By the end of October 1990 life at Dhahran Air Base, also known by now as “Langley East,” had pretty much settled into a dull routine – and considering the alternative, I guess a “dull routine” was the lesser of two evils. The tent city next to the flightline was long since finished, and the majority of the Wing had moved out of the Saudi police barracks and into the temper tents that had been erected in long, neat rows. This was good, because the poorly-constructed Saudi barracks were starting to come apart in chunks, so the less wear and tear on them the better. The grand plan was to move the entire wing out of them and leave them for housing the troops from other Air Force units that had arrived to flesh out our manning requirements, both in Security Police and in other units. But “Wambo” put his two cent’s worth in and said that he wanted “his” cops “closer to the resource” and in a “hardened facility” where they would be better protected. Never mind that the tent city was right next to the flightline, which WAS the resource, and that the barracks were falling down around us – he wanted us to stay there, so we stayed while the rest of the wing moved out.
By this time we had also pretty much finished constructing the numerous machine gun emplacements, foxholes, listening posts, and anything else that required filling hundreds and hundreds of sandbags that were scattered around the base as a part of “Wambo’s” grand plan to protect the base. Our shifts now were, for the most part, spent trying to stay awake and alert on post and not let the boredom of hours of looking out into darkness get to us. As a Sector Mobile Patrol leader, my job was to constantly patrol my assigned sector and check on the troops, replacing radio batteries as needed, giving bathroom breaks, and generally keeping the troops awake, alert, and focused. We had five different sectors in my area, and me and the other four Technical Sergeants on my flight rotated between them.
My favorite area, and the one that I requested to be permanently assigned to once the shooting started, was Area 4, radio call sign Charlie Mike 4. (“C” Sector, Mobile patrol, area 4 – CM4.) This was the largest, most open, and most desolate of the patrol areas on the base, and the good thing about it was that if you wanted to go disappear into the darkness where no one could find you without a map, a compass, and an 8-digit grid coordinate, then CM4 was the patrol for you. This area also became known as “13 miles to nowhere,” because the lone road that ran around and through the area was 13 miles long and it came to a dead end out in the middle of the desert – out in the middle of nowhere. If you drove down the road to the dead end and stopped, to your right would be a major highway with a Saudi town on the other side. (Years later I learned that this was Khobar Towers, the same Khobar Towers that terrorists bombed in 1995.) There was a fence between you and the road since this was the perimeter of the base, and at least once every two hours you had to conduct a perimeter check. So after I checked on all my static posts in the area, I’d call Charlie Base and inform them that I was initiating a “Poppa Charlie,” or perimeter check, and they’d know that I’d be busy for the next two hours or so.
To the left of the road was nothing but open desert – 26 square miles of it, and by the time we’d been in country for three months, we knew that desert like the back of our hands. Our standing orders were to stay on the roads at night, but to not get caught on the roads during the daytime. So as soon as the sun came up we’d be off doing some four-wheeling in our Hummers, and after we got to know the area we’d jump off-road at night as well.
The only thing you really had to be careful of at night out there in the desert were the packs of wild dogs that roamed the base. They were vicious and would attack anyone at any time, and we had standing orders to shoot them on sight if they came at us. We were always careful not to get put in that situation so no one ever had to shoot one, but I came awful close one night when my gunner, Staff Sergeant Wayne “Shorty” Simmons, was out of the vehicle taking a leak and a pack of dogs came over the dune. I locked and loaded and drew down on the lead dog while “Shorty” came running back to the Hummer, trying to tuck himself back into the fly of his BDUs while running hell-bent for leather back to the vehicle. He made it with time to spare, and I dropped the Hummer in gear and we went ripping off across the desert, leaving the dogs behind.
“Shorty” never got out of the Hummer at night after that. (RIP, “Shorty,” I miss you, my friend.)
One of my goals while I was over there was to get my Hummer stuck. Once we got over there and started using the Hummers in all sorts of conditions, I became quite a fan of the rugged, go-anywhere vehicles that just absolutely refused to get stuck no matter what. So I set out to get one stuck, and one night in October at about two AM I finally did it. I found myself a loose patch of sand and got the Hummer bogged down so deep that the chassis was sitting on the surface of the loose sand, the tires just spinning and throwing sand all over the place. I was elated and very proud of myself at finally having gotten a famous Hummer stuck!
Then I realized that not only was my vehicle out of commission, I was a sitting duck with nowhere to go should we get attacked.
Oh, shit!
So I got on the tactical radio and contacted CM2, who just happened to be my good friend Lonnie Fulbright. I told him where I was and asked for a rendezvous, and when he asked what was up I told him I’d tell him when he got there. As soon as he pulled up he knew what I had done, and he busted out laughing. “You did it, man, you finally got one stuck!” he said, laughing all the while.
“Yeah, I did,” I replied, “Now help me get the damned thing out!” With the help of the winch on the front of his Hummer and some finesse with the four wheel drive on my part, we got the Hummer unstuck in about half an hour or so. We laughed about it for the next few minutes after which we both returned to our respective patrol zones. That was the last time I tried to get a Hummer stuck – from then on I was happy to jump the occasional sand dune and let it go at that.
Did I mention the old motocross track that Lonnie found out in the middle of the desert? The one we used to drive our Hummers around on, whooping and hollering like kids driving dune buggies up and down the sand dunes at the local beach?
More later.
IHC
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