them. Eventually they made it out the other side of the city. Incredibly, 3/1 escaped without any fatalities.

  TOO EASY

  After An Nasiriyah the division encountered only light resistance and sporadic hit-and-run ambushes in central Iraq. The anticipated hard combat the Marines expected never materialized, but they soon outran their supply. They were down to eating one or two MREs a day and using their water sparingly. The battalion had to slow down until they received some support.

  Kasal was glad for the pause. His Marines would finally get some time to take off their boots and change their socks and at least get out of some of their clothes for a few hours. They were still wearing MOPP suits
and all their armor. Even then, the war was never far away, he says.

  “We did an operational pause just south of Al Kut,” Kasal says. “We set up a defensive perimeter. While we were set up there, this car comes down the road toward us. Behind it was an Iraqi truck. We kept trying to get the car to stop, but it wouldn’t stop. The next thing you know, the truck starts shooting at the car.”

  The Marines turned their machine guns on the truck and destroyed it, Kasal says. “We lit up the truck, and a bunch of Iraqi troops jumped out and we lit them up and killed them. Then we ran out to the car. There was an Iraqi family inside—an old man, his wife, and his two daughters. The wife was killed and the daughters were wounded when the Iraqi soldiers opened up on the car. We medically treated the two daughters, and then we took the girls with their father and medevac’d them back to the rear for treatment.”

  Kasal later discovered that the unfortunate family were Shiites fleeing the Iraqi army. The predominantly Sunni soldiers had been raping and torturing the Shiites as they retreated. The victimized family hoped to reach the Marines before the Iraqi soldiers captured them. To Kasal’s deep disappointment it was not to be.

  Intelligence later revealed the bulk of Saddam Hussein’s military forces had either melted away or retired to Baghdad for the final fight. The foreign fighters had not yet arrived in strength and the only real resistance was from the Saddam Fedayeen, Kasal says. Most Iraqis still smiled at Americans. Most Marines thought they had won the war and the Army would now move in and administer the peace.

  Despite the euphoria Kasal had reservations about celebrating the conclusion of the war. Things had just been too easy. Everybody with weapons had disappeared. Somebody had to have them. Kasal figured 3/1 would be back sooner than later.

  “I didn’t think it was over,” he says. “I was more worried about going back to Pendleton because the battalion was going to lose a lot of good people who were waiting for discharge or schools or getting transferred when OIF started. I was worried about what would happen to the battalion. It was the senior battalion in the regiment and the best battalion I had ever served in.”

  Except for the Marines and soldiers who still mourned their dead, the nation quickly forgot the cost of the seemingly easy victory. In terms of history it was almost a bloodless war. For a time it seemed peace and stability would soon follow.

  It was not to be, of course, but the shooting wouldn’t resume again for a while. 3/1 went home by plane in late May 2003. After a month stand-down while everybody took leave, the battalion reformed at Pendleton. As Kasal had feared, the Thundering Third swiftly changed its face as more and more men left for Civvy Street, schools, and assignments that had been on hold while they fought the war.

  They didn’t know it yet, but the war had barely begun.

  CHAPTER 7

  BEFORE

  FALLUJAH

  Kasal’s world in the months preceding the battle for Fallujah revolved around a single reinforced battalion of Marines, the Thundering Third. His focus was on his men. They were spread over 850 square kilometers of inhospitable ancient Mesopotamia full of Iraqis who alternately loved, hated, attacked, or ignored the Marines. 3/1 was irrevocably mated to the rest of the 1st Marine Regiment for support, the 1st Marine Division for direction. Above the fighting Marines was a maze of commands and commanders debating over the best ways to control the burgeoning insurgency.

  THE HOTTEST SPOT IN IRAQ

  When 3/1 arrived in al-Anbar province in June 2004 the gruesome murders of four American civilian contractors on March 1 that fired the Marine occupation of al-Anbar province in the first place had fled the front pages. Where their burned corpses had been hung in the wind on the infamous “Brooklyn Bridge” in Fallujah only a painted-over eulogy remained. The rage that followed the disgusting events had been replaced by more rage over equally despicable acts in the region. Tensions were high and secular violence was on the rise. So fittingly the Marines were dropped into the hottest spot in Iraq, al-Anbar province, the home of the Sunni minority that had ruled Iraq for almost four decades.

  Despite the carnage that hovered over Fallujah and the rest of the province, there was new thinking from up high that embraced benevolence, patience, and fair play when the Third arrived. Restraint was the order of the day. The Marines were there to “win the hearts and minds” of the Iraqis, certainly many of whom detested them. It was a jaded phrase and a tenuous proposition—and it was orders. The Marines were told to play nice with their Iraqi neighbors or pay the price.

