Reconquest: Mother Earth

Chapter VI

Chapter VI

Mitch continued to put one foot in front of the other. A few feet away, Sarm shouted encouragement. Learning how to walk again was one of the most difficult ordeals of his life.  

As Mitch continued to exert himself, his mind wandered to the Middle East. For a moment, he was back in Iraq. With clarity, he remembered one of his missions. Mitch's SEAL team was given the task of capturing offshore Iraqi oil terminals. During the previous Gulf War, the Iraqis had attempted to blow up these terminals, which made it imperative for his team to seize them. Destroying the terminals would badly pollute the Persian Gulf and delay the cleanup and reconstruction activities. Winning the war was a foregone conclusion. Winning the peace would be a greater challenge.  

The mission had been a joint effort between his SEAL team and the Polish Groms. The sound of helicopters and high speed boats operating blitzed the calm night air as they made their way to the target.  

Operating with quickness and surgical precision, the enemy did not have a chance to react. In less than one hour, naval boat crews had taken command of Iraq's two major offshore oil terminals in the Northern Persian Gulf, along with two valve stations, a pipeline and an onshore pumping station. Mitch's team then began the process of clearing a path for the warships and cargo vessels that would be accessing the Persian Gulf into Iraq.  

Mitch had thirty total hours of sleep during the next eight days. This was one of the most critical operations of the war and there was no time for it. Luckily, Mitch operated well without sleep.  

He led a small flotilla of high-speed Mark five boats and rigid hulled inflatable vessels through the narrow Khawr Az Zubayr waterway, which connected Umm Qasr, the only deep water port in Iraq, to the Persian Gulf.  

Clearing the waterway proved to be far more difficult than capturing the oil terminals. On the second day, the team found three vessels filled with mines. Mitch and his SEALs were on edge at all times since some of these ships had Italian Mantra mines, which could sink American and British warships traveling through the region.  

The Khawr Az Zubayr waterway was a graveyard of sunken and abandoned vessels. Over the next eight days, Mitch's team searched through eighty seven ships. The tides rose and fell, and in the process exposed dangerous shoals. On the fourth day, gale force winds exceeding fifty-five knots hammered Mitch's fleet. Visibility was either limited or non-existent. To make matters worse, Iraqi death squads opened fire on the fleet. On more than one occasion, Mitch thought for sure they wouldn't make it out of this alive, and that he would never see Deborah again. He prayed silently to make it through. Not especially religious in his upbringing, Mitch found himself turning to God more frequently in these trying times.  

Mitch asked the men to hold on until the storm cleared. He had been through similar rough times and had always managed to find a way through it, but for many of the men on his team, this was their first war. He would find out what kind of character and mental fortitude they had. A day later, his prayers were answered when the storm passed. Rejuvenated, his SEAL team was ready to meet the attack of their enemies and complete their mission.  

They fought off the death squads in a hellacious firefight, then cleared the aquatic graveyard of mines. He counted his blessings that he had only lost two men in the fight.  

Up ahead of him, Mitch sought his destination, the door leading to the outside world. He wanted desperately to make it out of there on his own two feet. It would be a major victory in his recovery. 

Mitch held Sarm's arm as he slowly walked across the room that had been his home during his five year coma. Each day, he walked more and more. He still needed Sarm's assistance for longer distances, but he could now get from one side of the room to the other on his own.