After Action – Excerpt

AS SCUD AND AL SAMUD MISSILES began to fall on Kuwait, I felt a detached sense of relief. Even as I fumbled to don my chemical suit with hands like clubs, I was almost giddy with excitement. The wait was over. The war was on.

Throughout the morning sirens echoed across the otherwise eerily silent airfield, warning of incoming missiles. Very few of us had ever had to take cover for real before, and at first the bunkers fi lled up rapidly with wide-eyed Marines. But with each warning that was not followed by a missile landing nearby, our response became slower and slower.

Feigned indifference replaced urgency—like having huge missiles potentially carrying chemical weapons dropping out of the sky around us was but a minor annoyance. Nervous laughter and stress yawns behind gas masks betrayed the truth though—being a target sucks big time.

Mid-afternoon we received orders to execute our strike mission. The time-on-target (TOT) for our squadron to destroy the five Iraqi border posts was set for 2200 that night.

I was surprisingly calm. Until now my most pressing concern was that the war wouldn’t happen at all. Now that it had started my concerns just seemed to disappear. My mind was filled with excitement and eager anticipation for something I’d spent years preparing for and was convinced I understood. I knew what I’d been taught and trusted that it would be enough.

Everything that needed to be done to prepare for the strike mission had already been accomplished—twice. Instead of the normal hustle and bustle the squadron was subdued, like everyone was conserving energy for what was to come. Groups of Marines gathered around the squadron tents, talking in low tones, reading or just trying to look relaxed. Tension permeated the quiet though and showed us all to be liars.

A little before 1700 that afternoon I got up from the sandbag I’d been sitting on and wandered over to the chow hall tent for a cup of coffee. I’d read the same page of my book four times before admitting it was futile. There were over three hours before I needed to be at my aircraft but I just couldn’t sit still anymore.

The sound of a racing engine and slipping tires drew everybody’s attention. Closely shaved heads turned in unison toward the sound as a tan SUV whipped around the corner and skidded to a stop behind the ready-room tent.

Who’s that driving like an asshole? I wondered.

A second later my question was answered as the squadron CO and XO came barreling out of the front seats. Without a word they burst into the ready room.

I had no idea what was going on but knew it was serious.

Lieutenant Colonels don’t run around like that without good reason. I veered off from the chow hall and headed toward the ready-room tent along with the twenty other Marines who’d been hanging around. Unconsciously, I broke into a run as feigned calmness was brushed aside by a ground swell of excitement.

Could it be? Is it on? Just then the wailing of a siren announced an inbound attack. I froze like a deer in the headlights, muscles quivering but mind torn.

Shit! Go to the bunker? Find out what’s going on? The choice was made for me as the CO, Lt Col Heywood, and his copilot came running out of the tent.

Forestalling any questions from the Marines converging on him like piranha, the CO yelled, “There is no TOT, Go Go Go Go!” His words and the direction he was headed made it clear that we were launching—the timeline was gone and the race to destroy the observation posts was on. Cups of coffee, half-read letters and tattered paperback books all fell into the sand as the squadron exploded into action.

Training and preparation took over as the pilots, crew chiefs and mechanics dropped whatever they were doing and raced toward the flightline. In a heartbeat the squadron changed from two hundred individuals meandering through the day into a single organism with one purpose in life, one imperative: Destroy the targets.

Nothing else mattered. Thoughts of home, worries about hitting the wrong target and fears of what might happen simply disappeared, buried beneath the claxons and flashing red lights that flooded my head.

I remember nothing of the half-mile sprint to my aircraft.

All pretense of calmness was gone. The only thing I could focus on was running, just run, faster and faster, just run.

A dull boom echoed from somewhere out in the desert and underscored the urgency of getting airborne.

Thoughts flashed quickly through my hyperactive brain.

Would we even get off the ground? Were there chem’s in that last missile? Are more damn missiles inbound right now? Fuck it. Run, just run.

