A View From Cracked Glass - Michael Hanson (part 2 of 2)

We pick up Part Two with Mike Hanson as he relives Ramadi through the details that didn't fade: from weapons caches and watch posts to split-second calls that still don’t have easy answers. We also talk about what it feels like to come home, carry the friendships forward, and remember the people who didn’t make it back.

• trying to stop incoming mortars and rockets
• finding buried anti-aircraft rounds and unexpected weapons caches
• near misses on exposed posts
• watching civilian life from the bridge
• night raids, Iraqi compounds, and how clean and empty many homes felt
• the smell of sewage in streets and burning trash near the landfill
• checkpoint shooting where the driver turns out to have no brakes
• responding to major incidents including the Mattis LAV escort aftermath
• escort missions with reporters 
• vehicle recoveries, convoy accidents, and improvised fixes 
• hooch life stories, downtime, money saved, and the realities of forward operating base life
• rushing a badly injured engineer to a helicopter for evacuation
• coming home, welcome-back moments, and what Marine Corps service means decades later

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Transcript

Part Two And The Mortar Hunt

SPEAKER_02 0:09

This is part two with Mike Hansen of Sledgehammer Platoon. I don't know if you remember, but the um the guys from First Recon, they came into Hurricane Point a couple of times, and that was part of their whole mission was stopping the mortar. All the the Okay, yeah, the ecosystem of mortars that was traded between us and Fallujah. And so McCauliff, that used to be in our company, who used to be a machine gunner in my platoon in Cat Platoon. Yeah, yeah. He went to recon and he would tell us, he's like, Well, we haven't got anybody. He's like, We've tried a lot, and we've, you know, we've had other things that we did, but as far as stopping the incoming fire, he's like, We're just not catching them.

SPEAKER_00 0:49

Yeah. I remember we were out on a patrol one time and we found a whole uh buried batch of um like anti-aircraft artillery um off the side of the woods in the woods, and it it filled up like two the back of like two Humvees, and that stuff was so heavy, those Humvees were like dragging those rounds, and they were because they were like I think they were called like like iridium tipped or something like that. Uh, but they're basically they had these little plastic pieces on the end of them, um, because they're basically for like anti-aircraft type, but I think they were like 20 millimeter or something like that, just huge rounds. And there was tons of those that we found just somebody saw something uh that looked like somebody had like been off the side of the road or like a track or something like that. It looked like, and we just rarely stopped and sent a quick patrol out there, and it they found it pretty quick, like just up just randomly on the side of the road, just a ton of it, which was crazy.

SPEAKER_02 1:53

Glad they didn't figure out how to fire it.

SPEAKER_04 1:58

Yeah, it was up, it was that was the on the north that was like in the Sophia district, like we were way even further out than that, I think. We're out on Route Nova, yeah. Up past Apple. And uh, like you said, actually, I the the half memory that I have of it is is that it was even less than that. I think I thought it was somebody like one go went to go take a piss and was like, this looks weird.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

It wasn't even yeah, it could have been something, but for some reason we're gonna be completely random and somebody looked and then it was kind of buried in just some some like long grass or bushes or something like that.

SPEAKER_04 2:36

And because they were in Palm Tree Grove.

unknown 2:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

Yeah, because I yeah, because they were in um big ammo cans basically. Uh and we backed up one of the Humvees and just loaded them all up and then brought them and then probably blew them up in the the demo pit, basically. I'm not sure what exactly they did with them, but yeah, that's I heard was gonna be their fate.

SPEAKER_02 3:03

Hard to say. I mean, uh half that shit we captured, sometimes we threw it in the river, sometimes we burned it, sometimes we had people demo it, sometimes we turned it into the army and they demoed it. Yeah, and it sometimes we turned it over to the Iraqi police, although I don't think we would have done that with anti-aircraft rounds, but we did take uh AK ammo and shit over to them. Like, hey, this stuff looks good, you guys want it? And they'd be like, Oh, yeah, we need training rounds. Like, okay, well, I don't know if we're supplying the enemy, but here you go. There's 50 cases of AK rounds we drag out of a house.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Yeah, yeah. And there was a couple times when we come back and just find um huge batches of like AKs and stuff like that, and rifles and stuff like that, too. Um, I got a whole bunch of pictures of them just laid out um in front of our hooch and stuff from some of the patrols where we go through. Uh and I don't remember exactly where those ones came, but I remember there's one in the K-bed, there was about 50

Weapons Caches And Ammo Finds

SPEAKER_00 4:00

guns that they had that they found somewhere.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Yeah, I feel like you guys drug out a lot more of those big weapons caches because you guys went into houses and just had a lot of stuff. So, but I I remember coming over and taking pictures with the weapons because it was fun.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

But uh, there were some cool ones.

SPEAKER_02 4:18

Yeah, my favorite was always digging through those weapons caches and trying to find the most like old rare stuff. Like, there's like World War One and World War II. Yeah, like wow, they still have this, and it's still functional. Like, how is this here?

