Through the Darkest of Nights: Testament XXXI

(9PM – promoted by RiaD)

Every few days over the next several months I will be posting installments of a novel about life, death, war and politics in America since 9/11.  Through the Darkest of Nights is a story of hope, reflection, determination, and redemption.  It is a testament to the progressive values we all believe in, have always defended, and always will defend no matter how long this darkness lasts.  But most of all, it is a search for identity and meaning in an empty world.

Naked and alone we came into exile.  In her dark womb, we did not know our mother’s face; from the prison of her flesh have we come into the unspeakable and incommunicable prison of this earth. Which of us has known his brother?  Which of us has looked into his father’s heart?  Which of us has not remained prison-pent?  Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?      ~Thomas Wolfe

All installments are available for reading here on Docudharma’s Series page, and also here on Docudharma’s Fiction Page, where refuge from politicians, blogging overload, and one BushCo outrage after another can always be found.

    Travis was getting ready to head to the mess hall when Jack Harper walked into his tent.   “Well damn, look who’s here.  It’s good to see you, Jack!  Happy Thanksgiving!”  Travis finished lacing up his boots.  “You’re just in time for dinner–roast turkey . . . dressing . . . mashed potatoes and gravy, just like back home. ”  

    “Hi Travis.  I think I’ll pass on dinner, I haven’t had much of an appetite lately.  How have you been?”

    “OK, I guess.  Got a couple months left in this tour, then I’ll be heading home.  We’ll be handing Baghdad area security over to the 4th Cav in February.  So what brings you here?”

    “I need to talk to someone I can trust.”  Jack handed Travis a Marine Corps statement issued in the aftermath of a roadside bombing in Haditha.  “Read this.”

    “Let’s talk over dinner, Jack, I’ll read it when we get back.”

    “Read it now.”

    “OK . . .”  Travis started reading.

    “Read it out loud.”

    “Out loud?  Why?”

    “Just do it.”  

    Travis shrugged.  “Alright . . . ’20 November 2005 . . . A U.S. Marine and 15 civilians were killed yesterday from the blast of a roadside bomb in Haditha.  Immediately following the bombing, gunmen attacked the convoy with small arms fire.  Iraqi army soldiers and Marines returned fire, killing eight insurgents and wounding another.'” Travis looked up at Jack.  “So there was a firefight and some civilians got killed.  Well our guys are getting killed too, and a lot of them are dead because Iraqi civilians didn’t tell us about insurgent activity in their areas, or are actively helping the insurgency.”

    “What happened in Haditha last week was a massacre, Travis.  And now it’s being covered up.  There was a roadside bombing and sporadic shooting in the area, but the rest of that statement is lies.  Twenty-four Iraqi civilians were slaughtered by Kilo Company Marines.  Many of them were children, others were women who were trying to shield them.”

    “How do you know all this?”  

    “I went there.  I talked to a couple of the Marines involved, to Iraqi witnesses, and to staff at the hospital where the bodies were taken.”

    “Jack, those Marines might have had a grudge against their squad leader or company CO, and just want to get them in trouble by claiming there were intentional killings . . . and the Iraqi witnesses are probably lying, that’s probably all this is about.”

     “We’ve known each other a long time, Travis, so don’t bullshit me. I’m going to tell you what happened and I want you to listen.”

    “OK, OK.  I’m listening.”

    “The roadside bomb blew up the last Humvee in the convoy.  I saw the driver’s severed legs in the wreckage when I got there, the rest of him . . . well, there were body parts a hundred yards away.  That morning started off bad, and got worse in a hurry.  A few minutes after the bombing a car drove up, there were five Iraqis in it.   The Marines wanted revenge, that dead driver had been well-liked in Kilo Company.  They ordered the Iraqis out of the car and killed them.”

    “They had it coming if you ask me, they were probably spotters for the insurgents who set off the roadside bomb.”

    “Yeah, spotters always drive to the site of the bombing to take a look around and admire their handiwork so we’ll know they were the spotters.  Get real, Travis.”

     “Were there any weapons in the car?”

    “No.  The men in that car were cooperative, they had their hands up, but those Marines wanted payback and didn’t care who paid.  They killed them all, then one of the Marines riddled the bodies with bullets and pissed on them.”

    “Christ . . . are you sure?”

    “A Marine who was there and saw it all told me.”

    “I’m having a hard time believing this.”

    “You have a bad habit of only believing what you want to believe, Travis.”

    “You sound just like one of my sergeants.  Chiles.  He’s always on my case, the Army’s case, Bush’s case.” Travis lit a cigarette and tossed the lighter on his cot.   “You came here to tell me what happened in Haditha, so tell me.”

    “There was a row of houses about 80 yards from the road, on the far side of a vacant lot.  The Marines headed for those houses . . .”

    “Were they under fire?”

    “If they were, it wasn’t from those houses.  But that didn’t matter, all that mattered was vengeance.  They went into the first house and shot the elderly father of the family.  He was in a wheel chair.  Holding a Qu’ran.  They shot him, Travis.  Nine times.  They killed his wife and his four-year old grandson and shot the rest of the family, except for his daughter-in-law, she fled with a two-month old baby while they were busy killing everyone else.”

    “Were there weapons in the house?”

    “Yeah, there were a lot of weapons in that house.  American weapons.”

