In the Gray Area

by Seth W. B. Folsom

  We follow behind the junood as they patrol down the plantation’s long, tilled fields. The ground is soft, and it is indeed an ideal location for a cache site. What the soldiers really need for the job are metal detectors to sweep the rows of soft, plowed earth. But despite our prodding the battalion staff has failed to properly request the metal detectors in a timely manner. After more than an hour of searching through the vegetation the soldiers find nothing and call it a day. As they remount their Humvees we call for our vehicles to shut down the SATCOM relay and come retrieve us. We fall back in with the IA convoy for the return to COP South with nothing to show for our efforts.

  In the end all we can do is designate Al Gab’aa as a named area of interest (NAI) and continue to monitor it. After the operation is complete we remind the battalion staff of the requirement to properly plan each operation. If we do it for them—if we request the metal detectors on our own—the battalion staff will never learn from their mistakes. They will keep relying on the Americans to pull them along. It is their country, their army. They must take ownership of both if they want to succeed.

  Chapter 17

  Mistakes and Mistrust

  My billet as the team leader put me in a unique position, one I had never been afforded during my roles as a platoon commander and company commander. Because the Outlanders comprised so many talented young leaders I was able to float from position to position within the team, whether we were inside the wire aboard COP South or out conducting a patrol or convoy. I didn’t feel compelled to lead every convoy or mission; in fact, it was much the opposite. I deliberately opted out of the mission-leader billet during nearly all convoys and patrols, choosing instead to ride behind the driver in the comm seat and manage the radios. I knew my choice was probably atypical of most type A infantry officers, but my reasons were legitimate. Above all else I wanted all of the Marines on the team to be completely cross-trained in every aspect of mounted operations in Humvees. Driving, gunning, manning the radios, or actually leading the patrols—all were important facets of the mission, and I wanted each team member equally comfortable in any role. Although we eventually developed assigned vehicle crews, no one was given a permanent position in a vehicle. Everyone took turns rotating through jobs, and by the deployment’s end each Marine had led numerous patrols and had manned every station in the Humvee more times than he could count.

  I had my own reasons for not constantly taking charge of each patrol. After all, I had nothing to prove. The team members knew my background, and they knew it was best not to challenge my operational credibility. Though they may not have realized it at the time, I tended to take the backseat so I could evaluate the Marines as they briefed and executed each mission. Most of the time I was a silent observer, but occasionally during a mission the vehicle commander or driver would hear me in his headset providing a gentle correction. While several members of the team had extensive experience operating in Humvees in Iraq, others did not. It became my intent to ensure all Marines on the team returned to their parent units better-trained than they had been when they left. I was more than willing to sacrifice my position in the vehicle commander’s seat to ensure my team members received the training and operational experience they needed.

  But not all Marines on the team understood my intent in that regard, and many began giving me hell for always sitting in the back of the Humvee during convoys and patrols. One afternoon, Lieutenant Bates sauntered into the MWR hut minutes before the daily team meeting. A convoy to Camp Al Qa’im had been scheduled for the following day.

  “Hey, sir, you planning on going to AQ with us tomorrow?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Throw me in on the convoy.”

  “Do you want to VC one of the vics [vehicles]?”

  “Naw,” I answered, thinking nothing of it. “Go ahead and put me in the comm seat.”

  Bates paused, and then smirked.

  “Sir, some of the Marines were talking shit about you always sitting in the back,” he offered.

  I shook my head, laughing wryly.

  “Bates, I won’t even dignify that with an answer. I have more time on the shitter than most of those Marines have commanding a vehicle or a patrol.”

  He recoiled at my reply and jumped to defuse the situation.

  “I think they were just joking around, sir. I don’t think they were serious.”

  “Yeah, roger,” I said sarcastically.

