We slowly drive down the length of a narrow earthen trail along the riverbank, trying desperately not to dump our vehicles into the Euphrates. The IA scouts are on foot, and once Bates and Ski and I dismount and join them they lead us toward the cache site. One scout tells us there is also a possible IED farther up the trail past the site. Bates and Ski look at each other warily, and then they look at me. I shrug, and the three of us follow our Iraqi guides farther up the trail.
The scouts first show us an empty hole at the river’s edge. It has been excavated, and its sides are flat and smooth, cut by someone with a shovel and a purpose. But there is no indication of what has been in it, and so we proceed farther up the trail. As we near the actual cache site, Ayad’s three trucks come tearing down the trail toward us. The vehicles stop once Ayad sees me, and he nervously tells me he has received a call from the brigade commander. “Colonel Ra’ed wants me to meet him in Karabilah,” he tells me through my interpreter. “I have to go now.”
I am incredulous, unable to believe he has taken me all the way out here and is now going to leave just like that. I look at him disbelievingly.
“Okay, sadie,” I say without attempting to hide the sarcasm and disdain in my voice. “I’m going to go check out this weapons cache and that possible IED. You go right ahead and go see the brigade commander.”
He smiles his toothy grin and says, “Okay, very good,” then speeds away with his PSD. Sarcasm doesn’t translate well.
The cache of suspected rocket launchers turns out to be nothing more than a dozen ancient artillery rounds dug out of a cut in the riverbank. The shells are old and rusted, and we can’t tell if the corrosion is from age or the dampness and humidity that permeate the area around the river.
“This doesn’t add up,” Bates says to me. “It looks like it’s been planted.”
I agree. “This stinks,” I say, looking around suspiciously.
Ski walks up to me with an update. The scouts say they were alerted by a young boy who found the rounds. Ski interviews the boy as he sits in the cab of a small pickup truck. We can’t tell if the boy is telling the truth. He speaks softly, and we are unsure what is making him nervous—the Marines clad in their bulky body armor or the Iraqi soldiers crowded around him.
The junood load the shells into their Humvee, and on the return trip we find more artillery rounds in a ditch alongside the trail. Like the shells on the riverbank they are old, but most have been cut into, the explosives harvested. A local farmer hands us a coil of new copper wire he has found concealed in a burlap sack next to the drainage ditch.
We return to BP Okinawa and dine with Major Muthafer, making small talk about the operation. Once we walk outside we find that the junood have placed all of the confiscated ordnance next to the company commander’s hut. Bates and Ski catalog the rounds, determining which are live and which are spent. Some of the junood take this opportunity to turn in all the unexploded ordnance they have found on previous patrols and have been storing throughout the camp. Soon they are dropping off all kinds of ammunition—mortars, artillery rounds, even a primed rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) round. One soldier walks up with a sandbag full of highly volatile grains of jet-black artillery propellant. He is smoking a cigarette, and one of the Marines yells at him to drop the bag and get away before we are all blown up. We report the pile of armaments to higher headquarters and arrange for the explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) team to come out the following morning to dispose of it all.
The operation is over, and the team makes the protracted drive back to COP South. Alone with my thoughts, I reflect on the long day and the underlying suspicions we have about the cache. Was it a dog-and-pony show? I ponder. I don’t know if the cache has been staged or not, but it seems like the entire episode has been put on for the battalion commander. And perhaps for him it has been a chance to showcase his scouts to me, a chance to say, See, we are gathering intel and acting on it, and we are achieving results.
It makes me uncomfortable thinking about it. If my counterpart can’t be truthful about what is going on, if he has to stage events to prove his battalion’s worth, how can I trust him to do the right thing when the time comes, after the Marines have left Iraq? Despite his protests to the contrary, I know he doesn’t want us here, and I begin to think he is just biding his time until we leave. It doesn’t bode well for my team for the next five months.
