Warrior Brothers (29 page)

During the first Battle of Fallujah, thousands of US troops were required to cordon off the city. Hundreds left Haditha Dam and only 37 remained. Many outposts were also abandoned, which meant there were no troops north of Haditha or between Highway Twelve and the Jordanian border. In other words, a void of several hundred kilometres.

The reduced number of military personnel and the increased threat made several of our clients extremely anxious. But things were to get even worse. We received intelligence that insurgents in Haditha planned to attack and overrun the dam. In the months leading up to the Battle of Fallujah, around the Haditha area US soldiers were targetted by roadside bombs and ambushes at least three times a day. There were times when our medics lent support and treated US casualties. But now it seemed like the insurgents were intent on getting close and personal.

One hundred and fifty Azerbaijani soldiers were responsible for securing the outer perimeter of the dam. I had inspected several of their defensive positions and, although they looked okay from afar, I had little confidence that they would be able to stave off a well-planned and coordinated attack. I didn't need to look far to reach this conclusion: their most vulnerable defensive position was secured only by a 50-calibre machine gun.

That sounds okay, but the reality was that there was dead ground leading to within 50 metres of this gun and it only had a 10-round belt loaded. The remaining ammunition was stored in sealed boxes that were secured in plastic sleeves. The two soldiers who manned the gun would have no chance of sorting that out at night if they came under attack.

With an attack looking more likely each day, I informed Kuwaiti Ops that an attempt to flee could prove disastrous. I decided that we would hold firm and secure the seventh floor of the West Wing. The 37 US marines would secure the seventh floor of the East Wing. The Azerbaijani soldiers would secure the outer perimeter. In the event that either side was overrun, we would break contact to the other side.

We spent three days rehearsing for the attack. Our aim was to secure the stairwells and corridors by creating choke points where the insurgents would be unable to utilise their greater numbers. We felt ready. Then we received intelligence that they were on their way – 1500 to 2000 of them.

I was confident we could hold our position and, to my relief, so were the guys. After countless hours of rehearsals, I couldn't help but be a little curious, even keen, to see if all our hard work would pay dividends. Most of our clients were fairly calm. I kept Kuwaiti Ops and our clients' security manager in Washington abreast of the situation.

The insurgents were moving ever closer. Eight kilometres away, six kilometres away. When they'd made it to within five kilometres of the dam, a couple of US gunships came to the party. With this, our approaching visitors decided to call it a day and that was that.

One of our clients, a really lovely guy, had reached the limit of what he could endure and wanted out. To move him I had to risk the lives of 11 security contractors, but fear is infectious, so we got him out fast.

We reached Jordan just before last light and moved to a small abandoned military outpost. We had not seen a single
military vehicle since leaving Haditha Dam. This unnerved our client even more, and he began to break down, saying, ‘This nightmare is never going to end.'

I told him that he was now at the border and at first light he would be taken across. We had 11 guys to secure the outpost and he would sleep next to me. But he was so paralysed by fear that he could no longer see reason and became entirely consumed with his own survival.

After escorting him safely into Jordan, we remained at the border until 10:00 hours so we could make the most dangerous part of our return trip in the hottest part of the day. Luck was on our side.

We were 18 kilometres away from Haditha Dam when we saw, at the side of the road, a seven-tonne US military truck that had been blown up. The US convoy, the only one that day, had been hit at 13:00 hours by an IED, and this attack had been followed by an ambush. Thirty insurgents had occupied the high ground with rifles and machine guns. They had attacked the marines, who'd responded with heavy-calibre weapons and automatic grenade-launchers. Unlike us, the marines were equipped with armoured vehicles. If we'd been an hour earlier, it's likely that at least one of our five vehicles would have been incinerated by the blast. Thirty insurgents pouring lead into our remaining cars would have been interesting. Who knows how it would have turned out?

Towards the latter stages of the project, on yet another road move, I was in the lead vehicle when my driver pulled out to overtake a truck and noticed a utility coming the opposite way. Unlike Sonny, this guy pulled back in behind the truck but the young Iraqi man driving the utility panicked and drove onto the verge. He then overcorrected, and the next thing I heard was, ‘Victa 1, this is Victa 5 – the utility vehicle just ran off the road and flipped several times.'