SPEAKER_00 4:33

Yeah, it was cool. Yeah, that was that was like one of the crazy ones. Uh, but yeah, let me see. Um I think if there was anything else. Oh, um, I remember one time, yeah. I'm getting back to when we were on on post on the wall, uh, when we were taking those rockets. There was one time when one of those rockets literally went like right over us on the wall there. And I was up there, I think it was with uh Venicea, and is the him or someone else, but they didn't we didn't even know. But and he ended up getting hit with like a round, like while we're up there, like on his back. And yeah, we noticed it while we were there, and we're like, wait a second, there's a hole in your flak jack. And there was literally like a round, they think it was one that just kind of came from quite a ways away because it didn't have any, it didn't go through, it pretty much just got stuck and didn't hardly even do anything to it. But I think it hit because it hit the sapby plate.

SPEAKER_02 5:40

That ended up being that was Escalante, and the only reason why it's like Escalante, that's who it was. Yeah, the only reason why I know is because he came and told us that same story. I had never heard it before.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Yeah, yeah, because it was me, it was me and him up there, and maybe someone else. But yeah, we were both up there and just I looked and I was like, Oh my god, you it was me either me or somebody uh said you got a hole in your flak jacket. We were able to literally like fish out the round. Yeah, that was crazy.

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Yeah, you said he felt like somebody just slapped him in the back, and then you guys were like digging around and found the bullet. That yeah, that's a crazy story.

unknown 6:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

Uh, but yeah, it was it was always interesting. Um seeing the watch like being up on that watch, like you were never sure uh if someone was gonna try because because we were completely open um up there. We had some we had some netting and some sandbags that we'd built up around. So we tried to kind of keep down, but we also had to to keep a lookout for everything that was going on. And then there was a time, oh I remember one of the biggest ones. Um, did you hear when all the snipers got hit out in town? Uh and in the areas, uh, we had to we had to go to like three or four different areas on a patrol and like pick them up after they all got hit. Kind of it seemed like almost a coordinated thing. Um so we always had that in the back of our mind too. That you could get either sniped or that we were being watched and could have been shot at the same up there because it was just completely it was pretty exposed right over right over the river banks and over the bridge.

SPEAKER_04 7:30

Yeah, I I was always surprised I didn't get hit hard. I mean, I that's that always fascinated me that they decided never to.

SPEAKER_00 7:40

I mean, you guys whenever I was up there, I always felt like it could have because it was completely like exposed. Um, other than there was some big like I think there were some big like generators for the bridge, because it was like uh central power station basically. Um the things, and and we'd watch kids like swimming in the river and stuff like that. So everything was pretty exposed up there, but it's funny.

SPEAKER_02 8:09

I was just gonna ask you.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

I don't think anything out other seriously happened up there other than that.

SPEAKER_02 8:13

Yeah, I was just gonna ask you what other weird stuff did you see from up on those posts? I mean, because you get to see like a uh uh like a small snapshot of civilian life too, right? It wasn't all like complicated.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

Oh yeah. Um, yeah, well, I would I would pay attention. They're they're they're terrible drivers. And they would get in fights in the streets down there because they there weren't any really rules, but somebody would piss somebody off and they'd get out and they'd be screaming at each other like in the middle of the road and stop traffic. Uh so we'd sit and watch the the road rage that would ensue on that bridge, because there was always somebody pissing somebody off.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

Um, exactly. And then you kind of would see like you get in a routine also of seeing like when everybody was like coming into town in the mornings, because everybody would come in, because there were shops that they would set up with all their like animals and stuff like that. Like you know, people sell goats and sheep and all kinds of stuff. So you'd see the trucks and all the people with their like goods coming in to set up their their shops in the morning. Um, because it'd be it'd be nothing, completely bare, and then uh almost like clockwork at a certain time, you'd see all the all the trucks coming into town from uh the different like residential areas where they're gonna sell their goods for the day, and then

Rockets Bullets And Exposed Posts

SPEAKER_00 9:45

and then it would just be busy cars non-stop, like all day long.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

Yeah, I don't know that very many people fully appreciated what Ramadi was at the time being the provincial capital, and that I mean you you made a good point. There were plenty of people who lived in Ramadi and ran shops, but there were plenty of people who lived in far other towns, but they drove, they commuted to Ramadi to come work and sell you know whatever they sold, electronics or whatever they sold. And then on top of that, it was the only, at least according to the farmers that we talked to, it was the only full-scale farm market where commercial buyers came and bought like like goods, like they would buy sheep or they would buy you know, buy meat, buy vegetables, buy whatever, and that's where they did it was downtown in that damn giant crazy ass marketplace.

SPEAKER_00 10:40

And or ice. We'd we'd see this truck come with a big giant block of ice, yeah. Um, and people would they'd chip off the ice or cut off ice blocks.

SPEAKER_02 10:50

They'd saw it with chain with chainsaws. We watched them do it with chainsaws, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:55

Yeah, I just remember seeing those big trucks come there, just giant blocks of ice. I'm like, where'd they get these blocks of ice from? But yeah, interesting stuff like that. Um, just watching the people come and go. Um, and sometimes like kids that come and talk to us, like, hey, hey, hey, and they'd kind of yell up a little bit, and people would say wave at us and stuff like that. Um so there was that type of stuff where you just be kind of trying to watch out over like the river, um, because we had a clear view of like all like the river banks and stuff like that. Um and and just keep a lookout for anything that and you also, yeah, we also had a feeling in our mind that someone could drive up with uh a VB ID or something like that. So we were always kind of just on lookout for stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 11:54

So you kind of mentioned uh a couple of the raids. Did you ever go inside houses or anything on any of the missions? Did you do any door kicks?

