![[Project Gutenberg]](http://www.gutenberg.org/ftp/images/PG_Button_104x40DEF64.gif)
My RSS Feeds
Incoming!
Originally published by the New York Times on March 19th, 2006
Sometimes I wake up here and for just a fleeting moment I am simply a human being shaking off the vestiges of sleep, and I forget I’m in Iraq. Not today. This morning I was awakened by three big explosions that sounded way too close for comfort. I reached over and pressed the Indiglo light on my alarm clock. It was 0600 — 15 minutes before my alarm would have gone off. I got out of bed, stretching, and thought, “Another lovely day in Ramadi.”
You’ve all seen actors in a hundred war movies yell “Incoming!” and run for cover. We call this indirect fire (IDF). The United States military and its adversaries have always bunkered down and fired some form of artillery through the air at each other. This war is no different in that sense, except that the enemy is not an Army – it is a group of murderers and extremists who hide among the citizens we’re helping to protect.
Part of reality out here is knowing that an IDF attack can occur at any moment. In training, they throw extremely loud artillery and grenade simulators all over the place. But no matter how intense the training, you know they won’t kill you. You do not know what it is really like until you experience it. After nine months here, I hardly even flinch anymore. My ears have been trained. I usually know by the sound if it’s enemy incoming or friendly outgoing.
Part of the enemy’s projectile (usually a 10- to 50-pound bullet) simply makes a hole in whatever it hits – the ground, a wall, your roof. But the rest of it explodes upon impact, sending shrapnel and fragments flying with blind fury and frightening momentum. Shrapnel can be described as ½-inch to 12-inch superheated razor-sharp chunks of steel that move at over 200 miles per hour for hundreds of yards, sometimes until they find something hard enough to stop them.
I had a pretty close call once. My room is part of a one-story building unofficially known as “mortar alley” because most of the IDF that hits our base lands right behind us. It was 2300 and I was standing outside a sergeant’s room talking shop. In the middle of a sentence, there was a huge orange flash and a loud explosion. I immediately threw myself down behind some sandbags five feet away. After a few seconds, the sergeant yelled “Come on, sir. Get inside!” I ran in and slammed the door.
When I went back to my room, there were concrete shavings all over my bed from the force of the explosion against the wall. The mortar had landed about 200 feet from my bed, right behind the building.
IDF injuries in my unit have been mostly superficial (knocking on wood here), and our soldiers have been treated and returned to duty. Another unit’s barracks took a direct hit once, wounding about a dozen soldiers. A friend of mine had a rocket land 15 feet from him. Miraculously, he was unhurt. The ground was parched and crusty, but there was a nearby spot where water had pooled and created sticky mud. The rocket landed right in the mud, pummeling 10 feet into the earth and spraying dirt all over him as he dove for cover. He was very lucky, or blessed, depending on how you want to look at it.
And of course there are the rumors. I heard of one guy who was in the shower and bent down to pick up a shampoo bottle. When he did, a rocket came through the wall right above him, but didn’t explode. He had to step over it to get out of the shower trailer.
To my knowledge, there have been only two deaths by IDF on my F.O.B. in the past 9 months. In one case, the individual was hit directly with a rocket. Obviously, he felt no pain and it was a very messy scene. In another, a civilian contractor died from shrapnel wounds. Considering the odds against a single projectile sailing through the air in the Sunni Triangle and landing directly on top of you, many soldiers have been known to talk about that “golden round” with your name on it. The theory is that if it happens to you, unlikely as it is, then it must be your time to go. Thinking about it this way seems to make it easier to deal with. This situation lends itself to some pretty absurd humor.
We are caught up in that proverbial choreography of good versus evil. They shoot, we shoot back. It’s easy to get angry when you and your soldiers are the target, and there is definitely a dark satisfaction in hearing friendly fire in response to enemy IDF. Many times I can hear the outgoing fire sluicing through the air hundreds of feet above my head towards a carefully predetermined target. As the 95-pound bullet whizzes past, the Doppler effect plays tricks on my ears. I have been known to cheer out loud.
The enemy might shoot at us once a day, five times a day, or not for weeks. We never know. How many are going to hit the F.O.B.? What are the odds of one hitting your body directly? How many are going to hit someone’s hooch, office, or a place where people gather? It’s very difficult to say because there are so many factors — weather, luck and level of training, to name a few. But in the span of a year, some are definitely going to hit.
I can’t count how many times I’ve heard or felt IDF in the past nine months. Nonetheless, it’s always a surreal experience when you’re sleeping, working out, eating chow, or simply lost in your own thoughts and the thump-thump-thump of incoming rounds gives your world a little shake or the door to your room suddenly rattles in its frame as if someone just gave it a swift kick with a combat boot. But you get used to it. If you’re still alive after the explosion, the threat is gone almost as soon as it came.
We take a lot of precautions. Without revealing any details, I will say that we have some incredible technology that mitigates the IDF threat. We also put metal, wood, concrete, sandbags, and whatever else we can find over our windows and around our buildings to keep the flying shrapnel out, giving our dwellings all the ambiance of a cave. Of course we have body armor, but we don’t always wear it when we eat, go to the store, the gym, the shower, and do whatever else we need to do. I’d be willing to bet that the number of people back home killed each day in car crashes is higher than the number of American soldiers killed by IDF in Iraq in a year. Still, given a choice, I’d take an icy interstate over an F.O.B., or a drunk driver over a fanatical, suicidal killer.
I’m not complaining, simply reporting. It’s a war. Things blow up. As the United States military, we represent the citizens of our own country, and we remain committed whether or not those citizens believe in or understand the political machines that nudge entire nations into war. We don’t have time for political debates right now, we’re simply trying to do the job we raised our hands and swore to do. And we need your support.
"And we need your support."
You describe your world at war in a calm and very terrifying way. Your
post ends, " And we need your support". That translates, for me, as prayer
many times a day for you, all those at your F.O.B. and for others for whom
names have been given. I believe this to be the most powerful way that I
can fulfill that last sentence in your post. Without prayer, one seems so
small and insignificant in giving any kind of meaningful support. I
contribute efforts through a variety of organizations, but it is in prayer
that I trust for the Big Lifting.
Dear Lee,
The military has and will always have my undying support and love. You can
thank my Marine dad for that...he raised us right. I apologize to no one
for my patriotism and fly the flags (the American flag, and of course the
Army and Air Force flags for my boys) high over our house. My youngest boy
(Army) has talked about the mortars and such that come in where he is...it
does make for a bit of excitement. Keep your head down, Lt K, and come back
safely.