I felt compelled to return, so after ordering our guys to secure the road and cordon off the area, Joe and I went
back to assess the situation. What I witnessed made me feel sick.

The utility was upside down and looked like a pancake. The roof was flattened level to the bonnet, and the wheels were still spinning fast. Half a dozen Iraqi men helped us turn the vehicle over.

We kicked the door open and saw immediately that the front seats had collapsed. There was a motionless body wrapped in rags – but he was looking at me.
What the fuck
? I thought.

Not only was this guy still alive, but he started to move his arms and legs. I checked his neck before pulling him from the vehicle. He began to walk. Several Iraqi men cheered him on, and with this we left.

The situation on the roads had become almost untenable. We still hadn't suffered a single casualty but the US marines were being hit daily. I decided to minimise all road travel, so from now on our clients would be flown out of country from Alasad Airbase.

Because of the dangers of road travel, at the completion of the project Kuwaiti Ops were hesitant about us driving out of the area in non-armoured vehicles. To fly all of the security consultants, Gurkha guards, vehicles and equipment out of country was not impossible, but it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

I spent days studying the US intelligence reports and concluded that it was feasible to drive out, providing it was well planned. After delivering our demobilisation orders, I asked if anyone had any questions or problems.

One man raised his hand. ‘We will get hit, 100 per cent.'

I asked him whether, if we had to drive, he agreed with my plans.

‘Absolutely,' he replied. ‘But it's not enough. They have to
fly us out.' This man, a well-respected soldier who had fought in the Angolan wars, was unrelenting in his position. ‘Keith, I have been rained on enough in my life. I want you to fly me out.'

I thought about his comments and looked into his broken eyes. I was aware that I'd have to risk the lives of 11 men to get him to the airfield, but he was no longer an asset to the project. He had to go.

We escorted him to Alasad Airbase the following morning. When we arrived he took his pistol out of his holster and nearly shot himself in the foot. He was shaking as I took the weapon from him, and his parting words were, ‘I'm fucking losing it.'

I began to prepare for the demobilisation drive. I had two options – to head back down Highway Twelve and try to hit Fallujah at 04:50, which was the time of the first call to prayer, or to travel in a north-easterly direction towards Bayji. At the time, the area around Fallujah was out of control. The problem with the latter option, however, was that the dusty stretch of road was regularly set with anti-tank mines.

The road was sealed, but insurgents had been known to dig holes in the asphalt, set an anti-tank mine, cover it with sand and splash some black paint over the top. To a car travelling at speed, the change in road surface would be almost impossible to identify. I knew of one young platoon commander who had noticed a piece of rubber on the track that hadn't been there the day before. He decided to check it out. Beneath the rubber he found two mines, with a third buried in the side of the bank at window-height and linked to the others by a piece of detonating cord. If a vehicle had hit the mines, no-one inside would have survived.

So my options were: roadside bombs and insurgents, or roadside bombs and anti-tank mines. After a lot of thought, I chose the bombs and mines. I offered to drive the lead car by
myself but Joe and Si would have none of that. Joe said, ‘If we hit a mine, then we take the hit together.' I was relieved; it's at times like this that you really get to know a person.

I delayed our departure until 07:30 so we would have the best possible chance to identify any disturbance in the surface of the road. Our convoy of thirteen vehicles headed north-east. By now I did not have to remind the guys to maintain vehicle spacing.

After 10 kilometres we saw several large craters in the road. We passed a sign reading D
ANGER
! B
EWARE OF
M
INES
. ‘No shit,' said Joe. I knew that an American truckdriver had been killed along the road the previous week and I wondered if this was where it had happened.

Our eyes remained glued to the road as Si kept our speed below 60 kmh. We came to another series of craters and Si managed to steer the passenger side directly through one of the holes. I grimaced, half-expecting our vehicle to leap into the air in a dance of flames.

Joe looked at Si and said, ‘If you ever do that again, I am going to belt you up.'

