More than courage

by Harold Coyle

  After a long pause, the investigator from the DOT turned to Palmer. "General, do you have any idea what could have caused the man to do something like that?"

  Tugging on the hem of his uniform blouse, Palmer looked once more at the open door before turning to face the others.

  "Guilt. Shame. Anger. Take your pick, gentlemen."

  "I can't put that in my report!"

  Palmer considered the civilian bureaucrat for a moment. "Sir, I don't give a damn what you put into your report. You asked me to come here and render an opinion. I have done so. Now, if you will excuse me there are other matters far more pressing than this postmortem that demand my full attention."

  Without another word Palmer began to make his way to where his aide waited with the sedan. As he walked slowly through the quiet hangar the man responsible for saving what was left of RT Kilo could not help but compare his current plight to the children's ditty that seemed so apropos to this operation.

  "Then there were six." And tomorrow, if the Syrians kept to their word there would be but five.

  Fort Irwin, California

  22:50 LOCAL (05:50 ZULU)

  The young officer who had led the OPFOR during that evening's exercise stood up, walked to the front of the assembled officers, and took his place. Try as hard as he might, he found that he was unable to keep himself from smirking whenever his eyes lit upon Emmett DeWitt. Knowing full well what was about to come, the best DeWitt could do at the moment was give his former com padres one of those Fll-get-you sort of looks.

  As he had done a hundred times before, First Lieutenant Clarence Archer introduced himself and discussed the operations from the OPFOR's perspective. He described the role his unit had been playing during the just-concluded exercise, how he had deployed his people, and presented a concise narrative on what he saw as the engagement unfolded. It had been both a dress rehearsal and the first company-level training event DeWitt's Company had conducted with the Land Warrior. Archer's people had been playing the part of a garrison unit charged with the internal security duties of a military compound. As such the bulk of his men were lightly armed with a few crew-served weapons.

  To augment this force and add realism to the exercise a number of soldiers ordinariy assigned to administrative duties with the OPFOR's parent unit had been locked away in various rooms throughout the building Archer's men were protecting. DeWitt's mission was to secure these captives and withdraw from the objective with minimum casualties.

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  translated into. If ten officers were asked to give a percentage of what they considered to be minimum casualties each of them would respond with a different answer. One thing was clear, though, even before the after-action review got under way. The simulated losses Alpha Company suffered that night would have exceeded even the most sanguine estimate. In their attempt to take down the building defended by Archer's men, DeWitt's company had lost eight dead and twenty-eight wounded, with half of the wounded winding up as prisoners.

  "Just about the time it finally became clear to the commanding officer of the assault force that none of the prisoners being held in the facility were American," Archer stated as he discussed the events, "I had finished rallying and reorganizing the survivors of my garrison at the far end of the building. When it was reported to me that the assault force was scattered in groups of three and four men searching for prisoners, I seized the opportunity to launch local counterattacks aimed at inflicting heavy casualties on the enemy. In two cases my soldiers' superior knowledge of the facility allowed them to slip a blocking force past the attackers and cut off their line of retreat prior to the commencement of our local counterattacks."

  Since this was essentially a training exercise designed to familiarize Alpha Company with the capability of the Land Warrior, Lieutenant Colonel Kaplan used every opportunity he could to make important points about that system. "The Land Warrior enhances the combat ability of your soldiers," he stated, doing his best to ensure that his tone was neither demeaning nor scornful.

  "It doesn't make you or your people any smarter. As the OPFOR

  commander pointed out, their intimate knowledge of the terrain allowed them to overcome your technological superiority. While your people were reduced to groping about in a portion of the building that they had not been briefed on, the OPFOR was able to move along secondary passages and through conduits swiftly and with confidence. By the time your people who were isolated MORE THAN COURAGE

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  by these tactics became aware that they were in trouble, it was too late."

  Though he knew better than to do so at an after-action review, DeWitt felt compelled to respond in his own defense.

  "Had the captives we were sent to secure been in the building anywhere close to where they were supposed to be, my company would have been long gone before the enemy had time to recover from their initial surprise and mount an effective counterattack."

  It was now Lieutenant Colonel Shaddock's turn to pounce upon the hapless company commander. "I know you have heard of Son Tay," he stated in a low voice. "I intentionally had the S-3

  design tonight's scenario based upon that raid. I wanted you to be faced with the same dilemma that the American commander of that operation faced when he broke into that North Vietnamese POW camp and found no POWs to liberate. The big difference between Son Tay and tonight was that the American ground force commander didn't leave any NVA guards alive."

  "Sir," DeWitt responded, doing his best to maintain his calm,

  "my primary mission was to find the prisoners. When the team assigned to secure them failed to locate them I made the decision to dispatch additional search parties."

  "And while doing so," Shaddock pointed out, "you turned your back on an enemy force that was battered but far from broken.

  Your decision to increase the number of teams searching for the captives was sound; Your failure to continue to maintain pressure on the enemy was not. In throwing every resource you had to achieve one part of your stated mission you set yourself up to blow another aspect of it, i.e., minimum casualties."