SPEAKER_00 12:05

Yeah, there was a couple houses like that I went in with on raids. It was always there everywhere I went, it seemed like there was always really clean. Uh whenever we went in there. Um I didn't go in a lot of them, but we go in and just kind of pull perimeter for people, and there'd be people going through the just all their the couches, the cushions, um the drawers, dressers, things like that. So I wasn't one of the people going through, but I was there for more for like security because we did do a lot of like night raids where they'd go and kick open the doors and we'd have certain things where they thought yeah, because at the time there was uh there's a lot of intel that we would be getting that certain like warlords were in the area or something like that, or Bathists that were that were loyal to Saddam. And so we'd always be getting like a thing like say, hey, we got intel that they were there, and uh most of the time they never were, but you'd go and knock over the gates, and some of the gates, some of them were pretty nice when you went in there, and you're like, Oh, this they have a huge, they have a bunch of people that live here, and sometimes it was like multi- multi-families would live there. Uh, there was this one that we went in the compound, and it seemed like there was like three or four different houses in there, um, and had like a big gate that we went in, and you'd see you'd see people like all at like one house, it seemed like like congregated, like they weren't like spread out like throughout the the the time of the day, basically, I guess I could say. Sure. But yeah, the compounds were pretty interesting because they'd have big gates and walls around and be like all by themselves, which is pretty interesting.

SPEAKER_02 14:12

Yeah, I imagine that was probably in the south of the city, is what I remember. I remember the compounds that had multi-structures in them were all in the south. And then the north was like in the north was more like once you got outward north, you know, northeast-ish, that was where you got like the two-story, they almost looked like palaces. They would have like the Romanesque

Markets Road Rage And Ice Blocks

SPEAKER_02 14:30

columns and like really elaborate decorations. What always struck me was the and again, I didn't go into as many houses as either one of you, but the ones that I did go into, they're just there every room was not didn't have furniture in it. It's just such a weird thing. As an American, right? If I go into a house in America, usually there's too much shit everywhere, and it they were the opposite, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:55

They would have like yeah, no, there's always very yeah, there's never very much stuff in there.

SPEAKER_02 14:58

Yeah, never very much stuff. There'd be like one room that would have stuff, and the rest would have like one or two things, if anything.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

Well, yeah, like I said, like, but they were very clean, um, with all the with as much dust and dirt and stuff like that. That's good. They spent a lot of time to keep that stuff out.

SPEAKER_02 15:16

Yeah. Yeah, probably a full-time job. It was a full-time job for us. I imagine it was for them too.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

Yeah. And that was the thing, like when we were in the neighborhoods, that's the biggest thing I remember is the smell. Um, because a lot of the sewage um would go like right into the streets. Yep. And we'd be driving through, especially in the earlier times, when we're like, that's not water. Because it would just be pooled up in the streets, and it was like all the kind of the sewer runoff that because all the houses just had a little pipe that in some of the areas that came out and just just fed into the street, basically. And that's where we're like that was where we were glad. Uh, that we were on a vehicle patrol. We were just like, Thank god, we're not walking through that.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

Yeah, driving through it was bad enough, it's splash all over your truck.

SPEAKER_00 16:09

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it was just, yeah, that's one thing I smell the remember the worst. And then we would do a lot of the patrols and we would go way out um to to the landfill because they were always burning the trash out there, and I don't know if they just permanently were burning tires as well, but it just always stunk so bad when we'd have to patrol. And there was these there's another, there was like a dam that was like not too far away from there as well. Yeah, that's that we would set up.

SPEAKER_02 16:42

Yeah, that's where the Hidita dam would start right there, or the Habanita Dam, not Hidita, Habanita Dam.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

Yeah, we'd set up on there because we we're trying to see if we could catch people like setting up like IEDs on the road, basically. Um, so we try and get off like far enough and sit out there for like half a day or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

You're talking about kind of sitting out and watching things and and uh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

We would try and just sit and watch and get low, um, and just see if we could come up with different tactics to try and catch people doing stuff. I don't think we saw anybody, but we also figured that we need to do it.

SPEAKER_02 17:28

Yeah, yeah, that was my my next question. Did you ever catch anybody? I don't think so.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

Um we both I remember we had a vehicle, I remember we had a checkpoint set up one time though, and um we I was off on like the back side of it, uh, and there was a group that was set up to to patrol and stop and like check vehicles and stuff like that. And there was this one car that he didn't stop, and he tried to blow through and they lit him up. Like, yeah, and we're and then where they were like, stop, stop, stop. It didn't he just kept going. So yeah, that one got lit up.

SPEAKER_04 18:09

That that one specifically was uh the poor guy. He uh uh the the short version of it is that he didn't have any brakes, yeah. And so uh that's uh that's the reason why he ran he ran. No, he didn't. No, yeah, I don't think he died. I was on the contact. Oh I was on the contact team, and that poor bastard when we when he was, yeah, I don't know how I mean he got hit several times. He got hit and both his hands got shot up, he got hit in the shoulder, he got shit, he got he got a big old chunk of his leg taken out, and he just fell out of the truck when we opened it up and he was still alive and we patched him up. And I was yelling at him. Uh like he was like, Why, you know, like why didn't you stop? Why didn't you stop? And anyways, it figured out finally that he he was like, I think there was like three or four people.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

Yeah, I think there were three or four people shooting at him too.

