Generation Kill - Evan Wright [77]
Encino Man and Casey Kasem are now huddled by Doc Bryan’s Humvee, trying to figure out what do about the RPG team. Even though Christeson is sure he wounded at least one of the guys, and his fire did push them back into a tree line, Encino Man and Casey Kasem have become obsessed with the possibility of the RPG team reappearing and attacking the company.
Fick runs up to Encino Man and asks him, “What are we doing here?”
Fick’s concern is that the company is spread out willy-nilly along the highway directly across from a town of about 75,000, some of whose occupants are now shooting at his Marines.
Encino Man ignores him. He and Casey Kasem are poring over a map, studying coordinates to call in an artillery strike on the suspected position of the suspected RPG team.
Doc Bryan is growing alarmed. “Sir, I don’t like this,” he says to Fick. Nodding toward Encino Man and Casey Kasem, he adds, “When those two put their heads together it’s fucking dangerous.”
Ever since Casey Kasem almost shot Doc Bryan a few nights earlier, he and the other Recon Marines have grown extremely wary of the man. And today the memory of seeing Encino Man trying to fire a grenade into a house with civilians in it is still fresh in the Marines’ minds.
“Sir,” Doc Bryan says to Fick, “we’re fifty meters from a hostile city, and those two jackasses are worrying about a possible guy with an RPG three hundred meters from here.”
Fick confronts Encino Man. “If you don’t tell us what we’re doing here, we should get the fuck out now.”
“I’m calling in a fire mission,” Encino Man says, still not explaining what he wants Fick’s platoon to do on the highway.
Part of the reason Encino Man is so preoccupied with calling in the artillery fire mission is he’s never done this before in combat. Now he tells the men the exact coordinates he’s planning to bring the artillery down on.
Doc Bryan and Lovell use a laser designator to measure the distance from their Humvee to the spot where Encino Man intends to direct the artillery strike, and it’s just over 200 meters distant.
Yesterday, when Capt. Patterson called in a danger-close artillery strike near his Marines, the distance was 300 meters, his men were behind berms and walls, and they were at the time under heavy enemy machine-gun fire.
Right now, Doc Bryan’s team and the rest of the platoon are on an open road, with nothing between them and the place where the artillery, if called, will splash down. They see no enemy where Encino Man is trying to call in the fire mission, and on top of this, they are taking fire, but it’s coming from the other side of the road. Doc Bryan can’t stand it any longer. He runs up to Encino Man and shouts, “You can’t do this. That’s a danger-close strike.”
“What’s ‘danger close’?” Encino Man asks.
Lovell, a few meters away, cites from a military manual he keeps in his Humvee. “Danger close is an artillery strike within six hundred meters of friendly forces.”
“You dumb motherfucker,” one of the enlisted men shouts. “The most boot-fucking Marine knows danger close!”
Fick grabs the radio handset from Encino Man in an attempt to stop him from calling in the strike. Gunny Wynn now tries to intercede. “Sir, this is fucked up. Let’s forget about the fire mission and get the platoons in a defensive perimeter. Then we can worry about the RPG team.”
One thing about Encino Man is that he’s stubborn. Having lost face in front of the men, he digs in deeper. He takes the handset back from Fick and attempts to call in the strike. But it never happens. There are protocols for calling in a Marine artillery strike, and Encino Man, it turns out, doesn’t know them. When the officer on the end of the line receives Encino Man’s confused request, he turns it down.
“For once,” Doc Bryan observes, “we were saved by the man’s incompetence.”
AFTER THE ARTILLERY STRIKE is scratched, Encino Man finally issues orders. The Marines are to remain by the road—on the south end of Ar Rifa—and