We Got Him!

by Steve Russell

  After the funeral, I enjoyed a few days in Oklahoma. I hurt for my mother and prayed her pain would ease soon. My sister and brother would be a big help to her. I was grateful for that because I had to return to the war. We enjoyed each other’s company for the very short time we had. Cindy, the kids, Jack (our Jack Russell terrier), and I returned to Texas before the scheduled date of my return. These few days were wonderful for me, but they were deadly for my soldiers in Iraq.

  The “Cobras” of C Company had their palace rattled by RPG fire on September 29. The next day, an informant led our operations officer, Major Bryan Luke, to a cache of 60 more rocket-propelled grenades. After weeks of successful raiding, the enemy was being severely disrupted. The fresh quantities of advanced and deadly weapons that our men were finding in the area still concerned me. The enemy was clearly stockpiling for more strikes. This, coupled with Jack’s SOF intelligence about SA-7 missiles, caused us all great concern as these projectiles could quickly knock our helicopters out of the sky. We were thrilled to have found 23 of them, but we feared that there might be many more of them in our area. Even a single missile could spell disaster.

  While we had successfully stopped a potential disaster with anti-aircraft missiles, the enemy continued to gather strength from the old Saddam networks and reorganize his efforts. Saddam’s cousin and a member of the Hasan family, Jeliu Abdul Hasan, had been a general for Saddam. Mike Rauhut led the raid that had just captured his brother, Saad, and our troops were hunting his other brother, Raad.

  Unknown to us then, Jeliu’s son, Mohammed Jeliu Abdul Hasan, was set on vengeance for when we captured his uncle Saad a few days before. He was teamed up with the Khatab family—the same family that produced Abid Hamid Mahmood al-Khatab, aka the Ace of Diamonds, whom we captured in June. Amer Kalid Abdullah al-Khatab’s family had successfully smuggled in some powerful explosives, and he and fellow insurgents had been busy building explosive devices in Cadaseeyah. Now, he and Mohammed Hasan decided it was time to test them, but not in the Cadaseeyah area. They would employ one of the new devices farther south in the city of Tikrit.

  Amer al-Khatab and Mohammed Hasan selected a spot along Highway 1 near the soccer stadium, using the cover of a cement factory owned by a man named Thamir al-Asi, an insurgent leader connected to Mohammed al-Musslit. Once the device was detonated, they could make their escape west and slip unnoticed into the city.

  On October 1, as I awakened to a new morning in Killeen, Texas, with early preparations to return to Iraq, my support company commander, Captain Curt Kuetemeyer, was conducting a mission supporting our battalion half a world away where the afternoon steadily approached dusk. The “Aggressors” of A Company, 4th Forward Support Battalion were a permanent part of our task force since the invasion began. Curt and his command element were returning from the parent forward support battalion near Auja to head back to his company, which was collocated with Brad Boyd’s C Company. Traveling north in downtown Tikrit where Highway 1 morphs into the main city street, they passed the soccer stadium, a few hundred meters shy of the Tuz-Tikrit highway turnoff.

  Curt suddenly went completely deaf amidst a bright flash as the Hummer rose sharply. The air immediately turned a thick dusty brown with a sickening sulfur smell. Something was terribly wrong. The Hummer seemed to be drifting, as though pilotless, at about 40 miles per hour.

  HIT THE BRAKES, he thought. Maybe they’re damaged. His mind raced as he braced for impact.

  The unguided vehicle continued to travel several hundred meters more, smashed into and bounced over the curb, flattened a road sign, and scraped to a halt. Everything seemed to be on fire, and Curt felt an intense heat at his lap and to his left. Though not hearing much at all, he could make out a scream and immediately took stock of his soldiers. They were in bad shape. His driver, Private First Class Analaura Esparza, was still behind the wheel and in terrible pain. Specialist Aldolfo Lopez, also visibly and audibly in pain behind her, seemed to be pinned among the flames.

  Flash-burned, pelted, and stunned, Curt stumbled from what was left of his stripped, open-top Hummer and grabbed Private Edward Stephenson sitting behind him, who seemed to be faring somewhat better. Despite the shock of the concussion, Curt seemed intact and able to move.