SPEAKER_04 19:01

Well, there was quite a few. Quite a few.

unknown 19:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:08

No.

SPEAKER_00 19:11

But yeah, there'd be stuff like that. Um, and then I remember there was a night patrol when we went out, and it had to be uh I'm trying to think of like what there was uh one of those like LAV care. Was it the LAV platoon? Um I think they had one where they went out and someone got lit up on a patrol, and and we went there and there was a there was a car,

Raids Compounds And The Smell Of Ramadi

SPEAKER_00 19:40

and I just remember it was more bullets in that car than I'd ever seen. More bullet holes. Like there was there was more holes than metal left on that thing.

SPEAKER_02 19:51

So very specifically, and just to pinpoint when that was, that was June 7th, and that was General Mattis's LAV escort. And they okay, okay, yeah. It was on racetrack road, they they got hit by an IED. And uh, I only know because our platoon went out with your platoon as well to respond to that, and you're right. That that they fired everything, including the 25mm main guns, yeah, of those LAVs. There was holes in everything everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 20:21

Yeah, that's my time as I was like, that is Swiss cheese, and I couldn't believe it.

SPEAKER_02 20:27

Yeah. Yep. That ended up being a big deal later. I don't know if you uh had ever heard that, but uh several of us had to be questioned and and testify about what we saw that night because no, no, I never heard of anything after that.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

But I just remember uh going out there and I was my truck was like kind of like wrecked next to it once we got out and we were on, you know, people set in security, basically.

SPEAKER_02 20:53

Yeah, yeah. It also uh I I don't know, I don't know whatever actually came of it, but the the rumor was that uh that General Mattis was basically like sneaking through the city, like they had not called out that they were in the middle of our city, and so we didn't even know they were there. And so when our QRFs responded, I mean we were we're late to the party because uh we didn't even know you were there, otherwise, there would have been somebody somebody out there, been someone somebody who staged.

SPEAKER_00 21:23

You know, they yeah, there were always some of those high-level ones that thought that they were gonna go and like just kind of do their own thing, yeah. And I know Booker had his own thing, like he went out on some of those on his own sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 21:33

Yeah, yeah, he had his own secret scroll missions, yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah.

unknown 21:38

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

And um and I'm trying to remember what the name of that, and I wish I could you'll know as soon as I do, but the name of the the reporter um that came out with us, uh, he was on Fox News. Oliver North. Oliver North, yeah. I was driving him around uh one of the days. when when he came out and that was pretty cool so we drove him out to all the different like checkpoints and stuff like that and all the bases and um drove him around the area so and that was the second time actually that I met him because we trained with him or we we did some training at an air force base before we deployed as well. We did uh with some with some um I think with some British like RAF soldiers that were out there training with us.

SPEAKER_02 22:34

Yeah I can't and I can't remember if they're RAF or what they were but something like that.

SPEAKER_00 22:39

I know there was some type of like British um they're definitely British like special forces or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Yeah. That's very accurate. Yeah March Air Force Base we did uh in their old abandoned officers housing we did some some pre-deployment training and Oliver North came out and videotaped it and put that at later put it on Fox News that that he didn't do any of that footage until after we were in contact which was interesting.

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Uh-huh yeah so that was that was pretty cool when I took a picture with him and got to talk to him a lot that day because he was I was driving and he was in the back and I think Gunny Cook was with us and stuff. So so that was that was pretty interesting to meet him. Yeah he tell you anything interesting he's I mean he's a Vietnam era marine he's got a lot of yeah I just remember he was really he was really down to earth really nice um he he just asked us like how's everything going for us basically out here um and just wanted to know basically kind of what life was like um if we'd been in any engagements about we've been and been getting hit with a lot of like IDs at that time um so it was just just about that type of stuff so but otherwise yeah he was super nice um took pictures with everybody and just told us just how much he appreciated that we were there and and what we were doing um so he was just a really nice really down to earth guy.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

Yeah cool any of those other escort missions strike you I know we took out all kinds of people like lioness teams and we took out other high values and other reporters it was I I always thought that was interesting how many tourists we ended up having yeah um let's see uh there was this one where um something happened and we had to escort this ambulance like halfway across the city and I can't remember what it was for but it I I don't know if it was an Iraqi ambulance if it was one that it had to have been because we didn't have any like regular ambulances not that I know of no yeah yeah but no there was definitely one where we had to escort an ambulance um that had to like get across the city it must have it must have had somebody that was was under threat or danger because we had an escort before and after them but so that was interesting.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

And we do a lot of patrols I remember I always thought it was interesting when we do like night patrols and I remember there's this one night in particular where we were tracking somebody that had set off an IED or fired some mortars rockets at night or something like that but they were coordinating with uh with the helicopters above um and coordinating like the ground crew and I I remember they they had him in the sights but I feel like he got away um but that was just pretty interesting of like hearing

