My battalion chaplain was Xuan Tran, a living testimony of endurance, patience, and new life. When Xuan was a boy in South Vietnam, he endured the horrors of war as a civilian, something few Americans can fathom. When South Vietnam fell, Xuan’s parents mustered together their best attempt at escape and literally drifted in the ocean for days until picked up by a passing vessel.
They were taken to the Philippines, and eventually, Xuan’s father was able to come to the United States where they started life from scratch in California. Xuan was an atheist, but while in college, he encountered a faith in Christ that changed his life forever. After schooling, he applied to become a U.S. Army chaplain. Our battalion was his first posting.
The banter between soldiers and this good-hearted man was relentless. Xuan gave it back in spades with his thick Vietnamese accent. Of particular annoyance to the soldiers was Tran’s musical talent. His singing certainly qualified as “joyful noise” but little else. He often turned to his accordion, which made the soldiers long for his singing. When the two were combined, soldiers were sent howling.
The good-natured friction reached a critical mass when some young headquarters officers took the chaplain’s accordion hostage. First Lieutenant Colin Crow and Captain Chris Morris, who led my Mortar and Scout platoons, respectively, were the prime suspects. Periodic ransom notes made from cut-up newsprint stated that if Xuan did not stop playing at all hours, the accordion would be gutted. Mike Rauhut was eventually able to negotiate the accordion’s release without injury.
What Xuan lacked in musical talent, he compensated for in ministry to the men. He baptized scores of soldiers in one of Saddam’s swimming pools near the Water Palace. I was grateful for all the assistance we could rally in our efforts in Iraq. Chaplain Tran supplied weaponry of a different kind for battles of a different kind.
That is the ironic thing about war. Soldiers become very connected to their mortality. In a war zone, where death and human suffering are constant companions, soldiers cling to the very things scoffed at by the highbrowed university professor amid the comforts of protection and peace.
I often told my soldiers that if God intended for me to die in Iraq, then nothing could prevent it. If not, there was nothing the enemy could do to make it so. I took comfort, like millions of Americans, in my Christian faith. I could lead from the front because I believed that my life was in God’s hands. It didn’t eliminate my fear of death, but it eliminated my anxiety about death.
Because our task force received continual press coverage, my personal faith was public knowledge, resulting in scores of encouraging notes and pledges of prayer support pouring in for our soldiers from Americans back home. Among the most remarkable of these was a message from a man who lived in Harker Heights, Texas, that I believe became one more part in the capturing of Saddam Hussein.
In late November, Dick Dwinnell, like many Americans, had been following the war, wishing for an opportunity to do something to encourage our troops. During personal times of reflection and prayer, he asked God for success in our efforts and victory for our troops. He had an epiphany, a sudden intuitive leap of understanding: God knew the precise location of Saddam Hussein. If the soldiers would petition God asking Him to expose Saddam’s hiding place, they could capture him.
With this in mind, Dick researched press reports of our task force with regard to the hunt for Saddam. He found my name, looked it up in the phone book for the city in which my unit was stationed before deployment, and dialed the number. My wife, Cindy, answered the phone.
“Hi, you don’t know me, but my name is Dick Dwinnell. Are you the wife of Lieutenant Colonel Steve Russell?” he queried.
“Yes, I am,” replied my wife apprehensively, not sure where the call might be going.
“Is he the commander of 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry?” he continued.
“Yes, he is,” Cindy treaded cautiously.
“I understand he is a man of God and has a deep faith . . . ”
“Yes, he is . . . ” Cindy interrupted.
“ . . . and I just felt like I should call you,” Dick explained as he offered his motivation for calling. He asked her to forward a message of encouragement to me. “The next time you talk to him, please tell him that God knows where Saddam is. It is just a matter of leading soldiers to that location. If he and his men will pray and seek God’s wisdom, I believe God can lead them to that location.”
“I will,” Cindy assured him. After a short conversation of pleasantries, Dick had delivered his message. Cindy relayed it to me just a few days later. It was certainly a message to ponder. I felt that Dick was right; God knew the location of Saddam Hussein, and it could not hurt to further seek His guidance.
