We did the same on the other side.
Then what worried me most was the ditch itself. It wasn't straight. It was twisty. If you tried to look down it, it wasn't like looking down a railroad track. You could only see maybe ten meters before it twisted out of sight.
By that time, I knew they couldn't come in on the flanks unless they started using fire maneuver and maybe brought in heavier support — but if they wanted to, they could come in force down the ditch and overrun us in really quick time.
Another air strike was coming in, and we called it right down this ditch. As soon as they lifted, my intel sergeant, Sergeant Robbie Gardner, and I went shoulder to shoulder (that was about the width of the ditch) back down the ditch, hoping to catch them by surprise. And we did.
We went maybe fifty meters and came up on the Iraqi point element coming up the ditch, but they weren't going anywhere just then, because the strike had got them down; and their guns were lying by their sides.
We came around, at the ready, and then we were face-to-face. Before they could pick up their guns, we were able to eliminate them.
We then walked all the way back down to the place where we had loaded up our rucksacks, and we found bodies all through the ditch. I recall coming up on one guy in particular. His leg was mangled and blown off, and he was about dead, but he was still breathing heavily. We got close to him and moved the gun away. He took his last breath, and that was it, he was gone. It was profound. It didn't strike me so much then as later, when I looked back.
We went all the way down to where we'd blown the rucksacks because it was getting into evening now and it gets cold in the desert. We dragged out some Gore-Tex jackets and any kind of chow that we could find. Although the jackets had been blown up by cluster bombs and our own explosion, it would still provide some warmth. We grabbed some stuff, moved back up into our fighting position, and hooked back up with the guys. By this time, the firefight had become less intense.
There was a kind of rhythm. A sortie would come in and then leave, and there'd be a lull when we didn't have air cover. At that point, the fireworks would pick up. Once a squad-size element — maybe five or six people — stood up and actually charged us, giving out this crazy battle cry: "Hey tetetetetetete." It was just suicidal for them, because we were able to pick them off as they were coming in.
The Iraqis were actually pretty game early on, but as we got into the evening and the F-16s had hit them a few times, I think we destroyed their morale. They'd thought this was going to be easy pickings, this air crew out there, and all of a sudden they ran into heavy resistance. There're the M- 203s. There're expert marksmen. And there's close air support, with F-16s coming in. And so the later it got, the more the battle died down.
After nightfall, I put on my night-vision goggles, looked out into the battle area, and didn't see any movement whatsoever.
Then we got word that our exfiltration was twelve minutes out.
I couldn't help but think of Vietnam then. One lesson we'd been taught was that the North Vietnamese, knowing there'd be a rescue attempt, would lie in wait. That way they had a bigger target.
Thinking of that, I decided not to give the Iraqis the chance to do the same thing.
Back behind us, maybe another three hundred or four hundred meters, was a berm that I had identified. We moved out and did a retrograde operation across to the other side of the berm. I wanted to put some cover between the Iraqi force and the helicopters when they landed, to prevent the Iraqis from stepping up.
Because the helicopters were flying low, we couldn't talk directly to them. We had to talk through the F-16 that was above us, and he would relay to the helicopter. The F-16 guy came through: "Give me your exact location so that the birds can pick you up." I turned to the weapons sergeant, who had the GPS, to get a reading. But when he pulled it out, it turned out that it was ruined. It had gotten busted up when he had fallen during the fight.
In my mind, I was seeing these guys coming in and getting the shit shot out of them. But then I remembered that that old PRC-90 radio had a beacon on it. So I said, "Can they pick up that beacon?"
They said, "Well, turn it on."
Buzzsaw kicked on that beacon, and within a few minutes we heard the wok-wok-wok and they swooped, and almost landed on top of us. I bet it didn't take us ten seconds and we were off the ground.
And it wasn't until then that it struck me that we were very fortunate. We had had an Iraqi company on top of us, and we had been able to get out of there. It was a tribute to the Special Forces A Team, and to the training that we had gone through.
Later, it struck me exactly what had happened to us and what we had done. I'm sure that battle is still on the minds of those people in that village today. One thing that personally satisfies me is that somewhere there are some kids, probably teenagers now, who are leading productive lives and don't know how close they came, just a decision away, to being shot.
Just before we got ahold of these F-16s, two of the guys, DeGroff and Dan Kostrzebski, one one side of the ditch, one on the other, turned around and waved good-bye to each other. It was like: This is it, we're not going to get out of here.
And one of the things that struck me at the time, and particularly later— one of the gravest responsibilities of a ground commander — is that you are responsible for the lives of men, both losing them and taking them. Losing your own and taking from the enemy.
It's a grave responsibility, and I remember thinking, "We're gonna get overrun here, and if we do, I hope I'm one of the first guys that you're taking out, because I'm not gonna be able to stand it, fighting in this ditch and watching my guys die in front of me." But thankfully it never got to that.
XIV
THE FACE OF THE FUTURE
Carl Stiner:
One of the proudest moments of my tenure as Commander in Chief of USSOCOM occurred during the spring and early summer of 1991, in the aftermath of the Gulf War. It was called Operation PROVIDE COMFORT. Within a few short weeks, special operations forces, allied with many other wonderful organizations, saved thousands of lives. Our Special Operations troops used their soldier and special operator skills to bring peace, order, and stability instead of war, destruction, and violent change. In the end, the better part of an entire population of hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children, all of whom had been dispossessed from their homes, were able to return to their farms, towns, and villages.
These people were Muslims, but that is only marginally important. These people were people.
The story of how they were saved is important for all the reasons mentioned above. But it is also important for reasons that are more immediately relevant. In the war against terrorism, any Special Forces troops ordered into countries to root out terrorists and their bases will need the exact skills and training that stood them in such good stead in PROVIDE COMFORT. They will need to gain the trust, respect, and support of some significant part of the local population. They'll need the locals to help them, and the locals will have to be shown that the SF teams are necessary to their own future well-being.
The difference between peacetime and wartime operations is always radical, and yet the similarities are greatly enlightening.
It will happen again and again: Our special forces will have to shoot at people at night and shake their hands in friendship the next day.
REBELLION
Tom Clancy:
As the Gulf War came to an end in the winter of 1991, Saddam Hussein faced rebellions in both his south and his north — continuations of deep-and long-running conflicts. Though President Bush gave these rebellions verbal support, actual American aid was limited.