Checkpoint Shooting And The Mattis Convoy

SPEAKER_00 26:00

the because I think it was like a cobra attack opter of like a cobra attack helicopter or something like that up that was like spotting from above yeah and directing us where to go because I feel like we were in these like uh these big like pine groves basically because there's some of those just basic there's big giant groves of pine trees um that people would run in and hide in basically so that was a really nice really interesting night patrol that we're on I remember hmm yeah we had a so many different integrated missions where that sounds like you're describing like a a JTAC officer but I I actually I don't remember ever having a JTAC officer but it could be it could have been one of the Delta guys too it's always hard to tell because there's all kinds of people that came with us that like coordinated air and coordinated like uh long before the era of drones like obviously drones are everywhere now in the news but that we had uh the one of the I remember there yeah I remember there that we did have drones at the time obviously but not to to the level that we have of now you know no I mean even uh I was back in country in 2008 2009 and in 2009 there were drones and they would just like punch it up on a screen like they were ordering McDonald's and they could give you a picture of anywhere in the city in three seconds like it was wow yeah like it just the night and day just into the five year time time frame. So yeah it's very very interesting the difference of the level of yeah aerial intel that we were able to get uh and I remember one big one as I remember when we had to go meet or somebody it might have been like one of the generals or something like that but we went to um I feel like we it was it was the downtown like city center of Ramadi basically that compound yeah and we spent almost like the whole day there uh because somebody was in negotiations like with with like the like the mayor or the governor of the city or something like that. Yeah um so I remember we kind of went up and we had some people posted on the roof uh and in other like areas um overlooking basically like that city area and I remember that in particular because it was short it must have been right before we left because I remember hearing that like shortly after we left and it might have even been like when we were leaving but our relief platoon or you know company that was like taking over I think they had had some people like based in there and we turned our vehicles over to them basically and I think a I think a bunch of them got bombed or blown up in that uh that city center um like on the way out or something like that and there was one of them here I was like that was I was like well I think one of them was my trucks that got blown up or something like that but I remember they got hit pretty hard like I feel like when we're on our way out or like right after we changed over or something like that. If if I'm aligning what you're saying correctly uh you're talking about the government center and I the government I remember I remember the mission we were there for goddamn the entire day um and we kept rotating I mean we had its rotation for the different spots that we were doing but then I think what you're talking about for the second one was one of the last days that that that the guys that were staying behind stayed behind because the government center got attacked uh really heavily and a lot of those trucks were shot up pretty good because we were as we were X-filling people they were taking some pretty intense hits and I know the truck that I went out in has all the tires had they were running on run flats in the and the uh all the windows had been basically shot out uh well they weren't shot out they were bullet proof you know glass but they had hit and so that was a yeah a lot of those trucks were yeah yeah well and in good shape at the end of that day you had and that reminds me of one also like when I think I don't know I don't think it was an abrams because I don't think those ever took too much damage but one of the army um there was an army tank that got a tracks blown off or something like that and we had to go up one time and post security for that. Yep um and wait they had to wait for like like basically the tank tow truck to come the Hercules and hook up to it. Yeah yeah the Hercules I remember they just dragged that thing through the street and it just destroyed the road yep yep yep yep yep I do remember but it was just dragging that uh that oh man what was that the Bradley it was a Bradley I think yeah it was a Bradley and if I remember correctly it didn't get the track blown off it just broke and but they had no way to fix it and not out there and so they just drug it back and destroyed the street yeah yeah yeah that was great because they're finally they're I think they were like trying to and they're like forget it just just drag it back.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

Yeah yeah that was when I at least for me that was when I had like an amazing amount of level of respect for that damn Hercules because I don't know how much that Bradley weighs but it's got to be 20 tons or whatever it is and it it didn't even care. It just pulled it like nothing just pulled like nothing didn't even look like it was straining or anything just dragging it. Well that's fucking nuts.

SPEAKER_00 31:52

Yeah yeah just the loudest grinding that I couldn't believe and it there's nothing that slowed that thing down. That's funny I forgot about that till you mentioned that but yeah they and destroyed that road and I remember all of us saying they're gonna bury an IED right in that destroyed part of the road tomorrow and patch over yeah yeah yeah and then uh another recovery mission we had to go on is

Reporters Escorts And Recovery Missions

SPEAKER_00 32:20

there was a team I think it it might have been from like Echo Company either Echo or golf but they had a a Humvee that was going like full bore full bore and they smashed into like a sedan or something like that and just crushed the car. Um and we had to go out and post security and get that and yeah I remember seeing that that little car there was nothing left of that like half the car was gone and I remember that was like a big incident because I think some locals died in that nobody was living through that was that one of the ones where uh the XO had to give money and then he was like how much money probably probably dead people it was there's there's probably a good chance of that because I know they had to because it's something like the Humvee was you know they was going full speed or something and they pulled out and something happened and they the Humvee just craned that car yeah and there was like nothing left of it yeah it's guaranteed to happen wild yeah yeah we hit a lot of and I mean unfortunately I mean unfortunately but there we hit hit a lot of cars and people and stuff like that while we were I was surprised sometimes that we didn't hit more because when we'd be going through like patrols in like the daytime especially in like the market and stuff like that um some of those streets were so so narrow and and there'd be other cars like right next to us like literally like inches away from us um and we probably lost some mirrors here and there but I remember like it was basically like stuck in traffic kind of trying to get through that stuff and you know and that's there that's the thing just everybody was everywhere so and then you and ours was an open like my truck had an open back but it just had the big side rail armor the up armor side rails that we put on there basically like at first they were just pieces of sheet metal that we uh welded on there. Yeah and and then we finally got the actual ones but I think the sheet metal ones were thicker than the actual new replacement ones that we got because they weren't that thick. Right.

