In November of 2003, Stan’s team was sent out on another adventure. Third Armored Cavalry Regiment (ACR) patrolled the Al Anbar Province, south of Stan’s battalion. The ACR requested a company to support their push into the border town of Husaybah. Charlie Company was elected, and the commander wanted two snipers attached. Since their area was quiet, all of the snipers wanted to go, but after a brief discussion the team leaders decided on Stan and his partner. The two of them packed up and met with Charlie Company to convoy south.
After a long drive, the soldiers met with the Third ACR. The plan was to patrol through the small towns on their way to Husaybah. The snipers were to be used as over-watch, and when they finally made it to Husaybah, they would sneak into the city in advance of the main force. To Stan, it was nothing new. He had done plenty of it before.
Two weeks into the operation, Stan and his partner were alone in Husaybah. They were blocks ahead of the main force, who were clearing houses in Stan’s direction. He and his partner occupied the top level of a gutted and partially built three-story house. Inside, Stan and his partner held security for the advancing force and had been doing so for hours.
Outside, the sky was gray and dark. It had rained for nearly a week.
“Hey, I’m going to the bathroom,” Stan said to his partner, and he reached for his weapon. Their headsets allowed them to keep communications.
Stan slipped into another room, careful not to draw attention to himself. There, he noticed movement outside. With his scope, Stan caught sight of two men moving through an alley in the distance. Nobody else was on the streets. He told his partner that he was going to investigate the men. In another room, he gazed through a window and noticed what the men carried. One had a PKM machine gun, while the other carried an AK with a bundle of RPGs strapped to his back. When Stan saw them, they were running from left to right, but they suddenly turned and headed straight toward his building.
“We’re compromised,” Stan said, worried. He remembered the Special Forces snipers that had fought and died in Somalia after being surrounded. He believed that his fate would be the same.
Without hesitation, Stan leveled his weapon. The men were easy targets. They ran straight at him. After Stan shot both men in the chest, his partner asked him the situation. Stan met him in the room, telling him to pack his gear. When they were ready, the two snipers moved out of the building and linked up with the other soldiers.
When the operation was complete, Stan moved back with his battalion to Sinjar. He spent the next six months conducting sniper missions and eventually his time came to an end. When it was all said and done, Stan felt lucky that no one in his section ever died. Others in the battalion had succumbed to insurgents in Iraq and the fighting in Afghanistan, but no snipers from his platoon.
TEN
ROE
Rules Of Engagement—Directives issued by
competent military authority that delineate the
circumstances and limitations under which United
States forces will initiate and/or continue com-
bat engagement with other forces encountered.
Also called ROE.
—Department of Defense Dictionary of
Military and Associated Terms
NEGOTIATING the streets of Iraq is tough. Amid fighting the insurgency, evading IEDs, repressing ambushes, and surviving attacks, snipers face another obstacle, one that can be as confusing and complicated as the fighting itself. It is the Rules of Engagement.
The purposes of the ROE seem simple. They regulate the actions troops can and cannot take in hostile situations, but for snipers they can also become hindrances for a few reasons. First, snipers are often used for prevention, which calls for split-second, life-or-death decisions to decipher intent. These are tremendously hard decisions to make under some circumstances. Secondly, insurgents know exactly what the U.S. military ROE are and have tailored their operations to skirt them in order to accomplish their missions. Lastly, because of the ROE, many snipers fear making any decision, knowing that if their actions seem suspicious, the repercussions can destroy their careers. One Marine sniper in particular, Sergeant Johnny Winnick II, learned this lesson the hard way.
In 2007, Johnny was aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard as a scout/sniper team leader with the Third Battalion, First Marine Regiment. At the time, “The Thundering Third” made up the ground combat element as the battalion landing team for the Thirteenth Marine Expeditionary Unit. He and the other marines had been out to sea for months and were in much need of ground time. Fortunately, by May, their Western Pacific float steered them toward the Middle East and to a four-month stay in Iraq.
Before debarking, the marines sat in on the typical briefs. They were informed of their mission; it was ground combat counterinsurgency operations in the Al Anbar Province. The insurgency was alive and well there, and Johnny knew it, having been there twice before. His team sat quietly listening to the intelligence officer explain cultures and customs, what they could and could not do. Finally, he described the Rules of Engagement.
Johnny’s team knew the rules of combat. Most of them had been to Iraq at least once. This was Johnny’s fourth deployment there; twice before he’d gone as a machine gunner and once as a SAW gunner in a sniper team. Stabler, from Missouri, was the assistant team leader and this was his second deployment there. The two of them had passed sniper school together just months earlier. Alex, the team’s radio operator, had been to Iraq, as well. They knew what to expect of the brief, except this time, when the officer was finished the marines were struck by one sentence.
“Remember this, gents, the Marine Corps eats its young,” said the officer.
He was referring to the fact that if the team screwed up in Iraq, they would be prosecuted to the fullest extent. They all knew what he meant, after having witnessed what had happened during their last deployment, when marines from their battalion were accused of murder in Haditha, Iraq. None of them wanted to be on the receiving end of that hell storm.