Our crew chief, LCpl Bottama, had removed the securing gear and had our cockpits open and waiting for us. I reached the bird just steps ahead of Gash and yelled at him through the open canopy.

“What the fuck happened?” Gash responded between gasps. “Don’t know…saw you running…figured I’d go too.” With our helmets, armor and flight vests on in seconds we climbed in our aircraft. My heart was pounding against the inside of my flak jacket with such force I imagined it might break through. I plugged my helmet into the ICS and heard Gash breathing rapidly as he went through the quick-start checklist.

My brain was in overdrive. Thoughts flashed by so fast they barely registered and I was in danger of being overwhelmed. I nervously followed Gash through the checklist just to try and calm down.

Within a minute Gash had the first engine running and I could begin my checklist in the front seat.

There was no pent-up stress in my body—it was being consumed like jet fuel tossed on a fire—and I began to function mechanically. Without thinking I flipped on our two radios and set the frequencies for check-in.

Our 43-mile route to the target was already saved in our navigation system, so all I had to do was align the GPS and activate the route. Gash got the second engine started and as soon as the blades were at 100%, we ran through the arming checklist in record time.

Unable to do anything while the ordnance crew armed our weapons, my mind started to break free again.

What the fuck is going on? Are missiles inbound right now? What if I get shot? What if Gash gets shot? Do I have a fresh canister on my gas mask? Shit! This is for real! What have I forgotten?… While my frenzied brain spun out of control, the ordnance crew armed all our weapons and raced out of our rotor arc. Out of habit I shifted my eyes to the ordnance team leader in anticipation of his salute. It’s always the last action the team leader takes after the aircraft is armed. This time it was anything but a formality.

Standing ramrod straight the Marine slowly raised his right hand, fingers extended and joined, to his cranial. With his fingertips hovering an inch over his right eye, he held stock-still amid the tumult of the flightline, waiting as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

His calmness and demeanor brought my screaming mind to heel. Seeing his example reminded me that we do this shit all the time, the only difference is that it’s for real. That’s not as big a difference as I was making it out to be.

Calm descended over me as Gash and I returned his salute.

Chill fuckhead, you know what you’re doing.

My internal pep talks were always profane.

The Marine’s right arm came down faster than I thought possible and in the blink of an eye he was gone, running to the next aircraft. That was all it took. One time-honored gesture of respect between warriors and all the extraneous bullshit whirling around my head evaporated.

You’re a goddamn Marine Cobra pilot, quit fucking around and do your job.

The white-hot energy that fueled my mindless sprint still raged within but that one thought gave me control. Like a steam engine I harnessed the fire and made it work for me. Now I owned it.

I took a deep breath to calm myself. Then I went methodically through the after-arming checklist with Gash. The comfortable cadence of the challenge/response was reassuring and soon we were ready to go.

Weasel was our division leader for the strike. His calm voice initiated the radio check-in and brought us up to speed over the inter-flight frequency.

“I don’t know the reason, but the TOT is gone; it’s each division for itself. We destroy the OP and then recover at Astrodome FARP to await tasking.” If he was suppressing any thoughts of his pregnant wife at home it didn’t show—Weasel definitely had his shit together.

I rogered up, followed a second later by Willow in the Huey.

Like most Cobra pilots who’d never been in combat, I usually made fun of the Hueys in our squadron—they were slow, overweight and lacked long-range weapons. Not this time though. Now that it was for real I was happy to have the fat kid tagging along. With its door guns manned by aggressive and accurate Marines, any threats that popped up close to us would immediately get cut down. The Cobras could take care of the long-distance stuff but there was nothing better than a Huey with door gunners for close-in work.

Nothing else needed to be said. We all knew the plan and the desired end state; now it was just a matter of execution.

We took off a second apart and stayed below 50 feet for our join-up. Once we were all together, Weasel turned to the northeast and our three ships headed toward the Iraqi border, low and fast into the darkening sky.

The pressure in my boiler was running high but still containable.

I settled into a tenuous balance between hyper-alert and calmly efficient. Like riding a bike, it was a balance that would become second nature.

