Issue In Doubt

CHAPTER Five

Exercise Area Bravo, Bellows Field Park, Oahu, Hawaii, NAU.



Every Marine, no matter his rank, or position in a unit, is expected to be able to step into the position of his immediate commander or leader, sometimes even a higher position, and perform well. Unknown to everybody below the platoon command level, one element of the night phase of the training exercise was to test that ability among the junior NCOs and junior enlisted Marines of 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines.

Third platoon was in column in Bellows’s Exercise Area Bravo—a less environmentally sensitive area of the park, one that had few civilian visitors—moving toward their objective. The Marines had their night vision screens in place to allow them to see in the dark forest. Occasional flash-bangs went off in seemingly random locations—simulated enemy harassment-and-interdiction artillery fire.

Halfway to the objective, Commiskey called a halt. “Squad leaders up,” he ordered on his helmet comm. “Assign your men defensive positions.”

While nearly all instructions and data could be conveyed over the net, there was always a chance of enemy intercept. Besides, sometimes a face-to-face meeting was better than remote communications, so nobody thought there was anything unusual about Commiskey calling a squad leaders’ meeting. Commiskey led Guillen and platoon right guide Sergeant Richard Bender twenty meters off the path. Sergeant James E. Johnson, the second squad leader, being closest to the command group, was the first to join Commiskey. Commiskey withdrew a flash-bang from a cargo pocket and tossed it to the side, away from the platoon. It went off before the other squad leaders made it through the trees to join the command group.

“Oh, shit!” Sergeant Martin shouted, hitting the dirt at the flash and the bang. A few meters to his left, third squad leader Sergeant Frederick W. Mausert also swore and hit the deck. So did the gun squad leader, Sergeant Matej Kocak.

When a few seconds passed without another simulated artillery strike, or any word from the command group, the squad leaders pushed themselves up into crouches and dashed to where they believed the platoon command group was. They found the four Marines gently rocking on their backs in their frozen body armor. Using a few words to coordinate their actions, the two squad leaders checked the downed Marines and their comps.

“Damn, damn, damn,” Martin swore under his breath. Then into the platoon net, “Where’s comm?”

“I’m here,” Corporal John H. Pruitt said as he scrambled to the scene.

“Get me company,” Martin told him.

“Right.” Pruitt got on the net and contacted Captain Sitter. He gave the handset to Martin.

“Six Actual, this is India-three-one,” Martin said in a voice steadier than he felt, “India-three-six, three-five, three-four, and three-two are all down.” India-three, third platoon, three-six, -five, -four, the ancient designations for the platoon commander, platoon sergeant, and right guide. Three-one, -two and -three, the designators for first, second, and third squad leaders.

“All seniors in India-three are down except for three-one and three-three, is that right?” Sitter asked.

“And guns. What do you want us to do with the casualties?”

“I’ve got a GPS lock on your position. I’ll forward it to battalion, and they’ll pick them up. All right, three-one, you still have an objective to take. You’re now acting six. Three-three is now acting five. Assign the senior fire team leader in each squad to acting squad leader. You’ve got three minutes to reorganize and get moving again. India-six-actual out.”

Martin returned the handset to Pruitt and looked at Mausert and Kocak. “It’s on us,” he said. “I’m acting six, and Fred’s five. We’ve got three minutes to reorganize the platoon and move out.”

Mausert shook his head. “I always figured I’d make platoon sergeant some day. But, damn, I expected to have the rank when I did.”

“You gonna give your squad to Phillips?” Martin asked.

“Yeah,” Mausert answered. “He’s got seniority, and he’s pretty good.”

“Do you have any problem with Glowin taking over second squad?”

Mausert shook his head. “I think he can do it.”

“Good. Let’s give them the news. I’m giving my squad to Adriance.” He turned to Pruitt. “Looks like we’ve got a new command group. You and me will be between first and second. Fred,” back to Mausert, “you’re between second and third. No sense in being where one round can get both of us. Matej, keep your guns where they are in the column.”

“Sounds good to me,” Mausert said. Kocak nodded.

“All right, time’s wasting. Let’s do it.”

“What do you think the lieutenant wanted us for?” Mausert asked.

Martin shook his head. “Maybe we’ll find out after this phase. Unless this was a set up.”

“Could be,” Mausert agreed.

“Let’s go.”

The four headed back to the rest of the platoon and made the new assignments.

“Mackie,” Martin said after making Adriance the acting squad leader, “this makes you acting fire team leader. Put one of your men up front, and move out.”

“Aye aye,” Mackie replied. He turned to his two men. “Zion, take point. Me, then Orndoff.”

“Why me?” Zion objected. “I already got killed once today.”

“So did all of us,” Mackie snapped. “Move out. I’ll guide you.”