SPEAKER_02 34:40

Yeah yeah I think if I remember correctly was it Echo I think it was Echo where a marine got hit by a Humvee right and got killed oh it was almost at the end of the deployment but I remember like being called for QRF. It might have been I don't I truly don't remember I just remember being called for QRF and uh we were on our way but we never made it they just they waved us off they're like we already took care of it.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

Did they get hit at night during like a patrol because sometimes it was kind of hard to see I have no idea I think so I think I think he was in the either laying in the middle of the road or standing in the middle of the road and got hit. Uh-huh but yeah there was one there was one time when uh we were on a night patrol we were set up um on a road and just sitting with our night goggles and we were posted and another company's uh vehicle patrol was out I don't remember who it was because we never we didn't really talk to them that much but as they're coming up we could only just barely hear them and then I looked over and saw them in my in my NVGs and I was like oh shit there's a Humvee coming so we had to quick like turn the lights on but it was really close to them almost hitting us because we couldn't hear and I couldn't see them until we like looked and they were coming like right towards us and luckily I turned the full lights on at the time um so I could see and stopped and then they got pissed at us they're like what the fuck are you doing out here? Like we're supposed to be on patrol like think there was like a breakdown of that they didn't know that we were going to be posted there because they it was supposed to be like coordinated I believe yeah um but there was something that they didn't know we were going to be there and obviously we didn't know that they were out and they were just driving and we were kind of set up. So after that we came up because you know sometimes it was kind of a pain in the ass to turn those lights on because you had to squeeze two things together and like turn it um and it worked to get half to get the light to turn on yeah so we what we did is we came up with a a a thing where we like tied two like kind of strings together with like a stick or something like that. So that like kept them together so we could just quickly turn it um if something was coming because that was the thing like it was those it's not just a not just a switch that you turn the lights on on those things. There was two little things you had to press and turn at the same time to turn the lights on. So then after that we're like okay we need to have a faster way to turn the lights on in a quick emergency like that otherwise someone was going to get hit by a humpie. I don't know that was an avoided thing. I don't know if every single interview we've done has had a story about how Calm was a shit show but that could be the that could be the subtitle for the whole deployment is Calm was a shit show all the time always yeah yeah that I just remember that because we were like holy shit like somebody could have gotten seriously hurt but we luckily quickly like avoided that but that's I was wondering if it happened at night because sometimes you couldn't see uh and if you can hear you don't always know where it's coming from because when it was dark it was pitch black oh yeah out there and if you didn't know exactly where you're looking with your MVGs on um you you couldn't see anything and hearing it you couldn't really pick too much up from that because we're the only ones out there because there was it was a complete as I remember yeah it was pretty much a complete lockdown nobody was allowed out at night unless they had like special like permission or they were going to the hospital or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 38:41

But it was a complete curfew that night for the locals when we were out there yeah and the curfew went up and down which also was weird like we instituted like a hundred percent curfew in the beginning and then randomly in the middle it was like okay like you could drive whatever you know yeah like you said you could drive to the hospital or if you know if you were driving to work it'd be okay. And so everybody had the same story. I am going to work like where do you work and they're like over there like yeah you know and then like we went to back to a hundred percent curfew in the middle of the summer and then it was like kill anybody who violates the curfew for like four or five days and then yeah it that that was the rules were always changing with that one too which was super strange.

SPEAKER_00 39:31

Well because then you never believed anything anybody told you because they always they sound like they're lying with everything they ever said.

SPEAKER_02 39:37

Yeah every because they also the answer was always the same yeah like you said and it always sounded the same and then they always acted like they had no idea what was going on and we're like we're like bullshit you know what the fuck's going on yeah man the cultural difference uh was so huge that I I always like I erred on the side of caution of not like killing every single person we ever met but boy man you really wanted to you're like I

Curfews Hooch Life And Homecoming

SPEAKER_02 40:05

you just see you like also like seems you're like how dumb are you you know like what the fuck are you doing out here yeah and then and they'd all be like oh I haven't and act like nobody had any idea what was going on oh I didn't know like nobody knows anything right and it was always the same exact answer so you never believed anybody and yeah most of the they were lying of course they were lying because the nobody everybody knew what we were doing and everybody knew we were there you know yeah there's secrets we talked a little about hooch life but uh not too much you remember anything funny that happened around the camp or in the hooch I mean you guys 81s was a cast of characters so yeah I remember we got our hands on a taser um and we wanted to see what it'd be like to tase each other nice uh and that was fun good yeah so everybody was just like like oh what's it feel like and like oh let me try it in the water that's awesome those good times that was good times yeah and let's see and that's when we learned that musser could uh bend all the way down to his toes and Hersher was like well man if I could do that yeah I don't know how you did it muster but yeah you could bend all the way down I was very bendy yeah yeah and let's see uh oh man I remember for a little while I feel like we had plumbing in the in the hooch for a little while because there was a bathroom in there but I don't think it worked for a long time but then towards the end um those porta shutters got completely full and yeah they were coming out all the way over the top yep and yeah it was it was not pretty uh in there but you didn't really have a choice that's right and yeah because there was a regular I think there was a crew of like that they contracted with the Iraqis that was supposed to come and clean them and then they just stopped yeah well to my recollection we killed one of them and then one of them I I don't remember the story for sure either he stopped coming because he got threatened or the insurgents killed him one or the other yeah yeah but we figured it was I figured it was like something like that.