It wasn’t a long flight to the border and Gash and I quickly readied our aircraft to fight. Although we could do it by memory, this wasn’t the time to risk missing something. As we went stepby- step through the checklists, the worn and soiled pages on my kneeboard reminded me of the hundreds of times I’d done these exact same actions in training. The familiarity kept my mind focused and reassured me that I hadn’t skipped something important. I was right where I needed to be.

Peering through the sights I looked for something to focus my sensors on. There was nothing but brown sand. Surprised, I looked up. As far as I could see the entire desert was empty, devoid of anything man-made. A couple of days ago this area was a seething anthill of men and vehicles. The hundreds of thousands of coalition troops and tons of equipment had simply disappeared. I wondered, somewhat foolishly, where they had gone before snapping my mental blinders back on.

Doesn’t matter. Get your head in the game. Nothing else matters.

Picking an empty patch of sand I shot the laser and got a good return that verified it was working. Next came the 20mm cannon. The long barrels underneath my feet slewed left and right and up and down but when I pulled the trigger, nothing. I could hear the barrels spinning but the gun wouldn’t fire. Gash verified that all the circuit breakers were in and then pulled up next to Weasel so he could check us out. I tried to fire it again and IKE reported that we were dropping rounds out of the bottom. The gun was mechanically fine but no firing voltage was reaching it.

Fuck! First time into combat and my gun doesn’t work? Fuck me.

We still had missiles and rockets—but I really wanted the cannon. This was not an auspicious start but there was nothing I could do. We couldn’t fix it from the cockpit and there was no time to go home to get it fixed. We’d just have to make do without.

We were still miles from the border when we completed all our checklists. With nothing to do, my mind started to chafe at the inactivity. Several times my imagination broke free and assumed the random trajectory of a pinball. Horrible scenarios of what might happen lit up brightly as my thoughts careened off bumpers of imagined dangers and got slammed by flippers of fear. With practiced effort I forced myself to remain in the moment. I couldn’t risk thinking about the entirety of what we were doing. I just needed to stay focused on the next little step and not jump ahead.

Step-by-step, one foot in front of the other. Keep going.

The calmness came back; this time for good. We were at our initial point.

Weasel turned toward the target and slowed to 30 knots as Gash and Willow maneuvered into an echelon right. I knew the observation post was 6300 meters off our nose and I buried my head in the targeting bucket to acquire it. Cold now, step-by-step, no thinking.

“With positive ID, flight is cleared hot.” Over the radio, Weasel cleared us to fire. The only thing left to do was positively identify the target buildings. There were Kuwaiti and UN compounds nearby that we really didn’t want to hit.

“Two.” “Three.” Gash and then Willow answered a half a second apart.

I tried to use the daytime optics but the picture wasn’t worth a shit. Everything was hazy and grey in my sights like I was looking at the inside of a ping-pong ball. Switching to the FLIR with a flick of my thumb I searched out in front of our aircraft, eager to be the first member of the division to acquire the small cluster of buildings.

6000 meters in front of us, along a heading of 325 was our target—I should have been able to see it already through the FLIR. To my surprise there was nothing but empty desert that morphed into sky with no visible horizon. On the fuzzy screen I couldn’t discern where the sand ended and sky began. I moved the sensor 5-10 degrees either side of where the target should be to be sure I wasn’t off a little on heading.

Why can’t I see anything? 5000 meters away, still nothing. I started to get antsy. Per the plan I should have already acquired the buildings and been firing a Hellfire missile at this point. Gash could see the distance- to-target ticking down on his HUD and knew the plan as well as I.

“Got anything yet?” His interest was not academic. The closer we got to the Iraqi positions without firing the greater the danger that the Iraqis would shoot us first.

“Searching,” I replied tersely.

I can’t shoot it if I can’t see it, I thought. Now where the fuck are the damn buildings? 3500 meters. I should have been firing a TOW missile into the flaming remnants of the Iraqi observation post but I still couldn’t see a damn thing. A sick feeling began to grow in my stomach.

