Outside the Wire
Short Story
Herbert Bluechel
Saigon, Viet Nam
5 Sep 1945
Peter Dewey
Tan Son Nhat, Viet Nam
Indochina is burning, and I have been given the task of writing. Writing to my superior that we should not replace the European powers and their allies, and to have strictly nothing to do with the Southeast Asia project. The reason I am writing to you, rather than anyone else is that our communication is less likely to be censored. It is not of hard and fast rule I know, but I will take any small chance that I am able to. Even my father, with all of the Hon.'s attached to his name, would not be the right choice.
But where to begin?
With hope
Peter
1
Bagdad 2006
Time it takes for reading - one forgets the old letters from the last great war, over Vietnam – to this one – over the land known to us as Iraq – will fade, as all do, with the land of the living reaches the land of the dead. Forgo and forget the conflicts and consequences of another generation’s war, because the present will have many who will want to send other people's children to die for their glory. The asymmetrical axis of evil, echelons above reality. I was on route Tampa for the first 6 months.
My boots were still light – I had not been there long, outside the Green Zone – but my fatigues had already gotten the stain of yellow, which would not come out. There were blasts of wind beating into my back, a reminder to march quickly. The sun was still orange from its weakening, and one could see the view whispering clouds on the horizon.
Our life, their glory – there's no Gallup poll of the job we do. Especially outside the wire, where the fobbits live (under general order No. 1.) Eating up FRAGOs.
It was very early in the morning on the I 411 to the Captain's office – the mud bricks and dirt road said everything an in-country soldier needed to know about the terrain – it was Iraq, in some distant desert of the campaign, just barely a FOB not a COP. Moondust galore. We were near Abu Ghraib on the opposite side from BIAP – though at that point few of the uninvolved civilians would have even known what it stood for. But if you were stationed here, there was no getting around the fact that it was a prison complex for the worst criminals and political detainees in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, and it had continued its long tradition under the new management. The ravens still landed.
I came to the porthole, which was just a covering by canvas rather than a door. Once upon a time, this had been a hovel for a family, but not before the area had been cleared out for American troops. There were ricochet pockmarks along the beige building, which to a trained eye meant that there was fire from it once upon a time. And the dish ran away with the spoon - we fired back.
Once inside, the shadow of the house made the temperature much cooler. There was a desk in which Captain, in all of his thin sheen, was already doing paperwork. How that could be so with all of the goings-on at this hour I do well. He had an assignment for me.
Placing his gold wire-rimmed glasses on the paper the ones reading, he looked up at me with absolutely no difference: “Lieut. I want you to get out to the HLS, and join the troop of people to rescue someone out in the middle of the desert. ” In his hands was a folder with instructions. Embrace the suck, his hands read.
“Rules of Engagement?” I waited for the dynamic truth.
“This is off the record - there are no ROE.” His face became yet more serious.
“No problem Captain, but if I may ask, why me out of all the people assigned to the GWOT?”
“Person being rescued was once upon a time one of your subordinates, Lieut. You are to perform a medevac on blackwater. Marsalama.” The glasses were in his hands, and he was waiting for my response. I only managed to nod, I was half a secret squirrel. Though not quite slovenly, my departure was not quite in the crisp, uniform precision that tastes preferred - though not sufficient for a demerit.
The sun was slightly higher and had regained the yellow and all of the heat that signaled the heat of the day. Gone was any demurement of the Iraqi morning.
When I got to the bird and it's lifting off point, the engines were already started and the pilot was already getting ready to set us on the course to where our person's last position was. No chance for PCC. She turned to me, and under the Oakleys looked at me with a critical eye.
“So you're the person having the bad day.”
“I do not get your meaning, pilot.”
“For my part, I will get a rescue, so for me, it is a good day. But that means there is someone who is having a bad day, Lieut.” She had just scanned my bar.
Again, nodding was the only thing that seemed appropriate. Imshi, or maybe imstah.
We lifted and were gone. The problem with Crash Hawks is that they are vacuum cleaners in the land of sand. They spent more time being repaired than the upper echelon would have liked, the problem was that their solution was to threaten the people keeping the birds aloft, which led to the usual problems.
