What Happens After You Accept Death - William Webster (part 1 of 2)

We talk with William Webster about arriving as a brand-new Marine and getting rushed into a Ramadi deployment where the mission keeps changing and the gear never feels caught up. Billy relives the night of April 4, the first major casualty for weapons company, and what it does to you when there is no time to grieve but you still have to roll out again. 

• getting rerouted after SOI and joining a depleted unit 
• the shock of meeting the platoon then hearing Iraq is next month 
• pre-deployment training and the long chain of travel into theater 
• first impressions of Iraq 
• Humvee vulnerability, exposed gunners and learning gear midstream 
• insurgency realities and changing rules of engagement 
• early missions, driver skill and why convoy discipline matters 
• April 4 RPG attack
• making peace with mortality 
• grieving, lessons learned, and building new SOP

If you like what you've heard, this is a multi part episode. Make sure you listen to the rest of the story.

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Transcript

Quick Setup And Welcome

SPEAKER_05 0:39

Great. Let's tell everybody who you are.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

My name is William Webster. Um back in two thousand four I was PFC. Um I was in map two with you, Shane. Yep. Um so what's funny about all of this is I came out of SOI. I was supposed to actually, and a lot of my other guys were supposed to go to Hawaii. Ah, yeah. You're part of that group. Okay. Yeah. We we had um we had orders coming out of SOI in North Carolina to go to Hawaii. Um they were supposed to change our orders, and we were supposed to go to you guys. Well, they decided not to change the orders, and we ended up in Hawaii for I think like two or three weeks. Um, kind of like they were just holding us over, trying to figure out what was going on. And I think there was like a fight going on between the two. They were trying to keep us there so they didn't have to like spend the money to send us to you guys. Yeah, for sure. Um, but in the end, obviously, you guys needed us more than what they were doing. They had no plans, from what I remember, of going to Iraq or anything like that. Um, but I know you guys, from what I understand, were heavily depleted from all the prior everything from the the uh you know from all the Okies and everything all of that sort. Um, so you guys ended up pulling us over there, and we got to you guys in January. And I remember it was late as shit, and they were like, here's your room, take your shit, go. Like 05, 06, you're up, and you know, we're we're running. Um, so you know, of course, we don't know fucking anybody, we're brand new there, don't know shit. The only person we met was the the duties that night. We didn't meet you, we didn't meet nobody until the next morning. Yeah, and uh so we get there, we're putting our shit away, we go to sleep, we get up the next morning, and that's when you guys ended up. We all met you, and you're like, Yep, we're leaving next month for Iraq. And we're like, I'm like, what the fuck? I'm like, wow, nice, nice way to meet everybody, you know. Hey, how you doing? Uh, by the way, you don't know anybody from a fucking hole in the wall, but next month we're going to Iraq. So I'm like, this 18-year-old kid fucking looking at the world, going, what the fuck did I just just get myself into? Um, but honestly, it was probably probably one of the best things. Like you guys, you know, you guys were tough on us. You made sure we knew everything. You know, obviously, we're watching your six, you're watching us. You want to make sure you know what the fuck's going on and we know what we're doing. Um, I mean, I got a lot of you guys to uh to thank for that. Um, Cohen, Jax, Johnson, Harden. You know, you name you. I mean, you guys, we were down at the motor pool, down at the at the armory, breaking down weapons, learning all the the Humvees, uh, like anything and everything. Like, it was fast tracked and it moved really quick. And before we knew it, I think it was February 16th. We were we were out ready to go. March Air Force Base, we were getting ready to go, and I still had no clue as half of you guys were.

SPEAKER_02 4:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Um, but I knew my life was in your hands and your your life was in my hands.

SPEAKER_02 4:47

Yeah.

Training Rush And Deployment Route

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Um, you know, it it it it was scary, but it became reality real quick.

SPEAKER_05 4:54

I don't remember, but did you go to the March Air Force Base training? I don't feel like I remember you there, but did you go?

SPEAKER_00 5:01

Um I think so. That was what the one um at the time Gunny Morachi set up, right?

SPEAKER_05 5:08

And it was the um No the March Air March Air Force Base training was something official. Uh they used the old uh abandoned officers housing. Uh they kind of roped off a whole big block, couple blocks of area and made it into modified town with uh with people who acted like uh Iraqis, they're dressed in local dress and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 5:28

Yes, I was there. That was I remember doing yeah, I remember doing that. That was uh that was a good time. Um I don't remember specifically when it was, but I remember I was there because I remember the little the housing and the streets and all of that stuff, and um but yeah, so February 16th, we were on the plane to go. Yep. Um, you know, we ended up getting we ended up having a few delays um going to uh the reserve base in New Jersey, I believe it was for a few days. Yeah, um, a lot of guys seeing snow for the first time, like shell shocked by that one.