Chapter 20
Personalities and Paradigms
On 11 April more details about the artillery cache discovery surfaced, and it became apparent that, more than likely, the ordnance had not been planted. The battalion S-2 officer showed Lieutenant Ski video of the junood unearthing the rounds from the riverbank.
“We’re both on there too,” Ski commented to me later, referring to the tape. “I’m sure our photos will be on Al Jazeera tonight.”
Regardless, it still seemed somewhat underhanded, and I continued to believe the entire episode had been staged as some sort of showcase. Whether it was for the benefit of the battalion commander or me, I didn’t know. Little doubt existed that it was an old cache, and we estimated that it probably dated back as far as Operation Steel Curtain in 2005. Nonetheless, Ayad still wanted to plan a cache-sweep operation for an island that was directly north of the site, and that evening he told me he needed boats to conduct the mission. The U.S. Navy had a riverine operations detachment stationed at Camp Al Qa’im, and while I knew the sailors from the riverine squadron would be ready and willing to undertake such a task, I also knew that I didn’t need to be doing Ayad’s job for him.
“Request them through Brigade, sadie,” I told him through Mason. “Seventh Division has boats you can use . . . you just need to ask for them.”
“Division will never give them to us,” he replied, shaking his head in disappointment.
“How do you know that?” I asked.
“No one at Brigade or Division will ever do anything to help us,” he replied.
“But you won’t know that unless and until you ask them,” I said, frustration rising in my voice. “Look, request the boats through the brigade. We will look into how the Coalition might be able to support the operation if you don’t get any results from your higher headquarters. But you need to ask your chain of command first.”
Convincing 3rd Battalion’s staff to engage the brigade headquarters was routinely an exercise in futility. The notion of higher headquarters acting as a supporting effort for its subordinates was lost on the Iraqis, and both Ayad and his staff patently refused to enlighten their counterparts at 28th Brigade with that concept. Whether asking for support was perceived as a sign of weakness or poor stewardship of his battalion, Ayad continued to avoid raising support issues with Colonel Ra’ed. We were there to help find Iraqi solutions to Iraqi problems, but the IA officers seldom seemed willing to try to help themselves. They preferred that the MiTT did the work for them, and that was a habit I committed myself and my team to changing. If we ever wanted to get out of Iraq the IA would have to learn to deal with problems on its own. It was turning out that, for the IA, fighting the insurgency was the easy part. The difficult part would be tackling organizational and cultural roadblocks that had plagued the army even before the Americans invaded in 2003.
At my urging Ayad planned an inspection of 2nd Company on 12 April, and as we accompanied him we hoped he would see firsthand the unsatisfactory conditions at BP Vera Cruz. It was intended to be a surprise visit, but the soldiers got wind of it and prepared the battle position accordingly. We were met by Captain Majid, 2nd Company’s lumbering XO, and he began walking Ayad through the camp. An ineffectual officer at best, Majid constantly had a stunned look on his face. His uniform was tightly wrapped around a swollen belly, and he was forever making excuses about everything. It was exactly the kind of leadership that the soldiers of 2nd Company did not need, and the unit’s discipline suffered accordingly.
With the advance warning of the battalion commander’s visit the soldiers had scoure
d the camp from top to bottom, and as a result the general cleanliness was much better than the last time the MiTT had visited it unannounced. Majid escorted Ayad through the company’s spaces, making sure he saw what Majid wanted to show him, not what Ayad really needed to see. Following his inspection Ayad gathered the company’s soldiers to speak with them, and the Marines took the opportunity to inspect the area the soldiers used to relieve themselves. There had been no change since our previous visits, and as Ayad spoke to the soldiers he remained blissfully unaware of the continuing sanitation problem.
“Sir,” Doc Rabor said to me, exasperated. “They’ve got to clean this up.”
“I know, Doc,” I replied. “It’s fucking nasty.”