At this point, I flipped open my folder and read the material which was for my eyes only. It was the actual meat of the assignment. The two medics were talking behind me, but no mention of anyone looking over my shoulder reached my ears. The whirling rotor blades could be seen as shadows on the text which skimmed. The gist of it was rather simple, almost too plain sentences: the Sgt. had been hunting for PSD, who were under arms and underneath a different command. I was to make sure that he did not talk about what his assignment was.
Commanders knew that men who were injured tended to talk about anything that came into their heads, and some of the junior COs took things into their own hands, and made sure that at least one person tamp down on anything untoward that might come to the rescued lips. In the discussion, that was my job. And my CO wanted to be done properly and with a minimum of fuss.
Looking up to the sand-duned actuality – the wave of the alienness struck differently. Looking down is very new compared to my usual looking up. The horizon was clear, and the litter of edifices still seemed flattened. It was Kansas after a monster wind storm – the Local Iraqis call it “haboob”, but no dust clouds torrenting to the sky, because there were no shamal winds, yet over Bagdad. No palm trees, nor any blade of grass stained the landscape. Dry for as far as the eye could soak in. The canal – and a few meters away – plots of cultivated soil.
“It must take some getting used to, pilot.” She was a contractor, as were, I might guess the medivacs. There was the only person who would be counted on icasualties. Dot org. Hi there.
“I will tell you when it takes hold. But you don't feel the yellow, blue, and dark green.”
“This is true. This is still strange?”
“Down on the ground you look at everything – up here in the space, we look for the trail of RPGs.” The reply was laconic.
“Point specifically?” A smile lashed my face.
“Exactly, losing is over-rated.” As she peeled off right.
“Did you see something?”
“Just moving back and forth half a klick...” The scene shifted across the road which already carried a convoy of trucks, each one loaded with goods for remote villages, but some were masking insurgents. It was prickly, and nothing was safe. On the ground, sheets of a mirage coat the vehicles. Here they are clean.
“What I like about you, is you do not swear, pogue.” If this had been a story about grunts – swearing would be scary – like it was part of the Quran, haji this and haji that. Assalam Alaikum.
“Only two conditions: on the ground or under fire.”
We weren't either right now.
Amidst the speckling dots, our metier grew increasingly clear, near the rivers the was dark green – a richness which we now encroached over. Between the scrubble was desert, with the occasional lake or pond – as now came upon our left. Looking out further the was sage green. It was the planting in a world where seasons arrived haphazardly.
Now we were fully over the lake. I pointed down, and the pilot answered:
“Lake Therthar.” Never seen it, up close.
Though large and artificial, there was no growing around it. I was told that when it was created that was the purpose of it. But for changes everything.
She scooped down – this was the place he was last reported in. Searching for a rebel base.
Loop from the rear – we had been hit on the rush down. Flames. Smoke. And screaming as the medics caught fire. Another mess made by OGA.
“Where was the crocket?” The pilot muttered.
I did not have a moment to look for the muj trunk monkeys – I was strapping in my chute. But jumping was not an option, the ground was too close.
Ground. To. Close.
While say what you will about PSD in terms of fighting, as a pilot, she manages to make the birdland in the drink – and while it was plunging fast, there was easily enough time to open the hatch, and shuffle off to Buffalo. A push and I was free.
But no one else was. Though I looked.
The bird promptly sank, with panache. This was extraordinarily quick and meant there was something heavy on board, though I didn't know. There were secrets with secrets. In 10 minutes it was gone without a trace.
As the saying went, there I was.
The place was not good. If I swam towards the nearest shore, my muj friends would almost certainly be coming from the other direction, and I would be caught. On the other hand, swimming out of words was suicide, and there were no places to hide on either shore - there was only a little bit of grass and then the rubble of endless plains. I had to think quickly because I was sure that someone would be coming soon.
Unerringly, a truck with a fifty appeared over the nearby hill - if one could call that - and started shooting at me. The only thing to do at that point was dive for my life. But each time I came up the shooting started again, so down I went, at least 5 or 6 times. Then when I came up there was no shooting, but 3 of the muj had taken to the water, and then it became a race - a race I would surely lose. But it was the only card I had left to play. Turning for the deep Lake, I did an Australian crawl, hoping that the lessons that I took so many years ago might give me the edge over the members of Ali Baba.
