Generation Kill - Evan Wright [147]
“We’ve never had this much air,” Colbert says, eyes gleaming, pleased with all the destruction we are witnessing. “It’s all about having some air and LAV escorts,” he concludes with a grand smile.
Pilots over the radio now discuss their next move, doing a “recon by fire” on the palm grove to the left of the intersection. The pilots can’t see what’s in the palm grove, nor have they taken any hostile fire from positions inside it. Nevertheless, they request permission to do a recon by fire, which simply means they’re going to rocket and machine-gun the fuck out of it and see if anything shoots back. The battalion’s forward air controller on the ground approves the plan. Helicopters skim low over the trees, stitching the ground with machine guns, setting off a storm of white fire with their rockets. It’s a real Apocalypse Now moment.
Colbert’s team and the rest of the platoon are ordered to drive up to the intersection, take the Y left and enter the palm grove while it’s still burning.
We drive into a bank of smoke, glimpsing a succession of small horrors. There’s a truckful of shot-up cows in the field, nearby several slaughtered sheep, their guts smeared out around them. Two charred human corpses by the road are still smoking. There’s a dog with his head buried up to his ears in the stomach of a cow he’s eating. We are again in Dog Land.
We come alongside the palm grove on our left. Fences made of dried reeds crackle and burn outside the vehicle. We continue on, pull upwind of the smoke and now see there’s a hamlet nestled between the trees—a series of farmhouses, interconnected by walls, animal pens and grape arbors. Thatched roofs and fences burn. These are what were reconned by fire.
“I hope there’s no people in there,” Colbert says. The gleam that had been in his eyes moments earlier during the bombing has been replaced with his worried, helpless look.
Republican Guard berets, uniforms and other pieces of military gear are scattered by the road across from the palm grove. Iraqi forces—legitimate military targets—have obviously been in the area. Colbert stops the Humvee. He and other Marines get out. Iraqi military communications lines—cables from field phones—lie by the side of the road. Colbert’s men cut them apart with their Leatherman tools.
While standing outside, we hear a babble of voices. Men whom we can’t see are chanting something. Their voices come from ditches by the road across from the burning hamlet. An old man now rises from behind a berm ten meters away. His hands are up. His eyes are wild and his face covered with tears as he shrieks, “No Saddam! No Saddam!”
A couple of other men rise behind him, all of them chanting the same words. One has his shirt off and is waving it as a surrender flag. Another man climbs out of a ditch carrying a small frightened girl, about five or six. She stares at the Marines in shock. They’re all civilians—probably residents of the hamlet reconned by fire.
The Marines lift their rifles high and gesture for the now-homeless villagers to step forward. The men keep chanting.
“Okay, okay!” Fick shouts. He gives them an exaggerated smile, trying to reassure them.
The eldest man approaches, still chanting insanely. Fick pats his arm. The man begins to shout. “George Bush! George Bush!” he says, pronouncing the first name like “Jor.” The Marines offer the little girl some candy but she turns away in mute fear.
Fick grabs the old man’s shoulder, steadying him. “Yes, George Bush,” Fick says. “No problem. Okay?”
The old man finally stops shouting. He stares at Fick, perhaps finally recognizing that this American is not going to kill him. He breaks down sobbing, grabs Fick’s face