SPEAKER_05 6:12

For you, it was going home.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Um yeah, I was literally the next state down, so it wasn't anything for me. It was just, you know, I I remember in my head, I was going, is this what every deployment's like? Do we have shit going on like this nonstop? Um, you know, but there was uh there was that. Then I, you know, I I believe a few days in Jersey, and then we ended up in a few other places. I think uh Germany we landed in to refuel. Yeah, and then um we ended up in Kuwait. We did our acclamation period there. Um and then I remember I was in uh Sergeant Jordan's truck, Calais was my driver, uh E my was my driver, uh my gunner, sorry, and then I had an open seat. Um and that's how we we were on a convoy, that's how we crossed into Iraq. Yeah, um, somehow we acquired a radio, had a CD player, and crossing into Iraq, we played Let the Bodies Hit the Floor, because you know how Jordan was.

SPEAKER_04 7:31

Yeah.

Crossing Into Iraq And First Impressions

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Um you know, we ended up there, and then we stopped somewhere along the the the way at some random just like resupply, refueling, just like in the middle of nowhere. I don't even know what it was. All of a sudden we just stopped, and we we were there uh I believe overnight, and then we ended up uh that was before we actually crossed into Iraq. We stopped there to resupply for fuel, I believe it was. Um and then we ended up crossing into Iraq and went into uh what was that hurricane point.

SPEAKER_05 8:16

Yeah. Yeah. Any uh any impressions when you first drove any part of Iraq, kind of actually you after you crossed the line of departure and and got to see what your what the place was. Any any thoughts about it? I know you didn't come from a desert, so it might have been interesting as far as that goes.

SPEAKER_00 8:35

Um, you know, not not not seeing much for miles, because you literally just look for miles and miles and not see anything. I mean, there was um, you know, you had the hills and the mountains in the background. Um, but generally speaking, just seeing sand for miles and miles, yeah. I that was a shock for me because I come from the city life where everywhere you you look you have giant ass buildings, you know, it's it's everywhere you look, you see something. Um I remember you know crossing into into uh Iraq, and I I I just remember I was like, so are we gonna be getting shot at from this point on, or like they gonna give us like some leeway? Like, you know, because you know, you're a young kid, uh and even some of you guys, like you don't know what to fucking expect. Like you're you're you're heading there. I mean, first of all, we had Hum Vs that you sneezed at and they fell apart, you know. For for you know, some of us, it was you know, they they didn't have any type of uh you know the upper armors that we ended up with later or acquiring armor to put on, you know, none of that stuff. I mean, I remember I think it was Captain Wyler took his doors off for part of the time because when we first got there, because the man was so freaking tall he didn't fit in the front seat.

SPEAKER_05 10:14

Yeah. Well, he also had a philosophy that the uh like having sort of an outward-facing posture was uh either more threatening or less threatening. I don't I don't know. He said both at one point in time.

SPEAKER_00 10:25

So well, I mean, you know, you remember going over there, we was we weren't going over there for combat operations, you know. If you remember, Bush sat there and said we were done with those, so we were going over there to win hearts and minds. Like, right, right, okay, that's great. You know, you always gotta be ready for everything. And you know, riding around, we had either no doors, we had those doors that came up to like your waist, and then we had the L-shaped ones. And I remember when we got those, I sat, I was sitting behind them. I'm like, this thin little metal is I'm like, this is gonna save my life. I'm like, and then realistically looking at it, I'm like, that's not gonna save shit. Yeah, I'm like, I'm like, they're they're gonna shoot right through that thing, and everything behind it, which is me, is gonna be dead. You know, and and and looking back at it all now, we all we look at it, what the fuck were we thinking? Like these these Humphreys are gonna save us and we're gonna be great. The gunners had no protection up there at first. Like we were we were very we were not prepared by any any stretch of the imaginations, maybe tactics and stuff, but but uh equipment wise, we we got everybody's hand-me downs and expected it just to how we always do, but we'll make it work.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

And that early the early part, I mean, they had only started the IDs, and so we didn't fully appreciate what was coming. Um, no one, I mean it didn't exist, but you you uh there was something that you said that made me have a half memory, and correct me if I'm wrong, did we did we ship over our Humvees from our motor pool? Am I remembering that correctly? Maybe some of them.

Humvee Armor Gaps And New Gear

SPEAKER_00 12:28

I have I do not I don't think all of them uh but if I remember correctly, I think we did bring some of them over there with us, yeah. Um, but we had to keep some in the rear for whoever was was still in the in the rear doing I mean training, training and driving, and yeah, you still have to do stuff back in Camp Pendleton.

SPEAKER_01 12:48

Yeah, yeah, I have a so we we didn't bring all of it. I have a I have a weird memory of I possibly was even a part of driving driving it down to get it to get them shipped over. And that also might be a half memory coming from Okinawa when we loaded them on too. We did do that in Okinawa. Yeah, yeah, like like the the ones that were on Hansen to go on to the Essex, and so that might be the memory that I'm having. So I anyways, sorry, no, I take a tangent there.

