Mohammed’s story is similar to that of many other courageous Iraqis who sacrificed so much—in some cases, their lives—to help us accomplish our mission.
The Iraqis we dealt with the most, the ones who became closest to us and vice versa, were the interpreters, or as we called them “Terps.”
Terps were essential for our success on the battlefield. Few soldiers or Marines spoke fluent Arabic. We had some basic classes before deployment and used what we called “pointy-talkie” cards, laminated papers with key phrases and pictures on them to help us get by, but that was about it. If we needed to talk to the locals—and we did—we needed Terps.
To become a Terp, Iraqis first had to take and pass written and verbal tests administered by the contract companies that recruited Terps for the MNF. These were designed to check the candidates’ English proficiency level. Depending on how well they spoke, read, and wrote determined what category of Terp they would be. The best went to the high-level commands and special forces—others were farmed out to the regiment level and below.
But that wasn’t all. The results of security screening and background checks played a large part in the decisions about where to place Terps. Again, the better the security clearance they received, the better the job they got.
By 2006, Terps were in such high demand across Iraq that some contractors cut corners on the language requirements and focused on the security screening. It made sense from a business perspective. The more Terps the contractors placed with the MNF, the more money they made. For those of us in the field, it meant that the quality and skill of the Terps could vary considerably.
Many of the Terps were drawn to the job’s relatively high pay. At a time when the average Iraqi salary was $500 a month, Terps pulled in three times that. It was a lot of money by Iraqi standards, and it apparently was enough to balance out the risks they’d encounter on the battlefield and at home.
They never got any formal training on how to be effective as Terps—the best experience was on the job. Their successfulness depended greatly on their relationships with the Marines.
Insurgents commonly targeted Terps during combat operations. It wasn’t too hard to do. The Terps stood out like a sore thumb. They looked different, they sometimes wore different uniforms, and the vast majority sported beards, something that only special-operations forces usually got away with. At home, if they were exposed while working for the MNF, they and their families became targets of threats, kidnappings, and murder. Some Terps were killed when they went back home to spend time with their families. Often, it was enough to drive them to quit. Terps would leave for home—and never come back.
The news of murders and kidnappings of Terps spread even before the surge strategy was underway. When the MNF withdrew from an area, it became even more dangerous for Terps. They were left alone and afraid, without their military protectors to shield them from the violence.
Within the MNF, especially the U.S. military, there were two unofficial categories when it came to interpreters. Terp lovers—those who valued the immense contributions they made to our cause and respected them for the sacrifices they made to serve with us—and Terp haters—those who felt they were nothing more than embedded spies forced into their ranks by higher command, and not to be trusted.
I was a Terp lover for more reasons than I can explain, mostly because I owe my life, the lives of my Marines, and the success of our operations and the hundreds of patrols we conducted to the bravery of these citizen-warriors. As a commander, I’d often think how lucky I was to have these brave young men, who gave up everything, by my side.
To this day, I am eternally grateful to the Terps that made a difference to Echo Company—we were total strangers to them, yet these patriots, no more than twenty years old, sacrificed so much to help us fight and win.
Happily, my Marines shared my view of Terps. They treated them as part of the team because they were a part of the team. They ate, slept, and worked with the Marines every day. They contributed to our success on the ground. The Marines bonded with them—to the point that they often subjected them to the same rough humor and curt language they used amongst themselves.
First Sergeant Foster, who took care of everyone, was as concerned about the Terps as he was any Marine. He knew that if the Marines pushed them too far, they might quit and leave us in a lurch. One day, Foster gathered the NCOs and platoon sergeants together. “Look, you have to take it easy on the Terps. They’re not Marines. They’re not used to being fucked with like you guys. You got it?”
Terps usually were known by their call signs, another way to protect their identity. One of ours, Big Sam, was one of Echo Company’s most skilled interpreters.
Big Sam was not that big really. He was tall, six feet even, and weighed around 150 skinny pounds. He was eighteen, with olive skin and dark black hair. His face was gaunt but clean-shaven, unlike most Iraqi men.
Forced to grow up fast surrounded by Baghdad’s violence and hatred, Big Sam had a serious and mature look about him. He had every right to it.
He had been forced to leave his home in Baghdad, and he missed his family keenly. He felt depressed about that and the fact he couldn’t confide in even his lifelong friends.
He knew, too, that many of his countrymen regarded anyone who worked for the MNF as “Kha’en”—a traitor—or “Jasoos”—a spy. The labels haunted him.
To ease his anxieties, whenever Big Sam went to sleep—normally for only three or four hours a day—he would try to remember the faces of his family. Small things, like the memories of his family, helped him keep his sanity.
Our other Terp, Ford, was baby faced, six-two, and slim. He was the quieter of the two, and his English was not as advanced as Big Sam’s. But, whatever Ford lacked in language ability, he made up ten-fold in effort. Ford had another link with Big Sam: they had been best friends in Baghdad.
Born in 1987, they were in high school when Saddam Hussein’s regime fell. Big Sam planned to pursue a degree in computer engineering—a skill that was in great demand in Iraq, as the war-torn country was on the brink of rebuilding itself.
