The Long Walk: A Story of War and the Life That Follows

by Brian Castner

  That was the moment the second bomber entered, detonating his belt in the middle of the Good Samaritan crowd. He made no mistakes, and was well clear of obstacles that would mitigate his effect.

  The bombers probably hoped that the gas station itself would explode as the result of their attack. But Hollywood lies, and even aromatic, poorly maintained Iraqi petrol pumps won’t send up a huge fireball from a small belt or two. Instead, the bombers simply sowed panic, pain, and madness.

  I only ever saw one Hollywood-style fireball. In Balad, one year before, on one of the few missions I completed on my brief, aborted tour.

  Organizationally, the Balad EOD compound was a virtual hub for five spokes, five combat outposts that relied on the main base for logistical support. I only visited them once, to make the rounds—drop off mail and pick up gear, remind the guys to shave and take a shower, and swap them out, giving them a not always welcome break at the main hub for a while. Delivering the mail in Iraq is not an easy task. Five gun trucks, our EOD Humvee, and hours of planning and preparation were required just to leave the gate. Our security briefed the convoy order, actions to take on stops, the route we would follow—through the village of Al Dineria, where it was either bloody or muddy, according to the First Sergeant in charge—and how we would stop and fight if ambushed.

  Bloody or muddy. Al Dineria turned out to be the latter. And how. The potholes in the hamlet’s semi-paved streets were the size of moon craters, and we nearly lost the front end of our Humvee in a harmless-looking puddle in the center of the road. The combat outposts where we stopped resembled frontier forts built to fight the Indian Wars in the American West. At FOB O’Ryan, Bradley armored fighting vehicles were lined up against the outer wall every twenty yards, 30-millimeter chain guns pointing out at the featureless floodplain, ready to respond to rocket and mortar fire. At FOB Paliwoda, foot-thick concrete slabs were stacked like LEGO bricks, building walls, roofs, and shelters for each tin can that housed beds or operations centers. And then to our last stop, across the Tigris, on a pontoon bridge only inches wider than our armored truck.

  We picked up a package at that last stop. It was a present from the spooks. There wasn’t enough space at their FOB to detonate it. Could we take it back to Balad and dispose of it there?

  “What is it?” I asked.

  The bearded, plainclothed man handed me an irregular black package. It was the size and shape of a football, completely wrapped in electrical tape and incredibly heavy. On one end a small strand of green detonating cord stuck out.

  “Don’t worry about what it is,” the spook said.

  “Sorry, man. I can’t just blow things up if I have no idea what they are.”

  Silence from the spook.

  “At least tell me how big the bang is going to be.”

  “Just blow it by itself—you can cap in here,” he said, pointing to the little strip of det cord.

  My curiosity got the better of me, and an hour later my teammate Finch and I were back at Balad setting up a disposal shot on the abandoned infield between the two main runways, our designated demolitions area, as it was the only empty space on an otherwise crowded American complex.

  “What the hell do you think this is?” I asked Finch, who had been around a lot longer than me.

  “Dude, I have no idea, but we’re moving back,” replied Finch. He had attached the blasting cap to the indicated cord as I was setting up a radio receiver that would electronically initiate the explosion.

  “How far back do we need to go?”

  “All the way back,” said Finch, as he hopped in the truck, and we drove off.

  I pulled out the heavy green radio transmitter once we arrived at our safe area, a protective shelter a sufficient distance from the freshly dug pit that contained the black football.

  “Fire in the hole,” I said, far more quietly than usual, as I peered around the steel wall and pressed the final button.

  Thunder and hellfire and a plume of black smoke ten stories high. The crack of the shock wave engulfed our metal box and rattled my lungs. The control tower on the far side of the airfield shook. Windows broke in the flimsy, Iraqi-made administrative buildings dotting the complex. Back at the EOD compound, the phone rang about a possible attack on the airbase.

  That explosion lived up to Hollywood expectations.

