Forward

It’s not every day you are told you are being attached to a forward unit. For the guys in my platoon, you would have thought we had just won the lottery. Marines are funny that way, I guess. We were a weapons platoon at the time. Three rifleman, Lcpl Dodorice, Lcpl Wolf, Lcpl Bill. Six mortars, Lcpl black, Lcpl worth, Lcpl Scare, Lcpl Rob. Four anti tanks, Lcpl Quinn, Lcpl Mul, Lcpl Len, Pfc Trey. Our fearless leaders, Lieutenant Sir and Sergeant Silks. And of course, myself as acting machine gunner.

It was the day before our battalion was to start our four-day weekend for the fourth of July. The battalion commander had hosted a competition for all the platoons to compete for an extra day off for the weekend. We ended up winning and were already riding high from our recent victory when top, Master sergeant, showed up at our platoon formation where we were to be released for the holiday. The plans we were making for our five-day weekend was interrupted by the news that we were to stay on base for the holiday and report to the battalion building at 0300 Tuesday morning with all gear and to have our all our weapon systems loaded into the platoon’s safe box for shipping.

With the bombshell delivered that we would not be enjoying our time off on a boat getting wasted and shooting off fireworks, our spirits were lifted again with the news of our imminent deployment the following week. Just like anything else in the military we did not know any of the details and would not know until it was time to know.

And with that our weekend began, well sort of. The following morning at 0400 I get a call from an unknown number to be at the armory in fifteen minutes and to bring my 240 bravo cards. It was top. I had no idea why he was calling me himself or why it was me being called as I was only a Lcpl, but still I threw my cammies on and ran to the armory down the street. Arriving at the armory I made several realizations. The only other people there besides me and top were officers, I was the only one in uniform.

I immediately started fearing the worst. I’m in some sort of trouble. The best answer I could think of was that I was called by mistake and was supposed to be in bed. But no, I was supposed to be there, and by the looks I received from the officers, I was not supposed to be in uniform. Top let me know I was there to pull my 240 and store it in the pelican case with the officers and his own weapon. He also let me know I was getting a small promotion for the duration of our “trip.” I just would not know what that entailed until we were where we were supposed to be.

The holiday weekend seemed to drag on forever as we waited for Tuesday to come. Monday night was the real beginning though. The entire platoon had our gear stagged and we anxiously waited for the time to leave for the battalion building. At 0200 we began moving our gear. A seabag and main pack with an attached day pack per person was carried to the battalion parking lot and stagged as we moved to the armory to draw our M4s. Around 245 a bus pulled into the parking lot. Not a normal school bus. This was one of those luxury tour busses you’ve seen going down the highway. Tinted windows, fold down tables, TVs mounted behind the seats, and its own bathroom in the rear of the bus. Our platoon commander Lt Sir, pulled in moments later. First, we loaded our gear into the bottom of the bus and then loaded the bus ourselves.

We soon came to find out that the windows were tinted from the inside as well, or maybe it was because it was 0300 and still dark out but we could not see anything out the limousine windows of the tour bus. With a quick head count we were off to parts unknown. The bus ride was filled with speculation as to where we were headed. No one knew for sure, but we were filled with ideas. The bus ride dragged on so long boredom finally overtook us, and we began to sleep. I still don’t know how long we were on the bus or where we ended up getting off at but eventually, we did get off. It was still dark outside so it had to be before sunrise, meaning we couldn’t have been on the bus more than four hours. Would have been easy to tell if we had been able to keep our phones but they were taken. As the saying goes “Loose lips sink ships.” We ended up at an airfield somewhere near the ocean. We could smell the salty air coming off the breeze and hear the waves but with the blinding lights from the airfield we couldn’t see anything beyond the fences.

We knew it was not a real airport into which we had just walked. For one, it was all one room with plastic chairs placed throughout the building and a row of desks and floor scales along one wall. We were ushered to the scales and told to weigh in one at a time. We had to give the clerk our name and rank and then weigh ourselves with our gear on and without our gear on. After the clerks were done taking their notes, we were again ushered to the chairs which were then barricaded off and we were told we could not leave. Our time sitting in the makeshift airport was spent with us lower enlisted speculating as to where we were going and what we were top be doing. Lt Sir and the Sgt were the only ones who had any additional information, but they were not eager to share with the rest of us.