I got a new guy on my gun team. A Pvt from Minnesota. In his room up on the wall by his bed, he has an 8X10 photo of the farm he grew up on, and a bunch of inspirational quotes from the bible taped up. I didn't know people still grew up on farms. Kid barely looks 18. He's been in the Army just as long as me, but he's been cursed and damned with bad luck so far his entire army career, getting kicked out of this squad and that squad, thus the reason why he's still a Pvt. In fact when they brought him over to me to tell me that he was now on my gun team, he had his rifle tied down to some survival chord that was tied off and wrapped around his waist. He left his weapon unsecured, so as corrective training and punishment for the next two weeks he has to have his rifle tied down on this string that's connected and tied off to his body so he learns not to go anywhere without his weapon.
Like I said before, if there's a problem, the Army has a solution. They sent him over to me, hoping that maybe I can straighten him out a bit. I'm a Team Leader for Gun #2 in my Plt, so I'm in charge of him now. I'm his boss. Last night we had a brief drive around Mosul and an OP planned for us. In the motor pool before the mission, be both met a little bit early so I could give him a brief class on the M240Bravo Machine gun, how to load it, clear it, and fire it, the basics. Since we're missing a couple guys from leave, they're having me operate the .50 cal on our vehicle for the next couple days. My job usually is to operate the 240 machine gun that's mounted on the back of our vehicle, but for now I'm having the new guy pull "Air Guard" and operate the 240 out the back air century hatch on our vehicle, while I cover down and operate the .50 cal that's on the front of our vehicle for the next couple days. Get him comfortable and familiar with the gun. I figure it would be good training for him.
I was teaching him how to mount the gun on the mount that's on the back of the vehicle when I asked him if he had any questions, he told me no. But I could tell there was something disturbing him, he was smoking his cigarettes very nervously and he looked kinda pale. So I pulled him over to the side and asked, "Hey man, are you all right? You look disturbed." he paused for awhile, and then without making eye contact with me he said softly "I'm not all right. I don't want to pull air guard." What? He doesn't want to pull air guard? WTF? So I asked him, "Why man, what's up?" He said, "I'm scared to be out the hatch. I don't want to do it. I was in 21Victor when we got hit with those IED's and ever since then I don't pull air guard because I'm too scared."
The story: a couple months ago we were doing a patrol and 21 Victor (A Stryker) got hit with two daisy chain 155mm Artillery rounds that were converted to IED's, both ignited at the same time. Two of our guys received purple hearts from Shrapnel. 155's are f**king huge. I was riding in the vehicle that was following 21 when they got hit, and that explosion was soo big and loud, that I actually thought our vehicle was the one that got hit. Anyways he was inside that vehicle the day it got hit and he's been creeped out ever since.
I have no idea what the f**k to say or do in a situation like this, a soldier scared to do his job. Damn.
In the movies the guy always says something cool in a situation like this to his soldier, but I had no idea what the f**k to say to something like that. So the big brother in me kinda stepped in and I told him, "Look man, you'll be all right, we're not going to be out too long, and nothings gonna happen to you. I know how you feel man, f**k, I feel the same way too sometimes, but you just gotta do it. You'll be all right man, nothings gonna happen, O.K.? It'll be all right."
I hate telling half-truths to people. But it worked, he looked a bit more relieved, and he paused and thought for a second about what I just said, and shyfully told me that he didn't want to do it, but he was going to do it anyways. I told him not to worry about a thing, and if he had any questions or anything to talk to me.
While we were driving around Mosul, I constantly looked back to see how he was doing, he looked nervous as hell, but overall, looked all right. We drove around a bit, and then when it got dark, we pulled an OP. We parked our vehicle, dismounted the guys, and I began my shift of scanning my sector with the 50 cal. In case anything happens I'm there to reach out and touch someday.
Then at about 23:00 I overheard on the radio the squad leader from 1st Squad whisper over the radio: "We have a man creeping up on us, break. He's wearing a white man dress, break. And he has a loaded AK47 in his hand, over." It was impossible for me to see the guy from where I was positioned, so I didn't have a shot at him. But what happened, from the story I collected from the guys from first squad was, this guy was creeping up on them with an AK, got close, saw that it was American soldiers, started yelling at them in Arabic, charged his weapon, pointed it at them and started firing. Almost hit one of our PFC's from Texas. They returned fire and ended him.
Now in the movies, when they kill people, they just leave the body there, and Charlie Mike (continue mission). Not us. We don't work like that. No, we police up our dead. We secured the area, and we had the guys in our vehicle go put the guy in a black body bag and throw him in the back of our vehicle so we could drop off the body at the local Mosul Police Station. My guy was a part of that detail.
As soon as they threw the body in the back of our vehicle it filled the vehicle with a very unpleasant aroma of a really bad stench, in a way I guess you could say it stunk like death. The zipper on the body bag was busted, and blood was drooling all over the place. The guys who carried the body in, had blood smear marks here and there on their BDU's.
Once we had the dead body in the back of our vehicle we took off and started to drive to the nearest police station, which was about 5 minutes away. One thing I've noticed about me since I've been here is that I've developed a really warped, dark, sick sense of humor out here. I have a headset on my helmet that allows me radio communication with the driver. Here's the conversation the driver and me had on the way to the police station while we had the dead guy laying down in the back of our vehicle:
DRIVER: Hey, did you ever see those old Police Academy movies?
ME: Yea.
DRIVER: Remember that one where they put the body in the body bag and he comes back alive?
ME: Yea!
Both Of Us: (laughter)
ME: Hey, you remember that Chris Farley movie, the one with him and David Spade where they're driving that car, and they hit a deer, and they both think its dead, so they put it in the back seat of the car and they drive off, and then all the sudden it comes back alive and goes psycho and f**ks the car up?
DRIVER: F**k yea, that sh*t was funnier than hell!
Both Of Us: (Laughter)
I am soo going to burn in hell. I have a f**kin dead guy in the back of our vehicle and I'm cracking funnies. So not cool.
On the way to the police station I was concerned about the new guy. He wasn't up in the back air century hatch behind the 240 anymore, they had someone else up there now. My guy was now sitting down in the back of the vehicle on the bench, with the dead guy on the ground by his feet. I looked back to check up on him, and I could tell right away from the expression on his face that he was all f**ked up. He looked like he was going to cry, and he was trying his hardest to fight it. F**k, g*d damnit, I didn't want him sitting down in front of that body bag. Why did somebody switch out with him? Why the f**k is he sitting down on the bench? That sh*ts going to f**k him up, I didn't want him sitting down in front of the body bag, he should be up in the hatch away from that.
But it was too late, we were almost at the police station. When we got to the police station we dropped the back ramp, grabbed the body bag and handed the ICP's the body and the weapon that he used, which was an AK47 that was completely missing the buttstock and handle. Ghetto.
After that we drove back to the FOB and we all went to midnight chow at the chow hall. They have a midnight meal available from 23:00 hours to 01:00. I wanted to make sure I sit down next to my guy, make sure he was ok. I looked all over for him, but I didn't see him anywhere. I found my Sqd Ldr, sat down next to my Sqd Ldr, and I asked him, hey, where the hell is the new guy at? He told me that when we parked the vehicle to go to chow, he said that he wasn't hungry and didn't want to eat, and he just wanted to go to his room. So he left and walked back to his room from the chow hall by himself.
Keep a close eye on that new guy - he sounds like a candidate for suicide. We had an almost suicide way back when We found him - after we sailed - with his M14 in his mouth. All we could do was tie him up for the rest of the mission.