Sunday, October 19, 2003

PART II - MISSION FOCUS


16:45 – Baghdad. I had a great start for this. Something like, “The cargo bay of the ancient C-130 was dark as pitch and strangely silent as 37 passengers considered the excessive forces tossing them from seat back to seat belt while the aircraft continued her screaming, tactical descent into Baghdad. From an unknown direction came the distinctive odor of human wretch. The screams would soon begin.”

Actually, no body puked, and if anybody screamed, there would be no way to hear it. The C-130 is a cargo plane. Not built for passenger comfort of convenience, it’s as loud on the inside as it is outside next to the engines, and earplugs are standard issue. We 37 were human cargo in this cargo plane, and we did spiral rapidly into Baghdad. But first, we had to get this far.

Early Friday morning, we completed our packing and stood with our gear at the edge of the road in front of our villa at the Kuwait Hilton. I was glad to see the last of that hotel, having seen well enough TCM westerns and the Fashion Channel over the past five days to last at least six months. Brian would not be traveling with us, still needing to be issued an XXXL flak vest, of which the supplier has very few. The downside of having a mass of a hundred and fifty kilos.

A closed van took our bags ahead, and we followed in a nondescript tourist-styled bus. I was briefly concerned when the driver made an unexpected U-turn towards an unknown section of Kuwait City, but this was only to stop at another hotel for more Iraq-bound passengers.

Some 40 minutes later and we drove through the first of five military (i.e. lots of soldiers with lots of heavy weaponry, from M-16’s to 50 caliber machine guns to Bradley assault vehicles) checkpoints going into the airport. Our government ID’s were checked at one of these. We were dumped on the desert-hot and sun-blazed tarmac along with our bags, flak vests, and helmets, heaped the luggage on an aircraft-sized pallet, and herded through another ID checkpoint into the military passenger terminal.

At this point, and to save some typing, whenever you read the word, “checkpoint”, insert the words, “guys with guns, lots and lots”.

Not unlike our time spent at the Hilton, there was some waiting to be done, around four hours this time, but no Fashion Channel. Our flight would leave at noon. There was a Subway van outside, but my stomach is way too touchy to risk filling with food before the tactical landing at BIAP.

With strict military precision, it was noon before we were herded (again, the herding) onto our transport (“one at a time on the steps, watch your head, fill in all the seats from the end moving out, sit on your flak vest, buckle in, who needs a vomit bag?”). Dang hot in the cargo hold, and sweat was running off of each part of me, and we waited some more, and I tried to size up the pukers while I cranked the fastest and loudest from off of my PDA/MP3 player. I was hoping that I had batteries to last the next 90 minutes as the rear doors sealed shut and we took off.

There was no beverage service on this flight. No movie. No bathroom. No screaming babies (yet). Just a very functional interior. Exposed conduits and cabling. Parachutes for the crew hung on hooks with their oxygen masks. Three pallets of cargo enclosed in a weave of heavy straps. Two score of passengers strapped to slung webbed seats in four rows aligned with the fuselage.

Ninety minutes later and right on schedule, Queens of the Stone Age accompanied the landing, which was preceded by a smooth descent and two minor alignment corrections. No problem. Kick ass, Baghdad! The engines shut down and we were herded out onto the disappointingly familiar tarmac at Kuwait City. Radar problems had scrubbed our intended landing and we were forced to return. We had another seven hours to contemplate the spiral descent into Baghdad before we would get another flight.

We used this time to eat Army chow, visit the BX/PX (Base Exchange/Post Exchange), and get a $5.25 military haircut from Anwar, a local contractor.

By the time our flight left again, it was a few hours past dark. I hoped I had not only ample batteries, but enough fresh fast and loud music to get me there. Once in the air, the plane was way dark, occasionally illuminated by anxious glimpses at watches. We only knew to expect a roller-coaster ride - one that traveled 400 mph through the night, dropping 12,000 feet in half a minute.