I laughed but was a little more diplomatic with my words. ‘If you have to run into a hole, then at least have the decency to do it on your side, not mine.'

Si laughed. ‘Sorry, fellas – I was just making sure the hole was clear for the boys behind.'

We made it to Bayji, refuelled at a US base and headed for Baghdad. By this time, driving around in non-armoured cars was an exception to the rule and definitely not cool. Most security companies had spent many millions of dollars on armoured fleets. But we'd been told that a fleet of armoured vehicles was waiting for us in Kuwait, a further nine hours south, so we had no choice.

Sixty minutes later, we entered the outskirts of Baghdad. Our rear vehicle reported seeing a carload of men who were running their fingers across their throats. These jokers
obviously thought our guys were in armoured cars and couldn't open fire. As much as our boys would have liked to flick some lead in their direction, they just maintained their composure and refrained.

Finally we arrived at the Green Zone and the guys were congratulated on their efforts. They had operated in one of the most volatile regions of Iraq in non-armoured cars without sustaining a single casualty. We had travelled those roads for five and a half months and the threat from Iraqi insurgents had only ever increased. But the intensity of living on the edge for such an extended period of time had taken its toll, not only on the clients but also on the operators.

Following the Haditha Dam task, our security teams were redeployed to Baghdad and employed on a countrywide engineering assessment and maintenance project. At the height of this project, Jim, as the project manager, and I, as the operations manager, coordinated 120 security personnel who were employed to protect 50 engineers, as they travelled to and from 18 sites between Mosul and Basra. Operations in Iraq brought many difficulties and obstacles, but the locals' perceptions about our presence always affected me the most powerfully.

In Iraq we were constantly on guard – tense, anticipating, expecting. We simply didn't know whom we could trust. Although we were a part of the reconstruction effort, not the war, many Iraqis who opposed the Coalition occupation didn't care to make that distinction. As far as they were concerned, we were foreign, we carried weapons and that was more than enough reason to want us dead.

Even our Iraqi staff, employed in the kitchen, laundry, or fuel and rations supplies, didn't smile. There was complete lack of warmth. We wondered, how deeply did they hate us? Or was it that they were afraid to be seen acting friendly to a Westerner? Would their lives be cut short because of their connection to us? Many Iraqis who were found with foreign identification cards were killed. They lived with a constant
threat of being tortured, beheaded or shot. And since rockets and mortars were being fired into the International Zone (as the Green Zone was now called), Iraqis who worked with us were subject to the same dangers as those who chose to be combatants. They also had to venture out of the fortified safety zones each evening when they returned to their homes.

Sometimes the hatred for us was clearly about more than fear. Strangers on the side of the road ran their fingers along their necks in a cutting motion and tried to lock eyes with us. These overt displays of enmity were easy to deal with. An operator could just mouth the words ‘Fuck you' right back at him, and hold a venomous stare to show that he wouldn't be intimidated. The insurgents were well aware that a weapon pointed at them from behind an armoured window was no threat at all. It was a win–win situation for the insurgents. They could display their hatred openly and detonate a roadside bomb whenever they felt like it.

Harder to deal with than this immediate, prejudiced hatred was the anger and disdain from people who knew someone killed as a result of the invasion. One particularly shocking and tragic event still lives deep inside my mind.

The threat levels along Route Irish, the road that led to Baghdad International Airport (BIAP), were extreme. I deployed with our security teams largely because I felt guilty sending the guys onto the roads during times of heightened risk. It was just easier to go with them. If there was an incident, it would be the designated team leader's show. I would simply help with the fighting and, at the very first opportunity, send off a contact report requesting assistance if needed. If there were numerous teams and it was a complex task, the team leaders would run their teams and I would oversee everything on the ground. The drills worked well and all the team leaders and 2iCs were outstanding. There wasn't a lot to worry about.

On one particular day I deployed in the lead vehicle as a gunner. We were returning from the BIAP and the traffic on Route Irish was at a standstill. There had already been six suicide carbombs on Route Irish, and there had obviously been another incident now. We always ensured our vehicles never remained stationary for an extended period of time, but a few minutes was acceptable until the team leader ascertained what was going on ahead. The convoy was ordered to maintain spacing and allow room to manoeuvre, should we be attacked.