For a while it did, and my lead on them grew. But the weight of the equipment on me, such as it was, and the fatigue from a late night playing poker began to get the best of me. Gradually my swimming stroke diminished, though I did not choose to look back. Water water water air. Water water water air. The dip from the crawl was ingrained in my head. Occasionally there were AKA-47 shots, but they were scattered and random. The only hope was to get beyond the reach of the weapons and tire out the 3 in the water. What I did not think of was the M2 starting up again, because it is reach was longer than anything else they had. In my mind, I could hear the roaring drone and the high pitch whaapa of the cartridges. The splash was felt as much as heard as the bullets skimming the water. When then nearby whirring of a cascade and felt a tear in my left leg, though it was a graze, I had still been punctured by a round. Bohica.
Decisions were made and unmade in my tangled brain, each one seemed to be countermanded by a new decision which decided to undo the last decision. I could feel my mind melting in the wasteland's heat. Somewhere along the way I tread water and held my arms up, in a gesture of surrender. This attitude came from heaven on high for all I knew, as if someone else had made it. Half of my skull screamed that they would just shoot me, or at least dry me off and set up a camera, and then shoot me for an audience not yet tuned in. Before I could start to swim again, two muj had reached me and I was captured.
Shame reached my lips as a flush of blood.
We swam ashore, and I was escorted by the three over the rocky soil. They were in old garb, the thawb, colored white. We stopped to recover their dastmaal yazdi, which only were slightly unusual in that they were also patterned white, but this would not be noticed at first glance by an outsider. It made me think that they were of the high desert people, but who to say? It could be the habit of the group. At that time there was not a unified command structure, nor a simple designation that could be called a uniform. There were dozens of competing groups – a true insurgency.
Thus the Coalition did not, officially, negotiate with any of them. Only friends got bilat roses.
My boots, wet with the dive, now were scuffing as I walked away from the water. I did not try to communicate, and even if that was my wish, I could feel the kals over my back. Shut up was the place to be.
Pile of sand reveals a depression on all 4 sides – and a canvas cover door that could not be seen from the air. A weapon from the inside opened the tarp and I was shoved into relative darkness. Eyes adjust slowly, and behind a board and sawhorses, pseudo-desk was a man in the same uniform as the others - white on white. He had a broad face and full beard and mustache, he was banned from all the exercise he got. But other than that the garb revealed little. Except for the muscular hands. Underneath his dark eyebrows showed a man was used to commending out in the field, behind a desk, or at a banquet.
“Are you Usa” Pronounced as a single word, “Army?” Spitting out the words crudely.
“Yes.”
“Why don't I have your name rank and serial number, then.”
This was more fluent than the 1st attempt, and sounded a level of mastery of the formalities of the English language, though I suspected more from the British side than the American. I gave what he wanted, with no betrayal of motion. The same was true of my body as well as my lips.
Flinching on my chest as he bored into me, he spoke with a relative hush: “It is not with you that we have problems, it is with the presence of your coalition forces and what they want to do.”
No movement from me gave me a sense of what I wanted to say.
The man continued: “Or we can lead to the endgame – though everyone will agree I have a distinct advantage.”
“What do you want?”
“As you know, your side will not talk to my side.”
“That's well above my pay grade.” In fact, the loose change could do.
“And you want me to believe that.”
“.” not “?”.
“If you don't believe me, then go to the endgame.” Tighten my jaw.
In Arabic, far higher than my poor comprehension, he ordered men who were hidden behind a twist in the wall. They took me away with the ubiquitous Kal in my back, after having checked for weapons or grenades. I snaked my way through a tunnel until finally prison bars ensconced Coarsely made cells. And there was one which was occupied and his demeanor and for were known to me. It was my ex-subordinate. Unfortunately, he was out cold, and I was shocked into my cell, but it was the cell next to his.