There was little warning, just the light stomach that accompanies simultaneous reductions in velocity and altitude, then a steep bank down and to the right, g’s plastering me to the notch of my seat. Then a quick bank down and to the left, and I was plastered towards the edge of my webbing. A few second of straight, then a sharp weave right, then left, then we were on the ground.

Welcome to Baghdad.

During the taxi, the cargo specialist donned his body armor and helmet, and rammed magazines into both his pistol and submachine gun.

Welcome to Baghdad.

And it’s dark. And after dark, the busses don’t run between BIAP and where we need to be, the middle of town. So we have to wait until the next day. There are a couple of Quonset huts at the “Arrival Terminal” full of uncomfortable chairs and uncomfortable soldiers. Between the huts are thirty cots under a mass of camouflage netting. All of the cots are taken by tired men and women in uniform. Many more are sprawled on their duffles or on the dirt. They are trying to get home on leave.

I try to relax in one of the Quonset chairs, but can’t, and eventually relegate myself to sleeping on the dirt. I wake up cold at 03:00 or so, and don my DCU’s for another layer and my camouflage poncho for cover and go back to a fitful sleep. I was roused at daybreak by rain, drops falling every three to four inches to displace the dust that has accumulated on my person. The dust is fine and choking and can’t be washed down, no matter the volume of water consumed.

Just a few more hours, and the bus will be here to take us to the palace. Just enough time to sit and do nothing. I drink more water and risk another trip to the world’s most horrid portalettes. On the way back to our pile of dusty belongings, I stop in one of the huts for an MRE (Meals Ready to Eat), the only food available here. I choose a Number 11, Beef Tamales, served with seasoned rice, a squeezable portion of nacho cheese, vegetable crackers, a couple of cookies, orange drink mix and instant coffee powder. I eat it all cold right from the box (it said “ready to eat”) but gag on the rice. Next time, I’ll use the little hydrogen emitting heater that came with it. Part of me hopes there is not a next time, but the other part of me grabs a Number 18, Thai Chicken, just in case.

We were told that the bus ride into Baghdad was manic, featuring frantic weaves and lane changes, and other evasive maneuvers. Like most second hand (or ten minute old) information here, it is subject to change. We wore our flak vests and Kevlar helmets (just like the story), and rode the expressway all the way into town, slowing at the check points, then being waved on through (quite unlike the story). We had our well-armed escort (Humvee’s with 50 caliber guns fore and aft, like the story) all the way to a parking lot one klik from the palace gate (the walk wasn’t in the story).

At the gate, the guard had not heard of us, or our leadership, or our organization. So we waited and pondered our next move, since we could not enter without an escort, and we really had nowhere else to go. While waiting, I watched folks clear their weapons into a sandbag enclosed sand pit. Nothing went off, of course, they were just demonstrating to the next guard that their weapon was empty, because not everybody gets to carry a loaded weapon within the palace grounds, only some people, like the Gurka (insane Nepalese commandos who provide facility security), and the Secret Service (who speak into their cuffs and protect our chief diplomats), and the CIA, and the Extra Secret Special Forces and Personal Security Details, who carry some very lethal looking hardware.

Most everybody else carries unloaded weapons – Nine-millimeter pistols and M-16’s mostly. Maybe 30-40% of the people here are unarmed,… just like Texas.

Eventually, a cooperative and previously unknown USACE (Army Corps of Engineers and our client organization) major escorted us through the gate and led us to our group, the CPA/IIRO/PMO (Coalition Provisional Authority/Iraqi Infrastructure Reconstruction Office/Program Management Office). And we had lunch, and located our luggage, and secured our billet, and found the office, and got more identification, and did some billable work, and ate some supper, and went to sleep. Prior to sleep, though, I took a long cold shower (there being no hot water), to wash off the grime of that long, long day.

I slept until I woke up and worked a twelve-hour day. The first of 155.