SPEAKER_00 13:21

I just I do believe we did have a few um working parties or whatever to bring some Humvees from our from Pendleton um to wherever to ship them off. Um, but again, it wasn't, I don't think it was everything. I think they kept some in the rear for people that had to do all the driving and everything else, learn how to drive and such of that. Um but yeah, it was I run, you know, going going learning you're going to Iraq is one thing, and then when you're in Iraq is another thing, because you don't you you think you know, you think you have an idea, you know, especially from listening to people that have might might have been there prior. Um but what the the initial invasion to what we went through was completely different if you look at it.

SPEAKER_05 14:23

Oh, for sure, 100%.

SPEAKER_00 14:25

You know, like I said, we were going over there to win hearts and minds. They didn't give a shit about what we wanted, they just they wanted us out, they wanted us gone. You know, you you you went in, you shook hands with people that were 10 seconds later shooting, trying to shoot you in the back. You know, they they'd act like your best friend, some of them knew how to speak pretty good English. Um, you know, they'd they'd bullshit with you or whatever. And then you know, down the road, they're the ones trying to shoot you in the back. You know, so it was like, you know, and you're not you're not going over there fighting guys that are in uniforms. We're all uniformed, we're all in the same stuff. They're wearing whatever the hell, whenever, doing whatever they wanted. So it was when you're learning about, you know, they're gonna put IEDs in this and that and everything else, your eyes lock on to certain things, especially with all the garbage as you're driving around. They didn't use all the a lot of the crap that they said back when you're learning about all that. Yeah, they were they were and I I hate saying this because a lot of us I think went over there thinking they were stupid, and you know, thinking we could just go over there and basically clean house and it was our our place to just run over everything and do what we wanted. And they were not stupid by any stretch of the imagination, you know, especially you had guys coming in from different countries that were very well trained, that were training the the Iraqis, you know, and and training everybody to basically do what they did and uh counteract everything we did. Every time we came up with tactics, they came up with something that that uh out you know that that basically outdid what we did, and we had to redo our tactics.

Insurgency Reality And Shifting ROE

SPEAKER_05 16:41

Yep. Yeah, it was a big uh big cat and mouse mouse game for sure. There was always always a push and pull between you and the enemy. I think that's probably true of every war, I'd imagine. But yeah, especially in this, since it was not a like standard lineup online and shoot at each other type thing, fight over territory.

SPEAKER_00 17:02

Yeah, you I mean, yeah, I I think I've heard uh muster a few times, you know, it's it it it we were going over there and kind of like trying to figure out how things worked, what worked, what didn't. We didn't have like the ones before us to to to realistically tell us right this worked, that worked, you know, don't do this, don't do that. Like it was like kind of we went over there and it was like, all right, let's start figuring out how to do things, what works, let's see where we can do this, that, and you know, whatever tactics might work. And then my you know, you had tactics work for about a month or two and then had to change them up because they figured them out.

SPEAKER_01 17:49

Right. Well, I mean, you have you had several. I mean, that you you bring up a couple. I mean, the point you're making is well taken. I mean, you know, a kind I can't remember how many times our ROEs changed while we were over there. Yep, and that had to do with the that we had a changing landscape of expectation. Also, we as you noted, when we first went over, we were doing SASO operations. Well, that evolved after we started seeing the insurgency, as you mentioned, you know, other people coming over, and then our fairly failed attempt at handing over power back. Uh no, uh, all I was saying is that our our ROEs changed a bunch, and then our mission changed a lot too, because of when the insurgency came in, and then finally the another big change was when we did try to hand power over to the Iraqis in June, end of June, and that was just an abysmal, that was a huge failure on our part, the the coalition's part. That that then once again changed our mission, and we and we didn't have other than other than keep Ramadi quelled, there wasn't strong. It's not easy to plan a you know plan an at you know, quote unquote attack if you don't know what your mission is, other than we were trying to snatch up some bad guys, right?

SPEAKER_05 19:13

You know and it and we've we've said this before, but it was uh it was also a ever-changing moment in Marine Corps at that time, right? Oh yeah. All the gear was changing, the uniforms had changed, many of the weapon systems had changed, with the exception of the 50 cal, which will never change apparently for 150 years. Uh but but every other every other yeah, I was gonna say, yeah, the 50 doesn't have to change, it's perfect. But every other gun system has changed, all the optics were changing, uh, all of the radios were changing, uh, the Humvees got jettisoned right after that. The the airplane that we flew over on literally got decommissioned 18 months later.

SPEAKER_00 19:58

Like there's just uh you can point in any direction, and it was just a time where every part of the military was revamping itself for a new you know, I I I feel like we were like a um like a learning point for a lot of that went over there, and they were like, Okay, this doesn't work, that doesn't work, change this, change that. Because like you said, we were either before while we were there, or afterwards, a lot of stuff was was was coming and going.

unknown 20:32

Correct.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

And it was like, here, take this, here, take that. Like, you know, we went over I went over there with iron sights, and then they gave us um the ACOGs. Um, what was it, the RCOs or ACOGs?