Zion stepped out, and the rest of third platoon followed. As soon as the platoon was beyond the place where they’d stopped and lost the command group, an umpire appeared out of the shadows and unlocked the armor of the downed Marines.

“Wait here for battalion,” he instructed the four, then resumed trailing third platoon.

An hour later, not much more than half a kilometer from the position that was the platoon’s objective, but still in forest, Sergeant Martin called a halt and reformed the platoon into squad columns twenty-five meters apart, with first squad in the middle, flanked by the other two rifle squads. The gun teams were on the flanks. He went ahead of first squad and called on the net, “Squad leaders up.” The three corporals who were acting as squad leaders quickly joined him and Mausert.

“Going for a repeat performance, Sergeant Martin?” Adriance asked with a soft laugh, thinking of what happened when Commiskey called for a squad leaders’ meeting.

“Just for that, your ass is mine later,” Martin said. After making sure everyone he wanted was present, he said, “Follow me,” and stepped out in the direction of the platoon’s objective.

A hundred meters farther, the forest petered out into a terrain spottily covered with shrubs about half human-height. In most places, there was sufficient space between bushes for a man to pass without brushing one. Fifty meters beyond where Martin stopped his command group, the ground started slanting upward at a modest angle until it formed a ridge more than three hundred meters distant. The last fifty meters looked to be cleared of shrubs. They could faintly make out bunkers on the military crest of the ridgeline.

“I wanted you to get a good look at what we’re facing. Now, most of us have been here before,” Martin told the others, “so you’ll remember those bushes are thorny. But not all of our Marines have had to make this kind of movement at night. The trick is going to be to use those bushes for concealment as we advance, while not getting hung up in them. The closer we can get to that ridge without being detected, the better our chances of taking the objective. Any suggestions or questions?”

“Stay low, that’s all I can think of,” Corporal Glowin said. “The trees behind us should hide any silhouettes until we get fairly close.”

“Unless they’ve got good night vision,” Adriance added.

“That’s why we keep low,” Glowin said.

Martin studied the landscape to the front for a few moments, deciding how to proceed. Finally he said, “Go back, get your squads and bring them up. Put your people in columns of fire teams with ten meter intervals. The lead man in each fire team has to find a way between the thorny bushes, so be careful about who you put where. We’ll get as close as we can before I give the signal to open up. Depending on how close we are, we’ll either advance by fire and maneuver, or we’ll get on line and charge. Questions?”

Nobody had any questions.

“So get your squads.”

Fifteen minutes later, nine fire teams and the guns were on line parallel to the ridge. Martin gave the signal to move out.

Lance Corporal Mackie looked at his two men and decided he’d take the lead between the bushes.

“Stay low,” he said. “Try not to rise up above the tops of the bushes.” The same thing Adriance had just told the fire team leaders. “Stay close to me, and go exactly where I go. If you see me flinch, or back up, don’t go where I did, because that’ll mean I just got stuck by thorns. Got it?”

PFCs Orndoff and Zion said they did.

“Let’s go.” Mackie crouched, almost doubled over and stepped out. While he looked mostly at the bushes close in front of himself to avoid the thorns, he also looked forward to make sure he had bushes in his line of sight, between himself and the ridgeline. He also checked his HUD to see where the red dots of his fire team were relative to the dots of the others. A few times Sergeant Martin called on the net for most of the platoon to hold in place while someone caught up, or for a fire team to stop because it had gotten too far ahead of the rest.

The weight of his combat load made it difficult to walk bent over below the height of the bushes, and Mackie was feeling the strain in his back after a couple of hundred meters. He knew Orndoff and Zion had to be feeling at least as much back strain, probably more—they hadn’t been Marines for as long as he had. He was just grateful that so far nobody in the platoon had gotten hung up on thorns and given them away.

But it couldn’t last. Still more than seventy-five meters from the top of the ridge somebody, Mackie couldn’t tell who, yelped out loud. The aggressor force on the ridge must have been alert, because the entire line erupted with fire.

“Squads,” Martin shouted into the platoon net, “advance by fire and maneuver! Guns, lay down supporting fire!”

Seconds later, randomly spaced flash-bangs started going off on the slope, simulating mortar fire.

“First and third fire teams, advance twenty meters!” Adriance shouted.

“First fire team, let’s go! Spread to my flanks.” Mackie lurched ahead, still hunched over. Orndoff and Zion ran to his sides. Zion stumbled into a thorn bush and yelled. Mackie had to dodge a bush himself. “Disconnect and catch up!” About twenty meters ahead of where he’d been when the order to advance came, he hit the dirt and began firing up the slope toward the ridge. But he was shooting blind, he couldn’t see anything through the bushes. Over the fire, he heard Adriance order second fire team to advance. The platoon’s fire didn’t sound as heavy as it should have, he thought the enemy fire must be effective if that many of the Marines were down, frozen in their armor.

