None Left Behind: The 10th Mountain Division and the Triangle of Death

by Charles W. Sasser

  Jesus Christ!

  He broke into a run for the platoon CP/radio room. Lieutenant Dudish was back in the States on a short leave, which left Montgomery in charge. Second Platoon had been out all morning stopping vehicles at checkpoints, dismounting through villages, confabbing with local sheikhs, checking out a suspected weapons cache . . . There had been no indication something this big was coming down in 152’s own backyard today.

  Specialist Joe Merchant was on roof watch. He heard and felt the explosions, followed by the sight of black funnels of smoke gusting up against a cloudy backdrop. As usual when something happened, the radio nets came alive with men yelling and screaming. Merchant sprang down the roof stairs to meet Montgomery as he burst through the front door.

  “IEDs, Sarge!” he shouted. “Right down the road. It sounds like some of our trucks are bad hit. One of ’em might have flipped into the ditch.”

  Messer and Given had been killed near the same spot. Weeds hadn’t yet overtaken the burn.

  “Get back on the roof and keep your eyes open,” Montgomery ordered.

  Merchant hustled to obey.

  The crackling of gunfire and the rattling of bullets against metal and asphalt provided an urgent background to stressed-out voices over the radio. It didn’t take Montgomery more than a few seconds to ascertain that something had to be done fast or Fourth Platoon was history.

  “Delta X-Ray, we have contact. My platoon in the S-curves . . . between Inchon and 152 . . . My God, I’m the only truck left!”

  “We got mortars. Mortars! Small arms, mortars, RPGs . . .”

  “We got men down. Repeat. We got men down!”

  “. . . fire from the buildings. I see them moving on top . . .”

  “Fire them fuckers up!”

  “For God’s sake, hurry up. We got to get the hell out of here!”

  Sergeant Montgomery jumped on the radio to Delta X-Ray Six, Captain Gilbreath at Company. “Delta-Two is enroute” was all he said. Any unit in the vicinity of another in distress was expected to respond immediately.

  Montgomery called in his two outriding security trucks. Reinforcements would meet them at the gate of 152. Then he threw down the mike and tasked one of his squad leaders with rounding up every Second Platoon soldier he could, on the fly, no time to lose. Montgomery would have to stay behind on the radio to monitor the fight as it developed and keep control over his part of it.

  Sergeant Jeremy Miller leading a group of soldiers that included Nathan Brooks, John Herne, and Specialist Jared Isbell busted out the front door and rushed out to the road. Montgomery sent everyone else to the roof, all armed to the teeth in the event this was some kind of Vietnam-style Tet Offensive, the something “big” long rumored to be in the mill.

  Specialists Robert Pool and Dar-rell Whitney were manning the security truck south of 152 in the direction of 151. They caught up to Miller’s bunch hotfooting it up the road, slid to a stop, picked up the soldiers, and headed on north at full speed toward the sounds of combat.

  Steffan and Streibel had the other truck, the one north of 152 in the direction of Inchon and the S-curve and therefore almost within sight of the action. They didn’t bother with returning to 152; they bore down upon the curve, Streibel in the turret and eager to throw his two-forty into the melee. From the sound of things on the radio, Fourth Platoon survivors were trapped inside a single stalled vehicle.

  Montgomery kept radio contact with his trucks. “Delta-Twos, don’t go into the curves. Stay back from the KZ and engage the enemy on both sides of the road. Roger that?”

  It would do no one any good to feed more trucks and soldiers into the grinder.

  Pool had the 7.62mm two-forty machine gun in his truck’s turret. Whitney swerved into the start of the curve. Pool caught his first sight of the scene. Men dressed mostly in black civilian clothing were running up to three heavily damaged and abandoned humvees on the road, their AK-47s hammering not at these trucks but at a fourth alone in the middle of the road nearest arriving reinforcements from 152.

  Lieutenant Tomasello’s men seemed to be holding their own. Whoever was behind the two-forty in the turret was giving the enemy all kinds of hell, slugging it out with a half-dozen or so insurgents in the palm groves off to his left. The rest of Fourth Platoon, at least those still able, had piled out of the vehicle and were all around the lee side of it, using it for cover as they pounded back with everything they had.