  "So you want me to kill every one of those little suckers I can while I'm there?" DeWitt asked in frustration.

  "Dead men," Shaddock stated in a tone that was as cold as the look in his eye, "can't counterattack. Besides, the bastards deserve it."

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  accepting the fact that he had royally screwed the pooch, DeWitt nodded. "Yes, sir. I understand."

  "Good," Shaddock stated perfunctorily. "Continue."

  Following their well-established format, the officers of Fort Irwin's training cadre who had been observing that night's exercise stood up, moved to the front of the small expandable van used for these after-action reviews, and discussed every aspect of that night's operation. Everything was addressed in its turn; command and control, tactics, the unit's use of intelligence, procedures employed by the unit as a whole, actions taken by individual soldiers to deal with wounded, captured enemy soldiers, and the redistribution of ammunition. For a unit commander and his staff the experience of being evaluated in this manner is pretty much the same as getting a root canal without the benefit of Novocain.

  This sort of inquisition is not without its benefits. Even the harshest critic of this technique is unable to discount the long-term value an unvarnished evaluation by the officers and enlisted men of the National Training Center can yield. Many veterans of the first Persian Gulf War owe their success and their very life to the lessons they learned in the crowded little vans in the Mojave Desert of California. If anything, one recurring comment after that war was that in comparison, the real thing was easy. "Not only did we have to fight the Gulf War only once," one officer stated in all seriousness after returning from the Gulf, "we didn't have to sit thr
ough one of those damned after-action reviews when it was over."

  Completion of the after-action review did not close out the day's work. With much left to do, the participants belonging to the 3rd of the 75 th and those helping it get ready adjourned to Shaddock's humble headquarters. Anyone entering the outer office where Shaddock's XO, sergeant major, and adjutant worked was greeted by a sign Shaddock had ordered Sergeant Major Harris to MORE THAN COURAGE

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  post next to the door of his personal office. On it there was the photo and name of every member of RT Kilo. In a box above the photos of those who had made it out was a large blue X. Below the photos was another box. In the case where a member of RT

  Kilo was known to be dead, a red X of equal size was placed. For those who were in Syrian hands or still missing in action, there was nothing in either box. Shaddock had briefed his commanders and staff when the sign had been posted that it was there to remind each and every one of them what they were preparing for.

  "Those who have earned the blue mark deserve an atta-boy, but not from us. The men who bear the red are to be honored and mourned. We can do nothing more for them. It is for the others

  that we must bend every effort, every conscious thought. Until they are free this battalion has but one purpose, one goal."

  Upon entering the outer office that evening Shaddock was greeted by the sight of Lieutenant Colonel Delmont standing next to the battalion adjutant as that officer was placing a red X under the photo of Sergeant Yousaf Hashmi. Shaddock watched

  for a moment. "When?" was all he asked.

  Delmont didn't bother to turn around as he answered. "Word came in while you were in the after-action. I saw no need to disrupt you then with this news."

  Shaddock nodded in grim agreement as he continued across the room to join the two officers before the poster. "That leaves us how many?"

  "According to DIA, five," Delmont muttered. "And if what the CIA says is true, four."

  "What do you make of that information, Delmont?"

  Delmont's hesitation in answering Shaddock was caused not by the disagreement between the two intelligence agencies but rather by something Palmer had passed on to him earlier that evening.

  Glancing up, he looked at the adjutant, then Shaddock, before walking into the latter's office without saying a word. Taking the hint, the battalion commander instructed his adjutant that 302

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  he was not to be disturbed, before following the special ops plans officer into his own office and closing the door behind him.

  After the two lieutenant colonels had taken their seats, several minutes passed before either spoke. It was Delmont who broke the silence by articulating a concern that both men had but which neither had yet dared share with anyone else. "There is an opinion being expressed by some," the special ops plans officer stated hesitantly,

  "that we may have reached the point of diminishing returns."

  Just to be sure he understood what Delmont was saying, Shaddock restating this concept in his own words. "The people back in Washington are concerned that the losses incurred in a rescue attempt can no longer be justified."

  "That's about the size of it," Delmont muttered.

  "What do you think?"

  The special ops plans officer looked up at the man who would have to lead the ground force into Syria. He could no longer answer such a question with any degree of honesty. Somewhere along the line he had lost all sense of objectivity. He didn't know when he had crossed that line. Nor did he know what part of this whole screwed-up affair had shoved him over it. All he knew for certain was that he could no longer render anything resembling an unbiased opinion. Somewhere between the unreasonable sense of guilt he felt for sending RT Kilo on mission after mission and the prideful desire to succeed that all plans officers possess when it comes time to see one of their creations given life through to its

  execution, he had lost anything resembling objectivity.

  Sensing that he wasn't going to get an answer to his last question, Shaddock dropped it and turned to the issue at hand.