  First Sergeant Ronald Davis and Specialist Karen Guckert, following close behind, watched their company commander’s vehicle disappear in the blast with stunned disbelief. They braced themselves as they entered the brown flaming fog and pulled up to the blazing vehicle.

  “Pull security!” yelled First Sergeant Davis to the other soldiers as he ran toward the flaming Hummer.

  Davis, seeing Kuetemeyer was on his feet and assisting Stephenson, went to help Esparza. She was not responding much at all. He couldn’t seem to get her out. The vehicle was burning intensely, and she was stuck. Seconds mattered. Kuetemeyer, seeing Davis, joined him to help extract her. They managed to free her broken body and carried her to the median.

  “Talk to me!” demanded Davis as he kneeled over Esparza. “Talk to me, Esparza! Breathe!”

  Esparza had been hit from head to toe on her left side. Her uniform was tattered and scorched, her left leg at an impossible angle.

  “Talk to me, Esparza!” insisted Davis.

  “Bemak, pull security!” ordered Specialist Guckert to Specialist Jason Bemak, a gunner on the convoy. “Regular Mike, this is Aggressor Seven Delta, over,” she voiced as she placed a call to our battalion headquarters.

  “Regular Mike, over,” the calm voice on the radio answered.

  “An IED hit our convoy. Three casualties, request Medivac ASAP, over,” Guckert matter-of-factly intoned.

  The battalion responded immediately after Guckert, calm and in charge, made this radio transmission for help. In the midst of this pandemonium, gunfire began to pop. The soldiers looked around for the source but, dazed as they were, could not recognize that ammunition from the burning Hummer had begun to “cook off.” During this bedlam, an unruffled Guckert described the incident and guided lifesaving assistance to the scene, fully aware of her dangerous surroundings.

  Lopez was in agony, semi-conscious, and on fire. Davis, hearing his cries of agony, ran to free him. Captain Kuetemeyer saw Stephenson slapping his own legs, attempting to extinguish his burning shins. While Davis worked Lopez free, Curt grabbed a bottle of water from the floor of the burning Hummer and emptied the contents on Stephenson’s legs. Working in concert, they managed to free all three wounded soldiers from the blazing hulk.

  As Davis and Kuetemeyer busied themselves with the wounded, Guckert spotted a convoy from 3-66 Armor nearing the scene from the south. She informed a captain of the situation. The convoy immediately pulled security around the vehicles. Guckert then joined Kuetemeyer and Davis, who encouraged the wounded to hang on as they rendered aid. Guckert grabbed her aid bag and attempted to help Esparza. Karen tried to comfort her good friend, Analaura, but she was not responding. Esparza’s entire left side was bloodied, tattered, and burned.

  Captain Brad Boyd from C Company raced up and provided immediate help with his men. The wounded soldiers were loaded onto First Sergeant Davis’s Hummer and taken to our battalion aid station. There, Major Bill Marzullo, our surgeon, along with physician’s assistants Captain Alex Morales and Second Lieutenant Armando Buergette, struggled to save Esparza. She died of multiple puncture wounds, trauma, and extreme blood loss. The other soldiers were treated for serious burns, concussions, lacerations, and broken bones.

  Brad Boyd assumed command of the situation on the ground and doused the partially charred Hummer that was listing to starboard, sagging, and fusing to the ground from the intense heat. Highway 1 returned to normal after C Company recovered the vehicle. The men were accustomed to the drill. They knew well my standing orders to recover all evidence of battle: No opportunities for Iraqis to dance on our equipment or gloat in some Internet propaganda video. Not in this town. Not in any town we owned. We would kill anyone on sight if they attempted to touch
our damaged equipment.

  As word and details became available to Major Mike Rauhut, who was in temporary command of my battalion, he relayed them to Captain Matt Weber, our rear detachment commander. Weber had been sent back from Iraq for just such contingencies. I was leaving a store with my kids in Killeen, Texas, when I received a cell phone call from Matt.