  All these guys had been in a single truck?

  The vehicle occupied by Steffan and Strebel stopped short of Tomasello’s. Streibel crouched on the roadway behind the front fender, shooting down the road, laying down a wall of suppressive fire along with Steffan’s two-forty in the turret.

  Whitney braked and skidded his hummer sideways in the road behind and to the left of the other Second Platoon truck. Reinforcements jumped out onto the road from the back-facing protected doors. Using the truck as a shield, they opened up with SAWs, M-4s and 203s. Miller’s M203 grenade launcher attached to his M-4 began seeding a barrier of fire and protective steel in front of Tomasello’s stalled truck.

  Pool’s two-forty was an awesome weapon. He raked a web of red tracers down the center of the road, scattering a group of enemy combatants. He must have nailed at least three of them. The others headed for the woods, dragging their wounded or dead comrades. They seemed to have the same creed as the U.S. Army: leave no man behind.

  The insurgents had lost their momentum and their element of surprise. Second Platoon gunfire continued to shred foliage after the last of the attackers vanished into it.

  Back at 152, Sergeant Montgomery sweated out an interminable four or five minutes before the word he awaited came over the air. Lieutenant Tomasello sounded a lot calmer.

  “This is Delta Four-Six. They’re falling back into the treeline and some houses ahead of us . . .”

  The cavalry had arrived just in the nick of time.

  FORTY-SIX

  If the insurgents could get away with an action like this, it only made them stronger and more aggressive. Alpha Company acting as a Battalion QRF arrived in force. Soldiers from Second Platoon and those still able from Fourth Platoon took over the house at the side of the road where Sergeant Parrish winged some of the enemy jumping off the roof. Blood trails all around led off across fields and into brush bordering canals and drainage ditches.

  Occupants of the house had vacated it either before or during the ambush. Alpha Company used it as a command post; whoever lived there didn’t return until several days afterwards. From its hub, Alpha and some members of Delta supplemented by a platoon of IA divided their forces into two elements and methodically moved through neighboring villages and countryside questioning witnesses, searching homes, confiscating weapons, and rounding up the usual suspects. These were brought cuffed to a collection point in an alley behind the CP house where they could be hauled to Baghdad for more extensive interrogation.

  In short, the Americans ruined everybody’s day in order to send the message that Delta didn’t appreciate its troops being attacked.

  Raiders and interrogators dug up the names of several believed to have participated in the attack. Most of them were now on the run and wouldn’t be captured for weeks or months down the road. Others drifted back into The Triangle to hide out and continue their villainy. One thing seemed certain, however. Insurgents along Malibu were no longer satisfied merely to plant IEDs and ambush in small numbers. This wasn’t exactly the turning point Colonel Infanti anticipated.

  Miraculously, none of Lieutenant Tomasello’s soldiers were killed that day. A few suffered minor shrapnel wounds and concussions, including Mayhem Menahem. A bullet grazed one soldier, and others were shook up pretty good. Only Specialist Scribner had to be medevac’d, due to his back. Platoon medics treated everyone else.

  The Black Hawk medevac came in so quickly to whisk Scribner away to Baghdad that Mayhem didn’t get a chance to thank him for possibly saving his life. That was a drawback of havin
g a tight outfit. You got extraordinarily close to each other, and then when one was wounded there was seldom a farewell. He was simply gone, medevac’d immediately. Most injured soldiers were back in the United States recuperating at Walter Reed Hospital within a couple of days, after which they were often medically discharged from the army.

  And the war went on in their absence.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  There has always existed a certain friction between the soldier on the front line and his counterpart in support, between the grunt who fires the bullets and the supply personnel who provides the bullets. For these rear-echelon types not involved in the actual fighting, perhaps ensconced at a cush desk job back in the Green Zone, life was usually no more exciting or risky than at Fort Drum or any other army base stateside. Vietnam-era GIs coined phrases and terms such as “Remington Raiders” or REMF (rear-echelon motherfucker) to express their contempt for—and perhaps envy of—the soldier who slept under clean sheets every night and whose greatest danger lay in breaking a fingernail on his typewriter.