SPEAKER_05 20:45

A COGS.

Camaraderie And Early Mission Lessons

SPEAKER_00 20:46

It was like, hey, now you gotta go, you know, go over to this base and and go uh, you know, go test them and make sure they're good and everything. It's like okay, well, what's wrong with our iron sights? I was doing just fine with that. Like, I know I can't see as far as with the with an ACOG or whatever, but I was alright. Yeah, you know, it was it was it was weird because like I said, me being fresh into the fleet, I'm like, is this how this goes for every deployment? Like, you know, it was it was weird, but like I definitely gotta say, um this is this was probably the best deployment I had in the whole 10 years I was in. Um, you know, not saying when I was with other other un, you know, other guys in 2.4 or 2-5, you know, because I went back to Iraq um after that. Um I went to uh Afghanistan with 2-5 and everything. But this definitely was was like the camaraderie and and everything was by far the best deployment that I ever had. You know, we had a lot of fun, we had a lot of good times, you know, we had our bad times. Um but overall the deployment to Ramadi after you know getting to know you guys finally, it was a good time. You know, and and I'm glad that I got sounds weird to say, but I'm glad I got the opportunity. Um, you know, and I and and and being the new guy coming in and getting to do what my you know what my uh MOS actually was, you know, you can't beat that.

SPEAKER_05 22:53

Right. Well, while you're talking about it, do you remember any sort of uh first missions, first instances where you were kind of learning about the team and you were doing stuff or or anything that stands out sort of in the early missions?

SPEAKER_00 23:08

Um I remember a lot of of going out, and as soon as we'd go out the gate, like I remember Sergeant Jordan would look back and he'd look at all of us and be like, we're gonna be fine. You know, you guys, you know, and and and and me and Calais were were new. E my was there, he was a Lance Corporal at the time. Me and Calais were both PFCs. Um, I don't know if Calais came in before me or after me, I'm not sure. Or we came in around the same time.

SPEAKER_05 23:46

I was gonna say maybe a week before, not long before.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

Yeah, there wasn't much before. Um, Calais was probably the and and and this is just me saying this. I I I loved him as a driver. He was, I say he was the best driver, um, but that's just me because he was my driver.

SPEAKER_05 24:09

Yeah, well, Radski has threatened my life. So anytime that's said, I now have to say he was the best driver, or else he's going to murder me.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

So well, I think yeah, you you you had Radsky, you had Homewood. Um, you had you had some good drivers, dude.

SPEAKER_05 24:28

I I have said this across weapons company, not even just our platoon, across weapons company, the drivers made the deployment. There is absolutely a million reasons why everybody should have died from a simple car accident, and somehow we they navigated everything explosions, bullets, gunfire, driving MVGs, yeah, garbage optics, uh all of it.

SPEAKER_00 24:53

Well, if you think about it, you're not trained to drive literally on top of each other's uh tire tracks, right? And how many times we'd be going out and it's like stay in his tire tracks in front of you, meanwhile, you have you know a good distance between you two. Yeah, I give those guys hands down, all of our drivers, I give tons of credit because you could have at any given time hit anything. The things that they saw, you know, the way they had to drive at times, it it hands down, they they were probably the best thing that we we had because we should have been dead a million times over, honestly. Yeah, yeah, you know, a lot of uh you know, I've heard you guys say it, a lot of IDs, IEDs blew up in between us.

unknown 25:52

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:53

You know, they they were that was the one thing that was shit that they were shitty at. They they would hit that button or whatever, and it would blow up right in between the trucks.

SPEAKER_01 26:03

Thank God they never figured out that timing. I have problem.

April 4 RPG Strike And Evacuation

SPEAKER_00 26:08

There would be a lot less of uh of us left if they actually did, you know, there were times they got lucky with them. Um, you know, I I I remember the one of the first times hearing gunshots off in the distance, and I'm like, oh shit. I'm like, this is real, and then like one of the first times you hear an IED blow up, and you're like, what the like you're looking around going, what the fuck was that? And then you realize you see the big puff of smoke somewhere in the distance, and you're like, I think that was meant for us.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

Yeah, you know, do you remember the do you remember the first time that you got engaged?

SPEAKER_00 26:45

Do you remember like whether it was an ID where you were shooting back or so unfortunately what the the first time I remember was April 4th. Okay, okay um April 4th was was not, you know, we Shane, we were out um across from uh I think it was like a three or four-story building at like almost midnight. Yeah, around there, maybe a little before. Um I forgot why we were out there, but I remember we were out there and so they had like a a courtyard. I don't know why, but so we had our truck next to the wall, and Emay was the gunner at the time. Um, so I stayed with him at the truck. Calais and uh Jordan, I don't know where they went, but they weren't around at this point. I think they went into one of the buildings with uh a few other guys. Um and Lieutenant Stevens had his truck, if I remember correctly, right across from this building. And it was almost under a freaking light, like they were just dead center under this goddamn light for some reason. And I remember, and I and I I remember um Morris was the gunner.