  My tour at Balad did not last much longer, though it ended over transportation paperwork, not detonating unidentified explosives recovered from strangers. For minor offenses in the military justice system, the General plays prosecutor, judge, and jury. For reasons unknown to me to this day, my charge was ultimately reduced and my penalty dropped to a reprimand that would be placed in my official record. The real punishment, however, was my removal from the unit. I was fired, disgraced, headed home on a plane less than a week later. The C-130 ride back out of the box—back to three-a-day beers and sun and safety and little Air Force girls in bikinis by the base pool in Qatar—was the longest, least welcome flight I have ever taken. I landed alone, lucky to be simply bereft of my command and not headed to jail. But I found my blessings hard to count.

  When I arrived in Qatar, home of Central Air Forces headquarters, the top engineer on staff met me at the plane. He said there was a change of plans. He shredded my paperwork and said I’d serve out the rest of my tour working for him. My work-release package involved a purgatory of shuffling virtual papers in a cheap office trailer, in the rear with the gear, answering phones and going to meetings and “working issues” and “providing the leadership with an accurate sight-picture” for their metaphorical radar screen. Every day I read the incident reports detailing missions that my brothers in Balad had completed. Every day I dreamed of a return up north that I knew was impossible.

  I had a taste of it now. The rifles, armored trucks, love, Brotherhood, detonations, IEDs, camaraderie, robots, bearded special-ops guys, and incoming mortar fire were all really there. I knew the life I wanted was possible in that exploding dustbowl.

  I had to get back. I needed to get back. But how?

  I dutifully served my penance until one day, four months in and nearly done with my staff tour, the phone rang. It was a fellow EOD officer, the commander of the largest EOD unit at that time in the Air Force, at Nellis Air Force Base outside of Las Vegas.

  “When you get back to the States you’re moving here to take over for me,” he said in a tone that allowed no debate.

  “Didn’t you hear, sir? I got fired. I’m done,” I replied.

  “Yeah, we heard what happened. Tell your wife you’re leaving Cannon and coming to Nellis as soon as you get back. We’ll get you deployed again to Iraq by this time next year,” he said, and hung up the phone.

  It happened all as he said, and now here I was. In Kirkuk. Knee deep in blood, charred cars, yelling Iraqi policemen, and sporadic gunfire. Luckiest son of a bitch I knew.

  I checked the date on my watch. I landed back in the box a month ago.

  One month. I had survived a full month, in command, without getting fired. And I wouldn’t be.

  “Hey, guess what?” I called over to Ewbank, who was sifting for explosive evidence through a mix of gasoline and unidentifiable body parts near the base of a white petrol pump.

  Ewbank looked up. His face was equal parts red and black.

  “I made it thirty days without being fired.”

  “Very groovy, sir!” came Ewbank’s chipper reply. He had left his Elvis sunglasses back at the compound, but the cool attitude was perpetual.

  We both laughed, and recognized our good fortune, and continued combing through the burned car parts and piss and brake fluid and odd fingers and ball bearings and shredded clothing, looking for omens in the entrails.

  I step out of my home, sun shining, air crisp and cold, Crazy on a slow boil, a pot left on the stove all day bubbling and cooking. Another run, to tame the balloon stew, to burn off the worst of the wave overwhelming my life.

  Ricky is waiting for me at the end of
the driveway. We don’t always run together, but he is joining me more and more. Rare is the day now I run alone, and Ricky is a good companion. We don’t have to make regular plans; he doesn’t need a specific invitation, and is rarely unwelcome. Running to burn off the Crazy can be lonely, and Ricky loves to run. I meet him at the road, and we turn toward the river, wide and gray on this late November day.

  Ricky is a broomstick with knees and elbows. Taller than me and with far longer legs, his natural gait is a steady lope I struggle to keep up with. We settle into a rhythm of breaths and footfalls, faster than I would run naturally. But Ricky knows the harder I work the more Crazy I smother, and he keeps the pace up. Two miles in, despite the level pavement and still-warming sun, I’m struggling to keep up. Ricky turns and looks over his shoulder, eyes squinting against the glare and an easy mocking smile on his lips.

  “What’s wrong, Captain? Don’t be scared of the soft sand,” Ricky laughs.

  I dig deeper and catch up, and soon we are side by side once again.

  The road winds between the water and stately homes, snapping nautical flags on beached boats and trim black-shuttered colonials overlooking the Niagara River. Two miles turns into three. Three into five. The Crazy began to loosen its grip at mile four. The last half is comparative bliss.