  As for the REMFs, while thankful not to be in the thick of battle, they were also a little resentful and jealous of the “real” soldier. They often got back at the dirty, scroungy, war-fighting infantrymen every chance they got through rules and regulations more applicable to the peacetime military than to a combat environment. All too often, it was also the rear echelon in their clean uniforms and striking military appearance who defined the soldier and set the army’s image, for better or worse.

  As a result, the army sometimes suffered from poor image modeling and indecisive leadership—high-ranking officers who sent men into harm’s way while they remained safely behind in the comfort of their air-conditioned offices; grossly overweight commanders who bragged about how their units were secure behind walls and were going to stay that way; pogue-bait NCOs riding out their combat tours in the relative safety of the rear; Pentagon-level generals on “fact-finding” missions who breezed in and out of the war zone, experienced it superficially, then returned to report to politicians . . .

  Like most combat leaders, Colonel Infanti expressed little more than contempt for such men and was quick to defend his soldiers against them.

  “Before you lay crap on my men,” he warned, “you need to get on the ground and get some American blood on your hands. Fight your way out of a couple of ambushes, hold a buddy’s hand while he dies, then come back and talk to me.”

  It seemed to him that many high-ranking brass and civilian leaders back in the States relied on the mainstream media for most of their information about the war. A dangerous habit, in his opinion, since he regarded the media as biased and quick to present a prejudiced, superficial, and downright fraudulent version of events occurring in Iraq. It seemed reporters were always present to televise clips of American “atrocities” or to imply that American was losing the war by showing Iraqis celebrating U.S. casualties by jumping around and waving frantically while American Army vehicles burned in the background.

  Precious few journalists dared stay long enough in-country, or delve deeply enough, to get the story right. They arrived in Iraq with skeptical my-mind-is-made-up-don’t-confuse-me-with-the-facts attitudes. Politicians and, too frequently, high-ranking, rear-echelon military officers ignorant of what was really going on played right into their hands.

  A Pentagon-level general officer accompanied by some politicians and TV and print reporters showed up one morning at Yusufiyah to tour Colonel Infanti’s Delta patrol bases on Malibu Road. The transport into the zone was twice as large as usual and heavily armed; heaven help the commander who let a politician get hurt.

  Although Battalion provided what amenities it could to make life easier for the dogfaces in the outposts, life remained nonetheless Spartan. There was, after all, a war going on. Several reporters expressed dismay about how soldiers could live like this for long periods of time. The general either revealed his complete ignorance of what combat was like in Iraq, or he was attempting to create a more palatable image for public consumption back home.

  “Oh,” said the general, “they don’t live out here all the time. They come out for a week at a time, then go back to the rear to rest up.”

  Infanti couldn’t let that pass, even though protocol dictated that a colonel never publically contradict a general. He stepped forward.

  “That’s not exactly accurate, sir,” he said. “My men are out here all the time. This is rest for them.”

  Friction existed between the front lines and the rear at all levels. And at all levels, leaders were willing to speak out to protect their men from the “chickenshit” REMFs attempted to dump on them.

  It sometimes took months for Delta Company soldiers to escape Malibu Road for a quick “refit” in the rear. When they got there, they were in no mood to take crap from the pogues.

  Near the end of the winter rains, Sergeant Victor Chavez took his squad to Camp Liberty in Baghdad for its very first refit. He had been here in 2004-2005 when Camp Liberty was still called Camp Victory. This was the twenty-five-year-old’s third combat tour—once in Afghanistan, now twice in Iraq. The members of his squad were excited at the prospect of a fairyland in the middle of the desert where they could acquire a Big Mac with a double order of fries, a Burrito Supreme, or a Whopper with an ice-cream shake.