Something caught my eye. A hint of a wavy line on my FLIR screen, a slightly brighter ribbon of green against the otherwise uniform pale background.

Is that the road? I scanned up and down the ribbon. The fact it remained stationary proved it wasn’t a weird pixilation and gave me the first good news of the day. My spirits rose as I identified the Kuwaiti border post, then the UN post, and then spotted the faint outline of several small buildings further north. Their arrangement matched the satellite photos I’d spent hours studying.

It was OP 11.

Finally, damn.

“Got it.” “Roger,” Gash replied. There was no question what ‘it’ was.

I set the FLIR to autotrack on the largest building and gingerly checked to see if it would hold. To my relief the four little dots on the screen remained firmly attached to the building.

Certain of the target I fired my laser.

2100 meters, the Hellfire symbol switched from ‘Ready’ to ‘Tracking.’ I lifted the final interlock and depressed the launch button with my left thumb.

“Firing.” “Roger.” Going through the rehearsed, sequential motions I felt detached, like I was watching someone else do them. There was no musing over existential questions of life and death, nothing special to separate this missile launch from all the ones I’d fired before. Mechanical steps. Just execute.

The calmness was almost unnerving.

Less than a second later the 100-lb missile roared off of our right wing. Climbing along its predetermined trajectory, the missile disappeared into the haze. I didn’t look at it though, my existence revolved around making sure the autotrack stayed locked on the building.

Seven seconds. Seven seconds to target. Fuck, uh 2…3…4…

I knew the missile should reach the target in about seven seconds but I screwed up the count. Didn’t matter, there was an automatic timer. With the crosshairs firmly parked on top of the largest building I continued to squeeze the laser designator as if the pressure I exerted would make a difference. Unconsciously I held my breath and waited for the explosion.

Come on, come on… At 2000 meters the aircraft’s nose dipped forward and the vibrations increased—Gash was accelerating into the final attack. At this range, any Iraqis on the observation post could hear our aircraft and would be trying to engage us with whatever they had. Speed became our only defense. The OP should have been a flaming mess already but the dust and smoke had really screwed up our plan. Now we were well within range of their weapons and we hadn’t hit them with anything yet.

Gash couldn’t stand it anymore.

“Is it going where it should?” The eighth second ticked by on the timer with no explosion.

“Nope,” I replied, much more calmly than I felt.

I had no idea where the missile went but it obviously hadn’t hit the building. Ignoring the fact that my Hellfire was streaking off somewhere into a sovereign nation, I switched to select a TOW missile.

“Switching to TOW.” “Roger.” 1500 meters away from the OP I could see the two buildings and a flagpole quite clearly in the FLIR. Gash was just able to see the compound with his naked eye from the back seat.

Fuck we’re close.

Mashing the action bar with my left hand I got solid ATK and READY flags and pulled the trigger. The second and a half delay between trigger pull and missile launch seemed to stretch to eternity.

Time froze as several small explosions flashed on my FLIR screen—impacts from Weasel’s 20mm cannon.

Fucking launch already! The wait was excruciating.

With a roar and flash the TOW missile ignited on our left wing. Like a pitcher’s curve ball its hot motor looped into my line of sight from the left. It corrected to align momentarily with the crosshairs in the FLIR and then slammed into the lower left corner of the largest building. The screen flashed white as the blast of my missile and multiple rocket explosions from Weasel and IKE rendered the heat sensors in my FLIR useless. I looked up for the first time in what felt like hours.

The only thing I could see was an angry fireball of orange flames, black smoke and pieces of debris reaching up toward us.

Before I could shout a warning Gash opened fire with rockets and pulled hard to avoid flying into the flames. His seven flechette rockets blanketed the compound with thousands of steel nails that sliced through buildings, vehicles and flesh as if they were butter.

