On Scope

Prologue

The afternoon sun was motionless in the scalding sky, and Staff Sergeant Kyle Swanson, wedged between the floorboards of a decapitated two-story house, cautiously wiped sweat from his eyes with a dirty handkerchief. A hundred and ten degrees out there, with more to come; heat merciless enough to bake a plate of cookies or sear a man’s soul. He drank some warm water, then returned his aching eye to the telescopic sight of his 7.62 x 51 mm M-40 sniper rifle. Far away was gunfire. He had been in the hide since before daybreak, part of a deadly anvil on which a huge hammer was about to slam down as part of Operation Phantom Fury. If everything went right, the insurgent forces that controlled this dusty city beside the Euphrates River were about to receive a crippling body blow.

More than two hundred armored vehicles of the United States Marine Corps had just crossed the start line to the east, accompanied by some two thousand Marines and soldiers of other Coalition countries. Judging by the increasing volume of gunfire, the insurgents had been ready for them, but the bad guys in Fallujah were always ready for a fight. They were determined not to lose their ruthless grip on the people in Al Anbar Province.

“Blue Dog One. They’re coming our way.” The quiet voice in his earpiece was Blue Dog Two, Staff Sergeant Mike Dodge, whose own six-man team was entrenched a half block behind Swanson’s. Each position supported the other.

“Ready here,” he said, running through a mental checklist still again: squad automatic weapons, M-203 grenade launchers, M-16s, even two sniper rifles, plus Dodge’s radio gear to call in roof-scraping Cobra helicopters and fast-moving fighter-bombers. They were the anvil. When the tanks and APCs and infantry struck hard from the front, the insurgents would roll back into the perceived safety of the city, smack into the waiting Marine force planted in the two buildings that dominated a broad street that was empty of traffic.

There was no doubt the enemy would put up a good scrap, for they owned the home field advantage in this stronghold forty miles west of Baghdad. Their deposed dictator, Saddam Hussein, was believed to be hiding somewhere in the stubborn region known as the Sunni Triangle, where he was protected by fanatic loyalists. The Iraqi force was comprised of members of Hussein’s ruling Ba’ath Party political apparatus and government, elements of the Republican Guard, some remnants of the Iraqi Army, and a growing number of Sunni Muslim guerrillas and foreign fighters. They owed their allegiance, their very existence, to Saddam. If they lost, none of them had a bright future in a new Iraq that would be ruled by their religious rivals, the Shiites. The burps and thumps of automatic weapons fire rose in volume and came closer. Explosions popped on the horizon, and the usual thick haze of dust and dirt churned.

The Swanson and Dodge teams had inserted during the darkest hours, linked up, and made their way into the eerie stillness of the city before the sun rose. Mike had set up in a house beside a junk-littered field, while Kyle arranged his guys across the street and a half block up, but within sight of the other team.

Straight down the avenue was the broad entry plaza and main doorway of the Haj Musheen Abdul Aziz Az-Kubaysi mosque complex, a domed citadel that had surrendered its protected status as a religious site when it was turned into a base for the insurgency. Trashed by looters and air strikes, the remaining mountain of jagged rubble had become a fortress. That was the prime target today. Whoever controlled that palace and its underground bunkers had the city. From his strong position, Kyle Swanson believed he held the keys to the front door. He watched gunmen pour out of the structure and up over the walls and head for the fighting. He reported the movement. The sniper teams were the eyes and ears of the assault force, gathering intelligence and picking targets, and only later would they exercise their trigger fingers. Let the big assault force do the heavy lifting and roll a couple of Abrams tanks up the main street in front of the old mosque, supported by a battalion of Marines. The bad guys would be concentrating so hard on the armor, they wouldn’t even know the snipers were at their backs until it was too late. When the hammer closed the trap, the guns of the anvil would erupt to take out specific targets such as officers and radio operators.

The forces were almost fully engaged now. Kyle checked his team, all of whom were veterans who suppressed their eagerness with professionalism, and then he let his fingers wander over his big sniper rifle, wiping away dirt. Ready. He was happy that Mike Dodge was at his six. The Marine Corps is a large organization but a rather small family, and over years of service any one of them meets many others. He and Dodge had been friends since their miserable days of basic training at Parris Island and later during Scout/Sniper School. They had gone off on their own careers but stayed in touch. Both had served in the first Iraq War, and afterward, Kyle had been an usher at Mike’s wedding two years ago. The bride’s name was Becky.

Now it was November 2004, and they were back in the Sandbox with the 3rd Battalion/5th Marines for another round, this one called Operation Phantom Fury, with the goal of taming the wild city of Fallujah.

“Blue Dog One. Hear that?”

“Copy. Fire decreasing on the outskirts. What’s going on, Two?” Dodge had the big radios. There was no answer. “Blue Dog Two?”

“Yeah. I was just over on the main freq. The attack has stopped. Repeat, the attack has stopped.”

Kyle kept his eye on the scope. Insurgent fighters were flooding back into the city. “Blue Dog One to Blue Dog Two. They’re coming our way. I don’t see any of our guys chasing them.”

Dodge’s voice was calm but urgent. “Dog One, we are ordered to exfiltrate immediately. Something has fucked up, and the attack stopped at Phase Line Butler.”