“First fire team, go!” Adriance shouted. “Second and third, lay down fire!”

Good! Mackie thought. The textbook method of two fire teams advancing while one covered them didn’t provide enough covering fire, so Adriance was moving the fire teams up one at a time to provide a heavier base of fire. Just what I’d do.

And then he broke out of the bushes onto ground that had been cleared as a killing zone.

“First fire team, down!” Mackie said. He heard Zion drop down on his right and begin firing up slope. He didn’t hear Orndoff on his left.

“Orndoff, report!” No answer. Damn! Mackie didn’t have time to worry about Orndoff now, he had to place heavy, accurate fire on the positions on the ridge top.

In moments, it sounded like most of third platoon had reached the cleared area. Even the gun teams had moved up to add their heavier fire. The return fire wasn’t as heavy as it had been; the Marines’ fire must have had an effect on the aggressor force. But the flash-bangs showing mortar strikes were coming closer.

“Fire and maneuver individually within fire teams, twenty meters!” Martin ordered.

“Fire team leaders, advance your men one at a time!” was the order from the squad leaders.

“Zion, go ten meters,” Mackie said. As soon as Zion dropped into a firing position ten meters farther up the slope, Mackie called out, “Orndoff!” but got no reply. He jumped up himself and sprinted a zigzag to drop down a few meters from Zion, and resume firing. “Zion, go ten!” This time, when Zion hit the deck, Mackie didn’t call for Orndoff, but jumped up and ran forward. In seconds, everyone in third platoon who was still combat effective was on line, about thirty meters away from the ridgeline positions.

Martin gave the order. “Third platoon, charge!”

The Marines surged to their feet and sped uphill, firing as they went.

There was a bunker almost directly in front of Mackie. He angled his run to reach the bunker just at the side of its embrasure, firing his automatic rifle at the opening. He reached the bunker, slammed his back against its front next to the embrasure, and jerked a flash-bang simulated grenade from his webbing. He held it for a couple of seconds after pulling its pin, then threw the flash-bang inside as hard as he could. After the simulated grenade went off, Mackie spun around the side of the bunker and jumped into a communications trench behind it. He quickly looked to both sides, but only saw other Marines from third platoon in it.

He looked at the bunker he’d just passed with surprise—fire was still coming out of its front. He readied another flash-bang grenade and threw it hard into the bunker’s entrance.

“With me!” he shouted at Zion, and followed the flash-bang as soon as it went off.

“What the. . .?” Mackie expected to find bodies, frozen in their body armor. Instead, he found a rifle set on a robotic shooter-mount, still firing downslope. Two other rifles had been knocked off their robots. There were no bodies. He knocked the firing rifle off its mount, and the bunker went quiet. He reported what he’d found to Adriance, who reported to Martin what Mackie had found.

“Third platoon, cease fire!” Martin’s voice came over the platoon net. “Cease fire!”

The platoon stopped firing, but most of the defensive positions continued firing downslope.

“Squad leaders, have your fire teams check those bunkers.”

In moments, the firing stopped all along the line as the Marines disconnected the weapons inside the bunkers from their robot mounts.

“Does anybody see an aggressor anywhere?” Martin asked. Nobody answered that they did. “Everybody, hold your position. And don’t fire unless you actually see somebody. Squad leaders, put your people in defensive positions. And report!”

“First squad, report,” Corporal Adriance said.

“First fire team, I’m missing Orndoff.”

“Second fire team, all present.”

“Third fire team, Kuchneister’s down,” Corporal Button reported.

“First squad, we have one down and one missing,” Adriance reported to Martin.

“Who’s missing?” Martin asked after second and third squads gave their reports.

“Orndoff.”

“Where’s Orndoff? Has anybody seen Orndoff?” Martin asked over the platoon net.

“He’s over here,” Corporal Thompson of third squad answered.

“What the hell’s he doing with you?” Martin asked, then without waiting for an answer, “Orndoff, get over where you belong!”

“Where’s that?” PFC Orndoff asked.

Mackie stood and waved. “Over here, numbnuts.”

Martin considered the situation. The platoon had lost four of its top leaders to a simulated artillery strike; he felt they were lucky to have lost only five more in the assault on the ridgeline. “Everybody, maintain your positions and watch outboard—not you, Orndoff,” he added when he saw Orndoff drop into the trench, “return to your squad. Everybody, be ready for a counterattack.”

“What happened to you?” Adriance demanded when Orndoff rejoined his fire team.

“I got hung up in a thorn bush,” Orndoff said defensively. “By the time I got loose, I didn’t know where Mackie and Zion were. So I went upslope until I found some Marines.”

“Third squad,” Mackie said, shaking his head.

Orndoff shrugged. “It was still the platoon.”

