Evan Wright - Generation Kill

In their most paranoid moments, some Marines believe Ferrando is trying to get them killed. Sergeant Christopher Wasik, a thirty-one-year-old Marine who sometimes serves as Ferrando’s driver, comes over this day to share some coffee and gripe with his friends in Second Platoon. Before the invasion, Wasik openly rebelled against Ferrando’s Grooming Standard after having been severely upbraided for allowing his mustache to grow too far beyond the corners of his mouth. He shaved it into a perfect Hitler mustache, which he wore for weeks at Camp Mathilda. Nevertheless, his rebellion was a failure. His superiors commended his Hitler mustache for complying with the Grooming Standard. Now, he and the other Marines speculate on Ferrando’s motives in Iraq. “In some morbid realm,” Wasik says, “it may be a possibility that the commander wants some of us to die, so when he sits around with other high leaders, they don’t snicker at him and ask what kind of shit he got into.”

WHATEVER FEELINGS Colbert has over his involvement in the shooting of the shepherds, he seems to have filed them away. His mood has been chipper since the all-night watch for the enemy column. Late in the morning, however, he receives another reminder of the incident. The tattooed grandmother and a man from the family who appears to be in his late forties walk through the perimeter toward his Humvee. Person, now on his stomach, tanning his bacne, is the first to notice their approach. “Hey,” he says, lifting his head up. “We got Hajjis. Anyone know how to say, ‘Get the fuck away from my Humvee’ in Habudabi?” he says, using Marine slang—“Habudabi”—for Arabic.

“I’ll take care of this,” Colbert says. He scrounges in the Humvee for an English-to-Arabic cheat sheet, then walks up to the man and the old lady.

“Al salam al’icum,” he says haltingly, reading the customary Arabic salutation from his cheat sheet.

His greeting provokes a torrent of words and frantic gestures from the couple. Colbert queries them in Arabic, then repeats in English, “I have pain?” “I am hungry?”

They shake their heads no. Then he asks, “Bad people?”

They nod, point across the field and speak more urgently. Colbert tries to radio for the translator, but he can’t be found. The grandmother keeps repeating something. He can’t figure out what it is. He shakes his head. “I don’t understand. I’m sorry.”

She shrugs. Colbert hands her several humrat packs. “I’m sorry,” he says in Arabic and English. “You have to go.”

They walk off. He watches them, exasperated. “We can’t have civilians hanging out here. There’s nothing I can do about this.”

DOC BRYAN RETURNS from the RCT-1’s medical unit with good news. “We got the kid stabilized and medevaced out on a bird.” Even so, Doc Bryan takes little satisfaction from the effort. “The whole drive down I was staring in the kid’s eyes,” Doc Bryan says. “He was staring at me like, ‘You just shot me, motherfucker, and now you think you’re great because you’re trying to save my life?’”

Later that day, Encino Man walks the perimeter, talking informally with his men in an attempt to ease the tensions. Meeting with Doc Bryan and the other Marines in Team Three, he apologizes for the incident a few days earlier when he tried to fire a 203 grenade into a house where the men had observed civilians.

His candor earns high marks from the Marines. Then he asks them to speak up about anything that’s bothering them. The funny thing is, the Marines have been laughing off hardships caused by the lack of food, the filth, the flies, the dysentery, even the uncertainty of not knowing what their next mission is. The one thing that no one laughs about is the loss of First Recon’s “colors”—a Marine Corps flag affixed with battle streamers. The colors are reputed to have been carried by Marines into combat since at least the Vietnam War. A few nights ago, they were lost on the supply truck blown up outside of Ar Rifa. One of the Marines tells Encino Man, “The colors should never leave the commander’s side. Losing them is a reflection on his leadership and on all of us.”

The only other serious complaints the Marines air are the usual ones about the battalion commander’s continued obsession with the Grooming Standard. Ferrando recently sent the Coward of Khafji around to lecture the men about committing petty violations—from allowing their hair to grow a quarter inch too long to lying in the sun by their vehicles with their helmets off.

One of the Marines complains to Encino Man, “They’re treating men who’ve shown discipline in combat like a bunch of six-year-olds.”

Encino Man listens, staring cryptically from blue eyes beneath the shelf of his Cro-Magnon brow. Then he turns to Doc Bryan, who’s been lying quietly on the ground the whole time. “Doc, is there anything you want to talk about?”

“I’m fine, sir,” Doc Bryan answers.

“If there’s anything on your mind, now’s the time to bring it up,” Encino Man says.

“If you insist, sir,” Doc Bryan says.

“It’s okay, whatever it is,” Encino Man encourages him.

“Frankly, sir, I think you’re incompetent to lead this company.”

“I’m doing the best I can,” Encino Man says.

“Sir, it’s just not good enough.”

CAPTAIN AMERICA’S PLATOON is also experiencing a deepening rift, exacerbated by the shepherd-shooting incident. Marines in his platoon speculate that Trombley might have been provoked into shooting the shepherds after hearing gunfire from Captain America’s vehicle. The fact is, Trombley denies Captain America’s AK fire had anything to do with his actions. Nevertheless, the morning after the incident, Marines in Third Platoon witnessed a remarkable confrontation between Kocher and Captain America. In the belief that his commander’s antics were beginning to jeopardize the safety of the men, Kocher took it upon himself to lay down the law. He backed Captain America against the side of his Humvee and told him: “If you ever fire an AK from this truck again, I will fuck you up.” Captain America denied shooting his AK. He blamed the reckless gunfire on Crosby, riding in the back of his truck.

Now a day later at the encampment, Crosby accosts Captain America in front of several other Marines. Crosby, not the biggest Marine in the platoon, steps up to Captain America and tells him he is asking for a “request mast.” Request mast is a formal process in which Marines, when accused of committing a serious infraction, may ask permission to appear before the commanding general and defend themselves.

Captain America shoots Crosby an amiable smile. “On what grounds are you requesting mast?” he asks.

“Sir, you’re telling other people I was firing an AK out of the back of the truck,” Crosby says.

Captain America tries to calm him. “We’re under a lot of stress right now. No one’s getting any sleep.”

“I’m not getting sleep,” Crosby says. “You’re the one who’s sleeping. You’re going around saying I’m a shitbag. I’ve never fired an AK.”

Captain America stares at him, apparently speechless.

“I’m not the one shooting AKs out of the vehicle,” Crosby persists. “You are.”

Captain America walks off, having just, in his men’s opinion, “bowed down” to a lance corporal. In this moment he loses whatever remaining authority he had. As Crosby says later, “I’m only a lance corporal. In the Marine Corps, the captain is God. But in this platoon, we’ve taken over. Now, when the captain tells me to do something, I ask Kocher if I should do it, and he says, ‘Fuck no.’ Because out here, the captain hasn’t given one order that’s made sense.”