One thing you learn quite fast is that Preparing for, executing during, and debriefing from a mission is filled with the kind of jargon that your mind takes to. Be interred because his not so loaded with jargon. The gulag has its own patois of meaning whose shades do not correspond to the military life, except tangentially. This is doubly true if the instigators of your fate are not military themselves. I looked around the room, and there were only 3 fixtures: a bed, a sink, and the most wretched excuse for a toilet that could possibly be imagined. And a softbound raggedy book, chained to the wall – my guess was the Quran.
The inside was scraped out, probably with the same tool used to do the 1st slab of a building: there were huge swirls in the not-quite concrete walls, made with rough hands not used to doing this kind of work. The floor was composed of 2 m² floorboards of slightly higher quality, probably done outside and brought here. There was no light, there was no hope, only the hours were in question. However since they kept my quarry, they would probably keep me as well.
Or so my hopes went.
Sitting on a thin stained mattress, to wait. It was too dim to do anything else. Then there was nothing, but nothing a great deal. Nothing means only one thing: you are with yourself.
Usually, you are not really with yourself, because you are Planning the next day from reveille to lights out. People that you will interact with, what you are mission is, the people that you have lost, the people who have been assigned to you, the person who is your CO. a galaxy of connections as if you were seated at an AO until you finally go to sleep.
Prison is entirely different. I knew that I would familiarize myself with every square millimeter of space. Again and again. I did not know how food was served, but a knew from movies and television shows that I would consume every little bit that was ladled out. In my mind, I could see myself in a distant mirror - only with a beard and thinner than I was now. And did not shock me, this was simply my fate. Somehow I had leaned prone, and my eyes were running over the ceiling, but I did not know which was real and which my imagination supplied. From the details of an ordinary kill happy life to a darkened room, almost in an instant.
It was like a hawk staring down and seeing everything with a cold distance. Everything is minutely captured and stored. No sound came from either cell or the corridor. If there were more people than the 2 of us, they made no motion.
Alone.
Outside the wire. And in the enemy camp.
But that set me on a new chain of thought: the difference between having an enemy, with a chain of command, even if you did not know the names - to a guerrilla conflict fought by PO, and subscripted with an Eternity. No birds, Angels, battle rattle, or CHU. no trips to DFAC. My only hope is for a FOB to sight the compound, and liberate me. That put it in a different perspective - there was nothing I could do.
Rack out, go to sleep.
2
“مرحبا ، وقت الأكل ، الكافر“
One minute I was dreaming, about the house that I grew up in. There were trees in the front yard, and a large backyard plays in. but this was not my house, there were no trees where I grew up, and there was only tall grass in the background. I was from Manhattan, but not New York – Kansas has a Manhattan far in the Western part of the state. I dreamt I was riding a Hummer, Rummy roulette style, but no weapons had been fired.
The minute I had rolled over off the bed and was crouched in a ready position for whatever came. What came was a rounded tin plate with rice and some sort of brown topping which I did not know what it was. In the distance, there was a man, who wore a thawb and their heads were massed with their dastmaal yazdi. No words came out of his mouth after the 1st, and he slid down to the next cell where he repeated his shout and left.
The problem with the no fraternization clause in the manual is one does not hear the language as spoken except at a shout. And then it comes at you in every direction, with no space for words as they might be enunciated in conversation. Only terp have a grasp of the language, and I was not one of those. I was a do-time TIC by TIC. Of course, I had learned a few words from our interpreter, but only if you and without the rhythm that makes them understandable. Thus the words which came out of the muj mouth came out in the regional dialect of a local tongue of Arabic, not the English countermangled version of it. In English, I can use words that are imported from Arabic but do not ask me to speak the language.
Chowing down was the 1st thing that happened, with a spoon attached to the dish with a small chain. Since this was the 1st day, I kept myself rather neat, knowing that in a few days, such amenities would not be necessary.
Wiping the gravy off my lips with my jacket, I put the dish and spoon near the cell door. I sat on the bunk for a while. A long hour later, a presence arrived, still in white, but no keffiyeh. It was the commander, whatever his real title was, he was sure to have one.
I stood up but with no salute.
A glare inched over me. “No salute? That thing with the arm you Americans are so fond of.” Was the chuckle from his gut?
“Am I in the mil-itary?” Nearly just having shortened it to “mil.”