SPEAKER_05 28:22

Cohen was with the third truck, because yeah, you guys had three trucks, we were split section at that time.

SPEAKER_00 28:28

Yeah. Um Cohen was was with the truck, and they went to go change out. And I was ducked under me, me and me and uh E my were having like a conversation or whatever. We were just bullshitting because there was nothing going on, we were watching everything. Um and all of a sudden I remember hearing a huge explosion. And I remember when I got up and I looked around the corner, I saw a bunch of smoke, and I saw at the time what I thought was like pavement and rocks all blown up on the ground. Um I didn't realize at the time that they had shot an RPG and they they hit the uh Morris and Cohen.

SPEAKER_03 29:15

Yeah.

Grief Without Downtime And Last Words

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Um that was that was the first time I remember. I don't think we I don't remember getting engaged before that, maybe a few pop shots. Um, but I remember after that they because I don't like I said, I don't remember where Calais was. He wasn't around at the time. So they yelled over to us to pull the truck up to basically put it in front to shield um for Morris and Cohen. And I remember when I got over there, and and and this will haunt me forever, because I remember when I got over there, what I thought was the all the debris and rocks and everything was actually Morris laying on the ground. Um he took the brunt of the RPG. Um and and you know, it was it was hard seeing because I've never I've never seen anything like that. And I didn't know like we're all like what the hell. And I remember almost like like he his his if I remember correct, his right side was was torn up. He was in extremely bad shape. Um and I remember um I think it was Bundesin. I think I think it was that was the one that that was trying to um do whatever he could at the time. And you know, they basically told me to kind of hold his insides in. Um and then with all that going on, there was there was like they were taking pop shots at us still. Um so we ended up getting him into our truck. We put him on a on a uh on a litter and got him into the truck. And again, you gotta remember it's like midnight. So they um they look at me and they're like, get in a truck and drive. And I'm like, the fuck? I'm like, me? You want you want me to drive? I was like, um, okay, I've never driven one of these before. Sure. Don't go with lights, go with MVGs. I was like, what the fuck? I'm like, yeah, this this is getting better and better by the minute. Um, you know, so at some point they realized I couldn't fucking drive this thing with the MVGs, so they like turned the fucking lights on and just dun it. Um, so we turned the lights on. I remember while while heading to combat outpost, because that's the closest uh we were. Yeah, I remember getting there. Uh well, I remember on the way there. Um I think it was Bundy and them. There was a few in the back trying to do whatever they could um just to just to keep him alive, to to bring him to uh get him on the bird and to uh I think it was Germany. Um he was in bad shape. I remember I looked back at one point and he was facing towards me. And I remember I don't I you know when when somebody's in that kind of shape, you don't know what is what they're what's going on. Sure. Um so I remember looking back and he was he he was making some some like like noises like I've never heard a person make in my life. And it scared the living shit out of me. Um you know when I I remember you know just you know ye what what can you do at that point? Like I I remember just yelling back and I'm like you're going to be fine. We're getting you to where you can get the help you need. Um and again, I don't know if what he was hearing or if he was coherent. I don't I don't know. I don't know, like I said, what state you're in at that point, sure. Um so I I remember getting to combat outpost and they all start jumping out. I jump out and I forgot to put the fucking truck in park. So the fucking truck starts rolling. It's your first time driving out, so yeah, and I remember I want to say um, I want to say Sergeant Harden was there, he was one of them, but I'm not for sure. I I I I don't remember exactly who was there. Um, but I remember somebody yelling and going, get back in the fucking truck and put it in park. And I'm like, because at that point I'm getting out of the truck, I'm like, where the fuck, where's the fucking truck going? And I'm like, oh shit, I forgot to put it in park. So I jump in and um, you know, I put it in park, and they didn't let all of us who was there, they didn't let all of us in. They only let who needed to go in, um, bring Morris in, and then they took it from there. And I just remember from that point on, I was like, oh shit, this is real, like this is not like make-believe anymore, it's not a game. Um, you know, this is real life, uh, you know, people are going to get hurt, and people are going to die. And that's more or less where I made peace with everything. And once you make peace that you know you could die in a foreign land, it becomes a little more like you you kind of you kind of get a sense of like you calm down a little bit because it's you're you're it's it's weird to say, but it it calmed me down knowing knowing that, you know, like at any given point we cross out of Hurricane Point. That could be the last time you are coming, you know, going out, coming back, whatever. Um, you know, it was scary. Um, you know, and and one of the things that that and I I don't like, you know, like I'm I'm sitting here talking with you guys about this. I don't like talking about this. I haven't um in a long time. You know, I was when I was married, well, I'm married now, but my ex-wife, um, you know, she didn't she didn't get it. You could talk, you know, I could talk to her, but she didn't get it. She didn't know what we went through. You know, you she had her own own side of it to deal with, you know, having her having our baby and and and being home wondering what's going on, you know, times like that, not being able to talk to us for days on end, whatever. And now, you know, being married and everything, again, um, you know, you you don't you you can't come out and and talk to people about it because they just don't get it. And when you when you said you wanted to start this podcast, I was probably one of the first ones in the group chat, uh, Shane, that was like, this is a great idea. Um, you know, it's it's almost like a therapy session for some of us. Because I know you've talked to a few latham and them. Um, and they, you know, they said, I don't talk about this, this will be the only time, and then I'm done.

