Home > Marine Unit from Ohio Wiped Out in Iraq

Marine Unit from Ohio Wiped Out in Iraq

by Open-Publishing - Thursday 12 May 2005
15 comments

Wars and conflicts International USA

HABAN, Iraq, May 11 — The explosion enveloped the armored vehicle in flames, sending orange balls of fire bubbling above the trees along the Euphrates River near the Syrian border.

Marines in surrounding vehicles threw open their hatches and took off running across the plowed fields, toward the already blackening metal of the destroyed vehicle. Shouting, they pulled to safety those they could, as the flames ignited the bullets, mortar rounds, flares and grenades inside, rocketing them into the sky and across pastures.

Gunnery Sgt. Chuck Hurley emerged from the smoke and turmoil around the vehicle, circling toward the spot where helicopters would later land to pick up casualties. As he passed one group of Marines, he uttered one sentence: "That was the same squad."

Among the four Marines killed and 10 wounded when an explosive device erupted under their Amtrac on Wednesday were the last battle-ready members of a squad that four days earlier had battled foreign fighters holed up in a house in the town of Ubaydi. In that fight, two squad members were killed and five were wounded.

In 96 hours of fighting and ambushes in far western Iraq, the squad had ceased to be.

Every member of the squad — one of three that make up the 1st Platoon of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment — had been killed or wounded, Marines here said. All told, the 1st Platoon — which Hurley commands — had sustained 60 percent casualties, demolishing it as a fighting force.

"They used to call it Lucky Lima," said Maj. Steve Lawson, commander of the company. "That turned around and bit us."

Wednesday was the fourth day of fighting in far western Iraq, as the U.S. military continued an assault that has sent more than 1,000 Marines down the ungoverned north bank of the Euphrates River in search of foreign fighters crossing the border from Syria. Of seven Marines killed so far in the operation, six came come from Lima Company’s 1st Platoon.

Lima Company drew Marine reservists from across Ohio into the conflict in Iraq. Some were still too young to be bothered much by shaving, or even stubble.

They rode to war on a Marine Amtrac, an armored vehicle that travels on tank-like treads. Marines in Iraq typically crowd thigh to thigh in the Amtrac, with one or two men perched on cardboard boxes of rations. Only the gunners manning the top hatches of Amtracs have any view of the passing scenery. Those inside find out what their field of combat is when the rear ramp comes down and they run out with weapons ready.

Marines typically pass travel time in the Amtrac by extracting favorite bits from ration packets, mercilessly ribbing a usual victim for eating or sleeping too much, or sleeping themselves.

On Monday, when the Marine assault on foreign fighters formally began, the young Marines of the squad from the 1st Platoon were already exhausted. Their encounter at the house in Ubaydi that morning and the previous night had been the unintended first clash of the operation, pitting them against insurgents who fired armor-piercing bullets up through the floor. It took 12 hours and five assaults by the squad — plus grenades, bombing by an F/A-18 attack plane, tank rounds and rockets at 20 yards — to kill the insurgents and permit recovery of the dead Marines’ bodies.

Afterward, they slept in the moving Amtrac, heads back and mouths agape. One stood up to stretch his legs. He fell asleep again standing up, leaning against the metal walls.

Squad members spoke only to compare what they knew about the condition of their wounded. Getting the latest news, they fell silent again. After one such half-hour of silence, a Marine offered a terse commendation for one of the squad members shot at Ubaydi: "Bunker’s a good man."

With the operation underway, Marine commanders kept the 1st Platoon largely to the back, letting its men rest.

Commanders had hoped the operation would swiftly capture or kill large numbers of foreign fighters. But the foreigners, and everyone else here, had plenty of warning that the Marines were coming — including those ready to fight at Ubaydi.

By the time the squad from Lima Company crossed north of the Euphrates, whole villages consisted of little more than abandoned houses with fresh tire tracks leading into pastures or homes occupied only by prepubescent boys or old men. Men of fighting age had made themselves scarce. The AK-47 assault rifles ubiquitous in Iraqi households had disappeared.