  Regardless, I couldn’t help taking the bait. Later at the team meeting I directed my attention to Sgt. Theo Bowers, the team’s intelligence NCO. Currently serving his fourth tour in Iraq, Bowers claimed to hail from California. But the ever-present wad of tobacco tucked into his lip, the battered old blue and white pickup he always drove, and the casual drawl of his voice screamed Texan. He had been designated as the convoy commander for the following day and was in the process of assigning vehicle billets for the movement.

  “Hey, Sergeant Bowers,” I said. “Put me in as your driver.”

  He tilted his head quizzically, as if he didn’t understand me.

  “Roger, sir,” he replied, making a note. I turned my attention to the rest of the team.

  “As for the rest of you, I heard you’ve been talking smack about me sitting in the back of the Humvee all the time. In case you care, the reason I do that is because I want you all to get the experience you need running the show. I’ve had more than enough hours and days in the VC’s seat, and I’ll be happy to sit down with anyone on the team and discuss in ass-bleeding detail exactly how much time I have.”

  I tried not to make a habit of jamming my résumé down my team’s throats, choosing instead to offer object lessons from my past when appropriate. And in this case the situation warranted it. It was important to me that the Marines understood that I wouldn’t ask them to do anything that I wouldn’t do myself. I didn’t limit that to operations outside the wire. Whenever possible I jumped in with whatever the team was doing, whether it was vehicle maintenance, camp police call, or standing COC duty as the team watch officer. The team’s small size required it; everyone had to work and pull his weight. As far as I was concerned, rank was not an excuse for not doing the daily grunt work.

  But my insistence on fully participating in all aspects of the team’s operations also resulted in me making visible mistakes in front of the Marines on a regular basis, such as forgetting my equipment during the brigade convoy on 12 March. The convoy on 22 March was no different. It was my first time driving a Humvee while towing a trailer, and I had noticeable difficulty controlling the vehicle, especially when going in reverse. It gave me a whole new appreciation for big-rig truck drivers who routinely haul oversized loads in trailers.

  My series of public errors continued later in the day as the team mounted up for the return to COP South. It had been a long day, and in what was becoming the norm we got stuck at Camp Al Qa’im when a dust storm rolled in and restricted vehicle movement outside the camp. By the time the skies cleared it was after 2200, and the team was in a hurry to get home. The convoy through the darkness wasn’t without its own set of internally generated friction, including a disjointed and confusing movement through the Wadi al Battikah.

  In the end we returned safely to COP South, but as I was conducting the required postoperation maintenance on my Humvee I realized with some horror that I had not activated a critical electronic system within the vehicle before leaving the wire of Camp Al Qa’im. No one had been the wiser, and my error would have gone unnoticed had I not announced my screwup during the team’s post-op debrief. As I declared my mistake publicly my vehicle crew glared at me, the looks on their tired faces saying, Nice going, asshole. You could have killed us. I could have omitted my error from the debrief and they would have never known. But it was important to me that my Marines knew that even I jacked things up occasionally, and that they should learn from my mistake. But I also knew that my openness and honesty was a double-edged sword. Such frankness in admitting blunders could potentially backf
ire, and I hoped they saw it for what it was rather than simply thinking their team leader was just an incompetent moron.

  Still reeling from my misjudgment about Lieutenant Colonel Sa’id, I refocused my efforts with Lieutenant Colonel Ayad now that he was back from mujaas. Waving a piece of paper back and forth, Ayad began ranting on and on, and I had a feeling I knew what he was saying even without Mason there to translate for me. On the evening of 21 March 3rd Battalion’s S-2 had produced a handbill that had been found posted throughout Husaybah. The flyer directly addressed 28th Brigade, and its message was simple: Cease flying the new Iraqi flag or suffer the consequences.