With Chaplain Tran out for some medical tests, I called on Major Oscar Arauco, Colonel Hickey’s chaplain for the brigade. I asked Oscar if he would come to lead us in prayer. Staff, soldiers, and anyone else were all welcome to participate. I would never force anyone to join us, but I knew that many would choose to do so. For the next several weeks, the chaplain led us in prayer asking God to expose the evil man to the light of day. The flood of information that broke loose in the next three weeks was simply astounding.
A SENSE OF MORTALITY
On November 19, joined by John’s SOF men, I led a very successful raid in pursuit of those plotting to shoot down our helicopters. The raid evolved from a tip we received on some insurgents who had reportedly acquired SA-7 anti-aircraft missiles and were said to be planning an attack for November 20.
With little time to prepare, we had to move quickly. I wanted to take no chances. As far as I was concerned, I had lifted the last charred American from a melted helicopter. I never wanted to experience that again. I located with Brad Boyd’s “Cobras” who seized two targets in close proximity while John’s SOF men and my scouts under Chris Morris took two others.
The raid resulted in the capture of some key figures, some we believed to have information about the helicopter attacks. The most important of these was Munther Mohammed Ahmed. He was a leader of trigger-pulling cells and had occupied a prominent position on our wish list for some time. More information would surely generate more raids. As the swamp continued to abate, a shadowy image of the alligator began to appear below the murky surface.
While developing more information, we continued an indirect war with the trigger-pulling group of insurgents. Mortar rounds slammed into Auja, narrowly missing the “Gators” of A Company. A powerful SS-30 rocket missed the “Cobras” of C Company as it fell short of its intended mark. The rocket left a bomb-sized crater in town, blew gates from walled compounds, and destroyed a car. Reacting quickly to the rocket’s launch trajectory picked up on Dom Pompelia’s artillery radars, Reg Allen’s 10th Cavalry Squadron found the launch area on the east side of the Tigris River and engaged several of the rocket-slinging enemy, killing five. We learned that they were from Fallujah.
I was glad to work with Lieutenant Colonel Reggie Allen’s 10th Cavalry Squadron who had now been attached to our brigade. The 10th Cav was General’s Odierno’s divisional reconnaissance battalion. They were equipped with tanks, Bradleys, and their own attack helicopters in a fine display of flexibility and power. For months, Colonel Hickey had been pleading for help in order to hold the areas that Dez Bailey and I had cleared on the east side of the Tigris. Now, with Reg’s troops, we could focus our efforts and find even more troublemakers in a greater area. I had known Reg since we were captains in school at Ft. Knox. It was reassuring to know that I could now call on a fellow battalion commander for helicopter support should the need arise.
Indirect attacks were but one of the perils we faced. Roadside bombs continued to be the enemy’s favorite. On November 24, Captain Jon Cecalupo, back from leave and in command of the “Cougars,” was leaving the battalion command post when he made a right turn onto Highway 1. As he did, a powerful blast showered the convoy with dust, chipped concrete, and smoke. Strangely, the blast made less impact than might have bee
n expected. The bomb, detonated by a wireless doorbell, had been placed in the opposite lanes. Consequently, it discharged away from Jon rather than toward him. We were thankful not to have another commander in his command convoy face the fate of Captain Curt Kuetemeyer the previous month.
Shortly afterward, I repositioned my convoy to the site of the attack, always studying the enemy’s techniques as we encountered them. As I stepped into the street, Sergeant First Class Gil Nail informed me that the on-board jammer, known as a “Warlock,” was activated. It would disrupt any signal sent to a bomb but would also routinely jam our radios. Bryan Luke had advised headquarters prior to switching on the device.
The crater and blast on the street bore the marks of a clean-burning bomb, probably pure C-4 plastic explosives in a container of some type. I couldn’t understand why they would detonate a device set to blast in the wrong direction. It made no sense unless they had noticed that we would often drive in the wrong lane to avoid bombs.
When we saw some locals venture out, Joe Filmore and I approached a local shop owner.
“Salam Aleykum!” I called.