SPEAKER_00 42:42

Yeah yeah people usually stopped coming for a reason or either they felt they were danger or they died or they were threatened that they were gonna die if they did come it's usually one of the three things it was the same with our original DVD guy. Uh he ended up getting killed too oh man I bought a lot of those DVDs yeah he'd be posted up right now and I probably still have them somewhere nice yeah yeah no because I remember yeah I I did end up buying yeah a a DVD player I think eventually because for the longest time I didn't want to like spend any money and get into that habit and like waste it because I'm like some people were buying them nonstop like whenever that guy came they'd come back with a stack of them but then eventually and I didn't want to just waste money on that stuff because I'm like I want to have money when I go back home because I didn't have any money before I went out there.

SPEAKER_02 43:46

Yeah yeah and it was tax free that was the uh the biggest benefit is suddenly you weren't paying taxes on your income.

SPEAKER_00 43:54

Yeah yeah yeah exactly so yeah I came back and I had a I had a good amount of money when I came back and that was nice and it lasted for a long time.

SPEAKER_04 44:06

Uh let's see.

SPEAKER_00 44:09

So we uh just to jog your memory on a couple, I don't I mean if uh if any of these cause a memory but um I know we spent a lot of time at the police station and at the hospital just holding posts um and uh and again I we talked about that earlier but we did we did a lot of escorts my god we had reporters yeah yeah but I don't know if either one of those popped up a specific memory um no well I do remember um we had to run out and one of the I one of the ID people um the what was that bomb EOD uh EOD they had a guy that one of the um bombs went off like while he was checking for one and it blew off either one of his legs or one or and the half of them I think he lost a leg and like a nut or something like that. But we had to rush him to a hospital because they were doing like an airfl airlift flight out and I remember I was one of the people that was holding on to because you know they'd have like four people hold on to one of the corners there. And uh yeah had to run him from the back of the Humvee to um the Hilo because yeah he was in bad shape. But I think he made it though um but yeah I remember that because I think he was probably one of the front guys because they had you know regular stuff that went out and checked on it but some of the guys just had um uh like metal detectors basically yeah I I think and I could be wrong but I think what you're remembering is the engineer the the two one of the two engineers that got hit by the IED that they found with the metal detector yeah yeah yep that definitely it definitely was one of them yeah yeah the EOD teams actually had bomb suits not that that would have stopped an IED from taking off a limb yeah I don't remember I don't remember any of those guys getting it because I thought EOD had attack had people like attached to them but if it was one of the engineers I wasn't sure I just knew it was like something like that where the one some of the regular routes that we took um that would be regularly um you know rigged but that was one of the big big rush escort ones to the hospital and and the airlift that we took out there so that was one of the big memo like one that I remembered pretty well well do you you kind of remember the line down and getting home what it felt like to actually come home uh yeah um I remember when I first when we first got back well actually I'll start with the we I think we took like a big like 747 or a 757 back yeah um and I remember that was the biggest plane I'd ever seen and I think we were like the only ones on it uh and I think we actually you know we didn't get any like really much service but I remember there was actually like flight attendance on it and stuff like that. Yeah because when we went out we were mostly on um well like DC 10s or something like that uh like cargo planes like when we went out yeah those specifically were C-141 starlifters which they don't even they don't even use anymore they got decommissioned about a year and a half after we flew on them because they were falling apart. They were falling apart because we got stranded and I think it was at one of the Air Force bases for a couple days because there was jet fuel pouring all over over the runway. Yeah and I think I heard later that like one of the um engines like cut out like while we're flying or they had some kind of engine problem like while we're going and I think it got quiet and people were like oh it's not it's not as loud and then we heard later that yeah they were definitely having like engine trouble when we were on the way because they had to make a landing and we were supposed to be out like the next day and I think it we were there for like two or three days or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 48:42

Yeah the uh the flight home I don't remember the size of the plane but you're right that was a big ass commercial plane now you might have slept the whole way home but they did serve food and and drinks they had uh they had cocktails yeah no I think I was out the entire time I don't think I ate any of that stuff yeah they gave I think they gave everybody one cocktail that was awake so yeah no I don't think I was awake because I remember getting on there um and I was flying out and then I just I and I maybe even just either fell asleep or like blocked it out because I was just so tired.

SPEAKER_00 49:22

Yeah but I just remember when I got on there I was like oh this is so comfortable these this is a nice plane I mean quite literally it was probably the nicest thing you had sat in for eight months great so yeah exactly exactly um so yeah that was the the biggest remember that I was like oh my god I'm not on like a military vehicle or something like that yeah and it's nice and I remember the flight attendants they were so excited to like you know have us on the plane and stuff like that and they were they were I just remember they were so nice and so happy and thanked us so much like when we got off and stuff like that and said that it was like a pleasure to have us on there. Yeah and then and then I remember just like when we got back and we were in those hangars and some of the people's like family members were there and stuff like that that that met us when we finally were able to like um meet when we're actually when we actually got to like California and that was really cool just to like see how happy um people were then that there like family members that were able to meet them there and stuff like that. I remember that was really special. I take it by the way you're saying that no one met you when we uh no I didn't have anybody there know because I didn't I I was I didn't live in California I mean I live obviously but my family didn't live like anywhere close to that or anything like that and I wasn't married or anything like that. So but but it was nice and then we got back and I remember we had like a big party um back at uh big like welcome back party when we actually got back to San Mateo and they had a bunch of kegs and stuff like that. Yep um and cookouts and stuff like that. You know some of the cookouts not just from like Romadi but when we were like um when we're in um we were at Mount Fuji we did that training out there I think we were there for like a month or something like that. And some of those cookouts that we had had there were some of the some of my favorites of just like the after and downtime and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 51:50

