Such incidents always happen in war, and they weigh heavily upon the warrior, for although he has done nothing wrong, he will carry the guilt and replay those images in his head for the rest of his life. And the legacy of not being able to discuss such terrible things has been passed down through generations of fighting men and women in many wars. You can’t write home to Mom about it; you would never intimately whisper such gory details to anyone you love, nor discuss it philosophically with your friends over a beer back in the civilian world. How can anyone who wasn’t there possibly understand? So it sucks at your soul like some private leech.
I was in such a daze that I did not even realize that the Panda Bear had fallen in step alongside as we trudged away from the kill box of the roadblock, back across the bridge, past the little guard shack where we had spent the previous night, past the blown-away Amtrac in the courtyard, back down the road, and out of the city, walking around advancing vehicles and men, until we finally reached the Main. We walked more than four kilometers, and I don’t remember a single step. The Panda steered me to our trucks, where I finally could rest, get some food and water, and begin to awaken, at least enough to realize that I was totally exhausted and covered in thick dirt.
Casey took a hard look at me, as if he were a doctor, realizing that something dreadful had happened up there. He would later tell me that he barely recognized me when I came stumbling into camp, but he remained silent, knowing I wasn’t ready to talk. My psyche, not my body, had been wounded, and I only said, “Dude, that was the worst thing I have ever seen. I haven’t been this mad in a long, long time.”
He was surprised by the emotion, because almost the only reactions he had ever seen from me had been confidence in my job and satisfaction when a difficult shot had been particularly well placed. I had always been considered to be the coldhearted killer, but I had been doing a hell of a lot of killing.
It would take several days before I could tell even my closest buddy what had happened, but during that interval, the media discovered the incident at the bridge, and everybody around the world soon was properly aghast at the carnage. It had been terrible to participate in it, but the firestorm of publicity was almost as bad. Insulting speculation and wild guessing ruled the day. The Jackals and their cameramen saw only the aftermath, not the actual event. They interviewed other people who also weren’t there, and a couple who were, and knitted together stories that made us look like ill-trained, uncaring, trigger-happy gunmen. They even talked about us slaughtering people on a bus, although there had been no bus.
As skilled as those writers might be, they weren’t there when the shit was coming down! They really didn’t know what they were talking about, but there is a grim old saying in the news business: “Never let facts stand in the way of a good story.” Photographs of the destroyed vehicles and dead people brought on a shitstorm of criticism from officials who were even more distant from the battlefield, some of whom were just playing cover-your-ass politics. The controversy increased until there was even a threat that Colonel McCoy might have to stand trial for war crimes. What total bullshit.
It was all a distraction from the true focus of the mission, and the most important point seemed to have become lost in the drama. We had fought our way to the heavily defended Diyala Bridge, captured it, and crossed it, and that long, curving, bloody road on the far bank would lead us straight into the heart of Baghdad.
Wasn’t that why we were here?
22
Moments of history are built on seemingly minor points, and it was fortunate for the Marine Corps, and for the United States of America, that Lieutenant Casey Kuhlman was sitting around the Main headquarters, doing nothing, on Tuesday, April 8. Everywhere else in Iraq, the war was blasting ahead with incredible momentum. It seemed to be leaving Casey behind, and he was big-league pissed off.
Far down south, the British 7th Armored Brigade finally entered Basra. United States Army troops had begun launching heavily armored probes called “thunder runs” out of the Baghdad airport and into the southwest section of the tangled metropolis and were met by intense enemy fire. American Marines were building more and more temporary bridges across the Tigris River and steadily putting more men and vehicles on the other side. The noose was closing on Baghdad, and the Iraqis no longer had any illusions about winning this war.
Our battalion had crossed the Tigris overnight on a pontoon bridge laid parallel to the blown Diyala span. The darkness was impenetrable; Baghdad was blacked out, and we could not turn on any vehicle lights because they would pinpoint our positions. Casey, wearing night vision glasses, led our headquarters unit over in that pitch blackness, and every other vehicle lined up behind his Humvee, without radio communication. If he had gone over the edge of that narrow bridge, we probably all would have followed. We had drilled this follow-the-leader routine for weeks, and now, when it required a dangerous river crossing, he made the job automatic and quick. By the time dawn broke on April 8, the entire 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines, was completely within the Baghdad city limits. The Bull had arrived.
I had spent the intervening hours pulling myself together, comfortable among my buddies in the Main, where no questions were asked. After cleaning up, getting some chow and some sleep, and gaining the alone time needed to sort out my feelings, my spirits steadily improved. The awful events at the bridgehead faded into memories and shuffled away to their proper places deep within my brain, going into one of those private rooms where I could close the door on them. It was getting crowded in there.
I knew that I had to get back on track in a hurry, because if I kept acting weird, a spotlight of suspicion would swing toward me. There was still a war on, and I was a shooter and a leader, so feeling sorry for myself or letting a series of terrible events beat me down simply was not an option. If I let on that my confidence was shaken, it would spread like a virus among those around me, and I would not let that happen. Impossible.
I had stripped down my sniper rifle and cleaned it carefully, becoming lost in the muscle-memory routine of the rag and gun oil, and slowly was able to pull myself back from the abyss, with the promise to never venture so near that edge again. All that the incident at the bridge really proved was that I was human, just like everybody else.
Once we were across the Tigris, the Main headquarters was set up in the prickly palm grove, which put me almost right back where I had started the previous day. I felt no guilt now, no doubt-nothing but a renewed determination to get on with the job. What was done was done. That other stuff was yesterday.
I hunted up Colonel McCoy to iron out the situation with Officer Bob.
“So what’s on your mind?” the colonel asked.
“I just wanted to find out what’s going to happen next so we don’t have a breakdown in communication like in the last attack when you had to scream into the radio to find me.” I took a deep, frustrated breath. “Bob told me today that from now on I’m strictly staying with the Main. I just want to see if that’s what you want.” By going over the staff officer’s head to talk directly with McCoy, I was close to insubordination, but this issue had to be settled.
McCoy had bigger things to worry about than this shit, and I knew it, but he growled, “I’ll take care of it. You just get your stuff ready. We’re going to check out what we think is a chemical factory. You follow me, and if we make contact, get to work. Be ready to go in twenty minutes.” The boss gave me a slap on the back, and I walked off to prepare for the patrol.
The colonel was as good as his word, but it was a devil’s bargain. I was going back into the fight, but Casey had to stay behind again, which meant that I was losing my security blanket. As much as I disliked that decision, it was neither illogical nor unexpected, for Casey had proven invaluable. His experience level had soared since the start of the war, and he was always busy, whether searching an Iraqi armory with enough weapons to equip a battalion or using his engineering training to help lay down those important new bridges. Such things win wars, and the battalion honchos expressed confidence in him.
Casey was blind to that; he just wanted to get back to the fighting. “I’m sick of being pissed off,” he wrote in his journal. “I am just depressed… a monkey could do this job. I’m a glorified taxi driver. I would be the happiest man alive if I had a rifle platoon right now.” Having had a taste of fire, he wanted more, and he considered anything