SPEAKER_05 38:12

It it's it's most. Uh, I think we're we're probably getting close to 40 interviews, probably close to uh with yours. I think we're at 38, 39, 40 somewhere around there. I don't know. I haven't counted. But uh of those, I would imagine I think it's 30 or 35 have probably all said that. That I will talk about this now, and I don't I probably won't talk about it much. There's only one or two who are like, yeah, I talk about this all the time, not a big deal.

SPEAKER_00 38:39

It's very rare. Like that. I there's no sense in talking to people about it that don't know about it and have never been through things that we've done or seen. Um, because they want they they they act like they understand it, but they don't, and they never will. You know, it it's a different place than you know what people think they know about what we've gone through.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

Um, and bring up you've brought up one of those really key ones with that that resigned moment, that moment that you make that transition of being like, it is what it is, but it's not suicidal, right? It's not it's not hopeless or helpless, but it's like this unless you've actually done that, it's so it you can't explain, you can't, there's not language to explain it because it's something that literally it's you know an emotional physical thing that happens to your point where it's like I can now relax, yeah, which sounds crazy, right? But I completely comp I completely identify with what you're talking about, that relaxed moment of being like, okay, well, now I'm gonna try I I I'm not worried about getting hurt, I'm not worried about dying. It's it is what it is, and mission accomplishment.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

Because think of think about it. When you go over there, it's keep everybody alive, so you know, and come home in one piece. So you're you're kind of tensed up trying to be overly cautious and everything else. Being overly cautious can get you in some shit too. Um so once April 4th happened, um you know, and then April 6th happened, um, and I had a lot of guys that I went to SOI and boot camp with that uh were either injured or lost their lives April 6th, too, and April 7th. Um that were in uh I believe it was golf company, Fox Company, whatever. I had a lot of lot of guys that were line company that went to those companies that um were in all of that shit that either got killed or hurt. Um, you know, so though those two days definitely hit very hard because I knew a lot of those guys. I went through SoI and boot camp with a lot of those guys. You know, um April April 4th will forever be in my mind, number one, because we lost Morse. You know, Morse was a great guy. You know, he was he was you know I he came in before me. Um him, Newmeyer, all of them, they they taught me a lot of stuff.

SPEAKER_05 41:43

It's funny, he was he was about a month your senior, not uh not significantly so, but yeah, he was in before you know, still a good guy.

SPEAKER_00 41:52

Um, I the thing with April 4th that gets me more than anything is me and Morris we got along, but we didn't get along, and a few hours before we actually went out, me and him got into some stupid argument about something, and it carries with me. You know, I don't remember what it was, it was probably something absolutely stupid that you know we we you know at the time thought was something, but it wasn't, and now I carry it with me because I can't ever say you know, apologize or anything for that, you know. So it kind of you know, it it gets at me at times. Um you know, but that and April 6th were definitely the two that were like, holy shit, this is real, and I just lost somebody in my platoon and a whole bunch of guys that I went to boot camp and SOI with that you know I knew for three, four, five, six months already, and now they're all gone. You know, and that's that's like I said, once all of that, and then I had that, you know, holy shit, this is real, and you know, you could be dead at any point in time. Like even when we were in Hurricane Point. When we got to Hurricane Point, I had one of the top bunks. Yeah, you had you had bunk beds. I remember laying there and I'm looking up, going, if they shoot anything and it drops, that cloth is supposed to protect us. I go, I'm I'm dead right off the bat. Like if something hits us square.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

I'm actually surprised that no one actually got hurt on base. Like we've had small injuries. Yeah, not small small injuries, but it is absolutely astonishing that we didn't have any significant casualties. Well, considering the number of times we got mortared and rocketed. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 44:10

I mean they hit that they they hit that one con Xbox and set it on fire. Yeah. That's uh that's that's as close I mean they got you know, they got close, but there was there was nothing crazy with any of that. Um I remember. I think I remember if weren't they like it was all it was like our 6 a.m. wake up call almost every fucking day. They were shooting mortars right across the river at us, right into the base. Yep.

