Ambush Alley: The Most Extraordinary Battle of the Iraq War

by Tim Pritchard

  In the sitting room downstairs, Worthington was talking to Carl, trying to keep him calm. The area had been turned into the casualty collection point and Lance Corporal Kyle Smith, with his trademark bandanna, was now beside him helping him treat the three other casualties. As Worthington reached over to hand out one of Smith’s Newport cigarettes to the wounded, he banged his foot against Carl’s leg. Carl screamed in pain.

  “I’m sorry, dude, I’m sorry.”

  As he tried to move out of the way, he hit him again. Carl yelped. Worthington thought about giving him some Valium from his NBC pack. But Valium slows down the heart rate. Instead, he tried to take his mind away from the pain by talking about what they were going to do when they got out of there. Worthington knew that Carl wanted to open a bar with Corporal Glass when he left the Marines. For a while, they talked about the perfect bar, what drinks it would stock, where the barstools would be, what sort of music it would play. Sometimes Carl would join in. Other times he just lay there looking straight up in the air, his arms out to the side, legs perfectly still, muscles flexed with pain. When Worthington thought he could do no more, he grabbed the squad automatic weapon that was lying next to him, ready to join the fight. He was dismayed to find that although the SAW had a belt of ammo, about a hundred rounds, it was covered in mud.

  If anyone could get it functioning again it was Worthington. The infantry trained all its marines to be expert riflemen. But Worthington was more than that. He was in Weapons Company and was at ease with any weapon system: the M240G, the M249, the M16, and the M203. He grabbed some cleaning gear that he had in his butt pack, took out an all-purpose brush, scraped the mud from the ammo, opened up the insides of the SAW, scraped it out, put it back together, and ran upstairs to see what was going on. At each corner of the roof there were two marines facing different directions, covering every part of the street below. Marines were picking people off blocks away. This is an amazing sight. Worthington was impressed and ran back downstairs to see what else he could do.

  Sena’s radio was still not working. Robinson knew that battalion was unaware of their location. If they didn’t get batteries for the radio, they were stuck. Again he ran around looking for Wentzel and Worthington. This time, they both agreed that Robinson could make a run for the track to try to bring back some batteries and whatever else he could find. Worthington asked him to bring back the CLU, the command launch unit thermal-imaging sight system for his Javelin missile. With the CLU, he could track anything that had a different heat signature from its background. It meant that he would be able to see and target anything that moved, day or night.

  Worthington organized suppressing fire from the roof and the downstairs courtyard while Robinson grabbed Milter and Olivas and headed for the gate onto the street.

  The distance from the gate to the track was about twenty strides. During that time, they would be exposed to fire coming down Ambush Alley. They all counted.

  “One, two, three.”

  On three, Robinson and Milter let out a burst of gunfire while Olivas ran into the street and jumped into the back of the track and began throwing out whatever he could find. There was still a danger that the whole thing could blow, and none of them wanted to spend any more time than necessary around that track. Olivas was tossing out several AT4s, portable 84 mm antitank rockets with disposable fiberglass launchers. Robinson winced at the sound of all that ammo banging on the ground. It’s not the textbook way to handle these weapons. He threw out some small-arms ammo and the CLU for the Javelin that Worthington wanted. He didn’t bring out any of the Javelin missiles. Other marines started grabbing the stuff and hauling it back into the house. Olivas hopped out of the track and charged back into the house. Milter and Robinson looked at each other.

  “Did he get the batteries?”

  “I don’t think he did.”

  Robinson cursed him under his breath. That’s the whole reason why we’re here. He asked Milter for cover and hopped into the track himself, turning over the debris inside until he found the batteries for the radio. All the time he heard the eerie ping, ping of rounds hitting the track’s aluminum skin. He grabbed some more ammo and stepped over Fribley’s body, which was still lying in the rear. I’ve got to get the hell out of here.

  Castleberry made his way across the downstairs room and headed for the roof. As he went past the casualty collection point where Smith was tending the wounded, one of the injured yelled out his name.

