AN MP in Baghdad Part II

I was fortunate. I had both a pack of cigarettes AND a tasty beverage on my person to enjoy during the upcoming hour and a half stuck in the bunker as various high ranking folks combed the FOB to see if anybody had been hapless enough to get vaporized. Oh, and to make sure there were no unexploded surprises sputtering away in the middle of darkened roadways to disturb any late night treks to the loo. Actually, we were only in the 'sandbag sauna' for about 20 minutes--a new record in speedy Bomb Damage Assessment.

So we were sitting in our trucks at the checkpoint on the bridge, and [Gunner] bent down from the gunner's turret.

I picked up the internal radio, and called [squad leader]'s truck, and reported this in a bored tone of voice, and was acknowledged by a disembodied and similarly bored voice. You hear gunfire here so often that we really don't get interested unless it's close. Like knocking on your door close. A couple of minutes later, and [Driver] popped back down again.

"Okay", I said, and lit a cigarette, which you're not supposed to do in a HMMWV, but when you are surrounded by high rise apartments in New Baghdad, you don't really want to stand outside to smoke. A couple of the POBs got up slowly from their sleeping mats on the sidewalk, walked over near us and started looking down on Route xxx and up to the north of our position. I looked over at them, tapping the radio hand mike on the side of my Kevlar helmet with one hand, and dragging on my cigarette with the other. It was kind of interesting that the POBs were taking notice, since this requires both physical movement and necessitates being awake, and does not involve eating, drinking chai or getting paid.

I relay the report to the lead truck, but don't get an answer. They are out of the truck, talking to the squad leader of the POB. Oh well. It's just business as usual in Baghdad.

[Gunner] is great, he's really energetic and on the ball, but he is starting to annoy me, and so I turn to gently admonish him in an attempt to get him to chill out a little.

Rounds start skipping on the concrete outside the truck and cracking over the top of the turret. It's really funny how quickly you get attuned to the different sounds of gunfire, and what the sounds mean. How far away the shooter is; whether he is using a Soviet weapon, or an American one; are the shots headed towards you or away from you; and most importantly, are the incoming rounds close or far away from you.

People start running away from the source of the gunfire, which is the series of highrise apartments just to our left, about 100 meters away. As the locals on the ground vacate the premises, the POBs all jump up, grab their motley assortment of weapons, and sprint into the complex. I've never seen these guys move so fast, and as they disappear around the brick corner of the apartment, the rate of fire goes from pop pop pop to full-on automatic fire, brap braaap brrraaaaaap. It's all AK-47 and RPD fire; loud, indignant, and strangely mechanical, sort of like a platoon of particularly well motivated carpenters finishing the roof of a house with pneumatic nail guns.

[Squad leader] and [Soldier 1] are instantly back in the truck and the four vehicle convoy rolls out. For a disappointing moment, I thought we were just going to run off for safer neighborhoods, but then [Soldier 1] jerks the lead HMMWV to the right, bounces over the curb, and disappears between two of the huge apartment buildings. The convoy lurches and sways obediently over the curb after him.

"Oh @##$ yeah, let's get some!", yells [Gunner] from above us. He is only nineteen.

[Driver], as always, has a big wad of Skoal in his cheek, and an intent look on his face. He doesn't say anything. I warn the guys to make sure of their targets; there are both civilians and the Iraqi Public Order Battalion soldiers (POBs) running around in here, as well as whoever was shooting at us. I'm concerned about the possibility of fratricide.

"43 to all Renegade elements. Watch the rooftops, watch the balconies. We got friendlies in here. Other than that, do what you have to do."

In the background, I can hear [Squad leader] relaying a situation report to our company on the other radio. We are all energized, but strangely, not in a hyper sort of way. Everyone is calm, focused. It's exciting, but not wildly exciting. The mix is surprising to me. No one is scared. It is about the same level of excitement as watching a fairly good action movie on TV. Maybe a little less so.

