Friday, January 16, 2004

19:30 – Baghdad. The Missive Unreleased.

The day of our trip to Razzaza squished in and out of sloppiness. Not raining when we left the palace, but cold and moist by the time we got to the old Ministry building, just a klik east and south of the Ministry’s temporary quarters at the Ministry of Oil (MOO, honest). We had to stop there first to pick up an FPS (Facility Protection Service) interpreter. You see, the troops that drive me to and from the Ministry have more than just my protection on their plate. Their duties also include recruitment and training of one of the many police forces that the CPA is establishing here.

The CPA argument could be that, in using various police forces throughout the country, as well as an independent Army, Navy and Air Force, no one entity will ever be powerful enough to wrest control from a duly elected civilian government. Fair enough, but it means lots of independent militias and lots and lots of AK-47’s.

My guys have a particular interest in the branch of the FPS that protects the facilities of the Ministry of Water Resources, providing guard service at offices, pump stations and dams. The interpreter, then, was an armed member of this Service, as was his driver.

Both were late.

And we waited for forty minutes or so in the figurative shadows of what remains of the old Ministry building, thoroughly looted and burned by folks who apparently don’t believe that one should avoid shitting where one sleeps. For a while, we bitched about the lateness, and then just bitched in general, which is mostly a joke of a dialogue, common to soldiers while they wait for nothing to happen. There were seven of us from the Coalition side, four soldiers and three civilians, myself and two from the CPA’s shadow ministry.

We headed out eventually into a light cold rain with the two Iraqis as lead in a four-door Mitsubishi pick-up, reminiscent of the old Dogwagon, but less old and more two-wheel drived. I was in the second vehicle, a dark blue civilian Suburban, the senior sergeant driving, MP5 in his lap, a Specialist in the front passenger seat, M-16 at the ready, a spare SAW between them. I was in the second row of seats, just behind the driver. One of the other civilians, a relative youth from D.C. was in the third tier of very bouncy seats on the passenger side.

The third and last vehicle in this minor convoy was a black suburban they call “the Intimidator”, due to it’s oversized profile, accentuated by an aftermarket luggage rack mounted half a foot too high on the roof. The other sergeant was driving this one, M-16 stuffed between the seat and the console. Another Specialist and his M-16 were in the second tier behind the front seat passenger, the other civilian.

[Yeow! What a waste of text. Why, prey tell, would your author bother with such detail?]

There’s no easy way out of Baghdad, and Razzaza is about an hour out, once you get out. Our interpreter’s lateness would certainly make us late for our rendezvous with the pump station manager and local DG. We pressed on through the heavy morning traffic as the moist air finally couldn’t hold it anymore, and let loose with a spotty and cold winter rain.

We needed a dual carriageway, but access to ramps were limited, unless you go on the off, turn right at the herd of sheep and, alakazam, seventy miles an hour. Eighty miles an hour. Ninety miles an hour. Bobbing and weaving through traffic. Using speed as a tactical element. It’s almost a game of chase. The lead car drives as fast as he can, and the following vehicles don’t fall behind. Note that it’s not “the following vehicles don’t try to fall behind”. There’s no trying. Falling behind is just not an option.

Ten minutes of this and we were out of expressway, routed now down a four-lane with earth median, then into one of many midsized cities. Thursday, the day prior to Friday, must be a more formalized market day in the hinterlands, as the markets were full to overflowing with people and goods, increasingly sodden by the steady light rain. Sloppy mess as well, as the dust here never gets washed away, just hydrated for a brief time and redeposited. The dirt’s relocation strategy involves applying itself as a slick film on everything around – streets and cars especially, although the fresh vegetables and raw meats displayed throughout this particular market couldn’t have been immune from the spray of filth.

The mud slime was so thick on most of our windows we couldn’t see out the back window at the trailing ‘burban (had to use the mirrors) and barely caught sight of the tractor as it passed us in the slow city traffic.

Honor tarnished, the best of the United States Army picked up the tempo, and forced our convoy down the street eventually passing the tractor when it’s way was blocked by a parked car.

The sergeant slipped more heavy metal into the stereo as we slipped out of town and cruised up to seventy or so on another southbound four-laner with grassy/weedy/scrub brushy median. The rain was falling harder and the mud slime was getting thicker on all the glass surfaces.

And then the “BANG”.

Not “pop”. Not “pow”. Not “boom”.

“BANG”. And I was more alert than I’ve ever been.

Self check. No damage. I looked up to check out the rest of us in my vehicle and met the eyes of each of them doing the same. We were apparently unblemished, and slowed to maybe forty to allow the other ‘burban to approach on our right. It took me a moment to realize that the reason I could see the following crew so clearly is that they had no window glass at all on the driver’s side of the vehicle. The door panels, fender and quarter panel were perforated, and the front left tire was flat.

IED.

An Improvised Explosive Devise. Command detonated in an unmitigated attempt to kill me and my mates.

Command detonated about half a second behind me.

Fuckers.

There are some people here who have yet to lose the war along with the rest of the country. They’re the same guys who lob mortars and rockets at us, and spray small arms fire when they feel they won’t get hurt doing so. Call them what you will. Insurgents. Former Regime Loyalists. Bad Guys. Terrorists.

Fuckers.

And these fuckers set about a dozen of these IED’s across central Iraq each and every day. Old munitions mostly, mortars and mines, reconfigured to be easily camouflaged along the roadside as a pile of rocks or a piece of junk or a small dead animal. Then they hide and wait for an appropriate target. Not a particular target, just an appropriate one, like a couple of Coalition Suburbans with some soldiers in them.

Fuckers.

I must admit, though, that I wasn’t so pissed at the time. I was on a very serious adrenaline rush. The senior sergeant radioed to the other vehicle to pull over when they could, which happened to be a wide area by the side of the road, a hundred meters or so from the blast site. Doors sprung open and armed and angry men emerged, eyes intent in the direction we had just traversed. Sometimes, IED’s are followed up with SAF, small arms fire.

There was none just yet. The FPS Iraqis had stopped as well, and their two AK’s joined the ranks of Coalition weaponry to secure our perimeter as the situation was assessed. The second vehicle’s driver had a few small cuts on his hand and ear from the flying glass. He had been knocked unconscious by the blast, but recovered as his passenger’s hands went to the steering wheel. The Suburban was toast. At least it didn’t look like it would travel well with all of its transmission fluid in a blood red pool intermingling with the slick mud as it spread out from under the chassis. It was leased, anyway. There was no effort to pursue our attackers. With no immediate following action, we figured that they had fled the moment the IED went off.

I later learned that our attackers did pursue us, and my guys were wise to remain vigilant. However, it took little more than five minutes for us to stop, assess, treat the injured, salvage everything we could from the much less intimidating Suburban, and pile seven of us into our remaining vehicle, abandoning the other. We would continue south for a time, get out of the urban area, then cut over to an expressway to Baghdad by speeding a few miles along a winding piece of asphalt. We were stoked. We were pissed. We didn’t need the heavy metal. Like myself, I’m sure everyone was playing a passionate and extreme soundtrack in their heads, penned just for the occasion.

The roads dried out by the time we hit the cutoff, and remained dry at the expressway, where the suburban ran back into Baghdad at about as fast as it would go, about one hundred twenty.

I was back in the office by ten, having left barely three hours prior. The adrenaline was starting to wear down and, by lunchtime, I found myself immensely tired and in a state of mild shock. I retired to my hooch to contemplate mortality and take a long nap.

That’s my war story.