  The new Iraqi flag had been adopted recently by parliament, and with its unveiling had come no small degree of protest within Al Anbar province. The old flag—with its red, white, and black field, three stars, and the words Allahu akbar (God is great) scrawled in Arabic across the center—had remained unchanged as the country’s national symbol since 1991 at the end of the first Gulf War. At first glance the new flag seemed no different than the old one. Further scrutiny revealed that subtle changes had indeed been made. The three black stars—said to represent the Baath Party—had been removed, and the Arabic script’s style had been changed to a modern, almost stilted font. It was widely believed that the original script had been a replica of Saddam Hussein’s own handwriting, and to a slice of Al Anbar’s Sunni population the two changes together represented a deliberate attempt by the Shiites in Iraq’s government to erase part of the country’s heritage.

  In some respects the complaints seemed legitimate, especially when, during the course of a conversation on the matter, one team member commented, “Try taking away the stars on our flag and see what would happen.” But the new flag was the law of the land, and the Iraqi army was supposed to be flying it. Ironically, the team had already seen the handbill during a resupply trip into Husaybah earlier in the week. It had been posted throughout the souq. But, oblivious at the time to what it said, the Marines had ignored it.

  Hours before my meeting with the battalion commander we learned that someone had placed a copy of the same flyer on the windshield of Ayad’s vehicle in COP South, in effect threatening him directly with retaliation if he continued to fly the new flag. He was furious, uncertain what to do about the transgression. Captain Hanna and I had discussed the issue earlier, and our mutual solution was simple: isolate all of the battalion’s personnel and toss the barracks. I urged Ayad to do so immediately, lest the anonymous bill poster rid himself of any remaining evidence. Ayad agreed to the snap inspection, but he postponed it until the next day. I knew he would find nothing. Word traveled fast in the battalion, and surely by the time the inspection was conducted any remaining flyers would be gone. Regardless, Ayad was already certain he knew who the culprit was, even if he couldn’t attach a name to the perpetrator. He believed some of his officers were involved, and he was adamant that the local police were behind the bill postings in Husaybah. It was a wild accusation, one with no tangible proof to back it up. And it was one more manifestation of Ayad’s mistrust in both his own people and the Iraqi Police.

  The posting of the enemy propaganda in Husaybah, in conjunction with a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED) that detonated at the IP district headquarters (DHQ) in Husaybah the previous night and the recent spike in IEDs and weapons cache finds throughout the AO, was alarming. The 28th Brigade MiTT intelligence advisor, a grizzled prior-enlisted bear of a man named Jeff Simpson, was certain something was brewing in the Al Qa’im region. A twenty-year veteran of the infantry and intelligence community, Major Simpson possessed analytical skills that were unmatched throughout the AO. He had cautioned me the previous night about my team’s trips outside the wire. In a cryptic warning he merely said, “Keep your eyes and ears open, and travel with the IA as much as possible.” It was unclear whether Coalition forces would be primary targets, but we weren’t going to take any chances. In light of the recent events and my discussion with Simpson I conveyed my concern to the team, echoing his guidance for increased scrutiny of trips outside the wire, as well as emphasizing again proper mission planning and execution. My parting guidance to the team was simple: our job was to advise the Iraqis and not get blown up in the process.

  As time wore on the Marines gradually assumed their natural roles within the team, and despite their different backgrounds and specialties they continued to gel and increase their collective proficiency. Our progress with the 3rd Battalion staff, however, was frequently like taking one step forward and two steps back. I had been pushing Ayad to conduct regular staff meetings with his officers in an effort to increase coordination among them. Individually the staff officers tended to get by to an acceptable degree, but synchronization between the staff sections was virtually nonexistent. No big fan of staff meetings myself, I nevertheless understood the utility in conducting them, and I urged my team principals to convince their counterparts to meet regularly. It was a constant battle, akin to forcing water to travel uphill.

  After much digging we eventually discovered that the Iraqi officers did in fact conduct battalion staff meetings, and on 25 March we attended for the first time. Much to our surprise the meeting was conducted professionally, even including an overreliance and general abuse of PowerPoint slides that rivaled most Coalition staff briefings. The greatest difference was Ayad’s comments at the meeting’s close. Rather than focus on what would routinely be big-picture issues or give broad guidance like most American commanders would, he instead read from an exhaustive list all the little things that had been pissing him off.

