The Bremer Detail

by Frank Gallagher,John M. Del Vecchio

  The twenty-minute trip out to the airport was uneventful. However, the eighteen or so car motorcade with U.S. Army Apache helicopters, Kiowa helicopters, and my two Little Birds certainly told everyone in the area something unusual and noteworthy was taking place at the airport this evening. Imagine eighteen-plus vehicles moving as if controlled by one mind. We called it “the motorcade dance.” All were moving within mere feet of each other. All were rolling at 60–70 mph. It was a thing of beauty. We arrived safely, and the meeting began.

  I gathered my men and explained that getting back to the Green Zone was going to be an adventure, and to make sure that everyone was aware of the dangers—a truly unnecessary step as they all knew the risks. While we had the advantage of surprise on our way to the airport, this would be lost on the return. We should expect a lot of unwanted attention on the way back. We laughed and said our good-byes to one another and promised to have a cup of mead in Valhalla later that evening. One has to love the macabre sense of humor among security contractors.

  At 2320 the meeting broke up. Ambassador Bremer and Brian McCormick came out, and we loaded them into the motorcade. We were the first motorcade to leave that evening, and the irony of being the advance motorcade heading down the highway of death was not lost on any of us. Earlier, because we had had no idea how long we would be there, I had told Hacksaw to have the Little Birds land at the airport and stay with us. I could not risk having the ambassador come out, and us not having the helos. Our adrenaline levels spiked. It was late. And very dark. The Little Birds were in the air flying top cover and scanning for potential issues. Due to manpower issues I had only one shooter in each bird, Shrek and another guy.

  We had two up-armored Humvees working as our lead CAT element in front of the protection detail motorcade. Our lead car, driven by Travis T had Riceman sitting in the front-right seat working as the tactical commander. Behind him we had two additional shooters staring intently out the windows peering into the darkness looking for potential problems. The limo had Q behind the wheel, and I was sitting in the front-right seat with the ambassador directly behind me. Brian Mac was sitting behind Q. The follow car had a driver, and Ski sitting right front acting as the shift leader. Behind them were two more shooters watching their areas of responsibility, and behind them in the third seat we had Doc Jones. Following up as rear security were two more up-armored CAT vehicles.

  From my position in the limo, a level-6 armored SUV, I could watch Q at the wheel and Hacksaw flying lead helo above. As we progressed, Hacksaw reported a suspicious vehicle backing down an on-ramp on the highway. He radioed that he was going to fly over and check it out. The shift leader gave the command to shift the limo to the left (away from the side of the road and away from the entrance to the on-ramp and toward the center median) while the follow and lead cars shifted to the right.

  Seconds later all hell broke loose.

  I heard something hit my window. While I was trying to figure out what it was there was an explosion of light and sound. The limo veered. Q fought to retain control. Temporarily blinded by the explosions we could see nothing. I leaned over the seats to check on the ambassador and Brian just as the ambassador asked what had happened. “Bomb and AK fire, Sir,” I told him. Despite the sound of the explosions, we could still hear AKs being fired at us. I asked the boss if he was okay, and he confirmed he was. I could see the back of the limo had sustained severe damage (the rear window was gone, and the door itself was bent), and I directed him and Brian to get down. Despite the damage, Q was firmly in control of the vehicle. The bad guys were shooting at the limo as we sped away at roughly 60 mph through the smoke-induced fog. Neither Q nor I could see anything more than five feet in front of us. Q was driving purely by instinct and training.

  Over the radio I heard the shift leader, Ski, calling out, “TUNA, TUNA, TUNA”—our code to drive directly through an ambush, getting off the “X” and out of the kill zone. The smoke cleared and I looked to my right to see the follow car driver about twenty-four inches away from me using his car to shield the limo—his side mirror touching Q’s side mirror at 60 mph. I asked for a casualty report and learned that two of our four CAT team vehicles were damaged, but limping along. No injuries to any of the detail or CAT team members.

  As all this was happening, Ambassador Bremer leaned over and casually asked Brian Mac, “Tell me again why we shouldn’t go to Davos?” They had been discussing the upcoming trip to Davos when the attack happened. And in typical Bremer fashion. He never panicked, just went right back to the subject at hand.

  As the AIC I had to make the painful decision that the damaged CAT vehicles were on their own. I was unsure of the damage to the limo, and the ambassador’s safety always came first.

  The shift leader radioed me again to ask if we were all right. I responded, “That’s an affirm.” Apparently the damage to the limo was far greater than I realized. The follow car guys could see it, we couldn’t. We were advised to slow our vehicle down to make sure we reached the Green Zone safely. Q throttled back to about 45 mph. And we made it back.