SPEAKER_05 44:40

It was the only reason why you knew it was uh some kind of Islamic holiday or some kind of national holiday meant that our 6 a.m. wake up didn't happen. And that was like like six times or whatever. It wasn't very many times. But we were like, oh shit, the wait a minute, the incoming fire is late, and it would be late, right? They'd go to prayer early morning and be at mosque, and then when they would let out, then they would fire the mortars.

SPEAKER_00 45:05

Yeah. Yeah, that was I I I remember when that started, and I'm like, what the fuck is this? And it started happening every day. And I'm like, all right, well, here's our 6 a.m. wake up, you know, and you'd hear it start going, and you're like, okay, it must be six. They they lob a few and then they they disappear with their makeshift uh their makeshift mortar tubes.

unknown 45:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

Who found those?

SPEAKER_01 45:31

Yeah. We we we captured some. Yeah. I got a really cool picture. I got a I got a really cool pick of uh picture of of the one that they made with angle iron and everything. It's a it was yeah, they had it was extremely ingenious the what they had made.

SPEAKER_00 45:47

They had like three three angle iron uh to shoot them off, right? Correct.

SPEAKER_01 45:54

It was well, it was several pieces of angle iron, but there was three that they had used to to hold the rockets, and then they had a thumb screw to adjust for the elevation, and then they just ran, it was like speaker wire that they had run to a battery to uh to to make touch off the launch motors, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:12

Touch off the launch motors. That and that speaks to they weren't stupid. You know, even the lowest level of the ranks there were they were not stupid. They would put stuff together and you when you found it, you'd look at it and be like, what the hell is this? But they made it work. They got us. They did.

SPEAKER_05 46:34

Well, I'm gonna reel you back to April 4th just for uh a half a second, not uh not to twist the screws in any way, but and again, not to be your therapist either, but uh to give you a little bit of of uh a sense of what what might have happened on April 4th, and also the significance of it for our company. He was the first weapons company casualty. Never mind that he was a great guy, and I I agree. I thought he was like a little brother to me, uh at least partially. Uh as far as your never getting to apologize, uh I now, 22 years later, deal with a lot of trauma as part of as part of my career. And one of the last things to go when people are going into shock and sort of swirling the drain is your sense of hearing. Your sense of vision can go, your sense of touch can go. Uh, they may not even be able to speak, but often your sense of hearing is one of the last things to go. That's just because the way your brain is physiologically built. So, probably one of the last things he heard before he went into uh the surgical suite or the medical suite, and they did give uh they had given him some morphine and some stuff when they got in there, and he was out. By the time I saw him, because I came in right after you pulled in and they took him into Crickard's uh area where he was doing the medical stabilization. Yeah, um, he was already in there. So basically, right before then, when you were telling him he was gonna be alright and you were getting him evac, you were probably the last words of comfort he ever heard. Maybe you never know.

SPEAKER_00 48:15

Maybe you never thought about that, but well, because like I said, I you know, you don't know what's like I me being a 19-year-old kid, I didn't know what state you know would he actually be in. Yeah, you know, it was it was he was it was a shock seeing stuff what like you know, I from what I understand, if this is correct, he got resuscitated like three or four times on the way from combat outpost to Germany, and they resuscitated him again in Germany, and that's where he ended up uh passing away, I believe.

SPEAKER_05 48:56

I don't know if he ever made it to Germany, but uh maybe. I know that he was breathing on his own when he left combat outpost, and being able to breathe on your own at least means that there was basiler function still in place, and so he was still maintaining his own airway and uh and stable enough to get loaded on the bird.

Hard Lessons Turned Into New SOP

SPEAKER_00 49:15

So I remember I remember we went back to to from combat outpost. Yeah, um, we ended up having to have Lieutenant Stevens truck towed. Yep. Um, he ended up jumping in with us, he took the the uh back seat. Um but I remember going back to combat out uh not combat outpost, going from combat outpost to Hurricane Point, and we were all kind of just sitting there. Nobody wanted to go to sleep, nobody we we wanted to know what was going on. And I remember um Staff Sergeant Coleman coming in, and I remember him telling us that he had passed away. And from that point, it was just like nobody really knew what to do, you know, and and and you know, when you have those things go on, we didn't have any grieving time. There were there was no downtime. It was okay, well, now you're you know, here's the next mission for tomorrow morning or whatever, you know, so it was kind of it was like yes, that happened. We need to now resituate and and get everything going again. And it's like how does how how do you like just you you can't just flip the switch and act like it never happened, right? You know, it's one of the toughest things to deal with ever. And you know, you're just you're you know, we're supposed to be these big bad men that you know the enemy think we kill our firstborn and blah blah and all this, whatever the hell they say about us.

SPEAKER_02 51:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:02

And you know, what do you do after that?