“According to your reading, no. But that is not the reading that applies here.” I raised my right arm and the CO smiled, even if he was muj.
“I am told you were woken up, late behavior for an officer.”
“No light.”
“There is not going to be any. I am told the civilian way is 'get used to it', I am sure the Army has a more colloquial phrase for it.” The use of the word 'colloquial' startled me somewhat. “Could you enlighten me?” At this point, I knew he knew. And with the ghost of a smirk, he knew that I knew.
“Embrace the suck.” In a whisper.
“Again.” With a whip of command, as if he were an officer of the disbanded army.
“Embrace the suck.”
“Louder.”
“Embrace the suck.”
“I still can't hear you.”
“Embrace the suck.”
“I suggest you do.” And he turned and went away.
The only thing to my mind was: “Why didn't the other prisoner respond?” Gaged? Unconscious? Sick? It is clear that I must move to the door, as the only light here is from the outside. And beyond the outside, the war that consumes the effort of millions of people. Crystalline in its intensity, savage in its aspect, ruthless in its nature. It has blown away a dictator, but not replaced him with anything remotely resembling a successor.
Instead, it has replaced him with anarchy both from the occupiers and from the insurgents. The occupiers have many voices now that the main objective is secured, the insurgents now have an objective too, but it does not have a name, and even freedom cannot be agreed on, roiling in the black background was Al Qaeda as a Sunni force and Iran for the Shia nation. They each supported proxies in fights design to chip away at occupation units.
And I am with one of them.
With the noise of memory jangling “Desert Rose” in the key of Sting (with its male backup singing in a form of Arabic) cogitation occurred with discernment about my guards. Burst, they were not dwellers of Iraq. This I knew because of the language of the CO, and the version of Arabic which is subordinates used. Truly Arabic is a family, not a language, but like Portuguese and Spanish, they are close enough for members of one language to understand at least some of what others are speaking. There was a difference between Bagdad Arabic and the other regional versions. Even with Baghdad, the is a distinct difference between the words that Muslims speak and the words that Jewish and Christian people use. The difference is between gilit (for the Muslims) and qeltu (for the others). The difference is that the pronunciation of 'ق' has either 'q' or 'g', this much I got from the cursory introduction to Arabic.
This meant, in all Probability that I was with people not from Iraq or people from the north. All all that meant they were probably not Ba'ath party members, more probably AQI. If these assumptions were true, that meant they were here for some reason other than herding people into cages, but there was no sign as to what it was. Thus the prison cells were an afterthought, something to do with the space while the real work was going on.
CO arrived, and I was up on my feet and was saluting - he was some form of regular military though of which state I did not know.
“How are you doing? Getting used to our hospitality?” There probably was a smile underneath his beard.
“I am trying to figure out where you come from.”
“Why cannot it be from here?”
“Possible, but not likely.”
“Why do you say that?”
“The language of your subordinates is different from either Baghdad or the nearby places.”
“You have a good ear if that is true.” There was a scoop on the 'if.'
“Not a terp, though I have some knowledge.” Staring straight ahead.
“You are right. We are from Saudi Arabia. Any more questions?”
We.
Having been in SA, also means they speak English. Which means they won't be polite, as a matter of course. Saudi Arabia thinks of itself as the first among equals. And though they do not say it in English, they do say it in their own language: everyone not Muslim is inferior, and Sunni better the Shia. MAS and JAM in particular.
“Are you still listening?”
“Yes, no more questions.”
He twirled away and one could see the metaphysical cloak trailing behind him. It was a scene out of Lawrence of Arabia. This is common among any military organization: the people belonging to the top dog have a way about them. And that they show it.
Then I sat down, in a Lotus position, and pondered all of the things that had eluded me at the beginning: why was the Koran nowhere close to being read, but stuck in the dark? What was the mission of the people who held this position? What had they done to the man whom I was supposed to rescue (and keep quiet)?
For long the CO arrived with a little book.
“It is the only English book we have. It will give you something to read.”
“Thank you.” It was the 1st kind of thing that had been done.