Gash continued pulling hard left and I lost sight of the burning compound for several seconds. With relief I saw Weasel and IKE rolling back inbound to cover us. Anyone still alive down there wouldn’t have a clean shot at our backs.

A couple seconds later Gash returned the favor as Weasel pulled off target. With no 20mm I watched powerlessly as Gash covered his back. It felt like I was on a carnival ride as Gash whipped us through impossibly tight turns and stomach-dropping dives, all the while decimating the compound with accurate rocket fire.

Setting up for another attack Gash bled some of our energy off in a climb to 300 feet. IKE and Weasel stayed at 50 feet so one burst couldn’t take us all out. Any enemy gunner would have to target one of us and in doing so, expose himself to the other.

It’s not supposed to be fair.

Willow’s door gunner peppered the compound with .50- caliber rounds to cover all of us as we dove in for another attack.

A stream of bright streaks rippled off Weasel’s bird as IKE fired his rockets and pulled off left. Their cannon puffed angrily as Weasel hammered the compound with the 20mm.

As soon as they were clear I fired our second TOW. The extreme short range allowed the missile only one correction and for a second I thought it was going to miss. Still turning hard to align with my crosshairs the missile slammed into the burning building and blew it flat. Gash followed it with several high explosive rockets for good measure before ripping us away from the clawing explosions.

Gash jinked unpredictably behind Weasel as we raced toward the safety of Kuwait. The strike was over—now we just had to get away. Although I hadn’t seen anyone on the OP, I imagined hundreds of weapons were opening up on our exposed backsides.

Self-consciously I tucked my right elbow back behind the seat armor and tried to make myself as small as possible. I needn’t have worried. Almost all the way to Kuwait Willow’s crew chief hosed the burning compound with a stream of redorange tracers at 6000 rounds per minute.

Nobody back there had a chance.

Before I recognized what it was, the berm separating Kuwait and Iraq passed just beneath our skids—Gash had to pop up a little to keep from hitting it. Good thing he did because just behind the wall a light armored vehicle was moving into position at the head of the invasion force. One second there was nothing in front of me, the next I was eye-to-eye with the commander of an LAV-25. The sudden appearance of the grunts told me we were back in Kuwait. Safe.

Holy fucking shit we did it! The release was incredible. Elation at having survived my first combat mission flooded my brain. I felt like I had just stormed the beach on Guadalcanal, turned back the Chinese at Chosin and taken back Hue City. Finally I’d been in combat, seen the elephant and faced the ultimate test. And totally fucking destroyed the target! Years of having the holy grail of ‘combat’ held over my head by trainers who’d never experienced it made my accomplishment all the sweeter. Nobody could ever say “you’ll need to know this if you ever get to combat” to me again.

That’s right fuckers! I’ve been there! You can’t tell me shit! I didn’t even consider that the mission had not gone as planned, that I’d almost had to stumble on the target to see it and that my first shot of the war might still be traveling north.

It didn’t register that the entire strike had been easier than most of my training missions and I certainly didn’t think about who might have been inside the buildings.

Instead I just felt good. Like I’m finally a real Marine.

The thrill stayed with me as we completed the flight. Once we were well inside Kuwait we climbed to 300 feet and checked each other for battle damage. Finding none we headed to Astrodome FARP for gas and ordnance. We could have made it back to Ali Al Salem with the gas we had, but the plan was for all sixteen aircraft from the strike mission to recover at Astrodome and wait for further tasking. Being at the FARP would protect us from retaliatory missile strikes against Ali Al Salem as well as allow us to respond quickly to the invasion force when they needed air support.

Nobody answered Weasel’s radio calls on the FARP frequency so we cleared ourselves in. Knowing that thirteen other aircraft were converging on the same narrow strip of blacktop in the darkening haze we came in slowly with a minimum of maneuvering. We got on the deck quickly—lucky for me because in all the excitement of the launch I forgot to bring my night vision goggles into the cockpit. They are quite useless when stuffed in the tailboom.

