The Bremer Detail

by Frank Gallagher,John M. Del Vecchio

  We loaded onto the U.S. Army Blackhawks and headed to the stadium. Two Apache escort gunships flew beside us. I was always very happy to see them. By now the ambassador and I had amassed a lot of Blackhawk frequent flier miles. These pilots did a great job.

  I tried calling Sax to let him know we were on the way. Our radios were limited in range, and with the noise of the Blackhawks, we both knew our comms would be difficult. I attempted to call him as we got closer, and he tried to reach out to us when he heard the rotor slap. Sax had prearranged for one of his guys to throw a red smoke grenade to indicate to us and the pilots that the site was secure and to land. I briefed the pilot on what to expect. I had on a headset that allowed me to talk to the pilots and to listen to what was going on. When I heard the pilot tell me we were about two minutes out, I tried to get Sax on our radios. No luck. The pilot told me that he saw an American on the designated landing area signaling to him. I told him to wait for the red smoke. The pilot then reported that he saw red smoke. I cleared him to land.

  Smoke grenades usually detonate and send out huge plumes of a very dense smoke that the blades of the Blackhawks quickly dissipate. I looked out the side of the Blackhawk and saw very little smoke, but I was not concerned. As we set down and the ambassador stepped out, I could see patches of the field on fire. Like burning, as in a wildfire! In the middle of each fire was a glowing red spot. I advised the ambassador not to step on the red spots, and we walked over to the soccer team and did the event.

  Over the radio I now heard the advance guys trying as hard as they could to stifle the laughter that somehow always accompanies an “Oh fuck” moment. It seems as though the advance guy had grabbed a red phosphorous grenade instead of the red smoke grenade. Phosphorous grenades are used to destroy vehicles or buildings. After exploding, they burn hot enough to melt steel. (Somewhere around 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit.) To say the least, they are not typically used to mark LZs as clear. Actually, they are never used for that. And, of course, we had not been issued any red phosphorous grenades. It seemed as though some of my guys had traded some stuff with our British colleagues to improve their load-out kit.

  The ceremony ended and we flew back to LZ Washington. No one caught on fire and the field survived. We laughed like hell. There is never a dull moment in the PSD world.

  The Iraqis did eventually qualify for the 2004 Olympics. And of course, up to that point, every time they won a game bringing them a step closer to the Games, the celebratory gunfire turned Baghdad into a festival that sounded like the world’s biggest firefight. Bullets landing on the trailers sounded like heavy rain. We were very happy for the people; we just wished they used fireworks to celebrate instead of AK-47s.

  The Governing Council of the Iraqis had a rotational system where each member of the IGC took a month-long turn as acting president. In May the president was Izz al-Din Salim. It was a tough spot for any of these men as they then became the focal point of all resentment and hostility aimed at the embryonic government.

  On 17 May 2004, then-acting president Salim was heading into the Green Zone to go to the IGC for the day. As he approached the checkpoint a car filled with explosives was detonated by its driver. The assassination had been carefully planned. The bad guys had done their homework and knew the approximate time Salim would arrive. The blast destroyed the acting president’s vehicle, killing him instantly. It was a huge bomb. Other vehicles in the motorcade sustained significant damage, and several of his staff and security team members also suffered injuries.

  The ambassador was shaken. Later that day he went to pay his respects to the Salim family. They were in shock, and his surviving staff and security guys were still wearing their blood-splattered clothes. That the murder took place just outside the Green Zone once again reinforced our fear of potential threats to the ambassador every time we went out for a Red Zone mission.

  And once again my guys sensed that the rules of the game had changed. The bad guys were doing active surveillance on the targets they wanted, and they were not afraid to act. You can get all the warnings you want, but when it hits this close to home, the warnings take on added significance. Suicide attacks are the hardest to stop. If a person is willing to give his life to kill someone, the elements of pain and death have been removed from the equation. He knows he is going to die. The thought of being shot at holds zero significance. The only goal is to get as close as possible to the target—the ultimate smart bomb!

  Ambassador Bremer was the kind of man who shook every hand and posed for every picture that was requested. It made the job for the advance team that much tougher as they set up the concentric rings of security to make sure no evildoers entered the ambassador’s space. The detail team went crazy trying to keep people away from the ambassador without him seeing them doing it. It was a kabuki dance of the highest order.

  The ambassador’s farewell tour got under way. The list of people he would visit was almost finalized and the schedule was being prepared. One afternoon he had scheduled a trip to the Ministry of Oil. Each of the preceding five days a coalition convoy had been attacked after departing the ministry. I did not like the idea of going there at all, especially after the incident two weeks earlier. Neither did my guys. I called one of my intel resources and asked him to meet with me. At the meeting he explained that his group suspected, but could not prove, that a person or people working at the ministry were notifying the bad guys as each convoy departed. The bad guys would then quickly organize an attack based on the direction of travel the convoy took. There were only a few routes that would take you from the ministry back to the Green Zone. It was fairly easy to determine the route and stage an attack.

  I met with the ambassador and expressed my concerns. He listened carefully then said that he had to go. I attempted to sway him, but he told me our meeting was over and he turned back to his work.

