“Have A Plan To Kill Everyone You Meet”
That is the sign on the door leading out of India Company’s Combat Center in Fallujah.
Michael J. Totten brings us another report on the ground in Fallujah:
FALLUJAH — A sign on the door leading out of India Company’s Combat Operations Center says “Have a Plan to Kill Everyone You Meet.” For a fraction of second I thought it might be some kind of joke. But I was with the Marine Corps in Fallujah, and it wasn’t a joke.
I asked Captain Stewart Glenn if he could explain and perhaps elaborate a bit on what, exactly, that sign is about. “It’s pretty straightforward,” he said rather bluntly. “It means exactly what it says.”
Welcome to counterinsurgency.
A sign outside Lieutenant Nathan Bibler’s Joint Security Station in the slums of Fallujah makes the point a little more clearly, and delicately. “Look at everyone as though they are trying to kill you, but you cannot treat them that way.”
“The threat’s always there,” Sergeant Chuck Balley told me as he looked blankly at nothing in particular. “Everybody is sketchy.”
Maybe they are. But very few people in Fallujah try to kill Americans – or other Iraqis – anymore. It has been months since a single Marine in Fallujah has been even wounded, let alone killed. But at least a handful of disorganized insurgents still lurk in the city. Once a week or so somebody takes a shot at the Americans.
“Do you have plates in that Kevlar?” one Marine sergeant said to me as I donned my body armor on our way into the city. He was referring to steel SAPI plates that fit inside Kevlar vests that can stop even a sniper round.
“No,” I said, and I didn’t care. The odds that I, personally, would be the first person shot in Fallujah for months were microscopic.
“Look,” he said. “You are not gonna get shot. But you should still carry some plates.”
One lieutenant forced me to wear Marine-issue body armor – which weighs almost 80 pounds – before he would let me go out on patrol with him. I felt like Godzilla lumbering around with all the extra bulk and weight, and I didn’t really feel safer. Running while carrying those extra pounds all of a sudden wasn’t much of an option. Sacrificing most of my speed and agility to make myself a little more bullet-proof might not be worth it. But perhaps that’s just what I told myself so I could justify wearing lighter and more comfortable armor. It’s hard to say. What I do know for certain is that Fallujah at the end of 2007 was neither scary nor stressful. No one can go there right now without feeling what is perhaps a dangerous sense of complacency.
But complacency kills. The Marines are reminded of this fact every day, as was I when I traveled and worked with them.
Read Totten’s report at his blog Middle East Journal.
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“Complacency Kills”
That statement brought this story back to my mind in a flash! I’d been pulled over by this Trooper once, had run into him around the ol’ stompin’ grounds while (fishing/Hunting) on several occasions and he was just one “Helluva Good Guy”… Unfortunately he didn’t frisk and cuff the “Passengers” in the story below, since he had never had problems with them before…
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Lost In The Line of Duty
In the early morning hours of September 30th, 1992, Trooper Bret Clodfelter, age 34, completed a traffic stop on a suspected DUII driver in the suburban area of Klamath Falls. Bret handcuffed his suspect for the trip to jail; he also agreed to transport the suspect’s two passengers to their reportedly nearby residence. One of the passengers was Franscisco Manzo-Hernandez. Who had a violent history of assault and drug use. The three men were placed into the rear seat of the patrol car.
When the dispatcher could not get an answer from Trooper Clodfelter on the radio, another Klamath Falls car was sent to check on him. His vehicle was found about four blocks from the location of the DUII stop, all three passengers were missing and Trooper Clodfelter, still seated in the driver’s seat, was found murdered.
This began one of the largest manhunts Oregon had seen in many years. Officers from local police departments, sheriff’s offices, and fellow members of State Police began the search for the killer, many of them volunteering their own time. The TV and radio stations broadcast the sad and gruesome details of the murder and ran composite drawings and the description of the suspect, both in English and Spanish. A large reward was offered for information leading to the arrest of Manzo-Hernandez aka: Poncho. This paid off because on the afternoon of October 2nd, 1992 an informant gave the location where Hernandez was hiding in a barn on the same street where he had shot & killed Trooper Clodfelter. The officers surrounded the barn & took him into custody as he climbed a fence and fled across a field.
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This is one of those stories in my life that made an “Indelibly Mordant” impression upon me and my sense of Right and Wrong was forever Galvanized by the contrast between this Good Guy and the Scum that took his life…
“If you ain’t got eyes in the back of your head! Don’t let some cocksucker have a chance of installing eye sockets in the back of your head for you!” OR “Complacency Kills” Paraphrased!
January 2nd, 2008 at 12:35 pmPersonally, I phrase it “Be polite, be courteous, be prepared to kill everyone you meet.” But the mindset’s the same. I took me a long time to realize that it never even occured to most people that anyone would want to hurt or kill them. Sometimes, I feel the see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil monkeys should be our national symbol.
January 2nd, 2008 at 2:50 pm