March 24, 2003
Throughout the night of the 23rd into the 24th, there were reports from Attack, the battalion’s mech infantry company and Cyclone, the battalion’s other tank company position about a mile or so south of us, of Iraqi dismounts raiding into our area. They killed about 20 of them. They were also mortared several times.
“I’m not going to be able to sleep with crunchies running all around,” said Smitty, using the term treadheads employ to describe the human things that get in the way of their tracks.
“How’d all these motherfuckers get through here undetected?” Baxter said.
“They come out at night. Like I told you, we underestimated these fuckers,” Smitty said.
We locked the hatches and the fuel cap as we slept, though of course one of the soldiers was always on watch on the thermals in each of the vehicles. We slept in snatches, sometimes no more than 15 minutes at a time. My eyes would open and in the dim light coming down from the thermal screen in the turret, I’d make out the shapes of Smitty and one of the others sacked out beside me, all of us piled on the lumps of gear. I’d hear the radio crackle. I would recognize that everything was quiet and I’d drift off again.
In the early hours of the 24th, Baxter and I were up listening to the company net as Blue One expressed some concern about dismounts moving from tree to tree in a date palm orchard in front of him. He couldn’t see weapons, and Wolford told him to hold his fire.
“It might be Bedouin bringing in their crops,” Wolford said.
“Bringing in their crops at midnight?” Baxter snorted. It did stretch the imagination, but Wolford hadn’t had much sleep and was trying to avoid something ugly.
“Anyone bringing in his crops at midnight ought to be shot,” Baxter said. “Them Hajjis are going to be coming up on us and stealing our skirt plates. They’ll put the track up on blocks and steal our 20-inch road wheels.”
“I bet after that initial shit last night, the whole company went to sleep,” the LT said. “I know I was fighting it. There was no one on the net.”
“Yeah, why sweat it?” Baxter said. “That’s just Hajji picking some potatoes around your track. Don’t shoot him!”
We heard a report that the Air Force was enroute to silence some Iraqi artillery that had been harassing the column, but wanted confirmation that the target was not civilian.
“That’s not Iraqi artillery. That’s how Hajji calls in the cows,” said Baxter. “I can’t believe this shit.”
“I’m surprised the Iraqis haven’t figured out that if they ditch their uniforms and put on a dishtowel and drive around in a painted-up truck, they could do whatever they want,” I said. In fact, the Iraqis had figured that out.
“That’s not an Iraqi T-72, that’s Hajji on his tractor, plowing his fields,” Baxter said.
Trojan, the cavalry scouts who went out ahead in machine-gun mounted Humvees, reported some trucks suspected of carrying Iraqi mortar teams. Tusker Three-Zero, the battalion fire-support officer, was on the radio demanding “eyes on the ground” confirmation of hostile intent before he’d OK artillery.
“You know, by the time we get to Baghdad, three-quarters of Saddam’s men will still be back here,” Baxter said. Baxter and I were close to figuring the whole thing out, a regular pair of military geniuses.
Later in the day, on the road moving north into the open desert, Baxter spotted some low-flying Apaches in the distance.
“Good spotting,” the LT said.
“I like to keep my eyes sharp so I don’t get shot in the head by Hajji picking vegetables,” Baxter said.
Topics: Iraq
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 12:13 am Comments (2) on Saturday, March 24, 2007
2 Responses to “March 24, 2003”
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March 24th, 2007 at 12:29 am
“Bringing in their crops at midnight?” Baxter snorted.
Not as ridiculous as you might think. Due to the heat many Iraqis in fact will do farm work at night-often late into the night, which is one of the things that makes it tough to tell the difference between potato farmers and IED hole diggers. They also will sleep on rooftops and generally do what we would think are suspicious things that commanders have to take into account in order to avoid killing lots of innocent people.
March 24th, 2007 at 2:23 am
March 24, 2003
Critter remembers: Throughout the night of the 23rd into the 24th, there were reports from Attack, the battalion’s mech infantry company and Cyclone, the battalion’s other tank company position about a mile or so south of us, of Iraqi dismounts