by Harold Coyle
Those who survived this shower of fragments suffered other often more heinous deaths as fragments from the bomb sliced through fuel tanks or the thin casings of shells and other munitions within the targeted area. The resulting fireball and the flow 46
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of burning fuel liberated by the rupturing of their containers seared and scorched exposed flesh, setting clothing and hair ablaze and sending the stricken souls off in a wild flight that only served to fan the flames they were trying to escape.
Even those who were fortunate enough to escape being butchered where they stood or burned alive were not safe. The force of the blast radiated out in a wave that had the power to turn internal organs into jelly, toss people through the air like rag dolls, or pound them into the ground as though struck down by a Nordic god's invisible hammer. Those who had the wits and ability to crawl far enough to escape the spreading pool of burning fuel or the effects of secondary explosions that inevitably followed a successful attack suffered broken eardrums, shattered bones, and crippling concussions.
The soldiers assigned to RT Kilo never saw any of this. At most they witnessed the initial explosion and its attendant fireball.
On rare occasions one of them caught a glimpse of a corpse being thrown through the air. But that was all. Once the bomb had struck home there was no time for the men who had guided it to its mark to celebrate their achievement or measure the bomb's effects. They had to swiftly turn from finding and designating to escaping and evading, for another tenet of the American way of war is to do unto others without giving them the opportunity to do it to you.
Like his predecessors, Captain Erik Burman never questioned the political wisdom of what he and his men were doing. That was not in his job description. He was an American soldier, a commissioned officer sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States and follow all orders from his duly appointed superiors. If those orders placed him and the soldiers entrusted to his care in harm's way, so be it. Regardless of their personal motivation, everyone in RT Kilo had volunteered for some form of service at MORE THAN COURAGE
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least twice--when they joined the armed forces and later again when they had chosen to become members of the army's Special Forces. Only the two men belonging to the air liaison team were part of RT Kilo against their better judgment. Joe Ciszak was fond of reminding everyone-who cared to listen that he had joined the air force to thunder along at mach one plus, not sneak about in the night like a Bedouin raider. This attitude, shared by Airman Jones, tended to isolate them from the rest of the team.
What the air liaison officer thought was the last thing Ken Aveno was concerned about. At the moment his entire focus was on finding a spot that offered anything that came close to offering cover and concealment behind which he could halt his vehicle. In this he was having no luck. Nothing resembling a textbook hull down defensive position seemed to exist in this region. When this was the case, both he and Burman in Kilo Six had to settle on creeping forward as far as they dared from different directions before simply stopping in the flat open country just outside the village they were approaching. Such compromises of acceptable doctrine were both hazardous to the max and completely unavoidable.
Sometimes
RT Kilo got lucky, and the object of their search was discovered on the periphery of a village or installation hidden in the lee of a building. On the nights that the officers found their mark exposed in this manner they were able to stand off and designate the target right from their vehicle. This did not prove to be the case tonight. As they drew closer to the darkened village where they hoped to find a chemical warfare lab the usually unflappable Ramirez assigned to Kilo Three began to wonder just how far they would go before Aveno ordered him to stop.
Ramirez's position during these cautious advances was up top, training the 40-mm grenade launcher on the village ahead. From there he had an unobstructed panoramic view of the village as well as its environs. With his right index finger never more than an inch away from the trigger, Ramirez watched and waited for 48
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trouble he prayed would not suddenly pop up from out of the shadows. When they did stop, he would remain with Kilo Three to provide cover as the XO continued on foot into the village with his driver, Amer.
Inside the humvee, Ken Aveno was also becoming nervous as he squirmed in his seat and leaned forward until the brim of his cap touched the windshield. He was pushing his luck. They were already far too close and still he saw no sign of anything even remotely resembling a safe place where Kilo Three could hunker down. Though he didn't like doing so, the Special Forces officer decided he had to order his driver to stop. "Things aren't looking any better between here and there," Aveno said to Amer before ordering the halt. He drew in a deep breath. "We'll have to leave her here and hoof it the rest of the way."