“Alaykum a Salam,” he slurred. Thayir Faisal and his buddies were tanked on a local licorice drink called Araq. They were having a good old time sitting in the back of their shop after closing. “The lights went out,” he proclaimed with hand gestures for emphasis. “Then BOOM! If I had been up here, you would not see me anymore.”
As I looked around the shop, I tried to determine the angle of the device to establish the probable origin of detonation. Sensing this, Faisal stood and began to assert his innocence. “We are sick and tired of people putting these bombs here,” he overdramatized. “If I see anyone doing this, I won’t tell you, I will kill him myself!” he boasted, pointing to his chest while getting a little too close to me.
“You have had a little bit to drink. I can smell it on your breath.” I assured him, “We don’t suspect you.”
Only a fool would detonate a bomb that would jeopardize his own life and livelihood. I could tell Faisal was not involved because all of his shop windows were smashed, and his own late-model BMW was peppered with concrete fragmentation, proving him either outright innocent or downright stupid. While both seemed viable, we were satisfied that he did not know the perpetrator. Iraqis cared deeply about their cars.
“If you see something, take action. Get an Iraqi policeman or a soldier, and we will help you,” I pledged.
Faisal and friends locked their shop door—probably out of habit because the holes in their shattered store windows were large enough for grown men to crawl through. Walking back to my Hummer, I was talking with Betsy Hiel from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Kevin Sites from NBC News, visiting reporters who accompanied us on patrol. As we discussed the incident next to my Hummer, Specialist Mike Bressette interrupted us. “Sir, we are standing next to a bomb.”
At my feet was a cinder block, its cavities packed with plastic explosives and capped with cement. Protruding from the holes were red pigtailed wires connecting the two halves for sympathetic detonation. We called them “Allah Akhbar” bombs, an allusion to the handwritten phrase “Allah is powerful” scrawled into the concrete of the cinder block hole caps. They were enormously potent, capable of shredding a Humvee and all those in it. A sense of mortality washed over me, sending chills through me from head to foot. “Yes, we are!” I said, gingerly stepping backward as I was standing less than two feet from the device.
Now it made sense. Two bombs had been set to snare us on both sides of the road simultaneously. The effect of that sympathetic blast would almost certainly have been fatal. For some reason, the bomb on this side of the road had not detonated. With the jammer engaged in my vehicle, any new attempt to detonate it would be somewhat more difficult.
We backed off and set a cordon on Highway 1 to protect innocent passersby. Bryan Luke told our headquarters what to expect as we decided to discharge the bomb. Gil Nail took a position at what we calculated to be a safe distance. We stood a little farther behind him. Nail’s rifle was an odd mixture of personal add-ons and Okie ingenuity. It was a standard M-16A4 with 20-inch barrel, camouflaged tan with an added retractable butt stock. Mounted on its flat top rail was an apparatus that roughly resembled the Hubble Space Telescope. Gil was affectionately known as “Mr. Gadget” for the multitude of devices, trinkets, and modifications he ever seemed to possess. On this night, the normal taunting of “Mr. Gadget” was swiftly replaced with admiration.
Sergeant First Class Nail shot one round of tracer into the cinder block and hit it squarely. Immediately it began to burn. Soon, a white-hot jet of flame shot up from the block like a magnesium flare. That was followed by a medium-sized “pop” of the blasting cap. Thinking it would continue to burn after the blasting cap failure, we kept the area clear and waited for it to burn out.
Suddenly, a violent explosion split the night air. Nervous laughter and banter ensued as a shower of flying concrete, spalls, and sparks flew up and over us. It was a brilliant light show, reminiscent of a Fourth of July fireworks show.
“I think it’s burned out now, sir,” Nail chimed in with his hilarious staccato laugh. My earlier sense of shock and mortality had been replaced with nervous laughter and overwhelmingly welcome relief. The reporters watched in amazement as the bizarre scene played out, but it was not an uncommon experience for our soldiers. We frequently cleared bombs to prevent the enemy from having freedom of action or to make us vulnerable to subsequent ambush. Kevin Sites caught it all on film, and as a sleepy America rose that morning, they watched the drama unfold on the television screen. We resumed our evening patrol.
