In the Gray Area

by Seth W. B. Folsom

  “Sadie,” he said, parroting to Abdullah my words from the previous evening, “the Marines are beginning to withdraw, and they will not be able to support the MiTT team or my battalion like they have been doing. I am concerned about not getting the assistance I need with my battalion.”

  I suppressed a grin, and for the first time I truly felt like an advisor. He was using my words, and I was pleased that he had summoned the courage to express his concerns to the general in front of the brigade commander and all of the other officers. Despite the fact that it was my remarks coming from his mouth, this was a step forward, a determined effort to engage his higher headquarters and insist on their support.

  Abdullah told Ayad that whatever he needed he would get. It was an empty promise, to be sure, but I had at least done my part in convincing Ayad to get the issue out into the open.

  That afternoon, still reveling in my success in getting Ayad to speak to General Abdullah, I received a radio call from Sgt. Olanza Frazier. The team’s gruff supply chief, Frazier was a barrel-chested Marine from South Carolina who looked like he had been throwing heavy things around a warehouse for years. He was as straightforward in his speech as they came, and I sometimes thought he lacked the capacity to filter appropriate and inappropriate comments before they left his mouth. But even as a sergeant he was a master of the Marine Corps supply system, and his ability to “acquire” essential equipment and supplies for our isolated outpost made him a valuable member of the team.

  “Six, this is Four-one,” Frazier said. “You’ve got a visitor at the COC.”

  “Who is it?” I asked.

  “A jundi has a gift for you.”

  Waiting for me outside the team’s operations center was Akeel, the tiny, graying warrant officer who ran 3rd Battalion’s chow hall, and one of his assistants. He spoke to me through Joseph.

  “Why don’t you and the Marines ever eat with the junood anymore?” he asked.

  “Akeel, I know food is pretty hard to come by around here. We don’t want to be taking food out of the junood’s mouths.”

  “There is plenty for the Marines,” he insisted. “It is an honor for your team to eat with us.”

  “Okay, okay, Akeel,” I said, caving. “I promise we’ll start eating with the junood again.”

  He turned to his assistant, who handed him a tray of hobas, chicken, and vegetables, which he then presented to me.

  “This is for you,” he said, grinning.

  “Shukraan [thank you],” I said, taking the plate. Then he dropped the boom on me.

  “Can I have some ‘magic water’?”

  I had walked right into Akeel’s con. For some reason he was convinced that the bottled water the Marines drank was “magic water,” and whenever possible he came around our camp and asked for some. It never occurred to him that the Aquafina that the IAs drank was probably better-quality water than the locally bottled water provided to the Coalition. But since it was American water it was magic water, and he begged us for it at every opportunity.

  And so, stuck with the plate of food in my hand and no way out, I told Joseph to give Akeel a case of our magic water. I had learned the lesson once again: There are no free lunches in Iraq. In this case, literally.

  Chapter 25

  Abandonment Issues

  It is 14 June—Flag Day—but no one knows this because the Americans are forbidden from flying the American flag anywhere in Iraq. Back in the United States people raise their flags and celebrate how patriotic they are from the safety of their own homes. The Outlanders, meanwhile, prepare for yet another patrol outside the wire.

  The blast furnace of summer is upon us, and even though it is still early in the morning the Marines break a sweat loading their gear and weapons into the Humvees as they prepare for the trip. Rings of perspiration darken the material under their arms, and beads form on their foreheads. We load bags of ice into coolers we have stored in the trunks of the Humvees, and on top of the ice we place bottles of water and Gatorade. The last thing we want to happen is to get stuck somewhere in the heat without anything to drink. One of the things everyone knows but doesn’t talk about is the fact that you can die very quickly in the heat of the Iraqi desert if you aren’t careful.

  Today the team will accompany Lieutenant Colonel Ayad and his PSD on their convoy to the regional security meeting at Border Fort 5, and for once Ayad and his soldiers are on time. Lieutenant Bates and I meet with Ayad before the convoy departs COP South, and together the three of us review the route our vehicles will take. Ayad tells us he must first go to the brigade headquarters at Camp Phoenix. He wants to travel to the security meeting with the brigade commander’s convoy. This information is new to me and Bates, and we look at each other and shake our heads. It will throw off our time line, and we will be late to the regional security meeting. Again.