In 2005, while still in high school, Ford and Big Sam spent time talking with American troops in Baghdad. They were curious about Americans and bullshitting with the troops allowed them to improve their English.
By 2005, even casual conversations with MNF troops were risky. Even the thinnest rumor floating around a neighborhood could put their entire family at risk for retribution—cozying up with the American troops was something that just wasn’t done.
One day, Big Sam and Ford went to the International Zone (or Green Zone, a place designated as a safe zone by military doctrine) in Baghdad to talk with a representative from one of the interpreter contract companies and test for the job. At the time, Big Sam had no intention of actually doing it. He just thought the experience of taking the test would be fun.
Both of them passed the tests, and the company offered them positions.
Ford smiled and said they should try it out.
Big Sam was categorically against the idea. “No way, brother. I don’t need the money. I want to stay focused on school. Plus, I’m seventeen. They won’t even hire me.”
Big Sam was a sharp intellectual. He wanted a university degree and knew working for the coalition forces would surely derail his plans.
The boys returned home and evaded questions from friends and family as to where they had been. They didn’t want anyone to find out they’d been in the Green Zone associating with the Americans.
One day in mid-June 2006, when Big Sam arrived home, he spied an envelope sitting inside the high, steel gate outside his home. He picked it up carefully. As he did so, he felt a small lump inside the package.
When he opened the flap, he found a long shiny 7.62mm bullet and a short, handwritten note:
“Leave your houses, or we’ll behead you and your family, Shia infidels.”
The insurgents had targeted Big Sam and his family and had no
w made that abundantly clear.
Before receiving this sinister package, Big Sam and Ford had enjoyed pleasant lives.
They grew up in stable neighborhoods, had plenty of friends, lived in beautiful homes, and had hardworking parents who provided for them. They were like other Iraqi teenagers who enjoyed talking on the phone, playing soccer, and just plain hanging out.
They had known about the insurgency and its effects and had heard of the increase in sectarian violence throughout Iraq—bombings, murders, and intimidation. But it had never carved its way into their lives.
Now, it had.
Big Sam and Ford were forced to abandon their homes and relocate to a Shia area. They hastily gathered up everything they could, but had to leave behind most of their clothes, furniture, and personal belongings and mementos—including irreplaceable photos that defined their childhood.
Big Sam felt utterly helpless as if someone were kicking him as he lay face down in the dirt, and he couldn’t get up to fight back. Things seemed hopeless.
It often pained him to look at his mother’s and sister’s eyes so often filled with tears at times and saw the despair painted on their faces.
Despite his pain and frustration, Big Sam’s indomitable spirit gave him the optimism that somehow, he’d find a way to get back everything that his family had lost, especially their sense of safety.
Ford continued to encourage Big Sam to become an interpreter. “Brother,” he said, “we’ve lost our homes, our stuff, and our respect. We’ve got to go to work as interpreters. Fuck those insurgents! It’s our only way to strike back at those assholes.”
Big Sam now embraced the idea. “All right, sadiq. Let’s do this. I can’t stay here any longer, and it’s killing me to see my family like this.”
It was a difficult and risky decision for both young men.
Big Sam broke the news to his father as they drove through Baghdad days before his departure. He told him he’d already gone through the entire process to be an interpreter and that he and Ford had already signed their contracts.
Big Sam’s father was shocked. “Son, I can’t let you go work for the coalition forces. They’re occupiers, and it’s too dangerous for everyone. I won’t let you do it.”
His father was a loyal Iraqi who truly loved his country.
Big Sam appealed to his father’s patriotism. “Dad, the U.S. troops aren’t occupiers. The real occupiers are the insurgents who have taken everything away from us, who took our homes and destroyed our lives and what you built your whole life.”
His father continued to try to make Big Sam change his mind and stay. He tried to assure him that he’d make a better living for them with the help of the family—together. Allah would help them do it.
Big Sam pleaded, “I have to do this, Dad. I can’t stand staying here seeing Mom and the girls in so much pain and living day in and day out with the grief.”
Reluctantly, but with a father’s pride, he acquiesced and agreed that no one from the family would know specifically what job Big Sam would be doing. More importantly, they wouldn’t mention where he’d be doing it—in one of the most highly contested and dangerous areas of Iraq.
Both agreed to tell Big Sam’s mother that he’d be working for an oil company in northern Iraq, a relatively safe area at the time. Ford contrived a similar cover story to tell his family.
Together, they stood ready to begin an adventure that would change the course of their lives.
The next day, Big Sam and Ford went back to the Green Zone. The company asked where they wanted to work. Big Sam said without hesitation, “I want to work in Al Anbar Province and serve with the Marines.”
Big Sam was enamored and impressed with the Marine Corps from the images they portrayed in the movies. He had interacted with them on the streets of Baghdad and knew they were special—he wanted to be a part of that.
Big Sam and Ford were scheduled to fly out on a U.S. helicopter a few days later, hundreds of miles away from their families and homes. Before they left everything behind, Big Sam wanted to spend his last night in his old home in Baghdad.
