Letters from War—Airmen and Soldiers

By Don Harward.

I am always amazed by soldiers, seldom by politicians and almost never by celebrities. Here on the front, we get to see a lot of all of the above. The politicians are always buzzing about seeking answers, or maybe just wanting to get out from inside the beltway and “hang out with the boys.” Some time ago, some senior Washington types were staying in the spare rooms alongside mine. I wonder if they even noticed the fact that we didn’t acknowledge them. You see, to us, the guys on the ground are the real men—like the two Special Forces commo guys who were all alone at a forward operating base for months without relief (the base is named after a heroic Special Forces soldier who died there). If aliens suddenly abducted those two remaining SF soldiers, there wouldn’t be so much as a whisper on national news, but they continue to serve their country while forsaking their families and personal lives, day-in and day-out.

Over time, I have become immune to and do not notice the subtle change that takes place in me when flying in a hostile environment. As a result of spending all my time dealing with facts, without knowing it, my sensitivities seem to slowly disappear (just ask my wife). A while ago, I had to carry a gentleman from one nation’s embassy to his base. Unfortunately, his headquarters lie in the middle of a city where the Taliban roams at will, routinely blowing up people and things. It was a dangerous place but I had been assigned to fly him there. My crew gave him the required safety briefing before flight—much the same as a flight attendant would have on a normal domestic flight. Then it was my turn. I told him we would be flying over the desert at around 500 feet and that when we neared the “objective,” I would descend to rooftop level and increase speed. I warned him to expect abrupt manoeuvring, but that this was “normal.” The poor guy stared at me with a “what have I got myself into?” look.

Then I got serious: “If we go down in the desert, stay with the aircraft; it will probably be a controlled landing. The sat-phone is in my right pocket. Get it and pull yourself—and anybody else you find—out of the aircraft. However, if we go down in the city, we will be literally surrounded; I will try to land or crash next to a walled compound if I can. Grab my rifle, get out of the aircraft and get inside the compound and hold it until help arrives. If you stay outside, you will probably not survive, so get inside with as many of the crew as you can. If I’m not alive, take my vest; it has eight M-4 carbine magazines and a radio and first aid kit. If any crewmembers are with you, follow their orders instantly; if not, then God speed.”

I realised I had scared the snot out of him, but it didn’t seem to matter all that much to me—am I losing my compassion? You see, there is a huge difference in perspective between his world and mine. I was simply telling him what he needed to know in order to survive and I wasn’t interested in the delivery technique. (Note to self: when you get home, do not say a thing—let the wife and kids do all the talking!). Pity me if I ever have to go back to flying commercial airliners—imagine if I slip up while making the PA announcement!

That flight was one he will undoubtedly remember for a long time. Crossing the river, we “jinked” sharply right then left until over the city. I selected a wide street and flew down it at about 50 feet while maintaining speed as long as possible. Approaching the compound, we flared steeply, dissipating airspeed quickly as we crossed the wall before descending the 30 or so feet into the relative safety of the landing pad “inside the wire.”

While off-loading, I maintained power and stayed light on the skids in case a mortar round landed nearby. As soon as our passenger was clear, we took off—but not on a reciprocal heading—circled the compound in a tight orbit and accelerated. As we reached 90 knots, I rolled the helicopter out over another alley, which led to a graveyard and then the river. That way, if we had taken a round in the engine, there might have been a place to auto-rotate that was free of “cumulo-concrete”.

It is one thing to get shot down, but quite another to get shot down and crash into a building; the sudden stoppage thing can ruin your day. In my wacky mind, I always envision the rotor blades being neatly sheared off if we go down between buildings, and the aircraft landing straight ahead with the dirty side down—but do I think that is how it would really happen? Fortunately, we were soon back across the river to the relative safety of the farmland.

