Best Cup of Coffee
Jacob stopped using drugs. It's funny you know, sometimes the places you hate the most is where you make your home. Jacob was 18 and traveling from the central coast of California toward Meadview Arizona. His family would be having Thanksgiving in Meadview, his cousins had retired out there. Traveling across the state of California was Jacob's mother (Lou) younger sister (Diana) by two years and Jacob. Traveling in a small 1990 Dodge Dakota pickup truck. There was not enough room in the cab for the whole family, so Jacob traveled that brisk day across the state in the bed of the truck. He tried to get warm in a sleeping bag but the licks of the wind were chili.
The family stopped off to get gas in Barstow California, as they pulled into a gas station. There was a homeless family, Father mother daughter and son. The children were Diana and Jacob's age. He thought to himself that life could be worse and he could live in this economically challenged desert town.
10 years later he would be stationed at Fort Irwin California and move into an apartment with his first wife Kerry in Barstow California. "Coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous" Albert Einstien
Some mornings there is nothing better than a cup of coffee to start the day. It was a bit cold and the ground was wet with dew that morning. The convoy of military vehicles that was a small part of the 11th Armored Calvary Regiment camped out on the Kuwaiti side of the Kuwait/Iraq border. Our Battalion Executive Officer (XO) Major Russell was cooking up a cup of coffee on a single burner propane stove. The major saw Jacob eyeballing his coffee brewing and asked if he would like some. The XO explained that he had only one cup but split it with him. It was the best cup of coffee Jacob ever had. Jacob checked on his section of soldiers and ensured that they were up and preparing to mount up. We were briefed that today was an election day, (the first Iraqi election day) and the local Iraqi's would not be allowed out in the streets. It was explained to our group that we would not have to deal with traffic but that children would run out to our vehicles. It was than explained that they must not stop for anyone on the road and must push north into our final objective.
The group of soldiers had arrived into Kuwait a couple of weeks prior to entering Iraq. Kuwait is very flat, hot and the majority of the population are outsiders such as Indian or Filipino people seeking employment. Kuwait 50 years earlier was a country full of very poor nomadic sheep herders. The discovery of oil had given the Kuwiati people a very comfortable living.
Camp Buehring Kuwait, and the work begins. Arriving into country they began preparing for what laid ahead of them in Iraq. The vehicles were not prepared for a battle of new age guerrilla warfare. The enemy had been trained to penetrate weak areas of U.S. troops by using improvised explosive devices (IED's).
The men began to improvise their defenses by adding 1/4" thick plates to our doors and sandbags along the bottom of the vehicles in hopes to deflect blasts against these IED's. Jacob enjoyed the huge chow hall and a fairly good selection of food at Camp Buerhing.
Jacob had his differences with the two other section sergeants prior and during the deployment. Jacob believed often times it was simply due to the fact that each section sergeant felt like another section was not pulling their workload or maybe even being treated unfairly. Funny this seems to be the reason for many of the differences between individuals today.
Anyway Jacob was approached by his platoon sergeant and he explained that the vehicles were not ready to leave the base because they were not hardened with sandbags. Jacob knew that his guys were hard workers and always did what they were told. The trucks were looked over to see his trucks. Jacob found the trucks and found another section was taking sandbags off of his trucks and placing them on the other sections vehicles. Jacob was furious and ran into the tent and told the other Section Sergeant (Staff Sergeant Bosley) that he wanted to talk to him outside. Bosley was about half of his size and saw how angry Jacob was and declined to speak with him outside. Probably a wise decision.
We awoke early in the morning and traveled north through Kuwait. We arrived at the Kuwait/Iraqi Border. Upon waking up and getting ready and ensuring my men were ready to mount up and head into Iraq, I saw Major Wilcox brewing a cup of coffee. The major asked if I would like to share his cup of coffee which I took him up on and it was the best cup of coffee I ever had.
They drove over the Iraqi/Kuwaiti border into the great unknown. The convoy drove north toward Baghdad. They passed through much of southern Iraq. There was more to see in Iraq than in Kuwait. The group passed through some towns, children came running out of the desert pointing to their mouths. The children were hungry; they sometimes would toss water bottles to the hungry children. Occasionally the children would flip them off for not giving them food.
After driving all day night settled on Iraq. The convoy pulled into a small base in Scania. It was finally time to get out of this truck and get some grub inside the chow hall. The chow hall seemed to be some portable trailers slapped together and inside tonight was steak and lobster for the troops. The steak and lobster for dinner was a nice treat, Jacob woke up and headed out to the porta john to drop off a load. I was not use to using a porta john with my weapon and nearly 70lbs of gear on. Somehow Jacob managed to squeeze in and piss all over his pants. Great, already feeling dirty and now he pisses himself, anyway on the road and on the way to Forward Operating Base (FOB) Kalsu.
The convoy of military vehicles fueled up in the small town of Scania. It was light outside now and you could see wild dogs everywhere. It turned out that Scania was a large power plant that supplied electricity to much of Iraq. They pushed on that afternoon and reached FOB Kalsu around noon. The large convoy of military trucks waited outside of the compound, as he set there waiting to get in the base, I watched a wild dog eat the intestines out of another dog on the ground. The dog pulled and yanked tearing the intestines out to eat and satisfy his hunger. Iraq is hungry, like a blood thirsty dog, desperate and depraved.