  “Sir, there’s been an attack, and we have some casualties. Major Rauhut is trying to contact you,” informed Captain Weber.

  “Understood, Matt. I’ll stand by for his call,” I said with a sinking feeling washing over me as I stood in the peace and safety of a Killeen parking lot. The phone rang a short time later.

  “Sir, I have some terrible news,” uttered Mike Rauhut, my exec. I listened intently as Mike described what he knew of the event at the moment. The full details described above were as yet unknown. I only knew that I had lost a soldier and that more were wounded. It pained me deeply. At the heart of the situation and in need of encouragement was Major Rauhut, feeling he had somehow failed me.

  “Mike, nothing could have been done any differently had I been there. There is no need to blame yourself,” I encouraged, knowing all too well the guilt a commander feels with every loss suffered in command. Still, I needed to talk him through it.

  The battalion continued to work the area. The street fight waned somewhat, but the locals became emboldened by our recent casualties. The Iraqi police showed genuine resolution as General Mezher aligned with our forces to put down some demonstrations near the ambush site a couple of days later.

  I spent the next two days mentally preparing for the transition to Iraq, trying to keep as current as possible on all issues. My mind had never really left there. It was wonderful seeing my family even under these circumstances. Yet I would have traded every precious moment to have my stepdad back.

  On October 3, I boarded a plane in Dallas. Cindy and I had been through the goodbyes before: Kosovo, Kuwait, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Now we parted once again. I watched with a lump in my throat as our van full of kids eased through the airport departure lane and faded from view.

  Half a world away in Tikrit, the soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry and the 4th Forward Support Battalion gathered at Saddam’s Birthday Palace. The Aggressors of A Company, 4th FSB stood on the asphalt still marked with lines for Saddam’s military parades. A chaplain stepped forward and prayed. A Purple Heart and Bronze Star medal for making the ultimate sacrifice were laid on a pair of boots overshadowed by a lone rifle with a Kevlar helmet planted on top. At a podium, commanders and friends struggled to find words that the English language failed to provide. Soldiers stood at attention. Private First Class Analaura Esparza-Gutierrez’s name rang out for roll call. She did not answer. Taps resonated mournfully from a bugler nearby. Tears rolled down soldiers’ faces as they remembered her life.

  AS LONG AS WE HAVE BREATH

  Forty-eight hours later, I was back in Tikrit. The situation had become much more intense. Our successful raiding on members of Saddam’s supporting cast would have to be secondary until we could gain control of the trigger pullers, even though I felt that many of these bodyguards were behind the attacks. The media pressed us for the status of the Saddam hunt. We replied that, while Saddam continued to be a focus, we could not ignore the boiling security situation we faced. The enemy seemed a bit more organized now and was attempting to regain the initiative. We could have none of that.

  Mike Rauhut and Bryan Luke updated me on our operations and gave me their own assessments. The roadside bombs were taking their toll. We were finding a great many of them, but the sheer volume of ordnance was a challenge. To counter the dangers, our rifle companies were patrolling in Bradleys and conducting bomb sweeps along the main routes. Foot patrols had been almost entirely eliminated. Their update continued, and I didn’t like what I was hearing. Not wanting to be insensitive, I expressed the need to put our infantry back out on the ground.

  “Sir, these mounted Bradley patrols were directed by Colonel Hickey,” Mike explained in an effort to clarify that neither he nor Bryan had invented or endorsed the shift in tactics.

  “Well, I’ll have a talk with him,” I said, still angry at the turn of events. “While a certain number of patrols and changes are good, I think it is insane not having our infantry out on the ground. Patrolling in Bradleys is an ambush waiting to happen without our troops on the streets.”

  Colonel Hickey’s reasoning was sound enough. He believed that armored patrols would lessen the effects of the bombs. While it seemed to make sense on the surface, I did not agree. I felt it could create new problems we didn’t want. Certainly, the effects of the bombs would be lessened, but our chances of being ambushed and bombed would be magnified. Armored patrols, noisier and far more visible, would announce our arrival at every turn.