A month later, Johnny and his sniper team were punched out to FOB Golden, near Lake Tharthar in the Al Anbar Province. They were quickly spun up on the area and the enemy situation. Insurgents owned the area, particularly al-Qaeda in Iraq, whose members roamed freely, establishing training facilities and terrorizing U.S. collaborators. Though small arms and mortar attacks were regular, the biggest danger facing the team would be, by far, the immense amount of IEDs.
The area was a haven for IED factories and bombings. Small teams of insurgents made up IED cells whose sole purpose was to make, plant, and detonate the deadly bombs. The most common were artillery or mortar rounds planted near or on roads. Even more deadly were suicide bombers in vehicles packed full of explosives, attempting to get as close to the marines as possible before blowing themselves up.
Other threats came in daisy-chained IEDs, where more than one bomb was linked together for multiple explosions. Some were pressure plated and positioned in the road, destroying vehicles when they were run over with the slightest of weight. The snipers also learned of a new, very powerful bomb made of ammonium nitrate packed in jugs, barrels, and cars. The jugs and barrels were a good way to hide the contents from snipers, who, the insurgents knew, needed positive identification before shooting.
The snipers were also told of the insurgents’ increasingly sophisticated tactics. They had planting IEDs down to a science, literally emplacing them within sixty seconds. Unmanned aerial vehicles caught footage of their method, which was broken into three parts. The “softeners” arrived first with gasoline or other substances to break up the concrete, asphalt, or dirt. Next, the “diggers” hit the exact same spot, making a hole for the final component, the IED “layers.” Ideally, this method endangered only the IED planters, allowing the softeners and diggers to escape because they were unarmed. The snipers realized the challenge ahead of them, but relished the idea of stopping IED layers and saving others from being hurt by them.
Johnny’s team
was anxious to get started. Their first mission was simple; they were ordered to provide surveillance on a mosque near their base. It was suspected that IED cells and bomb-making materials came from it. Should they spot anyone taking IED materials from the building or laying bombs in the road, they were to get permission and engage.
The mosque was not far away, only fifteen hundred meters (five thousand feet), close enough for the team to hump into position, which they did the next night. While departing, Alex radioed the COC, or Combat Operations Center, for a radio check. They were only a few hundred meters out, but Alex knew something was wrong, because he could barely hear the marine on the other end. It was a consistent problem that would plague their entire stay.
Early the next morning, Johnny’s team was in place. The radio had given them trouble the entire time, but they kept on with the mission. Hidden, the team was observing the mosque from a nearby building when, in the afternoon, someone spotted suspicious activity.
“We’ve got company,” said the sniper on watch.
A mix of cars and small trucks stopped on the road next to the mosque. The drivers spilled out and quickly gathered around the back of one car. Johnny took over the gun and followed in his scope, noticing that a few men pulled IED materials from the trunk and placed them in the ground.
“Get the COC up, and let ’em know what what’s going on!” he shouted, needing permission to engage.
Alex tried to raise the COC, but the radio would not have it. He immediately switched to the iridium satellite phone, their emergency communications device, but the Iraqis were gone before he could explain everything.
Frustrated, Johnny directed a nearby quick reaction force to the IED’s location. Sure enough, the marines found a 155mm artillery round fashioned into a bomb. To make the situation worse, when the snipers arrived back at the base, Johnny was lectured for not taking the initiative and eliminating the IED cell. He was told not to hesitate if the situation happened again. Being reprimanded for something that he could have prevented was disheartening, especially because he was obligated to get permission before engaging.
All that aside, if the exact situation arose again, he knew what to do. He had seen too many casualties from IEDs, and if he had the power to stop it, he was not going to be the sniper who allowed people to get injured or killed by any more.
Days later, Johnny and his team were assigned to the same mission. This time they planned to observe from a different location. They slipped off base early on June 17, under the cover of darkness. The patrol lasted longer than expected because of an abnormal number of convoys on the roads. Humvees mounted with lights shining in 360 degrees were the ones to avoid. The snipers knew that the gunners inside shot at anything they saw, and everyone hit the ground when they passed. Alex kept a pop-up flare handy, a signal meaning “friendly,” just in case they took rounds. He was already annoyed that the radio was not working again, but he had not had enough time to give radio checks before losing contact.
Shortly before sunrise, Johnny and Stabler stopped the team to recon possible hide sites. The satellite imagery they used to mark an initial position deceived them. The designated building was actually a small platform only a few feet off the ground and was not big enough for the entire team. With little time, Johnny and Stabler searched a nearby structure. Inside, the feel fit the description of buildings used by terrorists to videotape their killings. Bullet holes sprinkled the walls, along with Arabic writings. There were also plastic sheets on the ground.
“Is this a kill house?” Stabler asked.
“It looks like it,” Johnny replied.
Though they did not want to stay there, the sun was about to rise and they had no other options.