We saw a US military convoy 100 metres ahead, so we decided to remain in place. Several jittery vehicles from another security company attempted to edge past our convoy but after several forceful hand-gestures, and the fact that the traffic ahead was at a standstill, they had little option but to stop. Our guys then repositioned their vehicles to prevent these clowns from interfering with the integrity of our convoy.

Slowly the vehicles ahead began to inch forward. Our eyes strained in every direction to identify any possible threat. Being static on the roads is an extremely vulnerable time. Everyone begins to wonder if the delay is part of a ploy to channel vehicles into an ambush or roadside bomb.

As our cars meandered along the road, I caught sight of an old white sedan with a shattered rear window and a bullet-riddled windscreen. I could see an Iraqi woman trying to stand up while shaking uncontrollably. She had exited the car from the passenger side and held her arms in a surrender position as she tried to straighten her frame.

She was in complete shock. I noticed that her glasses, although still on her face, were cracked and bent. Her hair had been parted by a large-calibre bullet that glanced her head but did not penetrate her skull. Blood was streaming down her face and her open hands were also bright red. She looked like she had seen a ghost. Her eyes were wide open, as if her
eyelids were held apart by matchsticks. The area of her face that was not red with blood was white, a ghostly white that made her appear almost transparent. Her lips were blue and she had droplets of blood in the corners of her mouth, but it was her violent shaking that had the greatest effect on me.

I glanced forward and saw a US patrol parked on the side of the road. It was clear that they had opened fire on the vehicle, no doubt believing it to contain a suicide-bomber. The young soldiers stood there just staring at the woman with mouths wide open. No-one was giving directions or orders – they, too, looked like they had seen a ghost, one likely to revisit them for many years to come, I thought. The man who most likely had opened fire was being consoled, and a fresh-faced officer was trying to make sense of the situation.

As we drove past, I looked beyond the shaking woman and into the vehicle. There was a man in the driver's seat with a seatbelt holding him upright. His head was tilted back and firmly planted against the rear headrest, which was plastered in blood. So was the rear seat and ceiling.

I locked on to the man, searching for signs of life, but he no longer had a face. His head had been transformed into the shape of a funnel, hollowed out and featureless. Where his eyes, nose or mouth would have been was a gaping, sickly, red depression.

This, coupled with the state of the distraught woman, most likely his wife, was sickening and was taking its toll on the young soldiers, who were trying to comprehend the mess they had created. The young officer walked towards the woman, his weapon down by his side, defeated.

Losing mates in combat must have been hard enough for these young men, who in many cases were more like boys. Making a tragic mistake where you take away an innocent life would be a far greater burden to carry. The image would grow heavy and, over time, would drag a soldier down in shame.
These men would require counselling if they were to lay the incident to rest. Their faces told me this.

How could they make such a mistake? The answer is distressingly simple. Many soldiers in Iraq are national guardsmen who have only a basic level of training but have been called upon to serve in a time of need. Most are young and lack combat experience. They are anxious, poorly prepared and working in the most hostile country in the world. Those who remain in Iraq on combat operations for more than a couple of months have most likely faced the trauma of losing a close friend, which only exacerbates their anxiety and fear.

The more suicide-bombers there are who target US military vehicles, the twitchier the young soldiers become. A car that fails to heed warnings to slow down or back off could well be facing an inexperienced and nervous soldier, not a man who has spent many years making decisions based on sound judgement. It is a deadly cycle that gains momentum: the greater the number and success of suicide-bombers, the more anxious the US soldiers become, and the greater the number of Iraqi civilians who are killed by poor decision-making. The greater the number of Iraqis who oppose the US presence, the more the attacks increase, the more civilians are slain, and the more the Iraqis hate America. It is brutal and unrelenting.

There have been hundreds of suicide attacks in Iraq. It is an extremely successful tactic, as the target vehicle and all those inside are generally incinerated in a second. Anyone who has spent much time in Iraq has seen the devastation and knows men who have been killed by this means.