On another occasion recently, I gave a similar briefing to another official visitor I had been tasked to fly. The difference that day was that we were flying in the gunship instead of the more “civilised” CSAR aircraft. This meant she would be riding with the helicopter whose job it was to fight if necessary. I had to tell her that if a fight started, my job was to fly into it and place the bird in a steep orbit over the hostiles to allow our weapons to bear. We would not be able to run until those we were protecting were clear, but would purposely turn into the shooting and return fire. She didn’t seem to have a problem with it and flew happily with us for hours.

I remember thinking one Sunday how bad I had it when, with the temperature in the 120-degree range and dust everywhere, I had to walk to church because there were no vehicles available. I walked in to the sanctuary of Fraise Chapel and took a seat. When we all stood to sing, I noticed a young man in the front row who did not stand. The fact was, he could not. I then noticed he had one of those portable metal stands with an IV bag and a plastic line standing beside him. He was in the front row and he sat there alone. When the chaplain, a young captain from the 10th Mountain Division, asked for prayer requests and praise reports, the soldier raised his arm—the one with the IV still in it.

“Chaplain, could we pray for the guys in my squad who are worse off than me? And, sir, for a praise report, I’m still alive and I’d like to thank God!”

The statement was simple, succinct and dead honest—much as soldiers’ lives are. I later learned he had been the victim of an IED (improvised explosive device) and that this particular church visit was the first time he had been out of the hospital since he was wounded. I felt ashamed of myself for having felt hard done by, not having a vehicle and having to walk—at least I could walk!

I recently spent a little time in a hospital in Afghanistan and as I lay there quietly, what I saw was surreal to the point of disbelief. One night, there was a mass-cal—the abbreviated term used to describe the arrival of mass or multiple casualties. There had been a fight, which we had won—but had also lost. I watched as the wounded came in, one after the other. Multiple sorties by Blackhawk helicopters ferried casualties to the medevac pad just outside the building. There was screaming, barking of orders, some people were moaning in pain and some were slowly dying. The latter were quiet, mostly. The beds filled up quickly. The soldier beside me had no leg below the knee and was burned across his face and neck; in fact, he didn’t appear to have much skin left at all. Directly across from me was another who was badly burned and was missing an eye.

Two surgical procedures were being carried out in the hallway because the operating room was already occupied. An Afghani soldier looked at me with his sole remaining uninjured eye as a Canadian surgeon spoke to him through an Afghani interpreter. The surgeon matter-of-factly told the interpreter to explain to the soldier that he had lost an eye and was about to be shipped out to another hospital in Bagram. As the interpreter translated the doctor’s message, the Afghani soldier’s remaining eye fixed on me. Although his lips were trembling, he kept a straight face, not wanting to show weakness. However, I knew that he realised he was a ruined man and that his life was forever changed. His gaze held me captive—one man in great pain and distress reaching out to another; cultural differences lose their significance in a field hospital at a time like that. I prayed for him—I don’t care what religion he observed; he was just a man in need of help.

When I use the term “soldier”, I really mean all those who carry heavy rucksacks and move about in worn “leather personnel carriers” (boots), for it is they who shoulder the responsibility for protecting our mighty nation. They could be infantrymen, Air Force FACs (forward air controllers), sailors, Marines or Special Forces “soldiers.” At heart, they are really the same; although to ask them, you would think each is uniquely better than the rest. I see that as a healthy thing. Many have been the times that one or another of the various warrior communities has given me grief over my use of the term “soldier.”

If you are unsure of the military background of the person you are speaking to, simply call him a soldier. A Marine will instantly correct you; yep, he’ll come out first! Just yesterday, as we sat parked at a firebase waiting to make a second sortie, I was lying resting under the belly of our helicopter and talking to Jimmy (one of the gunners on my aircraft and a former Marine). When I called him a soldier, he immediately responded by asking me, “Do you know what the word ‘Army’ means? Ain’t Ready for the Marines Yet.” Funny! A sailor? Well, you can just tell—and there’s no mistaking an Air Force person’s techno-acronym babble. Former Army personnel will just nod in the affirmative and continue to listen.