  Inspecting the damage to the motorcade vehicles after arrival we found several bullet holes in the rear of the lead vehicle. The limo had lost the back end (the nonarmored hatch area), the electronic countermeasure (ECM) device had been destroyed, and we found shrapnel and bullet holes in the armored area just behind the rear seats where the ambassador and Brian had been sitting. The ECM blocks radio and telephone signals from being able to set off explosive devices. The IED must have been command detonated, meaning that, rather than being radio controlled, it was hardwired to explode when the terrorist pressed a button to initiate the device. In hindsight we concluded we had happened upon the ambush site before the insurgents had finished their nasty surprise for us. They must have shot at us hoping that we would slow down or stop and engage them. There were additional bullet holes in the right side of the car and, of course, one that was even with my head on my window. The follow car had extensive shrapnel damage and bullet holes riddling the body. When the explosion went off the heat from the blast convinced both the shift leader and the driver their feet had been badly burned. Fortunately it had been only painful, not permanent. Fifteen minutes later the CAT vehicles finally limped in. All the tires had been destroyed and they had sustained extensive shrapnel damage.

  The ambassador took a look at the car and asked again if everyone was okay. I said we were all fine. He turned and walked to his office and went right back to work. I met with Dan Senor, spokesman for the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), who asked if the incident would be on the news. I told him there was no way we would be reporting it. The ambassador called me to his office, and we talked about keeping the incident quiet and whether he should mention it to his wife or not. I told him he might want to mention it because this way if she heard about it, she would know he was safe.

  Minutes later I got a call from Brutus telling me that one of the Dirty 30 teams had been attacked on the road, and that they heard sounds of an attack about fifteen minutes before their guys had been hit. I told him the first attack had been against us. Our convoy to the airport had drawn a lot of attention.

  I notified Blackwater that we had been hit but suffered no casualties. They thanked me for the briefing. I also called Jimmy Cawley from the Secret Service and gave him the details. I knew the Secret Service would want to know the details firsthand and not through the media, if news of the attack became public. He was thankful that no one was hurt and that Bremer was safe.

  Somehow, the news didn’t leak out for two weeks. Who leaked it, I still do not know. Someone in Washington spilled it to the D.C. press. Very quickly everyone knew about it, and the Iraqi press pressured the ambassador for his reaction. He calmly stated it had happened two weeks earlier and it had not altered or changed the way he did his job or how he conducted his business as evidenced by the schedule that he had maintained since the incident. Dan Senor added at
a press conference that the ambassador had full faith in his security team to keep him safe. There were some family members of guys on the team who were not happy when they heard about it, but we had all survived. No harm, no foul.

  In retrospect I’m still not sure who the bad guys thought they were attacking or why no one ever took credit for the attack. The mission to the airport had been unscheduled but extremely high profile, so I think we were just a target of opportunity. Wrong place, wrong time.

  That night, after making my calls, I had headed over to Blackwater Boulevard to check on the guys. It was by then about 0100.

  Me: “Everybody OK?”

  The team, all talking at once: “Damn, that was close.”

  “Those motherfuckers.”

  “Have a drink.”

  “How’s the boss?”

  “Shit, they almost got us.”

  And on it went for about thirty minutes. I trudged back to my trailer and tried to sleep. The adrenaline was slowly wearing off, and my thoughts were filled with the usual thousand “what if” questions. I finally dozed off.

  We found out the next day that the IED consisted of eight howitzer shells wired together. Only the first two had gone off. The six that had not exploded were placed in our direction of travel. In other words, as we drove away from the first explosion we were meant to roll right over another three times more powerful! Thank God the guys who wired it had made a mistake, and that we were moving fast, otherwise the results would have been different. One more of our nine lives had been used up. How many more did we have left?

  Two days after the attack Blackwater notified me that my replacement and some other new guys would be arriving the following week. I knew this news was not going to be well received by the ambassador. I told Blackwater that their post-attack timing could not be worse. They told me to tell him, and “to make it work.” Yeah, right. They still did not realize that we were on the ground and knew more than they did back in Moyock, North Carolina. No matter how many times we tried to make them understand the ground truth reality of what was going on, they lived in some fantasy world where they were far smarter than we were. I talked to Ken and he just shook his head and said good luck.

  I called Brian and requested an appointment with Ambassador Bremer. Brian asked what was up, and I told him what the Blackwater plan was. He expressed total shock and asked me if I had been telling Blackwater about the issues with the rotations, and how they had not been sitting well with anybody on the ambassador’s staff. I told him I had. He said he would get back to me. Usually when I requested time with the ambassador, unless it was a true emergency, I would have a few hours before he could slot me in. Ten minutes later the phone rang. It was Brian telling me the boss wanted to see me now.

  I walked into the office and could tell by the looks I was getting that this would not be pleasant. Brian immediately ushered me in to see the ambassador. Again, way out of the norm. I usually had time for a coffee and some chitchat with Sue Shea, Bremer’s executive assistant. Not this time.

  Brian: “Sir, Frank is here.”

  “Frank, Brian tells me that you’re leaving next week.”

  “Sir, this is what Blackwater told me today.”

  “Why? Everyone else is doing a year here.”

  “Blackwater thinks rotating guys in and out is a good idea.”

  “I want you to stay as long as I’m here. Are you okay with that?”

  “Sir, I can only do what Blackwater tells me to do.”

  “Are you on a DOD contract?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Good, I’ll call SecDef Rumsfeld right now.”

  With visions of Blackwater getting kicked out of country, I said: “Sir, I’m not sure it needs to go to that level.”