  “Castleberry?”

  “Elli. Holy fuck. I thought you were dead.”

  It was only now that Castleberry realized that the two marines who had limped toward them down Ambush Alley from the burning track were two of his fellow trackers, Corporal Elliot and Lance Corporal Trevino. Trevino had his hand on Elliot’s neck and Elliot had his hand on Trevino’s head, each trying to compress the other’s wounds. Trevino’s eyes were oozing saliva-like goop and blood.

  “I can’t see. I can’t see shit.”

  Castleberry saw that they were both in a state of shock. They weren’t screaming, even though their wounds were hemorrhaging badly. Elliot was pale with fear. The back of his leg was gone.

  “What’s going on? What’s happening?”

  “You’re going to be fine. It’s going to be okay. We’re going to make it out of here.”

  Castleberry had no idea whether that was the truth, but, if he was in their position, that’s what he would have wanted to hear.

  Elliot lay there falling in and out of consciousness, listening to the shells land around them, hearing the rounds smacking against the wall. He could no longer feel his leg. His Achilles tendon had been sliced. His face was sore and burning hot. It’s only a matter of time before the house is hit. The hajjis are going to overrun us. He felt that his energy was ebbing away and that he wouldn’t have the strength to fight. We’re probably not going to make it. As time went on, it didn’t really matter to him anymore.

  Castleberry, too, was feeling the strain. He’d already thought he was going to die once that day, when the RPGs nearly hit his track going through Ambush Alley. Now there was no doubt in his mind that he was not going to last the day. I’m going to be going home in a cedar box. He heard the sound of incoming fire, there were pieces of dead people all around, and he could hear the track up the road still cooking off with enormous explosions. Everything popped into his head all at once. How will my wife spend the insurance money? What sort of life will she have? What sort of car will she buy with the money? Sergeant Schaefer is dead. I’m just one more on the list. I guess I’ll be buried in Arlington Cemetery. How will Mom and Dad take it? I’m going to die. For a few moments he lost hope. He wondered why no one had come to rescue them. He wondered what he was doing there in a strange house in the middle of Iraq. He felt like the loneliest man in the world. He’d never believed in the political reasons for going to war. I don’t care two squirts of piss about Iraq and the Iraqi people. But he believed in the marines around him. He fought his way back up from the depths of the blackness and got back into the zone. I’m not dead. I’ve got to live, and I’m gonna fight. It’s time to kill some hajjis. He got back up to the parapet and started going at it. He felt he was surviving on fear and adrenaline. He was not fighting for President George W. Bush, or the Stars and Stripes, or Mom’s apple pie. He was fighting for the men on either side of him. For the first time in his Marine Corps experience there was no one telling Castleberry what to do. He was just one of a group of young men trying to stay alive and keep each other alive.

  Iraqi fighters were now emerging from the backstreets to take the places of those whose bodies littered the street in front of the house. They are so brave, but so stupid. Robinson watched another Iraqi emerge from an alley and raise an RPG launcher to his shoulder. Before he could get his shot off, marines from the roof fired down on him. He was punched backward into the dirt, dropping his weapon. It lay there in the middle of the street. Robinson watched as other Iraqis ran out to pick it up. The marine
s gunned them down before they could reach it. Holy shit. This is like hajji bait. Someone hit the RPG with a direct hit and the grenade exploded, turning the weapon into a ball of twisted metal. After that the Iraqis stopped running for it.

  From one end of the street, the figure of an old man emerged into Ambush Alley. He walked slowly and deliberately up the street, his arms out in supplication. It was such a strange sight that the whole roof stopped firing. He turned and started walking across the street toward the house. The marines scanned his hands, as they’d been trained, to see if he was carrying a weapon. As he got closer, Robinson saw that he was wearing bulky clothes. Why’s he wearing so many clothes when it’s so hot? The thought crossed everybody’s mind that he might be some sort of suicide bomber. The marines on the roof started yelling at him to stop. Someone let out a warning shot. The man kept walking.

  Robinson dug around in his head for the little Arabic that he knew.