    “You’ve made your point, Jack.  I don’t need to hear any more.”

    “Yes you do, and you’re going to hear it, you’re going to hear all of it.  The Marines went to the next house and killed everyone there. The father.  The mother.  Their eight-year-old son and all of their daughters.   A 14-year-old girl, a 10-year-old girl, a  5 year-old girl, and a 3-year-old girl.  They killed them all.  A 1-year old girl was staying with the family.  They killed her too.”

    Travis stared at Jack.

    “There weren’t any girls in the third house.  There were four brothers.  The Marines killed all of them.”

    “There must have been some resistance, something that triggered this.”

    “There was no resistance, none of those people were any threat at all.  I went to the hospital.  Many of the victims were shot at point blank range, execution style.  One of them, an old man, was blown in half by a grenade. Several of the victims were shot in the back, one of the children was decapitated by gunfire or a grenade blast. The first neighbors into the second house said the children killed there were huddled together on a bed, the women were trying to shield them.”

    “Jack, you know what combat’s like . . . the fear . . . the adrenaline rush . . . the confusion . . . sometimes the rules of engagement can’t be adhered to.”

    “What happened that morning in Haditha wasn’t combat, Travis.  Those Marines executed civilians, there’s no other way to say it.  24 civilians.  They killed defenseless women and children, they killed babies, so quit giving me your Captain America excuses, don’t fucking tell me rules of engagement just can’t be adhered to sometimes.”

    “This is horrible, I’m not saying it isn’t.”

    “When that car drove up the killing started, the first lies got told, the squad leader–”

    “The killing started when the Humvee was blown up.”

    “The killing started when we invaded Iraq.”

    “It started on 9/11, Bush is right, we-”

    “I don’t want to hear any 9/11 bullshit from you.  We aren’t fighting terrorism here, Bush wanted payback and didn’t care who paid, he wanted oil and his neocons wanted an empire, and now we’ve got a Shi’a-Sunni civil war on our hands.”

     “It’s complicated, no doubt about it.  But we are fighting terrorists here, you’re in intel, you know damn well there are foreign fighters in Haditha, so don’t bullshit me.  They’re terrorists, trained by Al Qaeda and sent through Syria into Iraq.”

    “That grandfather in his wheelchair wasn’t a foreign fighter.  Or a terrorist.  And in case you haven’t noticed yet, this is Iraq, we’re the foreign fighters.”

    “We’re just here to–”

    “That crippled old man didn’t blow up that Humvee, Travis.  Neither did his wife.  Those slaughtered little girls didn’t blow it up.  That one-year-old baby those Marines killed didn’t blow it up either.”

    “Well what do you want me to do about it?”

    “I want you to start facing reality.  We’re just making things worse here.”

    “We can’t leave.  If you think it’s bad now, just watch,  there’ll be genocide if we withdraw.”

    “There’s genocide now. Half-a-million dead and counting.  I’m done with this, Haditha was the last straw for me. We both know what’ll happen.  It’ll be covered up.  Everyone will lie about it right on up the chain of command. The lying started right away when that squad leader said they’d claim the men in that car were running away.  I was lied to when I was there.  About everything.  Only two of those Marines told me the truth.  But they’ll lie too if this gets investigated.  This’ll be covered up.”  

    “Incidents like this have to be . . . sanitized, for a greater good.”

    “What greater good is that?   For the good of the killers?  For the good of the Corps?   For the good of the Pentagon?”  

    “Things like this happen, we’re in a war.”  

    “Yeah, a Muslim civil war.  It’s been going on for a thousand years, and now we’re caught in the middle of it.  Why are we here, Travis?  There was no WMD, Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, we shouldn’t be here at all.”

    “Well we are, so we’ve got to win.”

    “Win what?”

    “The war on terror.”

    “It’s insane to wage war on a tactic.  Terror is a tactic, Travis.”

    “A tactic killers use against the innocent.”  

    “Who were the killers in Haditha, and who were the innocent?”

    “It’s not the same . . .”

    “It’s not the same?  You’re off duty today, so let’s go see what’s the same and what isn’t.  I’ll give you a ride to Haditha, you can ask the neighbors of those slaughtered families who the innocent were and who killed them.  You can walk to those graves with them and ask if we’ve won their hearts and minds yet.”

    “It was an unfortunate incident, regrettable to say the least, but it’s understandable, insurgents and terrorists hide among civilians, they–”

    “So if Americans massacre innocents, it’s understandable, but if Muslims massacre innocents, it’s terrorism.”

    “You’re overreacting to this Haditha incident, Jack.  You’ve got to keep it in perspective.”

    “Perspective?  I saw those dead children, Travis.  I saw those dead women who tried to shield them.  I saw dead babies and a dead old man in a wheelchair.  Killed in cold blood by United States Marines, the Few, the Proud, slaughtered in a three-hour rampage.  I want no part of this anymore, I’m resigning my commission.  If you have any honor and integrity left, you’ll resign your commission too.”

    “I can’t do that.  I won’t do that.  We have to defeat the terrorists.”

    “Which ones?  There’s evil in everyone, Travis, there’s good in everyone.  War destroys the good in us and unleashes the evil.  No one wins, we all lose. I’m not going to be a paid killer anymore, I’m resigning and going home while there’s still some good left in me.  I hope you will too, if you don’t this war will destroy you.”