  It was my firm belief, based on years of infantry experience, that soldiers walking on the ground and patrolling in open vehicles afforded the greatest opportunity of surprising the enemy. They were better able to spot bombs with a 360-degree field of view. Hearing was not impeded by enclosed crew helmets, internal radios, and the steady drone and vibration of a Bradley. Walking was personal and kept the senses alive and attuned to movement on the city streets at a pace permitting full assessment of the surroundings. Bradleys are tremendous infantry support vehicles mounted with powerful weapons, but they were not designed to withstand anti-tank rockets, and they are vulnerable to mines, which they were likely to encounter. We had already suffered these types of casualties to Bradleys earlier in the mission.

  I was always respectful to Colonel Hickey, a stern disciplinarian, when challenging his decisions, but I felt strongly about this issue. It was my duty as his only infantry battalion commander to make such recommendations; it was an even greater duty to my men. The risk of confronting him was great. As an old cavalryman, he knew as much about Bradleys as any master gunner or tactician. But scouts were different from infantry, and infantry fighting was my training and expertise. I knew it well. I felt compelled to make a case against a modification of tactics that could jeopardize our momentum and the safety of our soldiers.

  Colonel Hickey graciously allowed a hearing of my dissension. He recognized that changes were made in my absence but made it quite clear that his decision would stand. To be fair, Colonel Hickey was as brave a senior commander as I had ever served with, constantly on patrol with a rifle in his Hummer and himself a survivor of enemy ambush. He knew the environment beyond the headquarters and the map because he was constantly out with us.

  When I protested that a lack of infantry patrols would create manifest problems and would essentially end our successful “Salt Lick” operations, he did allow for a compromise. Rather than riding in the Bradleys, the rifle squads on the ground could be loosely coordinated with the mounted patrols. This helped tremendously but would decrease the number of our outposts and ambushes because the only mounted Bradleys at our disposal were for the ready reserves and quick reaction forces in the companies and battalions. They had served well in that role but now would be constantly on the move, and the crews, once able to take on other infantry tasks when not in action, would no longer be available. We would just have to make the best of it.

  In addition to roadside bombs, a different kind of threat was generating. Demonstrations were breaking out in several Iraqi cities. Quick responses by our men had prevented the October 3rd demonstration from taking hold, and the protest was rapidly diffused. I believed that demonstrations should be quashed before being given the opportunity to develop. They might be tolerable in a country with a stable government where people generally respected the law, but such was not the case in Iraq. Seared in my memory was the summer of 1999 in Kosovo when an angry crowd of 5,000 surrounded a dozen and a half of us following a raid. I never wanted to experience that again.

  On October 9 and 10, we received intelligence about some prospective demonstrations. I ordered our forces to flood the suspected area of the city wit
h soldiers, tanks, and Bradleys to discourage the activists with a demonstration of our own. It was successful. The protestors never materialized.

  Meanwhile, our scouts continued the surreptitious observation of Thamer the Bomber’s house from an outpost in Cadaseeyah. In the evening, Staff Sergeant Sean Shoffner repositioned this outpost and received fire from a distance while doing so. Shoffner’s group was not hit but returned fire and continued its mission. We then raided several houses in downtown Tikrit tied to bomb makers and bomb layers. Four insurgents were captured, but no Thamer. Clearly, his influence and the network of insurgents were growing.

  The next night, several mortar rounds slammed into our training compound for the Iraqi Civil Defense forces on our little resort island in the Tigris River. A few rounds crashed into the main building but caused no appreciable damage. Perhaps the casualty most grieved was the hot water tank that fed the trainers’ building. The soldiers were incensed. C Company, along with our scouts and the Iraqi soldiers under our command, immediately set out in pursuit, heading toward muzzle flashes reported in the area of likely attack. They found and captured three more insurgents in the distant fields.

  October 12 dawned with the threat of sweltering heat. The weather had eased slightly in the previous week but not on this day. We were more than ready for the transition to cooler weather. Other transitions were already under way. Jack’s SOF team was rotating out of Iraq. I was sorely disappointed to see them go. I did not know if the new team would continue the close cooperation we enjoyed with Jack’s team. Our joint efforts had netted so much along the trail to Saddam.