One vehicle packed with 1000 pounds of explosives rammed into the side of a B6 armoured car and detonated in a ball of thunderous flame. The car was thrown 25 metres
into the air and landed on its roof. All five occupants were immediately killed, their bodies impossible to recognise. There was no chance of survival. The bodies of the three clients were welded together on the rear seat by the immense heat of the blast. The security contractors in the front suffered a similar fate, their bodies melted in an instant. The ghastly faces of victims often have their mouths wide open, as if screaming at the top of their lungs in pain before they die.

My closest call with a suicide-bomber took place alongside a hard-hitting operator nicknamed ‘Heater'. This guy, a former Australian SAS soldier, epitomised the stereotype of Mr Cool and was just the sort of man you'd want by your side if things got nasty. For someone so talented he was also surprisingly humble. He was an intelligent man who didn't say a lot, but when he opened his mouth everyone listened. I would regularly ask his opinion about operational matters.

He was so overqualified for the work he was doing it was almost comical. He had no desire for responsibility and wanted to be where the action was. He should have been a team leader but refused. I had no problem with this, as he was the best rear gunner in the company, a highly dangerous and important position. His decision-making was second to none, the perfect person to secure the rear of a convoy.

Heater was well aware that I was frustrated as the operations manager. I had been quietly spoken to on several occasions for constantly deploying with the teams. On one particular day of heightened threat, I was envious that the guys were deploying and I vented to Heater.

His comments were blunt and to the point: ‘You're the ops manager, aren't you? So what's the problem? Fuck those cowards who never want to leave the office. It's your call. Just jump in the rear vehicle with me.'

He made it sound all too easy. He was right – as long as the ops room was manned and the rapid-reaction force
briefed, what did it matter if I got out and about as often as I wanted? So I'd cop a bit of shit about it – who really cared? At least if something went wrong I'd be on the ground with the boys.

The teams deployed to a power plant in Baghdad and the journey was relatively straightforward. The company we worked for had a comprehensive intelligence cell which, when we requested it, provided an analysis of all the main arterial roads around Baghdad. We asked for information on the types and timings of all attacks that occurred. Suicide-bombers, complex attacks, small-arms attacks and IEDs. The data was collated from all recorded events over the previous 30 days. Using these statistics, it was possible to reduce the threat to us considerably.

The major concern was a ‘vehicle-borne improvised explosive device' (VBIED). We had armoured vehicles now, so a burst of AK-47 fire wasn't an issue. The statistics highlighted windows of opportunity where threat levels could be minimised. High-threat times were also identified. For example, 90 per cent of VBIEDs were detonated between 07:00 and 10:00 each day. Just by travelling outside these times, the teams were less likely to confront a VBIED.

In six months of travelling all over the country, from Mosul down to Basra, we were fortunate not to suffer a single casualty. We were lucky, but you also make your own luck. No unnecessary road moves were ever permitted. The contractors wouldn't be expected to make several trips to the BIAP for client pickups. They would depart during a low-threat period and remain at the airport all day, only returning during another period of lesser threat. Avoiding being incinerated is all about the law of averages. It is imperative to minimise road travel and, if possible, to combine several taskings into one. Heater and I monopolised the rear vehicle, and it was a buzz working with such a quality individual.

The return trip from the power station had been uneventful, and we began to relax as the convoy closed up and waited to pass through the military checkpoint. There were two queues. One was for military vehicles or Department of Defense contractors, and the other for all local traffic. We were static in traffic, 50 metres shy of the checkpoint, when I noticed a white, old-model vehicle move from the civilian to the military lane. This was strange. The vehicle had just one Middle Eastern occupant, a man who stopped his vehicle no more than 30 metres behind us. He stared in our direction with both hands grasping the steering wheel.

It was an old banged-up vehicle that looked heavy – it could have been worn suspension or a load of bombs. The driver looked tense. Why was he in the military lane? Something inside me clicked and a shiver passed over my body. This vehicle fitted the stereotype of a suicide-bomber.