  "Despite the results of tonight's training exercise, I believe that this battalion is about as ready as it's going to get." With a gesture that spoke of his frustrations as well as mental weariness Shaddock threw his hands out. "I'm not sure if we will ever be fully prepared to execute this thing. There are simply too many imponderables, too many loose ends. Perhaps the whole thing has MORE THAN COURAGE

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  become too complex. Instead of being a carefully crafted military operation, it's become something more akin to a crap shoot that no one seems to be willing to take. What I do know," he stated as he struggled to regain a firm, confident air, "is that within the next few days, we are going to reach our own point of diminishing returns."

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning, Colonel," Shaddock explained, "that I can only keep my men holding in the starting blocks for just so long. They watch the news and listen to talk radio. They can count just as well as we can. At some point they're going to begin asking themselves if we are serious about this or if we're simply jerking them around just to make it look like the army is serious about doing something. One by one, each and every man out there, officer and enlisted alike, will find himself coming to the conclusion that we're not going. Whether they're right doesn't matter. Once enough of them decide that this has all been one big bluff, one big media scam they're going to start slacking off. The edge that we have been working so hard to put on this unit will begin to dull. Once that happens, nothing I nor anyone else says will be able to turn it around."

  "What is it you expect from me?"

  Having regained his poise and the fire that he used to drive himself and his men to achieve the near impossible, Shaddock leaned forward and peered into Delmont's eyes. "You're the liaison between this battalion and the decision makers in Washington.

  I want you to go back to whoever it is you need to see and tell them that the time has come to make a decision. We either go and go soon, or ..."

  "Or what?" Delmont demanded. "We abandon our fellow soldiers to their fate?"

  "Better that," Shaddock countered, "than send more to join them."

  "And if those people back in Washington give us a resounding

  'Wait, out,' what then?"

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  Slumping back into his seat, Shaddock folded his hands in his lap and looked down at them. "I am a soldier. I follow orders. I do not believe it is proper for a subordinate commander to issue an ultimatum to his superior or tell him when it's time to shit or get off the pot. But in this case I do believe the time is drawing near when I will have no choice but to go back to my superiors and lay before them the same thing I just explained to you." After a slight pause, Shaddock glanced up at Delmont. "I do not deny that we have a responsibility to those men in Damascus. But as the commanding officer of this battalion I owe my men the same consideration. Sending these people to fight a battle they are no longer psychologically prepared to fight is worse than foolish. It's criminal."

  Of the two lieutenant colonels assigned to deal with the problem, only one would be held accountable for the end result. The man who generates the plan, no matter how brilliant it may be, is seldom remembered. Whether he deserves it or not, it is the commanding officer who receives the laurels if successful, or eternal shame and damnation if not. Delmont appreciated this brutal fact of military life and found that he had no choice. "When do you want an answer?"

  "Forty-eight hours," Shaddock stated without hesitation. "If I don't have a definitive H-hour by then, I will stand this battalion down."

  Delmont rose to his feet, nodding in agreement as he did so.

  "Fair enough. You'll have your answer by then or my endorsement that Fanfare is no longer a viable option."

  Arlington, Virginia

  13:05 LOCAL (17:05 ZULU)

  Within the military, liaison is defined as that contact or intercommunicati
ons that is maintained between military forces to

  ensure mutual understanding and unity of purpose and action.

  Liaison is most often conducted between combat units operating MORE THAN COURAGE

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  side by side, a support unit attached to a command it has been assigned to provide services to or, as with Robert Delmont, between a higher headquarters and a subordinate command.

  Without exception the liaison officer leaves his organization with the mandate of compelling compliance with the plans, goals, or doctrine of the parent organization that dispatched him. If the duration of this liaison mission is short-lived, executing these duties are not very difficult. If, however, the liaison officer is required to remain with the subordinate or sister unit for a protracted period, something strange happens. While the liaison officer never forgets whom he is working for on an intellectual level, living with the new unit begins to have unintended consequences.

  At the subconscious level the experience of sharing the physical hardships and tribulations of the host unit, dealing with its personnel twenty-four/seven, and even sharing its food creates a bond of kinship between the liaison officer and the unit. In time, rather than being an outside enforcer tasked with imposing his commander's agenda, a liaison officer can find himself becoming an advocate within his own command for the unit he was detached to.

  This is not all bad, particularly when the parent headquarters is far removed from the reality in which the subordinate unit is operating. Just how great this chasm can become is startling to someone who makes the leap from one world to the next in the span of a few hours. Robert Delmont left Fort Irwin just before dawn for the commercial airport in Ontario, California. From there he flew on to D.C. Once back in Virginia he went straight to the Pentagon.

  In the Mojave Desert the dominant attitude had been one of nervous anticipation. The officers and enlisted men of the 3rd of the 75th Ranger Battalion knew what they were preparing for and were doing everything possible to make sure they were ready for it. Whatever reservations their commanding officer entertained about their ability to pull that mission off were not shared with anyone other than Delmont. A good commander guards against 306