For wounded soldiers, the outcomes and stories are not always bad. Just because life in general—or a powerful explosive in particular—might have changed their lives, they still manage to maintain their strength of spirit and care for each other. Once you have been a soldier—particularly if you have been blooded—you are forever part of a brotherhood that transcends your personal life.

Last summer, it was almost a nightly event for our camp to be struck by rockets (typically Iranian-supplied), which usually came in pairs. After such explosions, most of us would walk outside to look around—yep, combat gawkers! It is sometimes funny when new people arrive here. If you are quick enough to get outside right after an attack, you can watch them scurrying around, running into the nearest bomb shelters, or tripping and falling. The seasoned veterans simply climb on top of something to see if they can get an idea where the rockets landed! One night, as I lay in my bed, the camp was rocked by a couple of powerful explosions and I figured we had been hit by a couple of 107 mm rockets. Most of the time, these impacted somewhere innocuous and exploded harmlessly—punching holes in taxiways or hitting open fields. It was not the case this night. As I looked towards the “boardwalk” (a place where soldiers congregate around the post’s Burger King), I saw flashing lights. I heard someone in our group say that we had unaccounted-for personnel—not good. I jumped into our Humvee (Army Hummer) and drove down there. The streets were blocked off and there were lots of ambulances on the scene.

This time, the rocket had hit our dining facility during the evening meal. I felt helpless and could do no more than send an email to my church back home, asking the good citizens there to start praying for those who had been wounded. The prayer worked—there were no fatalities; the surgeons (saints) saved them and the wounded were evacuated to Germany for treatment in Landsthule Army hospital, the Walter Reed of Europe.

It wasn’t long after this that I was hospitalised in Afghanistan and was also shipped out to Landsthule for treatment, where I ended up in the same ward as some of the casualties from the rocket attack. One afternoon, I was chatting with one of those gentlemen—an Army Major who had been really torn up. However, he had a cheerful spirit and a good sense of humour. “You know,” he said, “all I did was go to get a bite to eat and… BOOM! Now I have a second a***hole! The shrapnel entered right here,” he said, pointing to his posterior. “I’m all done now. Career is over; I guess I’m going home.” I asked him what he did for the Army. He replied, “I’m a lawyer,” then added, “I guess I’m now twice the a***hole that I used to be!” I laughed harder than I had in a long, long time. Can you believe that man’s personal courage?

There is no doubt that aircraft are critically important to modern warfare. Sometimes, the only way to get around or be re-supplied is by aircraft. Here in Afghanistan, the bad guys are not doing all that well against aircraft. They are usually on the receiving end, and the sound of an Apache or an F-16 might be the last thing they ever hear. Therefore, it has become important to the bad guys to shoot down aircraft as much-needed psychological victories. Shoot down one of our helicopters, and CNN will amplify Al-Jazirah’s story and provide all the free press that the Taliban or Al-Qaeda can handle. This probably makes flying a little more dangerous for our flight crews, but I doubt we will get a break from the media anytime soon.

We aviators get a lot of the press because we fly very expensive machines—generally on missions of high visibility or critical importance, which means we usually get recognised if something goes really wrong. Remember Mogadishu, Somalia? That mission went wrong when a young Ranger fell from the fast rope and the “Blackhawk Down” thing happened. While the pilots on that mission do deserve a lot of credit, it was really the guys on the ground who deserved the recognition. Much of the recognition given to pilots is really not deserved because after the helicopter or airplane flies away, the “grunt” still remains. Nevertheless, it sometimes still happens to be that way.

There may well be some who think of my writing as rambling. I care not. These are my thoughts and my feelings; they come from my heart and they guide my pen. When I think about soldiers being wounded—or worse—it always gets me into a knot. I feel deeply for them, because I know I can never match their heroic and selfless sacrifices. They are truly the real “Great Americans” in my book. God bless them all!