  “Imshi. Go away.”

  “Al ardh. On your belly.”

  “Idayk fauk. Put your hands up.”

  Someone fired another warning shot at his feet. The man just kept walking toward them. This is too eerie. Robinson was closest.

  “Robinson. For fuck’s sake, take a shot.”

  Robinson hit him in the neck and the old man sank to the ground, looking at him. Robinson shot him again and the old man sank to his hands and knees, still staring. It looked as though he was trying to say something, or make some sort of noise. He was gurgling. Robinson took another shot and the old man fell onto his hands, still looking at him. There was blood everywhere. Robinson could swear the man was staring right at him. He shot him twice more. The old man collapsed onto his belly, his gaze turned the other way.

  Castleberry had a view directly into a small alleyway from his position on the roof. For several minutes, he had seen an Iraqi with an RPG ducking out from behind it, ready to shoot off a grenade. Castleberry had shot at him but missed. The Iraqi came out again, this time lower, and managed to let off a shot. Castleberry missed him again. Moments later, two robed women emerged from a door farther down the street and very calmly began to walk toward the alleyway. Castleberry looked at their hands. He couldn’t see a weapon, so he didn’t shoot. It was confusing, though. There are bodies all over the place and they look like they’re out for an afternoon stroll. As they reached the alleyway, they stopped. Between their shoulders, Castleberry saw the outline of an RPG. The same man stepped out. Castleberry shot right through the women and three bodies dropped. This is weirding me out. Who were they? Was one of them the man’s wife? Or maybe his sister? Or were they men dressed as women?

  Downstairs, Worthington went out into the front courtyard. Ortiz had taken the position looking down the street to the right, and Smith had taken the position facing back down the alleyway. Worthington saw a place by the gate where he could set up his SAW to cover the street to the left. He found a drum of SAW ammo lying on some sort of water barrel. Maybe Robinson got it from the track. He set his SAW up overlooking the wall. He saw, heard, and felt everything with an intensity that he had never known. He felt that he had enhanced vision. If he looked at a window or a spot on a roof he noticed every little movement. Iraqi fighters popped out from behind dusty alleyways and balconies to take shots at them. He’d thought combat would be like a video game but as soon as he’d heard the first hiss and pop next to his ear he knew that this was for real.

  Iraqi fighters across the street were pushing young children out into Ambush Alley. They were getting them to point out the Americans’ positions. Worthington had a debate with himself. Do I shoot or don’t I? Can I live with this? From the roofs, marines shot at women and children and watched them die. He knew it would haunt him for years to come. But he also knew that he would never think that they should have acted differently.

  For the second time that day, he was sure he was going to die in Ambush Alley. Nobody knows where we are. From the front pocket of his Kevlar jacket, where the antiballistic porcelain plate should have been, he pulled out some letters and a photo of his girlfriend. He’d chosen to leave the bulletproof plate buried in his ruck. Her photo and letters will protect my heart. He fingered his bear-tooth necklace. Just before Worthington left for Iraq, his adoptive dad had taken the four canine teeth out of a bear skull he’d had since the 1970s and made four necklaces. His dad kept one, he’d taken another, and he’d given the other two to his brother-in-law and his girlfriend. Worthington was part Native American and his symbol was the bear. He had bear claws attached to his rifle, his Kevlar jacket, and his pack. When he got back home, they were going to meet up and put all the bear teeth together. The symbol of the bear would protect him.

  Robinson felt their position was getting better as each minute passed. As they defended the house from the roof, some marines compared their plight to the last stand at the Alamo. Nobody mentioned it, but all the defenders of the Alamo were wiped out. Even though Robinson’s nerves were stretched, he couldn’t help but laugh when, in the middle of it all, Milter, who was kind of goofy anyway, started going on about his tiger-striped underwear. It had been a running joke in Kuwait. Marines just don’t wear tiger-striped thongs. But Milter just loved to dance around with them and show them off under his chemical suit. Everyone got a kick out of it. Even now, in the midst of chaos, Milter carried on with the joke.