  I met with Sax and told him the boss was going. Sax was not happy at all. We discussed several different strategies about how to make the meeting happen. We could fly the advance team in on the Little Birds, then ferry the ambassador in via the same method. We rejected that idea when we realized that if we were attacked there, we would be trapped. We went over other possibilities and rejected them all. The only way to keep the ambassador safe was to travel the way we always did. Both our assholes puckered at the thought. We were going to earn our money the hard way.

  We went to chow and called it our last meal. The ghoulish sense of humor never failed us. If today was the day, we would go out fighting. I sat down, shoved the first chicken nugget in my mouth, and my phone rang. It was Brian Mac telling me that the ambassador needed to see me right now. I dumped my food in the trash can, returned my tray, and headed to the office.

  As I walked by Sue mouthed, “Fuckers.” I wasn’t sure what she was referring to.

  The ambassador and Brian were talking as I walked in.

  “Sir, you wanted to see me?”

  “Frank, are you trying to tell me that I can never go the Ministry of Oil again? Or that it is a bad idea to go today?”

  “Sir, it is a bad idea to go today.”

  “So I can reschedule it for another day?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “OK, we’re not going. Tell Sue to contact them and reschedule.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  I almost skipped out of the office. When I told Sue, she smiled. Concern over the perils of the farewell tour and over all the people trying to arrange visits for their special interests weighed heavily. The requests seemed endless. People bombarded her with pleas and demands. I did not envy her at all. Each request meant she had to try and shuffle the schedule that had just been finalized an hour before. How she kept her sanity is a miracle.

  I called Sax and told him the good news. He asked me if I was going to eat, and I told him I was. We met at the chow hall. The grilled cheese sandwiches and chicken nuggets were particularly tasty on this da
y.

  Up to this point the rocket and mortar attacks occurred almost exclusively at night. Then, late one afternoon while the ambassador was working in the office, a series of explosions shook the palace. Windows creaked under the concussions, but did not break. The guys on duty quickly evacuated the ambassador downstairs to the basement that the Force Protection team deemed the safest place to be while under attack. The guys notified me, and I quickly ran over with a few other guys. We located an office where the ambassador could continue to work uninterrupted. It was not to be. He quickly walked out of the room and began shaking hands and posing for pictures with palace employees also seeking shelter. It was clear that he was unafraid as he made sure that everyone was okay. Bremer was a true leader. It made us crazy, but he was THE MAN, and THE MAN did what the man wanted to do. Our job was to make sure that he was able to. After about thirty minutes, the all clear was sounded. He went directly back to his office and picked up right where he left off.

  Sue got me a copy of the almost finalized farewell tour plans. I felt a few of the places were less than appealing. Again I huddled at length with the intel guys to see if they had additional information, then plotted and analyzed the data against the semifluid schedule. One of the biggest question marks for me was a proposed dinner with Ayatollah Hussein al-Sadr. The last time we went there the advance team had been attacked on the way back to the palace. I spoke to Sue. She said the ambassador really wanted to go. I asked if we could change it to a lunch. A few days later she confirmed the change to a luncheon meeting. At least we would not be there after nightfall.

  One evening we made a trip to Mr. Talabani’s house for dinner. The Peshmerga always treated us very well, and the food was outstanding. We enjoyed going there. Their security setup included nearly one hundred men spread out throughout the neighborhood. Nothing could happen without us having a lot of advance notice. We almost relaxed. We departed, and about ten minutes down the road the tactical commander spotted a bunch of gas cans stacked on the left side of the highway—perhaps thirty yards ahead of the convoy. At the same moment the shift leader reported a man with a plunger (detonator) in his hands about fifty yards off the road. The man was repeatedly pressing it. Q shifted right and pulled alongside the lead car, while the follow car pulled in directly behind the lead. The bad guy was getting carpal tunnel syndrome from pressing the detonator on the IED as fast as he was. Fortunately for us the ECMs were working at 100 percent, and they blocked the signal from reaching the explosives.

  We reported the incident, and a military explosive ordinance disposal (EOD) team went out and disarmed the bomb. It was a device made from artillery shells designed to detonate on the radio signal of a garage door opener. Once again our tactics prevailed and no one was hurt. We all took a deep breath and laughed at the frustration of the terrorist as his bomb let him down. They were good; we were better.

  At this time the State Department attached two agents to the detail. Both were great guys. They were there to watch and learn how we ran the detail on a daily basis so they could manage the switch from Ambassador Bremer to Ambassador Negroponte.

  One big change they planned: instead of a Blackwater AIC, the State Department would now have a Diplomatic Security agent in charge of the detail as an AIC. The Blackwater guys would soon be answering and responding to a non-Blackwater boss. The guys were very wary of this switch. They feared another layer of bureaucracy that could slow down the response time to problems. The State Department has some great agents who were former military guys, former cops, etc., but they also had some straight out of college. Most of these younger DS agents had been doing visa investigations a few weeks before. Now they were in a war zone. Some really were not prepared for the realities of combat PSD missions. The smarter ones quickly picked up the nuances of the military jargon and forged great relationships with the PSD operators. Others had a tough time getting used to dealing with our operators. My guys, after having been there for months, were not sure the switch would work. Respect in our world is earned, not awarded via title. I hoped like hell the newly appointed DS AIC understood that he would have to earn their respect first, foremost, and quick as fire. (From all subsequent accounts I’ve heard most of the DS AICs did, and the working relationship was generally good.)

