Victory Point - Ed Darack [125]
After donning their ghillie suits (camouflage composed of densely packed, long strands of green and brown fabric for concealment in densely vegetated areas) and striping their faces in olive-drab and black camo paint, the trio moved into position and “glassed” Salar Ban with a powerful Leupold spotting scope. “Nothing. No fighters whatsoever,” Eggers reported to McShane after sighting just villagers—including women and children, who typically leave once extremist fighters arrive. Ronin would continue their overwatch mission for Echo-3 during the following days, preparing to link up with the platoon at Sawtalo Sar’s summit on 16 August. Those intervening days, however, wouldn’t pass easily. The amount of specialized equipment they carried—optics and radios, not to mention the sniper rifle itself and its support gear and rounds—meant that they portaged over one hundred pounds each, spread between their packs and gear harnesses, and like the other Marines of ⅔ during Whalers, they fought to stay hydrated in the intense heat. Searching for small streams while maintaining cover and providing overwatch proved exhausting. But the risks of their mission meant that they’d get few chances to truly rest and rehydrate—and they had to maintain the very sharpest of focus.
“So, we’re gonna get overrun by Shah’s guys, huh?” Joe Roy skeptically asked on the evening of the fifteenth at their hide above Echo-3’s patrol base just outside of Chichal.
“That’s what they say—based off the ICOM hits the terps are picking up,” Eggers responded. “Apparently they’ve seen us. But I don’t care how many times I’ve heard it and it turned out to be bullshit, we’re not taking any chances.” The three of them set claymore antipersonnel mines around a solid, densely treed “harbor site” at the top of steep ground above Chichal in which they’d remain concealed for the night, downed some caffeine pills, and waited—silently scanning the surroundings through their night-vision equipment, and most importantly, listening intently for the approach of anyone in the dead-still air. It’s so densely vegetated you’d have to be superhuman to get to us without us hearing, Eggers thought.
The night passed without incident—and without sleep, and at dawn, Ronin got word that Echo-3 was fast en route to Sawtalo Sar’s summit to investigate some suspicious smoldering fires, possibly left by Shah’s men during their movement into the Korangal from the Chowkay after the firefight with Fox-3. The three scout/snipers of Ronin stealthily moved out of their hide and vectored up the north ridge to observe and then meet Guyton’s platoon at the summit. With a mission spectrum far broader than targeted hits against individual personnel, Marine scout/ sniper teams are often tasked by commanders to undertake the type of “bounding overwatch” missions that Ronin performed throughout Whalers. Acting as the “eyes forward”—not just watching out for, and then using their precision rifles to interdict, ambushes against other Marine elements on the move, but acting as observers for forward air controllers and mortar and artillery teams—Eggers and Team Ronin combined their knowledge of the area’s terrain with their specialized training to virtually guarantee that units whom they overwatched could safely move through an area. As stealthy, fit, and well trained as they were, however, three men—completely unsupported—stood little chance of survival should an enemy force of greater number descend upon them. Thus, as he had always on such missions, Eggers kept constant watch over his radios—the team’s lifelines of support.
“Hides,” Pigman noted near the summit of Sawtalo Sar later that morning. “Damn, this is where they probably concealed themselves during the ambush of the SEALs.” Eggers, Roy, and Pigman studied the positions Shah’s men had made—nothing dug in, but rather walled up with large, felled trees, concealing their locations within the surroundings. Topping out on the mountain’s summit