Ford didn’t want to stay—it was just too risky. He’d already said his goodbyes to his family. He was sure insurgents would kill them if they knew they had returned.
Big Sam insisted. He needed the connection one last time, and later that night they sat in Big Sam’s childhood bedroom and played video games. Through the darkness, they heard strange men on the street chanting loudly.
“Al Moot LeKofar!” It meant, “Die, Infidels!”
Ford turned to Big Sam with panic written on his face, “Great. Thanks. We’re going to get killed because of your stupid idea of spending one last night at your house.”
Big Sam ran into his parents’ bedroom and found the AK-47 rifle that his father had kept. Neither knew how to use it, and they fumbled with it clumsily, trying to figure out how to load it and shoot it.
The shouting stopped, but the boys spent the night wide awake, crouched in the corner of the bedroom, holding the rifle—it felt like an eternity to them.
When morning finally came, Big Sam’s brother picked them up. They quickly snuck out of the house, got into his car, and hunkered down out of sight.
Big Sam’s brother drove them straight to the MNF staging base. Later that day, Big Sam and Ford and a handful of other interpreters boarded an Army UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter and headed from Baghdad to Camp Al Asad for assignment to the units they’d be supporting.
It was their first time on a helicopter—excitement and fear flooded their senses.
Flying a thousand feet above the ground, Big Sam looked down at the harsh landscape—the place he once called home. He pulled out his cell phone and typed out a text message to his girlfriend.
Big Sam and his girlfriend were happy to be just that, friends, and they pragmatically scoffed at the idea of true love at such a young age. Big Sam let her know he’d be gone for a while and asked her to keep him in her prayers. He concluded his message, “I’ll miss you a lot.”
Big Sam swelled with emotion, hurting inside, as his hometown passed out of sight.
He thought, “Baghdad, do you believe I’ll see you again alive?”
His sense of unease was heightened when, miles outside the city, the door gunner of the Blackhawk opened fire from the aircraft’s .50 caliber GAU-19 machine gun and the helicopter banked and rocked violently—it scared the shit out of Big Sam.
He thought, “What the fuck have I gotten into if this is just the beginning?”
One hour later, they reached Camp Al Asad and were put through the paces of getting outfitted with all the gear they’d need: helmets, camouflage uniforms, boots, backpacks, and twenty-pound armored vests they’d have to get used to wearing daily on their already slender frames.
Neither knew anything about the military. Both were plucked from civilian life and planted right into the Marine Corps—the most hardcore branch of warriors in the world. They got no training. It was a complete culture shock. While they lacked military experience and were now in an utterly unfamiliar world, both Ford and Big Sam pressed on.
What they didn’t know is how indispensable they would become to Echo Company as we continued to fight.
CHAPTER 7
Seventh
I moved from the Naval Weapons Station in Yorktown, Virginia, where I was serving with 2nd Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team (FAST) Company, to take command of Echo Company at Camp San Mateo at Camp Pendleton, California. I traveled unaccompanied, that is, without my wife and daughter, who stayed in Virginia. I drove cross-country. I checked in on a Tuesday, parked my Jeep in the battalion parking lot, and took command that Friday.
The next week the battalion was at Twentynine Palms, California, in the heat of the Mojave Desert participating in the Enhanced Mojave Viper training program that was designed to prepare Marines specifically for urban combat scenarios they were facing in Iraq at the time.
With less than five months until my ne
w battalion deployed, I decided to forgo renting an apartment and live in my office in the battalion command post.
The command post was a dilapidated, two-story building that smelled like a musty cellar. Mice infested the ceilings. At night, I would hear them scurrying above the white, flaky, industrial ceiling tiles. There was no air-conditioning, and the windows were always open. The ledges made an ideal perch for birds who defecated on the well-worn carpet—and occasionally my uniform that I regularly hung on the back of my office chair.
If only one unit used the building, it might have been in better condition. As it was, because units rotated through it constantly, no one had taken ownership of it—I viewed it as equivalent to a beat-up mobile home rental in a trailer park.
When the Marines found out that their CO was residing in the command post, they most likely thought, “Oh, hell. Here we go. This guy has no life, and we are never going to get off work early.”
Some would say that might have been the case, but in retrospect, I think I was rather even-keeled about the arrangement. We worked and trained hard because I knew what was on the horizon for all of us.
One of the perks of “office living” was the fact that I could swing by the Bachelor Enlisted Quarters (BEQ), or barracks, and check on my Marines whenever I felt like it. I knew firsthand that the best way to find out what was going on in a unit was to hang around the enlisted barracks on a Thursday night. It was “field day” in the Marine Corps—the day when enlisted Marines cleaned their rooms to be inspection-ready when the company first sergeant examined them on Friday morning. The smell of Pine Sol multi-purpose cleaner when walking in the rooms was strong enough to bring the toughest Marine to his knees.
My closeness to my Marines produced many benefits. The most important of which was that I got to know the Marines that I would ultimately be putting my confidence in, while they got to know the man they’d be entrusting their lives with as we fought in Ramadi.
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