Yeah it it's funny how much you hated the mandatory fun time when you were like you know made to go do something. Yeah yeah yeah yeah but they were it it is very fond memories. But so yeah uh can't think of too much more okay well we can put a bow on it that's uh that's I've been asking everybody close close to everybody the same kind of question yeah it was a lot of years ago any specific like final closing questions you have or anything like that or yeah man uh it's been a lot of years been 22 years when you look back on all this what is uh what does it mean to you either this deployment

What The Marine Corps Leaves You

SPEAKER_02 52:31

or your marine corps service are all together and uh what do you tell people about it?

SPEAKER_00 52:35

Um I tell people it it really just the marine corps in general it taught me like how to be like I felt like like a man and a person when I went in um I was 20 I turned 21 in in boot camp because and I didn't really have any idea like what I wanted to do. And I think it's a lot of people that kind of go in and become you know become a grunt because you don't know what the hell you want to do. Like what else am I going to do? You know um but that teaching me how to be just a decent human being um you appreciate um I think you appreciate things a lot more um and I still think about like that there's always people trainings like when we're here there's someone training somewhere or there's somebody on some mission somewhere um out in the world and especially with all the stuff that's going on in like Iran and stuff like that and hearing like the 31st Mew um and the South Pacific I think they were sending people over there. Yeah so it kind of gives me like a perspective of what we were kind of feeling like when we were on ship on the Essex. Yeah um that we were in that position where now we're here and there's a new group of guys that are kind of going through and got that same thing kind of going on of like uncertainty in their head um so I feel like a kind of a connection with that kind of stuff you know yeah yeah if you're if you ever want to feel a deep connection look for the blackest rain cloud and that's probably an 81 Splatoon underneath that rain cloud that's whether it's raining yeah steel rain steel rain oh man some of those fire missions fire missions that we would go on and we'd be out there for like a week or something like that um at the time it was the worst you know you'd never been dirtier you'd never been smellier um especially when we did that that hike I think it was like the tw it was 23 or 24 mile hike back from soi um and and then we ended up doing like first sardines hill and got back what like midnight or one in the morning midnight or something like that. I've never been more tired from that from something like that and that hike but then afterwards like it's one of the best memories of doing like a hike and stuff you just feel like you're gonna die the entire time but but you just keep going and then you always have that in the back of your head that like you did that especially when we were out back for out for the last uh reunion looking up there we're like oh I remember how many hikes I've stood up on top of that on top of First Sergeant's Hill and how they've really turned it into a memorial up there now. Mm-hmm yeah it's amazing because there was there was because there was none of that memorial stuff before no no it was even on the ground there was none of the memorial garden type stuff they got nope all the stuff for the Vietnam and then there was none of that stuff and it's really turned into a tradition of them going up to up there and I thought that was really cool. Yeah the only two memorials in the area were the Handahoe and there was a memorial out at Camp Telega when we used to do the runs up to Telega that was it there was nothing else but yeah the seeing what they've like done with it and they they have a tradition of like bringing um what was it the cross and the flag up there and stuff like that and yeah yeah man well that's cool yeah that's that stuff really just made it special and seeing all that and thinking back and having that camaraderie with any and everybody that we can still come back and talk about this and thank God the ones that are here that are safe and uh missing remember the ones that we that that aren't you know RIP Jamie I miss him so much when I think about because he was my roommate for a long time and coming back I don't know if you've uh did you know Jamie pretty well oh yeah everybody knew oh yeah yeah obviously no I will come back and he'd be like you know how much he like he liked his dick and he'd be like does my dick look big right now he'd be standing in front of the mirror in the room like I mean he'd have shorts on but he'd be like that looks big doesn't it that looks big right it's pretty good and I'm like I'm like Jamie what are you doing he's like but it looks nice don't it uh we'll do that so just that type of stuff and the the people that that didn't make it and stuff like that I mean they'll they'll always be remembered yeah and myth and stuff like that so yeah the friendships and the camaraderie and just remembering everything and you just you have that for a lifetime I feel like that's absolutely true and I really appreciate you spending some time with us uh recounting what you remember of uh of 22 years ago yeah yeah it is nice to get like refreshment they're like oh yeah it was actually at this time this time and I'm like yeah it definitely was because it kind of gets a little hazy sometimes yeah but talking about it now like really kind of brings back in a in a good way um like I said I think a lot of us had our own kind of uh stumps and falling down and stuff like that and trying to find a our way into like civilian life and what we're gonna do and how to act like normal human beings and I'm still figuring that out but yeah it's all to the the people around us that kind of keep it keep us in perspective and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_03 58:49

Um but but we're still here so we made it yeah but I appreciate guys having me on um like I told you thank you for it if you like what you heard make sure you subscribe for future episodes on your favorite podcast service