Many Marines complained bitterly that commanders had pulled them out of the fight at Ubaydi while the insurgents were still battling, to start the planned offensive. "They take us from killing the people they want us to kill and bring us to these ghost villages," one complained Wednesday on the porch of a house commandeered as a temporary base.

Uneventful house searches stretched into late afternoon, the tedium broken only by small-arms fire and mortar rounds lobbed by insurgents hiding on the far side of the river.

This correspondent had just gotten off the Amtrac and the reconstructed squad from 1st Platoon was rolling toward the Euphrates in a row of armored vehicles, headed for more house searches, when the vehicle rolled over the explosive.

Marines initially said they believed the blast was caused by two mines stacked on top of each other. But reports from Marines that they had seen an artillery round and two hand-held radios near the blast site raised suspicions that the explosion was caused by a bomb that had been activated remotely, Lawson said.

Hurley and others pulled their comrades out of the Amtrac as flames detonated — or "cooked off," in military jargon — its ammunition. As Marines carrying stretchers ran to the Amtrac, bullets snapped out of the burning hulk and traveled hundreds of feet. The Marines ran back through the fusillade, carrying out the wounded. "C’mon, c’mon, c’mon," some shouted, desperate to get the wounded out.

The four dead were trapped inside the vehicle, Lawson said.

"We passed right over it. We passed right over it," one of many Marines in the convoy ahead of the burning Amtrac said of the explosive, puzzling over why he was still alive.

"That’s the last of the squad," said another, Cpl. Craig Miller, whose reassignment last month had taken him out of the unit. "Three weeks ago, that would have been me."

Late Wednesday, helicopters flew out Hurley and the remaining members of 1st Platoon for time off. They are to return after the platoon is remade, Marines said.

Another Lima Company platoon commander ordered his men to bed early, in preparation for the next day’s operations. Mourning could wait.

"We don’t have time," the commander said.

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Forum posts

  • Those Marines were paid to fight and to die if need be. They fought. They died. Bring the troops home NOW!

    • Pulling out is the last thing we should do. That would subject the iraqi civilians to terrorists and possible loss of sovereignty to either the Iranians, the Saudis or the Syrians.

    • That a sheepish thing to say. The soldiers illegally occupying the country are the terrorists.

    • I doubt anything I say is sheepish but your comment is obviously shallow and illogical.

    • God bless the heroic fighters for their courage for taking out this hell-destined unit and may the rest of the cowrardly US troops meet this fate also.

    • These heroic Americans volunteered to join the military to PROTECT our country.

      They are the victims of an evil cabal that has abused their trust and sense of duty.

      Does anyone believe that the majority of US troops want to be there right now? Of course not. Do they have a choice to leave? Of course not.

      It is up to US to bring them home. They are counting on US! The American people must demand their return immediately.

    • You actually think that anybody in the administration cares about the troops or the people of Iraq? Your a loon. The only reason we are over in Iraq is for geo stratigic politics...money...capitalism...and cold hard cash. Troops are nothing but big dumb brutes to be used for the political expediency of the nation using them (Henry Kissenger).

  • Yeah, they - the marines or any kind of American Nazi troops - deserve it.

    Are you cry mama now. Remember it was America who ambushed Iraq!

    Go home Ami.

    • The little killers got what they deserve. The freedom fighters in Iraq will keep on picking them off one by one until 10 years and 58,000 of them are dead. Then the criminal element that controls this government will finally have its thirst for blood satisfied and they can admit they fucked up.

  • Ya really have to wonder who the CIA were after that would cause them to decimate an entire platoon.

    Or was it just for the propaganda value?

    These kids get conned into fighting. They think it’s going to be like a video game until reality bites them in the ass.

    All they want is a job and an education and to serve their country and instead they are sent into harms way in an illegal war to kill and be killed. There’s no way out for them. They aren’t coming home, people.