  “I hope I don’t die because they’ll cut off my cammies and everyone will see that I wear a tiger-striped thong.”

  Everyone laughed. Robinson really didn’t feel like laughing. But it’s kinda funny.

  16

  On the northern bridge, Captain Wittnam had a problem on his hands. Over fifty young marines had disappeared in the medevac convoy and were no longer in the fight for the bridge. He now had less than two platoons of infantry to defend the bridge. And many of those who remained scattered over the battlefield were scared and jumpy. The A-10 running on them had shaken them all. He focused back on his mission. It was to seize the bridge and hold it. There is no way we are going to abandon the bridge after we’ve fought so hard to get it. RPG and mortar rounds were still coming at them from all directions. Once more he ran up and down the lines to offer reassurance.

  “Keep doing what you’re doing. Consolidate your ammunition. The other companies are fighting their way toward us. They’ll be here soon.”

  He still expected Alpha or Bravo to come hurtling over the bridge at any moment. He wished he had the tanks with him to provide some real firepower. After the disastrous A-10 strafing run, he didn’t want to call in close air support. Anyway, he didn’t have a FAC to control it. With the direct hit on the mortar squad, his mortar assets were severely limited and running low on ammunition. He only had a couple of mobile tracks with functioning weapons systems. He had very few weapons systems that could operate at long range, beyond a thousand meters. He was relying on the individual marines with their M16 rifles to keep the enemy at bay. He got on the radio again, and now, for the first time in what seemed like hours, he managed to get a message through to the forward command.

  “Timberwolf, this is Palehorse 6. We are taking heavy casualties.”

  He could tell from the urgent voices at the forward CP that Bravo and Alpha were also in one hell of a fight. No one could promise him when they could get support up to the northern bridge. There was nothing for it except to continue the fight.

  “We’re going to stay here until you can link up with us.”

  Lieutenant Conor Tracy dodged rounds as he crawled through the swampy area on the west side of the highway, just north of the canal. The level of incoming was unremitting. He’d seen the medvac convoy hurtle past and had tried to flag them down, but either they hadn’t seen him, or they were just too anxious to get out of there. Shit. There goes a lot of fire-power. Then he’d watched in horror as one of the tracks exploded just as it had crossed the bridge. He’d seen people running along the banks of the canal but couldn’t tell whether they were marines or the enemy. He ho
ped it was marines who had safely escaped the burning track.

  He had been exhilarated when the first shots had been fired and seduced by the violence of battle. Now it was different. He was weary with exhaustion. I’m not having fun anymore. He climbed back into the track and fired the grenade launcher and the .50 cal from the gun position of his track at buildings to his north. Figures were appearing on the roofs in the distance, getting off shots at him. RPGs and mortars exploded only a few meters away. Looking around, he saw the worried, mud-caked faces of marines lying in the dirt, trying to pick out targets. He felt a surge of panic pass through the infantry on the ground. Our position is on the point of collapsing.

  As the AAV platoon commander, he was keeping count of what vehicles he had to support the company. He’d counted five vehicles going over the bridge, but another one must have gone either earlier or later because he only counted five vehicles with him on the northern bridge. He had watched two of them strafed by the A-10. Another was a mobility kill. It could still fire its guns, but it wasn’t going anywhere. He did a mental calculation. That morning he’d started with twelve fully functioning vehicles. He’d lost one to mechanical failure by the railway bridge just before they attacked the city. Six had gone back down Ambush Alley, and three others were disabled or destroyed. That left him with only two fully functioning tracks, 202 and 204. There was no way they could get the rest of the company into two tracks if they had to make a sudden escape. He remembered being briefed that there was a company of Iraqi commandos in the 23rd Infantry Brigade military compound to the north. At any moment, he expected to see them come down on foot from the north and fight them for the bridge. We’re trapped. They’ve targeted that bridge so we can’t go south. They are going to send foot-mobile troops down toward us from the north. For the first time, Tracy seriously considered the possibility that he was going to be captured as a POW.