  We insert our two Humvees into the PSD’s column of three Ford pickup trucks. Junood from the PSD sit in the beds of the trucks, manning machine guns and AK-47s. The trucks are not armored, but Ayad prefers to ride in the comfort of air-conditioning rather than the protection afforded by one of his armored Humvees. The file of vehicles exits the ECP and moves onto the highway. The PSD picks up speed, and soon our Humvees begin to fall behind. Our vehicles are so heavy that they can’t keep up. But then the soldiers in the pickup trucks realize that they are outside the protective bubble of our Chameleon jammers, and so they slow down until they are back under our invisible shield. It is the way things are here—the more the Iraqis begin to pull away from us, the quicker they return, seeking what we have.

  The convoy veers onto the dirt trail that is 3rd Battalion’s shortcut to Camp Phoenix, and as we approach the Wadi al Battikah, which bisects the trail, the Marines take bets on whether the junood from the PSD will dismount and clear the wadi by foot. They don’t, and instead the PSD blows through the deep cut in the trail, oblivious to the potential danger of pressure-strip IEDs that might line the washout. As they blaze the trail we follow—if there is a pressure strip, the IAs will be the ones to trip it, not the MiTT members. One day, I think, shaking my head, they’re gonna get a rude awakening if they don’t start clearing the wadis on foot.

  The convoy approaches the ECP that leads into Camp Al Qa’im and Camp Phoenix, and as we draw closer I radio the Marine task force.

  “This is Outlander Mobile,” I say into my headset. “Request permission to enter the west ECP with five vics and twenty-five pax [personnel].”

  “Roger, Outlander,” a faceless voice answers. “You are clear to enter at this time.”

  Our convoy pulls into the serpentine HESCO barrier maze that leads to the ECP’s gate and the vehicles roll to a stop. The junood and the Marines dismount, and one by one each man begins clearing his weapons, ensuring no one enters the camp with a loaded firearm. The act itself is second nature for the Marines, and after stepping out of my Humvee I point my rifle at a sand-filled HESCO barrier. I remove the magazine of ammunition and then, rotating the weapon onto its side, I pull the charging handle to the rear and eject the round from the chamber into my outstretched palm.

  As I repeat the procedure with my pistol the ear-splitting report of a gunshot echoes next to me. The proximity of the gunfire catches me by surprise, and I almost jump out of my own ass at the noise. The round thuds dustily into one of the HESCO barriers to my left, and I jerk my head toward the direction of the blast. A jundi manning a PKM machine gun on the pickup in front of my Humvee has negligently fired off a round into the HESCO barrier next to me, and I quickly turn back to my vehicle crew.

  “Is everyone okay?” I ask.

  “We’re good,” one of the Marines replies, shaking his head angrily.

  I turn back toward the jundi in the truck. He is still standing behind his machine gun, a nervous half-smile twitching on his face. He knows what he has done, and he knows it will be his ass. The Marines remount the vehicle, and I key my headset.

  “This is Outlander-Six,” I radio to the tas
k force once again. “Be advised, an Iraqi soldier in our convoy just had an ND [negligent discharge] at the west ECP. There are no casualties.”

  There is a long pause. Then the voice on the other end of the radio answers.

  “Outlander, where did you say the Iraqi soldier was hit?”

  “Negative,” I say, correcting the radio operator. “There are no casualties. Say again, zero casualties. Will send you a report once we arrive at Camp Phoenix.”

  We pull into Camp Phoenix, and Lieutenant Bates summons the PSD commander and the jundi to get the information required for the negligent-discharge report. He goes back and forth with them, speaking through Mason. I can tell Bates is becoming angry and frustrated, and I walk over to the group.

  “What’s going on?” I ask.

  “He left a round in the chamber,” Mason says. “Sometimes it happens.”

  “What?” I say suspiciously.

  “You didn’t unload the weapon properly,” Bates says again to the jundi.

  The soldier is indignant. He doesn’t think he has done anything wrong, and his PSD commander is trying to protect him.

  “Sometimes you just have to discharge the weapon,” says the PSD commander matter-of-factly.