    God help us all if we don’t stop the madmen from this quest for the control of oil.

    A learned man, Col L Fletcher Prouty (Deceased)(The man who’s character was used as Man X in Oliver Stone’s JFK) often said that oil is the second most plentiful liquid on earth. It is NOT a fossil fuel and there is NO shortage of it. There NEVER was.

    In Prouty’s collected works he explains that fossils are never found below 16000 feet EVER!. Oil is drilled for in excess of 32000 feet every day of the week. It’s a fact.

    Oil was listed as the residue of of rotting organic matter so that it would be deemed RARE and therefore a high price could be placed on it. A plethora of lies has kept this illusion going for well over 100 years and it’s time it stopped.

    WITHOUT THIS ILLUSION, THERE IS NO WAR!
    THERE’S NO NEED TO CONQUOR THE OIL FIELDS AND KILL OUR YOUNG OR THE POPULATION OF IRAQ1

    You can get The Collected Works Of L Fletcher Prouty at www.blackopradio.com It’s a bargain. The disk contains both of his books and hours and hours of audio & video interviews as well as documentation and still images.
    Prouty was the liason between the CIA, the Whitehouse and the Pentagon for 9 years through the Eisenhower/JFK eras. He’s a unique voice with a truly unique perspective on a diverse number of subjects, primarily as they relate to JFK and Vietnam. A must for the researcher looking for the origins of US governmental corruption.

  • On May 11, 2005 one of my bestest friends was in the aromed vehicle. He was killed but I am so proud of what he did. He wanted to serve our country and thats what he did. I will never forget him.
    R.I.P.
    Pfc Dixon

    Shawna

    • Yup, that really helps, doesn’t it, Shawna! He died because . . . because . . . because . . . oh, yeah, because he wanted to serve our country! Well, congratulations! You and Bush got the ultimate sacrifice from him, didn’t you!? And for what? No one in The United States of America is any more safe and secure because Pfc Dixon and more than 1600 other young people were killed by you and Bush and all of those other ’Sunshine Patriot’ girlie-Bush supporters! So take your crocodile tears and move on to some other web site that believes in your kind of soap-opera reality! Pfc Dixon is dead, and that’s a fact. Now deal with it and stop other ’Pfc Dixons’ from dying for no good thing and no good reason . . . if you REALLY DARE and if you REALLY CARE!

    • I dont know who you are but Chris was like my brother. I dont support what bush is doing. I dont even know how he can sleep at night knowing 18 year old kids are being killed to save him. I AM SO PROUD of Chris we tried to stop him from joining but he wanted to. So dont tell me to take my crocodile tears somewhere else. I bet you havent lost someone over in iraq so until you do dont tell me what to do. It was as if my heart was gone when i got the news. So tell me how you would feel.
      SHAWNA

    • This war should not have happened! That is a fact. Bush’s moronic administration deceived America. Bush should be tried for war crimes. However, to say that the soldiers who fought in Iraq deserved to die is much more idiotic and moronic than anything Bush has ever done. Remember, most of the soldiers in Iraq joined the military to pay for college. When they signed, they had no idea we were going to war with Iraq. So in other words, all of you should pray for the safe return of all troops, and feel sympathetic for the ones that will not return. Shame on the ones who blame the troops and not Bush!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

    • This may be coming too late for you Shawna, but if you are still viewing this post try to analyse just what it is that you find so commendable in the actions of your late friend Chris that causes you to be so proud of him. I really don’t understand what goes on in your mind. You say you are against Bush, meaning you are against the war? If so, then, surely you must see that your friend was a sacrificial lamb in this illegal and immoral war. Is it this pointless sacrifice that causes your heart to swell with such pride for your dead friend? If so, is this a legitimate reason for your emotion? Please try and explain why you are so proud of him? I can understand if you said you are sad or angry, but PROUD? I think you are confused.