There are POBs and civilians coming out of the woodwork. I spot a large group of them down an alleyway, and call it up to the lead truck. It's too late to turn right into it, so we go down the sidestreet, turn around, and come back. By the time we get down the alleyway, it is choked with POBs and a crowd of yammering and gesturing locals.

We pull up, and I get out to keep the civilians away from our truck. The gunners are crouched down, covering the rooftops and balconies with their .50 caliber machine guns and M4 rifles. The flats are eight or nine stories high, so it's not possible to elevate the crew served weapons high enough to cover the apartments closest to us. I stand with my armored door open for added protection, rifle/grenade launcher at the ready over the top of the door, and watch for snipers. Old guys in stained 'wifebeater' t-shirts stand and blink at the mess below from their balconies. Fat housewives in brightly colored muumuu's lean out of windows and flick ash from the ends of their cigarettes. No one seems particularly interested when I point my weapon at them and examine them through my scope.

Everybody is clustered around a blue Chevy Optra, a model I've never heard of before. It's a little import-looking sedan, and amazingly, there does not appear to be a single bullet hole in it. Eventually it turns out that a Iraqi Police car tried to pull it over. The car ran, the cops shot at it, some folks in the car shot back, and then they were unfortunate enough to run into the POBs, who got it stopped. The car is full of weapons and some bomb making supplies, so it is pretty clear that it is being used by an insurgent group to move supplies. We are told to look out for a female driver.

I ask for a description, but there isn't one. This is typical for the Iraqi Police. We are constantly being told to look out for sparsely described suspicious vehicles. A black BMW sedan, a blue Kia van with a luggage rack, or my favorite in minimalist threats, 'a silver car'. Do you know how many blue Kia vans with luggage racks there are in Baghdad? We won't even get into the silver car issue. We actually got that over the radio once; be on the lookout for a silver car. 'Ummmmm, roger,' look at the hand mic and make a face like, what the hell?

So, we diligently keep an eye out for the female driver. Being soldiers, we feel that we are reasonably qualified to complete this task. We dutifully ogle every woman in the area for the rest of the morning, watching for suspicious bulges in clothing. While we do find plenty of curves worthy of further investigation, none appear to be of the high explosive variety. Damn.

We roll out to circle the neighborhood, continuing our quest for suspiciously voluptuous Arab chicks and any card carrying insurgents. We're pretty sure that some of the fleeing locals at the start of the fracas were escaping insurgents from the car, but since they did not have the common decency to announce their affiliation to us, we couldn't shoot them. Not terribly sporting of them, but what can you do?

[Gunner] suggests around a wad of peach flavored chewing tobacco that we should just shoot all Iraqis with the foresight to run away from gunfire, but I have to reluctantly veto the proposition.

After a couple of fruitless circles of the area, several more conversations with the wildly gesturing POBs who were now happily looting the car, and more pointing of weapons at the oblivious local inhabitants, [Squad leader] decides that we have done all we can to liberate this block of flats.

Imagine doing this week after week after week. I stand at attention and salute our soldiers and Marines as they each day perform dangerous missions.

"[Gunner] suggests around a wad of peach flavored chewing tobacco that we should just shoot all Iraqis with the foresight to run away from gunfire, but I have to reluctantly veto the proposition."

After one particularly crappy day, a Soldier in my company, who happened to have a master's degree in English and read poetry in his free time and actively campaigned for Ralph Nader, came up to me and, clearly very frustrated, exclaimed, "sir, we just need to kill everyone in this city." I, too, had to exert my veto, but it was nice to see that even an enlightened liberal can occasionally see the light.

exclaimed, "sir, we just need to kill everyone in this city."

LOL - it wasn't Colby Buzzell, was it?

Thank you for your service.

Thanks for the pings. This gives good insight into what we're facing. Lot tougher than an assault. This guy has god instincts but he's in danger of becoming careless.

11 posted on 09/21/2006 3:41:27 AM PDT by Jimmy Valentine's brother (Crush Islamofacists; see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women.)

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.