May
31
2010
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100 Fewer to Memorialize Because of One |
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Written by JD Johannes
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Monday, 31 May 2010 |
In the Spring of 2007 as the Anbar Awaking began to spread downstream through the Euphrates river valley and Soldiers surged into Baghdad, a small outpost of paratroopers was under intermittent siege.
The paratroopers of Blackfoot Company, 1-501st, at OP Omar on the northern edge of Kharmah, Iraq 25-miles west of Baghdad, were fighting the last of the major fire-fights in Iraq. Every three weeks or so, Al Qaida in Iraq would assault OP Omar. The attack on March 26th, 2007 was supposed to destroy the outpost--if not for one man they might have succeeded and there would be 100 more white headstones with wreaths and flags on Memorial day.
The main building of OP Omar was a warehouse used for cold or dry storage of grains and vegetables before the war. The thick concrete walls originally designed to keep cold air in also kept bullets and shrapnel out. The exterior tan colored stucco has chipped and pocked, but the concrete held. Like nearly every other building in Iraq, it was surrounded by walls that successive units had reinforced. Gun towers and fighting positions had been added and improved over the years.
It was not an ideal location, but there is no such thing, it was merely the best among other options to use as a base of operations for 100 or more men.
I arrived at OP Omar at around 2 a.m. on the 26th on a slow-moving convoy of humvees driving by night vision goggles and feel. The Kharmah road had been notorious for improvised explosive devices for years. The last time I had been on that road was in 2005 and a humvee four vehicles back from mine had been hit wounding three Marines and taking a leg and arm from an interpreter.
The Humvees of 2007 were much more armored than those of 2005, but the bombs had gotten bigger too.
But Al Qaida was taking the night off and we arrived at OP Omar safe and tired. The 1st Sergeant showed me my bunk among the paratroopers and I slept in my clothes.
The morning broke cool and clear. March and April are mild in Iraq. The blazing furnace does not kick on until early May. I ate breakfast on patio surrounded by blast barriers and sand bags with a few paratroopers telling them why I was there, how I had been all around the area before and specifically requested to come back to Kharmah.
They thought I was insane.
The Sergeant of the Guard took me around the compound which is was only about the size of a football field with a dozen exposed spots where sniper fire could rain down. One of the Blackfoot Sharpshooters had engaged in a sniper duel a few weeks before. The Al Qaida sniper was good, going so far as to use a thermal blanket to disguise his heat signature. The Blackfoot Sharpshooter was patient waiting for days until a glint of the enemy scope gave away the position.
I was mostly in waiting mode. A large raid to track down some suspected anti-aircraft missiles would be kicking off soon. I settled in, getting to know the guys. In the dust I drew a map of their area of operations, telling them about the crazy things the Marines I was embedded with did in 2005.
They no longer thought I was insane--just suicidal.
The conversation was interrupted by burst of machine gun fire. Not a few pops from an M-4 crabine or AK, a burst of fire from the heavy M-240 machine gun.
Everyone paused, a space of only a breath.
Then the M-240 opened up again with a long, sustained stream of fire. A few paratroopers darted inside to the main building. Then the wind hit.
A gale of hurricane force wind pushed through the compound sending me backwards. Dust, rocks, dirt and debris biting into skin. Then the sound, a crack louder than a nearby lightening strike.
The over-pressure from a tanker truck loaded with more than 2,000 pounds of explosives produces a supersonic blastwave with shards of steel larger than a man's hand flying at more than 4,000 feet per second. If one of those shards hit a man a full velocity, all that would be left him would be his boots.
The echo of the explosion had barely faded when gunfire filled the air.
Sergeant Jason Stegall, the paratrooper who fired the machine gun at the tanker truck from the gun tower facing the main entry point, blinked open his eyes.
He was lying his back on the catwalk leading to the tower. The blast wave had blown him clear out of the tower. Another paratrooper leapt over him and started firing out out the gun port. Stegall gathered himself, scrambled into the tower and started shooting.
Within minutes, paratroopers and Al Qaida fighters were blazing thousands of rounds at each other. Paratroopers fired from the gun towers and firing positions along the walls, the AQI fighters from houses on south and west of OP Omar.
Another truck filled with explosives and driver bent an martyrdom rumbled up the road toward Omar.
The double suicide truck bomb attack was Al Qaida's most determined attack on OP Omar. AQI's plan was for the first truck bomb to breach and destroy the defensive perimeter on the south-west corner of the outpost. The second truck bomb would then be able to drive in and detonate inside the compound. The third phase of the attack would be a frontal foot assault by the fighters.
Al Qaida had been probing OP Omar in the previous attacks, testing, guaging. The attack on March 26th was supposed to overrun OP Omar.
Omar was isolated. Reinforcements by ground would be halted by IEDs. Air cover would take 15 minutes or more to arrive. Once the fighters were in the compound the remaining paratroopers would have to have to fight it out by hand or call in fire on top of themselves. There would be 100 more white headstones in national cemetaries today.
Al Qaida though did not plan on one quiet, un-assuming paratrooper from Alabama foiling their plan.
I met Sgt. Jason Stegall briefly a few hours before the attack during my tour of OP Omar. I shot a little video of him and he explained their duty that day--prevent anyone from making it through the entry point to Omar.
The asphalt road heading north out of Kharmah runs dangerously close to the west side of the outpost. A series of concrete barriers had been set up diverting Iraqi civillian traffic toward a gravel road 150 meters south of the outpost. Only US military vehicles were allowed to proceed through the barriers and the serpentine path toward the gate of the outpost.
Stegall was perched in the gun tower facing the barriers when the suicide truck bomb failed to turn and headed into the barriers.
Hundreds of cars and trucks approached the barriers everyday and turned to the right. The locals knew the drill. The water truck loaded with explosives slowed down and instead of turning, headed into the barriers.
Stegall jumped down and fired a flare at the truck.
It kept coming.
Stegall took the M-240 machine gun, braced himself and fired a burst into the ground. The truck sped up. Stegall then opened up a sustained burst into the grill of the truck. The truck turned right off the asphalt into the dirt and Stegall unleashed a hail of bullets into the cab of the truck killing the driver. It did not turn toward the outpost, it rolled east then exploded.
Al Qaida's deadly plan had been thwarted.
The second suicide truck bomb detonated inside the crater created by the first one. I ran up to the roof of the main building with a team of sharpshooters exposing myself for a few seconds to gunfire that almost killed me.
The mortar crew launched rounds at the fighters across the streets.
The fight raged for 20 minutes then it all fell quiet. Al Qaida retreated, blending back into population.
One paratrooper was evacuated by helicopter with serious wounds. He survived but is carrying large scars from that day. Many of the paratroopers are still carrying mental and emotional scars from the repeated attacks on OP Omar.
We all lived longer because of Jason Stegall.
Sergeant Jason Stegall served the rest of his tour with valor, distinguishing himself in combat on other occasions. He was awarded the Bronze Star for Valor for his actions on March 26th 2007. Al Qaida, Jaish al Mahdi and other malevolent men tried to kill him many times and failed.
In December of 2009 Jason battled one final enemy and lost. He died of an illness and fever.
There are 100 fewer headstones with flags on them today because of Jason Stegall. One of those headstones should have been mine.
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