The Palestinian-American said nothing. He dreaded wrhat lay ahead. The stress and anxiety lingering just below his conscious thoughts was already twisting his stomach into knots. Both would grow by leaps and bounds from this point on as they adbandoned what little protection Kilo Three offered from hostile fire. Once out of the vehicle and on the ground, Amer would have no protection at all, with only the darkness as a shield.
Amer brought his humvee to a stop and climbed out.
Sergeant Funk wasted no time sliding in behind the steering wheel. Like all the members of RT Kilo the medic was cross trained in other duties. Funk could fill in for Amcr as driver as well as operate all of the team's communications equipment except some of the more specialized air force stuff that was crammed into Kilo One. The fact was he had done just about everything else he had been trained to do except be a medic, something for which everyone in the team, including Funk himself, was quite thankful.
It always took several minutes for Aveno to collect his gear and steel himself for the coming ordeal. Besides taking his MP-5
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from the bracket where he kept the weapon while on the move, the XO had to remove the laser designator from its carrying case and inspect it as best he could in the dark to ensure that it was functional. He also needed to check the small radio he carried, placing the earpiece in his right ear and adjusting the volume.
During these preparations Ken Aveno reflected on how things had changed during their unending deployment in Syria. He recalled how excited he had been in the beginning. Like a child fumbling with gifts on Christmas morning, he had been all thumbs as he tried to do everything at once. Now such enthusiasm was only a memory, lost weeks ago in the monotony and strain of their daily routine and the harsh environment in which they lived. He tried hard to justify ifo his own mind that the time it now took him to prepare was necessary lest he overlook something.
But he knew that was not the real reason. He was putting off going forward, delaying for as long as possible advancing into the heart of a hostile village in the faint hope that Captain Bur man discovered their target first, thus sparing him the necessity of doing so himself.
That he harbored such feelings and thoughts shamed him. He was a professional, a West Pointer. Officers weren't supposed to think or feel like that. Yet, as their extended deployment had dragged on he found himself questioning his own fitness to be an officer, wondering if he needed to reexamine his priorities. Perhaps it was time to find a new career. His slow departure from the relative safety of Kilo Three only reinforced his self-doubt about his commitment to his current line of work.
When he had reached the end of his mental checklist and there was nothing more to keep him from leaving, Aveno turned to Amer. "Ready?" His throat parched by his own growing fear, Amer simply nodded.
Aveno turned his back on Kilo Three and slowly stepped off, advancing toward the village on foot. Amer took up his post five meters to the left and a little behind the XO. Whatever fears or 50
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apprehensions the two felt were hidden by the same darkness they relie
d upon to conceal their presence.
Even though Dee Dee Davis, protecting the rear area of Kilo Two, was facing in the direction of the Syrian recon vehicle, he was not the first one to become aware of its presence when it broke cover in the darkness, and began to advance on Davis and Kilo Two, and the air force team in Kilo One.
From his perch on Kilo Three Sergeant Harris heard the whine of the ancient Russian-built four-wheeled BRDM armored reconnaissance car but was unable to figure out which direction the noise was coming from. Assuming it was somewhere in or near the village, and knowing Aveno and Amer were out there, the weapons expert frantically began to sweep the area while calling out a warning to the others. "Wegot company!"
This announcement sent a shock through Kannen seated on the hood of Kilo Two. "Where? What is it?"
"I don't know, but it sounds like an armored car. A BRDM or something." After making another sweep of the village and the horizon on both sides, Harris quickly added, "I don't see it. Does anyone else?"
Kannen was still straining his eyes in an effort to catch sight of the menace when he felt a hand grab his right boot. Looking down he saw Davis standing next to the rear of the humvee.
"Back there!" Davis screeched. "Back there!"