  “Bullshit,” I say, raising my voice and pointing to the two Iraqis. “You failed to properly clear the weapon. That is a negligent discharge. Period. And you’re on report.”

  I turn and head back to my Humvee, pissed off at the soldiers’ nonchalance. Neither seems to care about what has happened, but I do. After all, I was the one closest to the round impacting in the dirt.

  We wait in the dusty staging lot for Ayad to link up with Colonel Ra’ed and the brigade PSD. Ayad has disappeared into the brigade compound and we have no idea what the hell is going on. Suddenly a stream of Humvees and trucks spills out of the compound and heads toward the camp’s exit. Ayad’s truck is near the head of the column, trailing behind the trucks carrying the brigade commander and the division commander. In his haste to position himself near the colonel and the general, Ayad forgets about his two other PSD trucks. They fall in with us at the rear of the twenty-vehicle convoy, and soon Ayad’s pickup is out of sight. He has left us and the bulk of his own PSD. I am nonplussed, but there is nothing I can do except follow the speeding circus procession through Karabilah and Husaybah.

  The convoy stretches over several miles, and by the time the Outlanders get to the border fort we are twenty minutes late. The fort is a squat stone castle surrounded by a tall, razor-wire-topped berm. It looks like a picture taken directly from Beau Geste and the French Foreign Legion. The courtyard encircling the fort is clogged with Coalition and Iraqi vehicles. A gaggle of Iraqi border guards directs our Humvees to a remote spot behind the castle. The Marines enter the meeting hall, embarrassed once again by our counterpart’s tardiness.

  The gathering drags on for far too long, and once it finally ends the meeting hall empties quickly. Lieutenant Bates finds the PSD commander and tells him to wait for us, and we rush to our Humvees as the courtyard rapidly begins to empty. The Marines throw on their gear and we speed out of the fort’s ECP, but it is too late. Ayad has abandoned us once more. We find ourselves again at the convoy’s tail as the long procession of vehicles heads north toward Camp Gannon and Husaybah. Bates radios me.

  “Six, this is Three,” he says. “I don’t think we’re gonna be able to catch up to Ayad’s PSD before we get to Husaybah.”

  The implication in his voice is clear: our two Humvees will soon be isolated from our Iraqi escorts. I have no other choice.

  “Roger, Three,” I say. “Continue to roll. We’ll push through the city as fast as we can. Everyone keep your eyes open.”

  Soon we are driving through the slums of downtown Husaybah, once again alone and unafraid. It is a risk, but I have no alternative. As we push hard through the crowded streets I seethe with anger that Ayad is more concerned about his appearance in front of his bosses than he is about the safety of the Marines.

  Because Ayad and Ra’ed are traveling with the brigade MiTT team, I am able to track Ayad’s movement on the glowing electronic screen of my BFT. By the time we make it out of the city they are more than ten kilometers ahead of us. They are heading to Vera Cruz and Okinawa for a site visit to 1st and 2nd companies. I hear Bates’s voice again on the radio.

  “Do you want to keep going?”

  “Negative,” I say, unwilling to try to catch up to the Iraqi convoy far to our front. “Fuck them.”

  Our two vehicles split off onto the highway that will take us back to COP South.

  That night I convey my irritation to Ayad about the negligent discharge and him leaving us behind twice. I remind him it is not the first time he has abandoned us. He is unrepentant and disregards my irritation about getting left behind. Instead he briefly addresses the shooting incident.

  “The jundi has been punished,” he says.

  I leave his office, still gnashing my teeth. As I exit I see the jundi in question standing guard outside the battalion commander’s hut. He hasn’t been punished at all. He is, after all, one of Ayad’s bodyguards.

  Chapter 26

  Running Out of Patience

  As the Outlanders grudgingly prepared their equipment and vehicles for the trip into Husaybah the omnipresent sandstorms kicked up again, forcing us to cancel all movement outside the wire. Our second attempt to visit the souq for our feast with the 3rd Battalion staff was thwarted, and I wondered if perhaps it was a sign. Watching the Marines unload the Humvees and begin returning their weapons and radios to the team’s armory, I pulled aside Master Sergeant Deleonguerrero.