SPEAKER_05 51:07

Well, you talk about uh you talk about a couple of things that we learned from that moment that we didn't uh realize. First and foremost, uh what do you do when you don't have a driver for your Humvee? Uh we actually did talk about that after that moment. And uh we did say that from then on, uh sort of our protocol was everybody should know how to push a gas pedal, because almost everybody knows how to drive a car, but that we wouldn't do anything fancy, right? No more NVGs, no more weirdness, right? Whatever. It's if somebody has to drive, they just drive. And you don't take any you take the most direct route, even if it's the worst route, no left and right turns. So we actually, me and Randall and uh and Lieutenant Stevens had that conversation afterwards. The second one thing was is that you were in uh you were in a closed top, uh what do they call the shellback Humvee or whatever anybody a million different hatchback Humvee or whatever they call them? They're not made to load a litter in the back. They're definitely not made to load a litter in the back and have people work on a human body.

SPEAKER_00 52:08

And so there was not a lot of room. We had, I if I remember correctly, everything was open in the back. The the litter was actually hanging out the back. Yeah, um, and we were well, not me, I was obviously driving, but they were trying to hold onto the litter as they were doing whatever they could do. Yep. Um, you know, so there wasn't many people in the back.

SPEAKER_05 52:33

Nope. I think it was just I think it was just Bundy and whoever was with you in the front seat.

SPEAKER_00 52:39

Yeah, it was it was we've we learned a lot from that. I mean, it it didn't, you know, you're you're not going out. I mean, you can go out expecting, maybe expecting to, you know, maybe get into a firefight or whatever. Right. Um, but you're never going out expecting to lose somebody, expecting to have this this huge litter sitting in the back, and you're trying to hold it in as you're racing down Michigan to go to to get to from where you were to combat outpost.

SPEAKER_05 53:15

Yeah. You know, um that's that's also why, and I don't know if you remember this, but the next time that we had that situation was with the engineers, and when they got wounded on the dam. On the dam, yeah. And we loaded one of them in one of those shellback Humvees. We actually opened the back two doors and slid them in sideways, and we had uh a strap, and we used the strap to hold the door shut, which held the litter in place instead of loading them in the back. That was our we had made that SOP from learning from that particular mistake, just shit you're learning on the fly.

SPEAKER_00 53:48

Yeah, again, that like I said, that was you you don't go over half of this stuff. It it's it's always stuff that just happens as you're going, and it's you know, now all of a sudden your brain has to start flying off the handle to figure out what the fuck do we do to get out of this situation?

SPEAKER_05 54:11

Yeah, you know, um the last thing that we learned from that particular incident, because that was the first weapons company casualty. I went over and talked to Staff Sergeant Coleman, and uh neither me nor Randall had a good answer for what was the answer. But we said, uh, what do we do about grieving? What do we do about you know, whatever? And they're like, if anybody wants to talk to the chaplain, they can. Otherwise, you're going right back out. And it's funny at the time I remember thinking, man, that's brutal. Like, it's fine, I'm good with it, but that's that seems rough and aggressive. It ended up that ended up being Marine Corps policy that when there was a significant casualty event, you debriefed, you took the lessons out of it, and you gave them a couple hours to talk about it, feel your feelings, think your thoughts, and then you go right back to work. There was no extended grieving period.

SPEAKER_00 55:06

Well, a lot of us, I mean, because it was it was early morning. I think a lot of us ended up from the adrenaline, from from everything that happened. A lot of us just ended up passing out.

unknown 55:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:20

Um, I don't remember what was what was for the next morning um for us, but I remember a lot of us just passing out, and we started waking up little by little, and I remember looking around going, was that a dream? Like, was that like it was just it was so like I I I wanted to wake up and hope it was a dream, yeah. You know, but then when you wake up and you see everybody still like half of us fell asleep still in in what we went out in. You know, it it was it was a tough time. I mean, you know, later down the road, you know, think about with IEDs. Later down the road, we got hit by ID IEDs. It was, are you okay? Can you go back out? Later down the road, it was they got time to get checked out and everything.

SPEAKER_02 56:16

Yeah, we didn't, we didn't know.

SPEAKER_00 56:18

We know it was uh with everything with us was are you okay? Good, get back on truck, let's go, you know.

SPEAKER_05 56:25

Next meeting up literally, and you mentioned it, we kind of passed over it, but Miranda and Cohen both took RPG shrapnel, significant shrapnel and had significant wounds.

SPEAKER_00 56:34

They were on the um did Cohen leave and then came back?

SPEAKER_05 56:39

He didn't leave from that. He left later. No, he left later from a broken jaw.

SPEAKER_00 56:43

I remember he left later.

SPEAKER_05 56:44

Yeah, he left later from a broken jaw. He did I remember that he did skip the afternoon mission the next day, I think. I don't know, I'll have to ask him, but that's that was my memory. But Miranda went right back out on mission the next day.

Multi Part Closing And Next Steps

SPEAKER_00 56:56

There was no well, that was a tough son of a bitch. Miranda was was was he he's built like a fucking he's a tough son of a bitch.

SPEAKER_01 57:05

Yeah. Yeah. If you like what you've heard, this is a multi part episode. Make sure you listen to the rest of the story.