Jumping to his feet Kannen stood on the hood and turned, looking out over the roof of Kilo Two. Even without his night vision goggles he could make out the form of a BRDM barreling down on their position. That the Syrian recon vehicle could also see them was confirmed a second later when its 20-mm cannon cut loose.
Syria
20:43 LOCAL (16:43 ZULU)
The eruption of gunfire in the distance found Erik Burman and Sergeant Yousaf Hashmi on foot and not far from the center of the village. Instinctively the Special Forces officer threw himself on the ground and rolled up against' a building, which was, at the moment, the only thing that afforded him anything resembling hard cover. Once he came to a stop against the wall he brought his weapon up to the ready, flipped its safety off, and began to frantically scan the area around him for danger. Even in the midst of making himself as small a target as possible, it was clear to Bur man that the fire was not directed at them or anywhere near. Still, he responded as if it were. Hashmi didn't wait to be told what to do either. As professional as anyone else assigned to Kilo, the New York-born Syrian followed suit, twisting himself about as soon as he was on the ground, to check their rear and make stire they were not surprised from that quarter.
Having tended to his first order of business, that of providing for his personal sectirity, Burman now needed to find out what was going on. Fumbling until his left hand found the hand mike of the small radio that linked him to the other members of his command, Burman depressed the push to talk button. "Kilo, Kilo, this is Kilo Six. Sitrep, over."
While waiting for the scattered elements of his team to report their situation, Burman continued to look around in order to assess his own. Already he could hear the sound of the village coming to life. On the other side of the wall he was pressed up against he could hear feet hit the floor and begin to scurry about, 52
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accompanied by a flurry of excited voices. Deep down in the pit of his stomach, Burman felt a growing fear begin to well up, a fear that if left unchecked would turn into panic. He had to contain it, to keep it in check if they were to have any hope of surviving the next few minutes. Both he and Hashmi couldn't stay where they were for very long. That much was obvious. Soon, someone would come tearing around the corner and trip over them. It didn't matter whether they were civilian or military. Everyone in this village, with the exception of Hashmi, was a hostile, a person who would just as soon see him dead. They had to move. The sooner they did, the better their chances of getting away.
Only the failure to get any sort of response to his call for a situation report and a fresh burst of gunfire in the distance kept Burman in place. For all he knew there could be Syrian soldiers lying in ambush, waiting for them to make a run back to their humvee.
As dangerous as it was to stay where he was, it was even more hazardous to jump up and charge off into the dark totally ignorant of what was going on out there. Crushing the push to talk button on the small hand mike, Burman frantically repeated his call to his subordinates. "Kilo, Kilo, this is Kilo Six. Sitrep, over. I say again, give me your sitrep, Now!"
While someone with each of Kilo's scattered detachments heard Burman's call, all were busy responding to the same threat that had sent Burman to ground, whether they could see it or not.
The members of the air liaison team in Kilo One were the last to catch on to the acute danger that faced them, or, more correctly, was rushing up at them from behind. As was his habit, Airman Jones had turned down the volume of the tactical radio net that linked all of Kilo's humvecs so that Lieutenant Ciszak could better monitor those nets upon which the AWACs and strike aircraft were operating. It wasn't until Jones noticed the frenzied activities of Kannen, Harris, and other members of Kilo Two's crew, punctuated by bright orange flashes streaking through the MORE THAN COURAGE
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night sky, that the airman turned to Ciszak. "It, we've got a problem."
Jones's statement took several seconds to cut through Ciszak's mental haze. Confused, the air force officer was about to ask Jones what he was talking about when the sharp pow-powpow of the BRDM's 20-mm cannon provided the answer. Startled, Ciszak looked over to where Kilo Two sat. In a scene that reminded him of an old silent movie, the flash of the BRDM's cannon lit up the night, illuminating the army humvee and its crew. Ciszak watched as Harris frantically swung the TOW missile launcher around to face the threat barreling down on them. Two other men, whom Ciszak couldn't identify, had thrown themselves on the ground and opene'd up with their individual weapons. That they were having no effect was obvious as the unseen intruder continued to hammer away with a slow, steady pow--p ow--p ow.