Adriance shook his head. “Well, you’re back. That’s better than some.” He looked down the slope to where PFC Thompson and four other members of the platoon lay frozen in their armor, awaiting release by the referees.

“Every squad, send a fire team to collect our casualties,” Martin said on the platoon net. “This was an automated position. There’s gotta be bad guys around here somewhere, so everybody be alert.”

It took five minutes to locate all the casualties and lug them, frozen in awkward positions, up to the trench line. During that time, Martin and Mausert discussed what to do next. When everybody was back in position, Martin spoke into the platoon net.

“Listen up! I don’t have any instructions on what we’re supposed to do after taking this position, but I don’t like where we are. The aggressors have to know that we’ve taken the ridge, and they know how it’s laid out. That gives them a hell of an advantage in a counterattack. So we aren’t going to be here when they come for us. I’m sending the squad leaders a map, showing where we’re going. We move out in four minutes. Bring our casualties. Get ready.”

“Fire team leaders up,” Adriance ordered. He was studying the new map by the time first squad’s three fire team leaders joined him. He projected the map onto their HUDs.

Mackie studied the map while Adriance explained Martin’s plan. “We’re setting an ambush to hit the counterattack from the flank.” A thick clump of trees a hundred meters to the northwest was highlighted, and squad positions were marked in it.

“Unless the aggressors come through the trees behind us,” Lance Corporal Mackie murmured.

“We do the best we can with what we’ve got,” Corporal Adriance said. “You got a problem with that?”

“No, Corporal. Just making an observation.”

Less than fifteen minutes later, third platoon was in position in the clump of trees. Adriance had passed on Mackie’s concern, and Martin adjusted his plan to have one fire team from each squad positioned to watch the rear approaches to the trees. The platoon sat in ambush for two hours before the call to stand down came from battalion headquarters. A referee came by to unlock the armor of the casualties, and lead the platoon back to India Company’s bivouac area.

The exercise wrapped up two days later, and the battalion forced marched along a winding, twenty kilometer route to the Marine base at Kanehoe Bay, where the Marines of Three/One were given temporary billeting.



Marine Corps Base Kaneohe Bay, Oahu, Hawaii, North American Union.

Early morning



The forced march from Bellows had ended about 0230 hours, and the Marines had immediately set to cleaning their weapons and gear, including the blank fire adapters and hit detectors. After they returned the training gear to the supply sergeants, they showered, shaved, and dressed in clean uniforms for morning formation, after which they were marched to a dining facility for their first hot meal since they left the Oenida to make the landing at Bellows.

Back in formation after chowing down, a very welcome liberty call was sounded—most of the Marines in the battalion had never been to Hawaii before, and were looking forward to visiting the beach at Waikiki, and the famed fleshpots of Hotel Street in Honolulu.

“Come on, Mackie, we’ve got liberty!” Lance Corporal Garcia said. He was dressed in civvies. So was Lance Corporal Cafferata; first squad’s three lance corporals usually pulled liberty together. Everybody had brought along a seabag with a dress uniform and civilian clothes. The seabags had been stored in the ship’s hold, and brought ashore to the temporary billets during the exercise.

Mackie shook his head. “Nah, I’ve got a paper due for my Marine Corps Institute course a couple of days after we get back to Pendleton. I should work on it.”

“What, more of that Napoleonic Wars crap?” Garcia asked.

“Little tin soldiers all in a row,” Cafferata said. “That’s all you need to put in a paper about the Napoleonic Wars.”

Garcia poked Cafferata’s shoulder. “Got that right, Marine! Stand in rows and bang away at each other.” He shook his head. “What a damn dumb way to fight a war.”

“Come on, man,” Mackie protested. “Infantry weapons back then were so inaccurate that you couldn’t count on hitting anything at more than fifty meters. Besides, the gunpowder they used kicked out so much smoke that you couldn’t see anything after two or three volleys. Standing in rows and banging away was the only way you had a chance of hitting anything.”

“Maybe so, but the Royal Marines used rifles,” Garcia said. “So did the U.S. Marines. No tin soldiers all in a row for the Marines!”

Mackie looked at Garcia. “Did you ever look at a parade formation? What’s that if not little tin soldiers all in a row?”

Cafferata guffawed at that, while Garcia said,

“Point to you.”

Cafferata slapped Mackie’s shoulder. “Come on, man. Let’s go have a few brews, check out some hula hula girls.”

Mackie looked at the books he’d packed in his hold-seabag, and the pad he was taking notes on. The paper only had to be a thousand words. He decided that he knew enough about the Napoleonic Wars to knock that out in a couple of hours. He stood.

“Give me a couple minutes to change. I want to try a real Hawaiian mai tai.”

Mackie never got the chance to write that paper. And it was a very long time before any of the survivors got to see that Amos Weaver movie.