Read Online Ambush Alley: The Most Extraordinary Battle of the Iraq War by Tim Pritchard - Free Book Online Page B

credibility. He had no doubt that Grabowski really did care, but somehow he didn’t say the right things. It was the same when he gave the sending-off speech the morning before leaving Camp Shoup for the attack into Iraq. They were expecting a rousing speech about a “Band of Brothers” and “Fighting together for Victory.” Instead, he’d said something in his husky voice about getting to Baghdad as soon as possible so they could enjoy the luxuries of the PX, the military stores where marines could buy their Cokes and favorite candy bars. It was awkward. No one laughed.
    The battalion commander’s apparent obsession with gear uniformity also concerned him. He wanted all the machine-gun ammo men to look the same, all the grenadiers to look the same even down to the exact location of a magazine pouch. Reid understood the point he was making. He guessed it was a good thing to know where to find ammo on a marine if necessary. But he did think it was over the top.
It’s a lot of bullshit so that
the battalion commander can feel important.
He didn’t see how that would help him fight his battle. In Reid’s view there were other concerns that deserved more time and energy. He did accept, though, that maybe Grabowski was right. Maps, compasses, and first-aid kits needed to be carried in a standard location.
I guess that’s why I am a lieutenant and not a lieutenant
colonel.
    Reid stuck his head out of his TC’s hatch. They were moving up on the left of Bravo Company. Up ahead he could see the first sign of activity. A few cars were driving back and forth real slow and the occupants stopping to talk to people.
This looks suspicious. They look as though they are getting ready to do something.
An old man leading a mule was carrying a bundle of what looked like white sheets. As they moved up, marines in Reid’s track pointed their M16s at him and shouted at him.
    “Drop what you are carrying.”
    “Fucking drop it.”
    “Drop your fucking laundry.”
    They weren’t really nervous. They were just doing what they thought they should be doing. Anyway, the harmless old man didn’t understand and just walked on.
    Farther to the rear of the column of Charlie vehicles, in the back of track 211, Lance Corporal Thomas Quirk of 3rd Platoon was having a hard time of it. The exhaust was coming back into the track, and the dust and dirt and smell of diesel were getting to him. He was hacking up wads of yellow pus caused from the dust infecting the lung’s membranes. His vocal cords felt stretched and raw from the coughing. He no longer knew how long they’d been moving, but for hours now he’d been cramped up in his track, dozing off in the most uncomfortable of positions: a head in someone’s lap, a foot on someone’s stomach, a hand in someone’s ear. It occurred to him that if someone had opened up the track, it would have looked like something from a nature documentary on the Discovery Channel. They were like little animals all curled up together in a dark hole.
    The radio squawked into action and the marines dozing in the rear forced themselves awake. In the distance was the sound of gunfire. Quirk’s squad leader, Corporal Randy Glass, who had been monitoring the radio, spoke up.
    “Hey, listen up. What we heard is that the Army is pinned down in the city to the north of us and we’re going to reinforce them. And we gotta watch out because the hajjis were making out like they were giving up and then pulling out AK-47s on them. They killed a couple of Army guys.”
    In his head, Quirk slagged off the Army.
These fucking idiots got themselves in trouble. These pussies are in the wrong fucking spot. They need to
be building churches and handing out food, not fucking getting in firefights.
    Then another message came through the radio. No, the Iraqis had not pretended to surrender.
The briefs are changing all the time. What is
going on?
    Quirk was glad for the minor excitement. It was something else to talk about. During