  Ricky and I turn for home, race in a bit of a sprint at the end. Ricky wins. He always does.

  “See ya tomorrow, sir.” Ricky waves and jogs away fading down the street. I pant, struggle up my driveway, open the door to my house, and the unwavering Crazy engulfs me anew.

  IV | The Daily Grind

  THE REHEARSED BALLET began when a call came in. A bomb squad doesn’t drive around town all day searching for IEDs any more than firefighters patrol the city streets looking for plumes of smoke on the horizon. Instead, the entire compound waited in perpetual anticipation, one ear trained for the phone, muscle and concrete taut in preparation, a coiled spring. Armored trucks lay in wait in the yard, noses toward the gate, robots loaded, explosives stowed, doors open and adorned with body armor and helmets at the ready. Teams sorted gear, packed and repacked, checked and rechecked. Every day the explosives were inventoried and refreshed. Every day the robot batteries were swapped through the trickle charger. Every day the jammer was turned on and cycled, load set confirmed. Every day the bomb suit came out of each truck, to inspect the pants and suspenders and spine guard, the zipper and ties, the diaper that swaddles your groin, the heavy overcoat and front Kevlar plate, quick-release tabs, helmet and air snorkel, microphone and power-fan electrical connections, a line of fresh batteries and a wipe of the two-inch-thick visor.

  Everyone had a different ritual. No one started a task they could not quickly put aside. Some cleaned their rifles over and over again. Others fretted over the last e-mail from their wife or girlfriend. Mengershausen slept, with one eye open and a black watch cap on, even in the heat of the summer. Ewbank slipped on wide black sunglasses and a Hugh Hefner silk robe, proper loungewear, he called it, took a seat to wait with a cup of specially prepared fancy coffee and Magnum, P.I. reruns. Keener pored over supply inventories and bitched that no one completed their paperwork right. Mitchell and Crisp, black and white partners in crime, smoked and joked the minutes away in front of the HAS. I endlessly read reports, wrote reports, rewrote reports, and justified not having to write reports. It filled the time between phone calls, and beat the slow death waiting brings. The ops desk, continuously manned, existed simply to answer that phone. For a call.

  Sometimes there was a warning of a call—thunder in the distance on a clear day, a black cloud hanging over the city. Usually we were not so fortunate. Monotony, a string of tasks, the long wait, and then, piercing the quiet, a ring. The ring. Time to go on a call.

  If I close my eyes now and let my mind drift I can see every ritualized movement, every inch of concrete crossed, every step between my desk and the waiting armored truck. The papers thumbtacked to the plywood wall next to the phone, the computer that printed maps of the location of each call, the dust on the gray floor, the placement of my pistol in the gun rack, the metal peg on the HAS blast doors where my body armor hung, the contents of every pocket.

  My brain has been torn and ripped by explosions, memories of my children stolen or faded, blown apart in each blast. So how do I remember every inch, every second of the move to a call? I am surrounded by reminders. They come unbidden, springing to mind. Every pair of boots I own are sandy. My rifle is always waiting for me. My children’s first steps are my walk to the truck.

  When the phone rang, and we knew it was a call, I began the rite. Out of the office that I shared with the phone and the ops desk and the big map of Kirkuk on the wall. A yell to the team on standby: time to wake up, time to go, time to do the job. To the gun rack, where I unbuckled my pants and tucked in my long desert camouflage blouse to get it out of the way. Nine-millimeter pistol first, stuck in the back of my trousers. Rifle next, out of the rack, in my hand, then out of the ramshackle work space and into the wide-open covered aircraft shelter we used as our base. Across the dirty floor, past the racks of spare robots and radios and .50-caliber sniper rifles. To my gear, rifle down, pistol out. Body armor on first, lashed across, shoulder armor strapped in place. Tactical vest on top, covered in pouches and pockets containing six rifle magazines, extra pistol mag, flashlight, crimpers, Leatherman tool, knife, a note from my wife begging me to come home, the rosary from my dead Aunt Mary and a scapular, so when I died I wasn’t going to Hell, no matter what I had done on the call. Pistol in the cross-draw holster on my front left side. Helmet on my head. Gloves on, earplugs in, sunglasses. Rifle magazine in, bolt forward, round in the chamber.