Johnny called the team in and everyone prepared the hide. Immediately there was a problem. From the building, they could not see the all of the primary objective, the mosque. Several buildings were in the way, making it only half-visible. The gas station, a meeting point for insurgents and a known IED hotbed, was the secondary objective, and it was in plain sight. The secondary objective would now have to become the primary.
In the hide, communications took priority and Alex went to work. He sat against the wall and pulled out the radio. Johnny and the others set up security, except Stabler, who prepared the shooting position. The front doorway had the best view, and he placed the rifle there facing the gas station. He found that the area could not fit more than one person, so whoever manned the gun would have to relay everything to the team.
The snipers were in place and ready to observe by sunup. Stabler rested Johnny’s MK-11 on a tripod and took first watch. He had screwed on the suppressor for Johnny, who preferred the rifle over the M40A3 because of its ability to put rounds downrange faster. Stabler did not care what weapon he had just as long as he could shoot it. Johnny sat a few feet away with his Mossberg 500 pump-action shotgun handy. The MK-11 allowed him to carry a close-range weapon, and he preferred a shotgun. Josh had an M4 with an M203 grenade launcher, while Alex carried an M4.
Shortly after sunrise, the action picked up. The gas station was three hundred yards away, next to a four-way intersection with a stoplight that maintained traffic in all directions. Stabler scanned the area and noticed a white Toyota pickup with six men stopping on the side of the road. The front passenger got out, walked to the back, and opened the tailgate. Four men in the back looked nervous while the front passenger grabbed something and walked a few meters behind the truck.
“Hey, boys, get ready,” Stabler announced, but he could not make out the object in the man’s grip. He instantly adjusted the scope’s focus, but the man had bent down and was finished by the time Stabler zoomed in. Suddenly, a separate car that was parked on the opposite side of the road acknowledged the truck and they drove off in different directions. They vanished to the sound of Stabler swearing out loud.
He was furious. Everything had happened so quickly that he could not tell if the man had softened the ground or planted something. If he’d planted an IED, Stabler was responsible for any damage, or so he thought. Either way, it was over and he could only wait to see the outcome.
After minutes of cursing, Johnny relieved Stabler to get his mind off the incident, but Johnny was also thinking. As small as it was, their building was not an ideal defensive position. If his team made contact, they could easily be overwhelmed with well-placed RPGs and machine guns. Fallujah in 2004 had taught Johnny the effects of a well-trained enemy. Stabler and Johnny formed a plan.
“If we make contact, this is what happens,” explained Johnny. “After I shoot, you all have to push out of this building. I’ll maintain contact until you all take cover, and then you guys open up. I’ll take Governal and we’ll sweep through the objective,” he said.
They all agreed, and it was not long before the scene was thrown into action. Minutes later Johnny watched an eighteen-wheel semitruck stop where the other truck had been. Two men fell from the cab. One walked to the rear of the trailer while the other stopped directly center. Johnny had a waist-high view only.
“Hey, boys, we got a truck,” said Johnny to his teammates.
The man near the center of the trailer caught Johnny’s attention. He was squatting and reaching for something in the undercarriage.
“I got a guy. He’s squatting,” Johnny relayed to his team.
The man washed his hands from a spigot. When he was finished, he dug at the ground exactly where Stabler had described. Johnny watched closely but could not tell the size of the hole in the ground. He anxiously waited to see if the man was going to plant something. Suddenly the man pulled a blue jug from the undercarriage and placed it on the ground.
Earlier that year, insurgents had made IEDs with chlorine and nitroglycerine packed in jugs. Other reports from areas such as Adwaniyah confirmed that insurgents were using antifreeze jugs for IEDs. Johnny considered the man’s actions, combined with the actions of the men earlier, and the jug. The entire situation was similar to the procedure
s used by IED cells. Johnny could not let the man get away, and instantly chose his fate.
“He’s got a blue jug,” said Johnny, “I’ve got positive identification.”
Stabler waited for Johnny’s next move.
“So . . . ?” he questioned, wondering why Johnny was taking so long to shoot.
He did not know that Johnny was taking a breath to get his natural point of aim.
The suppressor fixed to the MK-11 helped mask Johnny’s shot. The man did not know what hit him. Johnny’s crosshairs lay on his chest, and the man twitched after the first shot, but Johnny did not let up. He fired two more times before the man stood up and stumbled away.
The team instantly executed the plan. Johnny moved the rifle to the side and grabbed his shotgun.
“Let’s go!” he said.
Alex dropped the radio and picked up his rifle. Stabler followed Johnny through the front door while the SAW gunner and the rest of the team followed Alex, except one marine who stayed on the sniper rifle for over-watch.
Outside, Stabler led the team twenty meters to the front and took cover behind a few trees near a small dirt mound. Johnny and Governal moved up while the team laid covering fire.
The truck was still running, and by now others were getting out. Two of the men ran to the back of the truck, leading the marines to believe that they were going for weapons. Alex unloaded on a man looking toward him from behind a tire. Stabler lobbed a grenade from his M203, placing it under the truck and blowing out the back tires.
Hunters: U.S. Snipers in the War on Terror Page 18