  He paused for a second and said: “Get Colonel Sabol in here right now.”

  I grabbed my phone, called Colonel Sabol, and told him the ambassador wanted to see him right away. He asked what was up, and as I was in the office and could not talk I said just get here ASAP.

  The colonel arrived within five minutes, went into the ambassador’s office, then came out and told me he would take care of it. And he did. About ninety minutes later he called and said I was not leaving. I asked him what had happened. He said he called Blackwater and asked to speak to Erik Prince or Gary Jackson. He was told they were not available. He said they had sixty minutes to call him back or he was calling the SecDef. When asked why, he told the lady on the phone what was in play. Ten minutes later they called back and said I would not be replaced. Mr. Prince clearly understood that the client, especially this client, is always right when it comes to how he wanted the contract supported, and who he wanted with him.

  Almost everybody on the team was happy I would not be leaving. My wife and kids were not as happy as the team. Thirty days had now been extended to an undetermined time period. In a weird way I was extremely excited to be seeing this through to the end. The ambassador had paid me a huge compliment and had given me a huge endorsement. I felt good that apparently all the stuff I had been juggling and dealing with was really worth the time and effort. Blackwater, on the other hand, wasn’t quite as happy as they made out to be on the phone with the ambassador’s staff. I got a call from Blackwater HQ later that day and was basically accused of leveraging my relationship with the ambassador so I could stay in the country and make more money. Of course, the ambassador had nothing to do with this decision, as I had apparently brainwashed him and it was not that we were doing an excellent job. We hadn’t just survived a fairly sophisticated assassination attempt, had we? Once again, Blackwater HQ was out of touch with the ground truth, and was trying to run the show from the safety of their office trailer in Moyock.

  At this time I learned that the majority of my e-mail communication was not being passed along to everyone who should be seeing it at Blackwater HQ. Apparently a few members of the division had been kept in the dark about some of my concerns and did not know that the ambassador had expressed concern about the rotations and other issues. From this point forward I copied everyone on the e-mails. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. And magically a lot of my problems disappeared. Imagine that.

  A couple of days later we headed to Bahrain with the ambassador so he could watch the Iraqi national soccer team continue in their quest to compete in the 2004 Olympic Games. My advance team, which had departed two days earlier, met us at the airport. We went to the hotel to check in. I could tell by their smiling faces that my guys had done their work, then had an evening or two of relaxation. We went to the game, then to a dinner, and finally back to the hotel. Ski had arranged for a couple of the advance team guys to watch the ambassador while Ski took me out to dinner and for a drink. He was always looking out for my mental health. We arrived at an establishment that had been scouted out the night before by the advance team guys.

  Festus and a few of the other guys were already there. They were relaxing and admiring the menu, which seemed to consist primarily of young Thai ladies. Festus was a former SEAL who was one of the funniest guys I have ever met. He was a great shooter and could always be relied upon for moments of hilarity. This particular evening I witnessed something I had never seen before. Festus ordered a shot of some liquor. A few young lovelies had been trying to win his heart for the evening. He was fighting them off as best he could. Out of the blue he stood up, dropped his pants, dunked the head of his dick into the shot glass, then grabbed his lighter and lit his dick on fire. Had I not seen it with my own eyes I would not have believed it. Then he downed the shot and pulled his pants back up. Needless to say, he got quite an ovation from the other patrons. And because it was funny once, it became a recurring performance throughout the rest of his tour with us. Boys will be boys.

  The word spread quickly through the team I would not be leaving and morale really picked up. It seemed as though rumors of my departure and
the speculation on my replacement had made a lot of the guys nervous. They had seen the attempts at controlling the show and the Monday morning quarterbacking from North Carolina. And they feared that the wheels would come off the machine that we had created together. If you were not working with the team, you truly could not have any idea of the stress, or the hoops we constantly jumped through. The guys knew I was protecting both them and the ambassador. The Marine Corps adage—accomplish the mission and look out for the welfare of your men—rang true with me every day we were there. The guys knew I could be stern, but I always tried to be fair.

  Ken rotated out and handed the Ops/support responsibilities to his assistant. Apparently Ken had overestimated his sidekick’s grasp of how things were done. We rotated three more guys out and for some reason they were sent to Kuwait instead of Amman. The new Ops/support guy did not realize (read: failed to do his homework) that the guys would need visas before arrival into Kuwait as opposed to simply buying them at the customs counter upon arrival as we were able to do in Jordan. The three guys were quickly placed under house arrest while I attempted to sort the fiasco out. I did not get much sympathy from the Air Force colonel who was in charge of flights. He was beyond pissed off that we had screwed this up. His counterpart in Kuwait was threatening to send the guys back to Baghdad. And, of course, it was entirely my fault.

  Further compounding the problem was that one of the guys was a Swiss citizen traveling on a Swiss passport. We called him Hillbilly because he was anything but: he was a former French Foreign Legion guy who spoke five languages and could fly a helicopter in addition to having extensive protection experience. He had a great skill set and was a good man. I’d met him ten years earlier at a school we both had attended.