I couldn’t help feeling a bit angry with myself for being caught unawares. I always had my guard up. Always. Even if surprised, I made it a point to be alert and react quickly. What if that bomb had fulfilled its purpose and killed the men for whom I was responsible? I was reminded once again of my mortality. Life, my life, could be snuffed out as easily as a candle. I had been in wars and firefights, and would be again, but standing toe to toe with a bomb that could have obliterated us gave me great pause. I was thankful that our lives had been spared again.
HOLY MONTHS AND MILK MONITORS
As the Muslim holiday of Ramadan approached at the end of November, Iraqi leaders urged us to lift curfews in the cities on the condition that they be reinstated if there was even a single outbreak of violence. We gave it a shot. It was a nice gesture. Our goodwill lasted approximately five minutes. Shortly after what would have been curfew, automatic weapons fire erupted near the main gate of the 4th Infantry Division. No one was hurt, and we were never able to determine exactly what had transpired there. In Tikrit at least, the holy month of Ramadan would also have a holy curfew.
The holy month of Ramadan—it even sounded out of place in Tikrit. I knew the significance of Ramadan as I had served in other garden spots in the world, but I had never been given a comprehensive explanation of Ramadan until Sheik Mahmood al-Neda al-Nasiri enlightened me in Auja.
“During Ramadan, we don’t eat,” he asserted, omitting the exception about eating after sundown. “We don’t smoke,” he explained as he brandished the Marlboro cigarette in his right hand for emphasis. “We don’t drink,” he lied, as everyone knew Mahmood had some of the finest blue label whiskey in the province of Salah ad Din. “We don’t . . . ”—then rotating his downturned palm from side to side, he finished the sentence—“with the women.” Finally, with a straight face to declare something he actually observed, he asserted, “And we don’t lie . . . as much.” It was the most honest assessment of reality in Iraq I had heard regarding the holy month.
On November 25, we located more roadside bombs. A large one made up of an 82mm mortar round packed with plastic explosives around it had been set in the median of the main highway downtown. We discharged it without incident. That evening, some insurgents crept along the palace wall on “Excellency Street” in front of our battalion headquarters to fire an RPG that skipped
down the road near one of our guard towers. It failed to explode, and no one was harmed. The insurgents, in their haste, forgot to pull the safety pin from the nose of the rocket.
In contrast to the events of previous weeks, the next several days were calm. The press tried to make something of the Thanksgiving we celebrated, but in reality, it was just another day for a fighting soldier. The big spreads, the hype, and the lofty “care about the troops” speeches rarely affected the soldier on patrol. He ate his usual fare or got his choice of the pickings after all the rear echelon troops had their fill. There were nice mess halls, but they were not readily available to troops on patrol or soldiers waiting patiently in position for forty-eight hours to ambush insurgents.
I tried to explain this to the head mess sergeant and chief at the contract dining hall who promised great things for Thanksgiving. He just could not understand why I wanted food sent to the troops’ locations. In his view, the troops should all feed at his facility. When I explained that I had troops scattered in seven different locations, the learning light began to come on. It was the continuation of a rocky relationship that never improved. I had been personally banned from the mess hall just weeks after it opened.
It started out innocently enough. Sometimes, returning from a patrol, our soldiers wanted a cold drink. There’s nothing like an ice-cold can of Coca-Cola to remind a soldier of home. We rarely saw them. Troops on the line routinely got generic brands of disgusting grape drink or odd-flavored sodas that no one wanted or recognized. The “good stuff” was in the mess hall at the division headquarters. So, when patrols came in from the streets, they would often stop for a cold drink and maybe a decent meal.
One day on patrol, my guys pressed me for a diversion to the “cattle trough,” as I affectionately called it. The morning had been successful, and the guys were laden with some enemy plunder for the battalion weapons holding area. It was unbearably hot outside. I did not want even one of my soldiers to stand guard over the weapons while others ate comfortably inside. So, stinky, sweaty, and bristling with our own weapons plus some grenades and enemy AK-47s wedged in the tops of our assault packs, we casually dropped in.
We Got Him! Page 28