  I was quite proud to learn that I would be the first and only AIC that Blackwater had for a head of state. It had been quite an adventure keeping the highest-ranking man in Iraq safe. But we were not yet finished.

  The DS agents came with us on several missions and seemed to like and understand how, and more important, why we were doing certain things. I became good friends with Murph (a former Special Forces guy) who seemed to understand the challenges that awaited the new DS AIC. We would see soon enough. Most of my guys had heard stories of coming pay cuts, and many decided not to stay past the ambassador’s departure date. We began arranging exit flights to begin on 1 July, and Blackwater began scrambling to get new guys in-country as quickly as possible. The company’s new WPPS (Worldwide Personal Protective Security) training program was under way, and a lot of quality guys were joining up. Being a member of the Blackwater team was the place for high-risk security guys. Some had seen the pictures, read the stories, or heard the praise, and they were anxious to be a part of it. This was a blessing and a curse. When you don’t know what you don’t know, everything seems great. Many of the guys running the training program had worked with and for me, so the new guys coming in got up to speed more quickly. What you can’t train for is the heat, the rocket and mortar attacks, and the constant danger. You can simulate the very real Red Zone missions, but practice is never the same as the real thing. There are no time-outs or do-overs. You succeed and live, or you fail and people die.

  I could foresee the pay cuts resulting in the new DS AIC finding himself with few experienced guys on his team. I called Blackwater. They wanted to know where the pay-cut rumor was coming from. I told them it was one of the new guys who had also announced that he was best friends with the program manager. He evidently didn’t have his facts straight. Blackwater quickly scuttled the pay-cut rumor for any of my current guys. Their pay would continue at the same rate for as long as they stayed in Iraq. A few decided that with no pay cut looming they would remain. Potential crisis averted.

  The intel reports were as bleak as ever. The bad guys desperately wanted the ambassador’s head before he left. And also ours. By this time there had been more than a few incidents involving other PSD teams, both U.S. and non-U.S., needlessly shooting, injuring, or killing civilians. I called another meeting. “This,” I said, “we cannot let happen. If you’re scared, you can, and you should, leave now.” While protecting the ambassador no team member had been killed, nor had the team killed anyone. We had not fired a shot while keeping the ambassador safe. And would not, unless we were attacked and trapped. Of course every shooting by a PSD team was attributed by the media to Blackwater, and by extension to me. I became very weary of the other Blackwater guys doing stupid shit, and having to explain to people that it had not been by my team. And now it seemed every PSD team shooting, even the non-U.S. and non-Blackwater teams, was also mine.

  Colonel Sabol called, and I could tell he was extremely pissed off. I went to his office, and he tossed a couple of ID cards on the table and asked me to explain them. The cards identified the holder as a Blackwater employee with authorization to carry a weapon in the Green Zone. I had never seen them before, and told that to the colonel. It seemed some guys at the team house had dummied up a bunch of ID cards for the local nationals they were employing. They had used the CPA badge as a template, and the IDs looked real as hell. The problem was they were phony as hell. Two local nationals used these cards to attempt to gain access to the Green Zone but had been stopped. The MP on duty saw they were fakes and quickly handcuffed the men and took them into custody. The MP realized that the color coding was wrong. Of course, since it was Blackwater, it landed in my lap. What were thes
e guys thinking? I called Blackwater and again told them they had more than a few guys at the team house who were not doing Blackwater any favors. The leadership elements who were there were not up to the job. It never ended. To this day I do not really know if these issues were actually addressed by Blackwater HQ.

  The ambassador’s Red Zone missions continued with a fury. We were doing three or four every day. The guys were on the top of their game. The drivers continued to screen other vehicles from the limo, and the MP CAT guys were going as hard as they could to keep us safe. We were a well-oiled machine. No one even got close. I had a tough decision to make as the 30 June departure date approached, and I wasn’t sure what to do. I had my Red Zone team, and I had several other guys who had never been into the Red Zone. Did I sit some of my regulars out to let these guys get experience (as they would form the nucleus of the team protecting Ambassador Negroponte), or did I continue to maximize the protection for Ambassador Bremer? It was a tough call to make. Threat reports continued to escalate. I talked with Sax and Drew, and we made the decision that this was not the time to start training new guys. We were in the home stretch and we wanted to win. The newer guys would have to learn on their own. We were not running a training program; we were running a PSD mission.

  The ambassador began his farewell tour. These encounters lasted about an hour—shorter than most of the business meetings he had had up to this point. It was bittersweet for the team as we said good-bye to the Iraqi security guys we had met and with whom we had become friends during our many visits to all the various locations. The initial visits had been frosty, but now we were greeted with hugs and chai tea. They had taught us Arabic profanity; we had reciprocated with lessons in American swearing. It was pretty funny. By and large they were good guys doing the same job we were doing. There was professional courtesy on both sides.