  The Post Exchange was huge and stocked like a Super Wal-Mart back in Kansas or Texas. The men parked their two humvees in the big lot, secured their weapons, posted a guard, and headed off in high spirits to the PX. They had arrived in Iraq some six months ago wearing crisp new ACUs. They were now stained and frayed; their helmet covers and gloves worn as threadbare as their nerves; their vehicles dented and twisted, dimpled, chipped, and pock-marked from battle. They wore unshorn mops of hair, and their uniforms were rancid from poor hygiene and the normal grind of battle. They looked what they were: combat-hardened warriors.

  Chavez looked around at all the other neat, Army-Regulation-type soldiers. Then he looked at his Joes. Man, we’re a mess. Somebody is going to say something.

  Sure enough, a bright and shiny captain from the 3rd ID blocked the entrance to the PX. Chavez, who had lagged behind, walked up to ask him what the problem was.

  “Are these your guys, sergeant?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Your uniforms and hair are not within army standards. You’re not allowed to use the facilities until you make corrections.”

  Chavez had to muster restraint to keep from bum-rushing this pompous, overbearing asshole across the lot and ramming his to-army-standards crew cut into the side of one of the hummers. He took a step into the captain’s space and locked his eyes on the officer’s. He spoke in a low growl so no other passing officer would overhear.

  “Sir, this is the first time in months we’ve been to a place with something other than MREs and army chow to eat and water or coffee to drink. I can see that’s not true for you, sir. You get this shit all the time. I want you to listen to me carefully, sir. My men and I are going in there to refit. Then we’ll go back to fighting the war to which you’ll never get any closer than you are now. So unless you want to take this further, you’ll get your soft white ass out of the way of real soldiers. And we know where the barbershop is, too.”

  Obviously, the captain hadn’t been around too many combat soldiers. Chavez and his squad pushed past him and entered the PX while he stood there, speechless.

  “I wanna be a rear pogue just like him when I grow up,” Matt Moran jeered. “How about you, Sergeant Reevers? What do you want to be when you grow up?”

  Deadpan, Reevers replied, “Alive.”

  FORTY-EIGHT

  Personal dishonesty and corruption were virtually a way of life with Iraqis. The Saddam regime had been an extreme plutocracy in which everyone stole from everyone else as a matter of survival. In the rural areas and in the small towns and villages, extended families consisted of parents, grandparents, great grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins of various degrees
all living in the same area and farming the same land while they pilfered from each other, their neighbors, and the Americans whenever they could. The only persons considered even moderately incorruptible were Iraqi Christians, whose honesty was the main reason they exerted influence in professional fields far out of proportion to their numbers. Even Saddam used to say that the Christians didn’t steal.

  Since Christians were such a tiny minority, and since there was no tradition of selfless national patriotism in the country, the Americans dared not assume people would do the right thing. The safest approach was to trust no one and view everyone with suspicion.

  Delta Company raided a house near JSB after alert patrols spotted people sneaking in and out at night. Caught red-handed, the man of the house grinned sheepishly and shrugged. He had built a general store in his back room to service his neighbors with stolen goods. In the room were cases of such items as Pampers, Johnson & Johnson foot powder, Colgate toothpaste, Barbasol shaving cream, jeans and other Western apparel, all apparently stolen from American PX warehouses or hijacked from cargo trucks on their way to the PX. As the guy explained, he wasn’t an insurgent, simply an honest thief making a living. People seen creeping around the house were consumers coming for Winstons and Aqua Velva and not bombs and fuses.

  Patrols and recons served the dual purpose of disrupting enemy activity in the AO while at the same time building relationships with residents and communities. It had been repeatedly demonstrated that security had to be imposed upon an area before anything else could be accomplished. Chaos and lawlessness inevitably reigned where units attempted to appease rather than fight; they were cut to pieces and chased off their bases with their tails between their legs.

  In contrast, in those AOs where battalions were determined to hunt down, kill, and capture insurgent cells, the higher level of security provided the necessary conditions for legitimate economic, civil, and political reconstruction. Many of the insurgent cells took the path of least resistance and moved into AOs where they were not so rigorously challenged.