After what seemed like hours, they pulled into our new home 33 miles south of Baghdad. The men were new and fresh only a couple of people from the platoon had combat experience. The first night we stayed in a GP medium a large army tent. One of the soldiers Sergeant Bowman slept in his bullet proof vest, kevlar (helmet) and boots. Sergeant Bowman thought it was better safe than sorry.
That morning Jacob awoke and decided to find out where our section would be staying for the next year. People ask what war is like? Try imagining walking into work one day and not leaving for a year. War is kinda like that, but with bullets and bombs zooming by and blowing up unexpectedly. The section was there to relieve the Marines who had been there the last seven months. The marines were glad to see the new section there to replace them Apparently the marine had just shot a local Iraqi man in the stomach. He was quiet proud of the distance of his shot. It was about a 600 meters which really is not a bad shot. The bad thing was the local Iraqi man was unarmed and died the next day after stumbling into the FOB's front gate.
It was at times a bit difficult to decide when and when not to shoot at someone. The ammo dump was located along the south east perimeter of the base, a good 300 meters from the main FOB. Everyday local Iraqi's would climb the fence in order to steal the garbage, a couple of hundred meters behind the ammo dump and our living quarters. The thought of Iraqi's entering the compound "secured" perimeter and being able to ambush us at anytime never left our thoughts. It was always in the back of their minds, not only could they kill the section, they could get into the FOB and do a lot of damage. When I say damage I mean killing soldiers. So it was tempting to shoot at these infiltrators trying to decide to kill, shoot to warn or do what? It was a difficult position to be in 24 hours a day seven days a week for an entire year. What if the outsiders got in and decided to steal the ammunition and explosives to use against the soldiers? The FOB trash was burned continually to our east, the helipad to the west and a detention facility to our north. The section was for the most part on their own left alone from the rest of the bas
It was our duty to have a guard in the guard tower overlooking the ammo dump and the south east side of the FOB 24 hours a day. My section consisted of six men, we issued out ammunition, went out on mounted patrols and manned check points. Sometimes we even slept, washed and ate. My men were working hard 18-20 hour days sometimes, with no days off. I often protested, but we were undermanned and I normally was blown off.
Unfortunately the marines left with the generator, that ran their air conditioning, heat lights etc. and left them without one. So they acquired a generator from another part of the FOB. They found a contractor from Cashmere, the man had apparently been an electrical engineer and was happy just to have a job and could fix the generator when it went down sometimes with just a piece of tin foil. He was good to have around.
Well, I want to say one of the most difficult concepts I found to being deployed was keeping my section content. The 18 hour workday's took a toll on everyone. I had two Sergeants under me who in turn each had their own team. One of the Sergeants (Brad) was a little older than me and was not happy with my leadership and his lack of leadership. We would butt heads, most of the time to my face he would be very respectful but behind my back with the other men he was stirring up mutiny and voice his discontent.
We were did not get attacked directly for the first three months in country. The enemy was watching us and noting where we patrolled. We took somewhat usual indirect attacks by the enemy but nothing is more frightening than a long somewhat sustained attack of nearby mortar rounds.
The direct attacks I was involved in normally caught us by surprise with an explosion, rocket propelled grenades and maybe some small arms fire. The difference is that, mortar fire comes in sometimes so close that you can actually hear the crack of the explosion and they keep coming. You pray to God that the next round does not land next to you.
Our location on the FOB was a good two hundred meter walk to the edge of the rest of the base. We were located almost on top of the ammunition holding area (AHA) on the other side was airstrip and behind us was the garbage dump.
We were in a prime location for mortar attacks. The mortar attacks would have me pleading for my life to God, lying on the ground until they would end. One of my soldiers Sergeant Haley had to entrust his mother to watch over his money while he was in Iraq. To his disappointment toward the end of the deployment he discovered that his mother had a bingo problem spending the blood money he had earned on the game.
My wife at the time and I had just gone through a rough patch in our marriage prior to my deployment to Iraq. I came to the conclusion that women often feel abandoned when their man goes off to war. Everyday before dinner I would wait 30 minutes to an hour waiting to use a phone and call my spouse. An hour a day was not a luxury and it was spent trying to call home. I will never forget, a soldier (Sergeant Smith) had been killed a couple of days earlier, after returning from a mission. Smith had come in to see me that afternoon before he left for ammunition. Smith had tattoos of the characters from a childhood book "Where the wild things Are" Maurice Sendak. This was my favorite childhood book and I recognized the characters on his forearms. I asked him why he had the tattoo of the characters from the book. Smith said "it was his favorite book" He died that day in an ambush as he gunning in the Humvee, he caught some shrapnel from an IED in his thigh.
The wound did not seem to be life threatening so the convoy of Humvee's continued back to FOB Kalsu. The shrapnel entered Smith's thigh and severed his femoral artery, he was dead before the entered the gates of the base.
Our command had decided after that incident, our military personnel would use a Medical Evacuation (medevac) after an ambush and someone was injured. It was funny, the first three months that we had been at the base, there were no attacks.