Bounty Hunter 43 by Jason Delgado & Chris Martin

Author:Jason Delgado & Chris Martin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

12

NO BETTER FRIEND, NO WORSE ENEMY

Operation Iraqi Freedom 1 really laid the groundwork for the rise of the ultimate sniper. Entering that war, we were only a half step—a baby step, really—beyond the Vietnam era in terms of our TTPs (tactics, techniques, and procedures).

SSBC was still based around the lessons learned by Hathcock and others and in desperate need of an overhaul. But the tricks we picked up shortly after 9/11 (which have continually been improved upon with enhanced training and technology in the years since) basically transformed our snipers into super-soldiers.

If it wasn’t for OIF1, America would not have been ready for the bigger war to come, I guarantee you that.

* * *

After the Marines below us secured the cash from the bank vault, we were all refragged to a sprawling hospital complex in the area.

Despite the sheer horror and carnage we’d already witnessed, no one was ready for what we walked into there. Every evil associated with war and widespread chaos was on full display—dismemberments, scorched bodies, victims of child molestation and rape, terminal patients untreated due to a lack of basic supplies, and on and on and on.

The hospital overflowed with human remains. Carcasses were crammed into large box trucks. The sickening stench of rotting flesh poisoned the air.

We were tasked with reestablishing control of the facility. We were to provide security and whatever sense of normalcy we would bring. It was our responsibility to allow the doctors and staff who had stuck around to do whatever they could.

The confused state between police action and war occasionally bit us on the ass.

An M1A1 tank was positioned in front of the hospital’s entrance in order to establish a checkpoint. And sitting watch on the tank on April 12 was Jesus Gonzalez, a gunner from the 1st Tank Division. Unbeknownst to him, an armed man slinked up behind him and fatally shot him.

Following Gonzalez’s murder, the assailant was swiftly tracked down and killed. That wasn’t vengeance enough for the Marines who had witnessed one of their best friends slaughtered in front of their eyes.

Those Marines who were forced to continue manning the checkpoint as they mourned mounted the body of the killer on the tank with barbwire. As if that didn’t get the point across clearly enough, they also hung a sign that read, “This is what happens when you fuck with us, you Muj fuckers.”

When the company commander discovered this grisly warning, he immediately ordered them to remove the body. However, by that point, the “deterrent” had already been strung up for hours.

Was it tasteless? Yeah, it was. But in war, matters of taste and logic only surface after the violent emotional reactions have their say.

For those caught in its grips, war is not about the atrocities. It’s about inflicting the violence necessary to get back home alive. War is shit, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. There is no gray area. You either live or you die.

* * *

Two days later, tragedy struck again, although this time it took on a different form.

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