  At the time of OIF 2 deployment the Thundering Third was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Willard “Willy” Buhl, a mild-mannered Californian of medium height who still carries the build of his wrestling days on his stout frame. Like all Marines Buhl stays sharp and neat but without some of the excess starch that stiffens so many others. His personality was perfect for the situation in al-Anbar province. By nature he is a friendly man who looks for the best in other people. Perhaps because he is also half Sicilian and half Irish, he has a dark side as well as a quick smile and a gift for gab. More than a few Iraqis who confused kindness with weakness would one day pay the price for their mistake.

  Any Marine who served with him will say Buhl wasn’t made in the ordinary mold of Marine officers. He is outwardly friendly, relaxed, and full of modern ideas about personal relationships and the art of command. He doesn’t bark, snap, or snarl to expend his nervous energy. He burns it up visiting his troops, getting to know them, finding out what makes them howl. Buhl believes foremost in leading from the front, and that is where he was usually found. Kasal remembers him in his Humvee darting between companies under fire to discover for himself what was happening. At first Kasal wasn’t sure whether his new commander’s approach would work, but after studying him carefully, he decided Buhl’s methods worked pretty damn well and the two men worked closely together to mold the battalion to fit its new mission.

  “In the beginning we butted heads over a few things,” Kasal recalls. “But as I grew to know him more and watched his leadership in combat, I found him to be a very adept and aggressive warrior who believed in taking the fight to the enemy and cared deeply for the Marines under his charge. I grew to respect him very much. He was always up-front.”

  By the end of the long, hot summer, Buhl could see that 3/1’s Marines in al-Anbar province were slowly roasting in the desert heat under increasing numbers of sneak attacks and deadly ambushes. The battalion had lost 10 men, and there was no letup in sight. Some of the Marines were getting testy and more than a few simply wanted to kill somebody. At least one senior NCO was heard in Regimental Headquarters lamenting over his inability to kill someone or something. In Texas they call it buzzard’s luck when you “can’t kill nothin’ and won’t nothin’ die!” Buhl kept a close watch on the temperament of his men to make sure they maintained their composure.

  “You have to be careful with your anger because it can easily cloud your judgment,” he says. “For me anger actually enabled me to remain calm. We’re trained to think clearly under stress, but to really go through it, to live it, is another world.”

  UNPOPULAR PULLOUT

  Buhl’s Marines knew about the first attempt by 2/1, 1/5, and the Regiment’s 1st Recon Battalion to take the ancient city of Fallujah the preceding April. That the mission was aborted pissed them off. Although their predecessors were already gone, it was no secret that the fight started April 4 during a handover ceremony with the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division when an enemy mortar wounded several Marines. It ended with the testy Devil Dogs grudgingly pulling out while they were in the midst of some serious ass kicking. The Marines had the upper hand in Fallujah when they were suddenly—some say inexplicably—told to leave.

  The order came from 1st Marine Regiment Combat Team’s commander, Colonel John Toolan, who got it from Major General J. N. Mattis, and so on all the way to its source among the grand strategists in Baghdad. Toolan was ordered to hand over the parts of the city his Marines ha
d just captured to so-called Iraqi National Guardsman and local police. The idea galled the Marines who swore the same guys had been shooting at them the day before.

  The universally admired Toolan was still in command in al-Anbar province when 3/1 arrived. He would go home in September before seeing his mortal enemies get what he thought they deserved. In spring of 2006 Toolan was promoted to Brigadier General and reassigned from Director of the Marine Corps Command and Staff College for what he thought was a plum assignment as Assistant Division Commander of the 2d Marine Division. Later these orders would suddenly change, and he would find himself back in the bowels of the Pentagon. He didn’t get a general’s star being meek and mild. His Regimental Combat Team in June 2004 was more than 6,000 Marines strong and the absolute power in the region.

  Toolan didn’t say whether he agreed with the new methods that followed the so-called unilateral cease-fire that went into effect after his men pulled out or whether he preferred a more direct approach to settling up in Fallujah. Insurgents and Marines were still exchanging heavy fire every day over the berms and at the hard points where the Marines kept watch on the city. The Iraqis took full advantage of the unilateral part of the cease-fire to blast away at the Marines whenever they thought they could get away with it. Those who saw Toolan work generally go with the notion he would have preferred to go back as soon as possible and finish it up before things got out of hand. Toolan is a big, powerful Irish rugby player who doesn’t look like turning the other cheek is central to his personality. To slap Toolan would be like slapping John Wayne.

  However, he made it clear to 3/1’s Marines they had a new mission and new methods to employ. “Honestly, we didn’t go in there with the intent of crushing the Iraqis,” he says. “We went in there with the concept that we were going to win them over with a patient, persistent presence. Our first objective was getting them jobs. We knew where the jobs were, so our first objective was to get to get the factories in and around Fallujah going.”