HN1 Emiliano Rabor, our Navy corpsman, was originally from the Philippines and was perhaps the most sensitive member of the team. He had extensive training in combat trauma management, and his experience included operations with Special Forces in the Philippines and emergencyroom duty in Los Angeles. Though often the butt of jokes and constant ribbing by the team, he was a wellspring of knowledge when it came to preventive medicine and trauma care—so much so that the Marines often avoided his care for fear that he might perform unnecessary field surgery on them. But he took his job seriously, and he often became fixated on medical issues with the Iraqis. The situation with 2nd Company’s sanitation was no different.
“It’s unhealthy, sir,” he continued, pressing the issue. “It’s near where they make their food. They’re gonna get sick.”
“I got it, Doc,” I said. “I’ll press the issue with Ayad. You just work on getting Second Company’s medic up to snuff.”
The convoy departed Vera Cruz and moved east to a small village on the Jibab peninsula to conduct the previously canceled community-relations visit Ayad had discussed with me several nights earlier. He had not told me of his plans to continue with the project, so the visit came as a surprise to the team. The Marines became aggravated. The team had recently received stacks of boxes from home containing candy and personal items, but without knowing about the project beforehand it had all been left behind at COP South. Throngs of local children crowded around us, asking once again for candy and pens. But the Marines could do nothing but shake their hands and pose for pictures as the IAs distributed food and money.
The impression, whether intended or not, was that the IA soldiers could provide humanitarian assistance while the Marines were just along for the ride. We didn’t necessarily want credit for the operation. We were there, after all, to facilitate Iraqi operations, not the other way around. Yet while it was important that the locals see the IA as a caring force that was not just there to wreak havoc, I was nonetheless annoyed by Ayad’s refusal to tell me his plans beforehand.
As we discussed the visit later that night, he asked me for a roll of power cable to help the two families we had visited slave electricity from a nearby generator. It would, he told me, help put a Marine face on the next visit.
“We could have done that today,” I informed him, trying to mask the displeasure in my voice. “If you had told me last night that you planned to go out there. We could have brought a whole bunch of stuff for those people, sadie.”
He was unfazed by my comments. “Well, you can just give us the cable and we can take it out to them tomorrow for you,” he offered.
I balked at his suggestion. Given his current track record there was no way he would give credit to the Marines for the power cable.
“Tell you what,” I countered. “How about we just take it out there the next time we go, okay?”
“Okay, very good,” Ayad answered.
The return visit never occurred. It was an opportunity lost, but it wouldn’t be the last time. Disappointment was becoming a daily sentiment among the team members.
My evening meeting with Ayad turned toward the day’s visit to 2nd Company, and I suggested that perhaps he wasn’t seeing the entire picture. Commenting on Majid’s apparent lack of supervision, I opined that perhaps the captain’s poor leadership was responsible for Vera Cruz being such a shithole when the battalion commander was not around. As I explained the sanitation issues and the associated health risk, I recommended that his next visit be unannounced so that he could see Vera Cruz as it really was. My pointing out 2nd Company’s glaring deficiencies—when he had been so impressed with what Majid had showed him during the tour—embarrassed Ayad, and suddenly he changed his tune.
“Yes,” he added. “I also noticed some things wrong there. Naqeeb Majid is on notice. I expect immediate improvement from him.”
Unsure if Ayad was just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear, I pressed the issue deeper.
“Well, what have you done to put him on notice?”
He wouldn’t give me a solid answer, and I knew he was trying to cover his tracks. I didn’t expect him to solve the problem right then and there, but I hoped he would take to heart what I had said about Majid and the camp’s condition. Performance counseling was an alien concept with the IAs. We had observed little in the way of mentoring and guidance to subordinates among the battalion’s officers, and I once again had to caution myself about projecting American ideas and values on the Iraqis. We weren’t supposed to be looking for the Marine Corps solution. If the Iraqi solution worked, that would have to suffice even if it didn’t meet our own high standards.