"Lieutenant, shouldn't you be calling for support?"
Ciszak turned to face Jones, who repeated his plea almost as an order. "Sir, you need to inform Rainbow we're in trouble."
Rainbow was the call sign for the AWACs. The code word for
"team in trouble, send immediate air strike" was Cherokee.
Unfortunately, Ciszak found he wasn't able to recall that particular code word. The ones he used day in and day out were on the tip of his tongue. Those that he had no need for during the course of normal operations such as Cherokee had been stored away somewhere in his memory and quietly forgotten. Completely rattled by what was going on outside, Ciszak didn't think to ask Jones if he remembered what the call for assistance was.
Instead the harried officer flicked on his small penlight and looked down at the sheet where all the code words, call signs, and frequencies for that evening were listed.
Already shaken by the surprise enemy attack, it took Jones a moment to catch on to what his officer was doing. When he did he yelled at Ciszak. "Cherokee, for Christ sakes! The word is Cherokee."
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Embarrassment added to his befuddlement as Ciszak fumbled with his hand mike while he attempted to make the call. Unable to hold back any longer, Jones snatched the mike, mashed down the push to talk button, and screamed repeatedly into it, "Cherokee, Cherokee, Cherokee."
Two hundred fifty miles away the word "Cherokee" had the same startling effect on the crew of the E-3A AWACs that the fire from the BRDM had had on Ciszak and Jones. Caught totally off guard the AWACs controller asked to confirm their requests for assistance.
The controller's call for confirmation was heard by a number of other aircraft throughout the region as well as the operations center responsible for monitoring the day-to-day activities of Razorback in Turkey. But neither Ciszak nor Jones heard or responded to the call. By then events on the ground had spiraled out of control and overwhelmed the crew of Kilo One.
The BRDM that had initiated the frantic call for assistance was not alone. At a minimum recon vehicles trave
led in pairs, allowing one to go forward and search while the other hung back and quietly watched, just as Sergeant Kannen and the crew of Kilo Two had been doing.
The sudden appearance of Kilo One and Kilo Two was as much a surprise to the Syrian lieutenant commanding the pair of BRDMs as his unit's appearance was to the members of RT Kilo.
The Syrians had been returning to the village after having finished a routine mounted patrol when the gunner of the lead BRDM
called out that he thought he saw something on the horizon.
Startled by the sight of combat vehicles where there should not have been any, the Syrians automatically reverted to established battle drill. While his lieutenant radioed his observations to his superior, the commander of the lead BRDM continued to press on in order to investigate. With his duty of reporting his discovery fulfilled, the commander of the Syrian recon team ordered his MORE THAN COURAGE
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driver to come to a halt as he prepared to support his lead vehicle.
That BRDM continued to roll on, opening fire on the target nearest to it, which happened to be Kilo One. The presence of a second enemy vehicle in the area, Kilo Two, didn't become apparent to either BRDM until- after the Americans manning it sprang to life and prepared to return fire.
Because the recon vehicle was parked, the gunner seated next to the Syrian officer took his time laying his sight on his intended mark with care, unlike the other BRDM, which was in motion and spewing its fire about like a drunk trying to urinate in a jar.
That they were a target was not readily apparent to Ciszak or Holton. Their vehicle's hard exterior shell as well as the supplies, equipment, and radios that Jones was using to call for help shielded them from the initial burst of 20-mm cannon fire. Only when they felt their humvee begin to rock and shake did they realize they were not only being shot at but were being hit Jones tossed the radio hand mike to his lieutenant. "Keep trying to get them. Send them our location." As Ciszak groped in the dark interior for the hand mike that had hit him, Jones faced forward, grabbed the steering wheel with one hand, and reached for the ignition with the other. Getting out of the line of fire, if, even for a moment, seemed to be a vastly superior option to simply standing fast and being chewed to pieces.