Once he had drifted away down the corridor, I began to examine the book. It was a book I had not heard of before, about the origins of the war in Vietnam. Nor had high heard of the author. It told a very different story than the one I was used to from the milenglish perspective. It began with the 1st contact and went through the decision to replace the French and English. I was staring when two of the guards came up to me, with a menacing stance.
“هيا تعال. Come.”
There was no choice - taking only the time to put the book aside, I stood up gracelessly as they unlocked the cell door. Both men grabbed me by the arms and almost dragged me. I got a look into the next cell over and only saw a figure on the bed before I was carried along. It was clear that new orders had been given because the rough treatment was new, and I assumed would just be the beginning.
Turning left, I examined a new room, at least to me. There was nothing in the cell, or so it appeared. Then I glanced upwards and saw rings from the ceiling this was the place of torture. And I did not know how long I would be incarcerated here, or what punishments would be authorized.
They placed my hands behind buyback, and stripped me to my underwear. Then with harsh motions, they motioned my hands up to the ceiling, with every ounce of pain that this implies. The arms howl at their positions behind my body. At least I knew what had happened to the 1st prisoner.
What was about to happen to me.
Contortionist is not in my repertory of accomplishments. I am sure that there are some MOS that make a DMOS you can qualify for by passing MOSQ (LBJ IRT USA LSD FBI CIA). Ratcheting up the wrist features until sharp. And now I can barely concentrate and they ruptured the 2nd phase, locking my ankles with leg shackles. In other times in other places, I would describe these, But. Now. There. is. Too much. Agony from the torture and suffering from the torment that throbs in my legs. All I can do is stare at the floor, tied to the ceiling from wrists and heels. I was suspended looking down, and I did not see any others with me. That means that I was unconscious or rather suspended in ecstasy induced by the pangs of pain.
How long I hung there I do not know, but then the buzzing through every direction of sand, coming from a group of fast movers over the sandbox AGL, sent from REMFland to rescue people like me. My mind's eye could see the sky, with the beagle lapping downward, but not with too much vertical velocity. No death blossom from the muj.
Ceiling collapsed in the hall, and there was a stream of bullets whizzing in every direction. This was being saved, in an Air Force kind of way. Then after a long wait, there was A unit of Joe's cleaning up the mess. With idiot sticks.
3
CHUville – on a stretcher in cash. Flour power provides lights. I blinked, my guts had been operated on, and I did know I was out.
“Relax (don't do it) you have been in surgery.” As if that wasn't obvious.
A moan and a mumble escaped my mouth, but no more than that. I was rolled into a vast healing stable, with many others. Then the blinds were rolled. The nurse said some pleasantries and then departed.
Alone, except for the other post-wounded.
There was no clock, but it was at least an hour before a man in fatigues showed up.
“Hello, I am major Rickenbacker. We can spare the formalities, and talk about what you saw.”
“Can I ask a couple of questions?”
“If they are brief.”
“Is the other man alive? What happened and how did they find me?” I gulp all of the questions at once, not knowing if I would get a 2nd chance.
“To the first: he is still in surgery. To the 2nd, a group of F-15s pounded the AQI installation, and then RWCAS went in to clean. The last I can only say is that we heard on the radio transmission from out by the lake, giving orders to exterminate two military men” Read: high-grade terps on skyrise at Mortaritaville or Bombaconda, “on the wire, so a QRF was sent out. Now, let us debrief you on the mission.”
Bumbling my way through the lost details of my mission, from a search for a stranded PSD to a trap for the bird, to a short stay in hotel muj to the rescue minus the Alpha Mike Foxtrot. I certainly got something wrong and was confused over several of the details. But it was my story and I am sticking to it.
Numbing amount of questions, most of which had the answer lobbed to me, and then he sat up and said: “Is there anything else you want to amend your story with or add?”
Hesitate, do I want to say what is on my mind? Give a final explanation as to why we should no longer-longer thunder run in Humvees with hillbilly armor around the country, with no point but to score points in a room someplace populated by Colonels slapping each other on the back? That we should no longer send young men and young women to dress up in battle rattle and take lollipops to children? Booyaa. GOFO - Hell with it, and I answered:
“Baghdad is burning, and in my final report I will say that we should get out as soon as possible, whatever the consequences are.”