As the realization sunk in that the Outlanders were unlikely to engage in direct combat operations while we were with 3rd Battalion, Lieutenant Grubb began to push for sustainment training for the Marines. The combat marksmanship course we had undergone in Camp Pendleton had made a significant impression on Grubb, and whenever possible he pushed to include such training in our schedule. Alone with the IAs in the middle of nowhere, we had more autonomy to train with our rifles and pistols, and the freedom to design whatever course of fire we wanted invigorated Grubb. On 14 April he and Staff Sergeant Leek set up a shooting course for the Marines on the small-arms range just outside the berm at COP South, and I decided to ask Ayad if he wanted to come out and shoot with us.
My motives were not entirely altruistic. I hoped that once he saw us firing our weapons it would motivate him to authorize live-fire small-arms training for his own soldiers. The junood had not fired their AK-47s in many months, and the bureaucratic obstacles within the IA system made it next to impossible to do so. Although 3rd Battalion possessed 134 percent of its ammunition allocation, I could not convince Ayad to request permission from 28th Brigade to receive authorization to shoot. Because the request process was so complicated, and because he assumed he would not receive approval, he continued to disregard my pleas to conduct the training. Even when I reminded him that he possessed 34 percent more than he was allotted—theoretically enabling him to expend ammunition without requesting approval—he discounted my suggestion. What if an emergency arises and I need the extra ammunition? he would ask. It was the same thought process he applied to fuel allocation among his three camps, a mentality that was a holdover from the old Iraqi army. Never knowing when—or if—the next shipment of supplies would come, the natural thing to do was hoard what was currently on hand. The subsequent result was a battalion that claimed it never had enough fuel to run its vehicles and generators, and soldiers who lacked the confidence and skill required to accurately and effectively employ their weapons systems.
Ammunition, fuel, spare parts—all were commodities the Marines had grown accustomed to. Although we often complained about a lack of them, we never feared that our supplies would simply dry up. The Marine Corps supply system, for all its faults, always managed to deliver, especially when Marines were in bad situations. It was not so with the IA’s supply and logistics systems, and learning to navigate it was a constant challenge for us. Convincing the IAs to make their system work for them was difficult when the system hardly worked at all.
Upon receiving my invitation to our training, Ayad suited up in his body armor and Kevlar helmet and joined us on the range. My intent was
for him to first observe our shooting procedures and techniques, and then let him fire both the M9 pistol and the M4 carbine. Standing off to the side with his bodyguard, he studiously watched me and the line of Marines complete the first string of fire with our pistols. But when I returned to his position on the observation line he suddenly informed me that the brigade commander had just called him and that he needed to go.
As I watched Ayad hastily move off the range and return to his office, Mason walked over to me.
“What was that all about?” I asked.
“Do you know what just happened?” he asked.
“No.”
“Once you started shooting, Ayad walked up to his bodyguard and told him to go around the back of the berm and come back five minutes later and say the brigade commander was on the phone for him.”
“Are you shitting me?” I asked incredulously.
“No,” he insisted. “He told me that he hasn’t fired his pistol since he was a lieutenant.”
“Jesus,” I said, shaking my head.
Unwilling to embarrass himself in front of the Marines, Ayad had instead taken the easy way out and excused himself from the training. Apparently pride and appearance meant more in the Iraqi officer corps than good training.
Ayad’s questionable behavior in front of the Marines wasn’t the only episode that day that shed more light on the battalion’s officers. Lieutenant Bates later recounted how, upon entering the S-3 hut for his daily meeting, he found a weeping Captain Al’aa. The officer had been barely able to even speak, and Bates left him alone. Bates later heard that Al’aa had collapsed and had been taken to the hospital. Eventually we learned that Al’aa’s Internet girlfriend, Nadia, had fallen ill—supposedly it was cancer—and Al’aa had experienced some sort of emotional breakdown over it.
In the Gray Area Page 13