“They want us to leave a place that is filling up with enemy fighters in broad daylight? Let’s just stay here and keep quiet until it gets dark.” He wanted to know what had gone wrong, but shit happens in war, and he would think about that later. Staying alive was now the higher priority.

“Negative. Those bad guys are being flushed right toward us, and they will be in every building. We don’t have until dark.”

Kyle could see it unfolding. The attacking armored force had drawn up in a line outside the city and was laying down a massive barrage that was driving the insurgents back and making them hunt cover. The Marine infantry, however, was not in pursuit, although the enemy was scattering like a gaggle of scared cats. Coming this way, fast. “You’re right, Blue Dog Two. This is untenable.”

As if to make the point, a fighter seeking safety from the barrage threw open the booby-trapped door of their building, and the explosion shook the entire structure and drew the unwanted attention of other enemy elements in the area. They swung away from the stalled attack and opened fire on the sniper positions. Kyle’s team answered with a hail of automatic weapons. Swanson squeezed off one shot that took down a dumb gunman standing in the middle of the street and spraying bullets from an AK-47 held hip-high. You watched too many movies, Kyle thought. Then he popped a second man on the plaza, who looked like he was giving orders.

“Blue Dog Two. You guys stay out of this. You haven’t been compromised.”

“Negative, One. We’ll engage from here to take some of the pressure off, and you guys bound back to us. I’ve called air cover and the choppers for the extraction from the field next to our building. You control the fight, and I’ll control the air.”

Swanson clicked his microphone to let Dodge know the message was received, then let the fight talk to him. Bullets were crashing into the mud-and-clay building where they hid, and the Marines were answering with outgoing fire that was disciplined and deadly. “Corporal Burke! We’re leaving. You and Ridgeway fall back to the Two position when they start firing.” The two Marines slid from their hides and moved to the rear door, and when Mike Dodge and his crew opened up, the pair broke cover and pounded across the street and into the safety of the Blue Dog Two position.

That element of surprise was gone, and the gunmen would be ready for more Marines to make the dash. Swanson and his spotter, Corporal Boyd Scott, came down the broken stairs of the house with Kyle calling out, “Reynolds and Thomas! You’re next. Stay low and move your asses when you see the smoke.” Swanson, kneeling at a window, tracked an insurgent who was closing in and put a bullet in him. Scott fired smoke grenades with his M-203 launcher, and a soup of thick gray smoke bloomed in the street. Reynolds and Thomas took off running and made it to the house half a block away.

The firefight was getting serious as more insurgents joined in and the acrid smoke started to swirl away. “Now us, Scott. Shoot and scoot.” Kyle slung his long sniper rifle over his back and brought up his own M-16A3, then followed Boyd out. The bad guys were firing blind, but with everything they had. Bullets whined off of buildings, skidded along walls, and kicked along the pavement. He could see Mike Dodge not far ahead, standing in the window, firing carefully over their heads and into the mob behind the smoke. Movemovemove!

Halfway across, Boyd Scott was hit. He spun left and crashed onto the ground. The corporal had been struck in both the neck and the head and was bleeding like a fountain. His helmet had been torn off and rolled away like a hubcap off a Plymouth. There was no time for emotion or emergency treatment, so Kyle dropped his weapon and grabbed the shoulders of the wounded man’s armored vest and began staggering backward, pulling the bleeding man with him as more bullets sang around them. The possibility of being shot himself by slowing down to help a buddy did not enter his thoughts; Marines don’t leave other Marines behind.

Then someone else was at his side, also grabbing the downed corporal and yelling something incomprehensible in the roar of the battle. Mike Dodge had left the safety of his building and leaped into harm’s way to help, and the two of them stumbled into the shelter together while the other Marines laid a hurricane of fire up the road toward the palace. A corpsman hustled over to take charge of Scott.

“You were a fucking moron for coming out there, Staff Sergeant Dodge.”

“Saved your slow ass, didn’t I?”

“Shit you say. We were almost in the door before you even moved.”

“Screw you, Staff Sergeant Swanson.”

Kyle got busy placing the remaining Marines in tactical positions, and Mike went back to the radio. The incoming fire was growing, and two more Marines were wounded within the next three minutes. “Watch your rate of fire,” Swanson called as he jumped from team to team. “Help’s on the way. Don’t let ammo become a problem.”

The first Cobra helicopter gunship wheeled in and made a gun run straight down the boulevard, and another scoured the rooftops on the left side, where enemy shooters had gathered to get a better vantage point over their target. As the first team of snakes pulled out, another set of helicopters came down to continue the counterattack, and above the roar of the hellacious firefight, Kyle heard the deep-throated thudding of an approaching CH-53 helicopter, their big taxi out of there. Corporal Scott died before it landed.

On the way back to base camp, Swanson wiped his face and drank some water and thought about what had happened. No way was that a successful mission, not with one Marine KIA and two WIA. It wasn’t an unsuccessful mission, either, because the insurgents had been battered pretty well. He might never know why the original plan had been changed. What was it they said about battle plans not surviving the first shot? This was Iraq. It was just another mission in a long and dirty war. He listened to the thunking rhythm of the helicopter blades and figured that he owed Mike Dodge a beer.