  I could do it today. I do it every day.

  Then back to the ops desk—where was the IED, the car bomb, the crater in the road left from a blast that just hit one of our convoys? Map in hand, we talked. Hey, we were just there yesterday. Do you remember the second pressure-plate-actuated device, hidden where we planned to work? That is where Ewbank got hit. That’s our third truck bomb in that neighborhood this week. Grim pins stuck in the wall-sized map of Kirkuk reminded us of each call.

  The calls come all day and night. Rockets in the morning at breakfast. Car bombs all afternoon. In between prayer times, sung from the minarets. After dinner as darkness sets in. After curfew, when all average citizens should be home snug in their beds, and only trouble awaits on patrol.

  Trey said it’s not today until you sleep. Sometimes, when the calls pile up, you can go from yesterday to tomorrow and never get to today.

  Dawn and a wakeup, tepid mushy oatmeal, a run to clear a crush switch and a couple of 130s left from the night prior, hardened hamburgers on dry stale buns, the regular afternoon suicide car bomb downtown at a school or police station, the weekly serving of pork adobo, dusk, a suspicious-looking white trash bag called in by a hesitant patrol that turns out to be nothing, midnight chow of rubbery steaks and pancakes, an endless drive out and back at twenty miles per hour to a cell phone and dual-tone multi-frequency decoder-board setup discovered by a long-haul convoy in the dark and distant desert, dawn, breakfast of spicy sausage patties and cold omelets, a cordon-and-knock takedown of a weapons cache in downtown Hawija, more hardened hamburgers, and finally, exhausted and delirious, sleep.

  It was never today. It was only yesterday and tomorrow.

  The worst calls are the ones just after midnight and in the earliest pre-dawn. Sometimes you just know a call is coming. You can feel it in the air; your Spidey sense tingles. Maybe it was a quiet day. Maybe it was good weather; Haji doesn’t like the cold or the rain, so a long hot quiet day means a long hot busy night. When you know a call is coming, you stay up late, waiting for it. No point in going to sleep if you are just going to be woken up. But then a call doesn’t come. 2200. 2230.

  “Hey, Price. Do you think we’re getting any calls tonight?” you ask.

  “Nah, why don’t you hit the rack,” answers Price, a hovering
mother hen in a linebacker’s body, massive black arms the size of your thighs crossed over his wide chest while reading intel reports. Price guards the phone each night, and suffers worse insomnia than you.

  “I’ll stay up a little longer and see.” So you wander over to the adjacent room, and play a little Halo. Every alien is a bad guy, and needs to die. It’s so refreshingly simple. Now it’s 2300. 2330. Still no call. But you can’t hang on any longer; your eyes are closing on their own.

  “Price, I’m bushed. I’m giving up for the night.”

  “Sounds good, sir.”

  A half hour later, Price is banging on your door with a call. A string of pressure-switch contacts Christmas-tree-light-style and two 122-millimeter projos on Route Cherry. So you roll off your cot and start the ritual: gear on, grab a sugar-and-caffeine energy drink, hop in the Humvee, slam the sickening concoction in one gulp, a stomach rumble, open the door, puke onto the awaiting dirt, and you’re ready to run all night long, on a half hour of sleep.

  And out you go, out of your compound, off the FOB, outside the wire, past the guards and spotlights and blast barriers and gates, and into the unknown.

  What do you think when you leave the gate? When you leave the protected enclosure and false security of your ringed base? I thought of an uncle, filling a C-130 with bullet holes over tiny jungle airstrips in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. A grandfather who built the double runway on Guam in 1944. Another grandfather who landed in southern France and marched to Berlin. A great-great-grandfather, a lumberjack and pig farmer in North Pine Grove, Pennsylvania, fresh from the boat and the Kaiser’s army, who at the age of forty-one, and with seven (of his eventual nine) children at home, left his plow in the field to march south with the 63rd Pennsylvania Volunteers, to the Peninsula Campaign and the Second Battle of Bull Run. He returned ten months later, with a bullet hole and a Purple Heart. How would I return?