  The discrepancies he noted were issues normally reserved for the battalion XO or sergeant major to address, but Ayad refused to employ either in that capacity. His acting XO, a monstrous, potbellied major named Jawaad, was known throughout the battalion as “Silverback,” and he had a reputation for manhandling misbehaving junood when they failed to bend to his will. Although more than capable of running the battalion for Ayad, Jawaad was usually relegated to dealing with personnel and life-support issues throughout the camp. The battalion sergeant major filled a similar function, completing logistical and administrative duties that were more characteristic of a company gunnery sergeant than a sergeant major.

  Ayad’s mistrust of his officers was apparent as he rattled off his list to the staff. Such a lack of faith in his subordinates was evident in his micromanagement of even the tiniest aspects of the battalion, and the frustration of the officers present at the staff meeting was written on their faces. As during the visit by Colonel Ra’ed earlier in the month, I marveled at the commander’s obsession with the little things, particularly when there were so many greater issues on which to focus.

  Yet Ayad’s ravings weren’t exactly without merit. If the petty things he described were true, then his staff was indeed letting him down, not supervising when they should have been. The issue of trust—or, in 3rd Battalion’s case, the lack thereof—was a significant obstacle that polarized Ayad and his staff. For whatever reason he didn’t trust them to make what would appear to be even the most basic decisions, and so every issue had to be brought to him for approval before any action could be taken. The officers and staff were generally unwilling to approach Ayad with questions or to seek guidance or clarification, and the result was an organizational paralysis throughout the battalion.

  When it came to leadership and initiative, a gulf existed between what Ayad practiced and what he preached. He had told me many times that he placed great emphasis on the importance of junior leaders—the NCOs, lieutenants, and captains—but his words became merely lip service once I realized that he wouldn’t give his subordinates the freedom to exercise initiative and responsibility. Despite his weak attempts at advocating modern military concepts such as the importance of junior leadership on the battlefield, Ayad was very much rooted in the customs and traditions of the old Iraqi army. His actions and decisions indicated a belief in strong, centralized leadership, and I soon realized that n
o amount of persuasion on my part could ever convince him to change his tune. The problem was compounded by the handbill that had been posted on his vehicle. Such incidents only heightened Ayad’s sense of mistrust in his officers and caused him to tighten the reins within the battalion even further.

  Setting aside the battalion’s leadership challenges, I instead began to grapple with a larger issue. After having observed the battalion for nearly a month I wondered exactly what it was that was holding back the Iraqis from declaring complete independence from the MiTT team. Each month we submitted an operational readiness assessment (ORA) to our higher headquarters, and by the time the old team had departed 3rd Battalion had achieved ORA Level 2. Achieving Level 1—the point at which transition teams would no longer be required—meant that the battalion would be “capable of independent operations and sustainment.”

  While there were indeed leadership concerns at all levels in the battalion, the unit’s Achilles’ heel had actually been its weak logistical capability. But in general that weakness stemmed from a much higher level. Fuel, spare parts, ammunition—everything required to keep the battalion running—were in short supply, and neither 28th Brigade nor 7th Division could seem to provide them on a regular basis. And once I understood that I suddenly had an epiphany. Until the Iraqi Ministry of Defense was able to properly supply, equip, and maintain 7th Division, and the division could do the same for 28th Brigade, and the brigade could do the same for 3rd Battalion, Ayad’s unit would not be able to achieve Level 1. We were hamstrung by the logjam further upstream, and until the MOD got its act together MiTTs would be required at the brigade and battalion levels. Until that time we could only continue to observe, offer assistance, and make recommendations when necessary. Whether the Iraqis acted on our suggestions was another matter entirely.