Still riding the high of success and survival, Gash and I secured our aircraft, joking and yelling at Weasel and IKE as we tied down our main and tail rotor blades. I heard the clattering of another division nearby and, somewhat belatedly, wondered how the other strikes had gone. I’d been so caught up in my own little victory dance that I hadn’t even considered that some of my friends were still in danger.

Over the next forty minutes the FARP became a beehive of activity as the rest of the birds dropped out of the darkness to land. A thick layer of black smoke made it seem like it was later than it was and I was glad we’d gotten down first. The visibility was really getting bad.

Now that the strike was over we reverted to our normal combat division of four Cobras with BT as our lead. Leaving our aircraft, Weasel, IKE, Gash and I walked up the narrow road to find him. Realizing that I’d forgotten my kneeboard in the cockpit I ran back to get it as they continued on. I was still riding high on adrenaline and couldn’t imagine a better feeling in the whole world. I don’t think my feet hit the ground as I grabbed my kneeboard and hurried to catch up.

The sound of the Cobra’s engines barely registered amid the celebration in my head—just another bird coming in to land.

Ahead of me I saw the faintest outline of a Cobra parked on the road, its grey paint scheme making it barely lighter than the surrounding blackness. Off to my right I could hear the inbound bird’s engines spooling up as the pilot began his descent.

He must be landing on the other side of this one, I thought.

The elevated road was only 10 feet wide, with soft sand all around it. Birds had to land next to each other.

Something felt weird but I ignored it—don’t bother me with piddly shit—I just started a war! I hurried past the first parked aircraft—I didn’t feel like waiting for the landing bird to set down before catching up to the guys. Coming around its nose I was surprised to see another bird parked very close by. The weird feeling came back—stronger now.

Where’s this dude trying to land? From where I stood, the entire stretch of road was full of helicopters. There was no room for another to land between them. My confusion deepened as the whine of the engines and percussive beat of the main rotor blades grew in intensity.

Something was wrong, very wrong.

The impossibility of what was happening took a second to register. Then it hit with a flash—they were setting up to land on top of a parked bird! “NO!” I shouted with predictable results. The bird kept coming.

Fight-or-flight considerations took control and I tensed in anticipation. To stay put meant I would die. I had to move, but where? Dive for cover…or try to do something? Diving for cover wasn’t really an option. Even if I escaped the impact I would get caught in the fireball. Might as well try something.

Pulling a flashlight out of my pocket I ran toward the noise.

Oh shitohshitohshitohshit! Slamming against the side of the parked aircraft my heart was pounding out of control. I mashed the switch and pointed the dull beam of light down the length of the bird, trying to make it visible to the guys about to land on it.

Here it is fuckers! Look at it! Waving my flashlight underneath the descending helicopter I had a brief realization that this would be a really stupid way to die.

I flinched. Cringing like it would deflect the thousands of metal shards about to come shrieking out of the darkness I ducked. The noise was relentless, overpowering. Here it comes… This really sucks. Fuck fuck fuck.

The tone of the engines changed abruptly—the screaming turbines told me I might yet live.

They’d seen it! As the pilots waved off my fear turned to anger.

Dipshits! Get your heads out of your asses! I kept shining my little light as the pilots reacted to the danger and moved away. It wasn’t needed anymore but my brain just wasn’t thinking that way. After the noise of the helicopter shifted from intense to ambient I gathered myself and walked away like nothing had happened. If Marines whistled I would have tried to force a tune.

Just another day at the office … Bullshit.

Fuck me, I thought as the adrenaline wore off. What’s next? The dull circle of light underneath my right hand reminded me that the light was on. I had to try three times to turn it off, the shaking of my hands making fine motor skills impossible.

What the fuck is this? I’d gone through a full strike mission without the slightest tremble, but now I shake like a leaf? That just didn’t make sense—but neither did almost getting killed in the FARP. I didn’t want to go there.

It’s over. Forget it.

After jumping up and down a few times to dissipate the energy I was back to level. Shaking my head at the weirdness of it all I ran to catch up to the rest of the guys.