  “I don’t think this storm is gonna go away anytime soon,” I said, my eyes watering from the stinging airborne particles.

  “Yeah,” he agreed, squinting. “It’s some nasty trash out here.”

  “What do you think, Top?” I asked, my arms crossed. “Should we postpone the feast?”

  “We need to just cancel it altogether.”

  I thought for a moment. It was difficult to disagree with him. My heart wasn’t exactly exploding with goodwill toward Ayad and his staff at that point, but I wanted to hear the master sergeant’s opinion.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Sir, those crazies don’t rate a feast right now with all the fucked-up trash they’ve been doing around here lately,” he explained. “The guards sleeping, the battalion commander leaving you guys yesterday, the jundi shooting off his machine gun. No one wants to cook for them right now.”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” I replied. “My ass is still chapped about yesterday too. All right, let’s postpone it indefinitely. Maybe we’ll do something for them before we leave this joint.”

  The decision to cancel the feast was not protested by the Marines. No one’s heart was in it, and I sensed that, like me, the team’s amity and sense of benevolence toward the IAs was declining rapidly. And it was no surprise. The Marines had worked hard to put aside their distaste for many of the Iraqis’ cultural idiosyncrasies and instead had focused on doing whatever they could to make 3rd Battalion a better, more capable unit. Their efforts with their counterparts on the IA staff, however, were met with the same stubbornness and sense of entitlement by the Iraqi officers that I had encountered with Lieutenant Colonel Ayad. Their patience, like my own, was running out.

  Shortly after midnight on 14 June a jundi had a negligent discharge while standing his post. The next day Corporal Fry delivered the details of the incident, and during the course of my nightly get-together with Ayad I presented the information to him. Fry and Staff Sergeant Leek had begun conducting random inspections of the camp’s posts and guard towers—often at great personal risk to themselves because of the junood’s jitteriness and questionable weapons proficiency—and I wanted Ayad to understand what was going on with his guard force and the risk it posed to my Marines. No one on his staff had told Ayad about the incident, and he was upset that he had had to learn about it from the Americans.
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  “So, sadie,” I said, “what are you going to do about it?”

  “The jundi will be punished,” he told me. “That is unacceptable.”

  “Well, from what I hear he’s already in jundi jail.”

  Ayad nodded in approval.

  “When junood mishandle their weapons, that is the punishment they deserve.”

  “You’re right, sadie,” I said sardonically. “But if that’s the case, then why isn’t the jundi from your PSD who fired off his PKM in jail?”

  “He has already been punished. He has to stand extra duty and his mujaas has been suspended.”

  “That concerns me,” I replied, trying unsuccessfully not to sound like I was lecturing him. “The perception I think you are creating within the battalion is that you are favoring the junood on your PSD, and that they are not receiving the same treatment and punishment as the rest of the soldiers who screw up.”

  Ayad was uninterested in my observations.

  “The jundi from my PSD is new and inexperienced,” he explained. “He made a mistake and he will receive further training. The jundi on post was negligent with his weapon; it wasn’t a mistake.”

  “How do you know that?” I challenged. “You didn’t even know about it until I told you. You don’t know if he was negligent or if he was inexperienced like the jundi on your PSD.”

  “But I need that jundi on my PSD.”

  The conversation had begun to go in circles, and I finally realized that nothing was going to happen. Ayad had dug in his heels, and he was not going to mete out justice to the soldier from his security detachment. For me it was just another battle lost in the long war to convince my counterpart to do the right thing.

  A Marine had once told me when I was a second lieutenant that I wore my heart on my sleeve. It was a character flaw I had struggled with throughout my career. Those around me always knew when I was pissed off, when I was upset, or when I was happy. It wasn’t an admirable trait to have as an officer, and it routinely betrayed me during my time as an advisor. As June reached its middle, Ayad—apparently sensing my growing frustrations—invited me to lunch with him and Colonel Ra’ed one afternoon. As the three of us ate together, Ayad extended an open invitation to me to eat with him any time I wished. He also made it clear that the Marines were welcome to dine at the battalion chow hall. One of the interpreters had told him the Marines were eating out of cans inside the MiTT compound, and he was appalled.