“All I have is a twenty,” Parrello continued, slapping the bill into Rubio’s hand. “Here you go, Merry Christmas,” he said before walking away.

Brian Parrello had grown up in these last months. He loved being a Marine, and he was damned good at it. He eagerly accepted each new responsibility, and he was a natural-born leader. As a squad leader, he worked very hard to make sure that his Marines were properly trained. He watched over them like an older brother, and seemed to thrive on the responsibility. Gunny Vinciguerra and Staff Sergeant Iversen knew this young man would go far in the Marine Corps. He had the right stuff.

The Marines wanted to return control of a secure city to the Iraqi people and their fledgling government as quickly as possible. Before the civilians could return, however, all the weapons and explosive caches would have to be cleared, bodies would have to be removed, and more Iraqi forces would have to be brought in to help the people resettle and maintain order. The Marines wanted to put an Iraqi face on the security of Fallujah; the last thing they wanted was to be perceived as an occupying force.

With the enemy inside the city defeated, there was no longer a need for the Black Jack Brigade’s cordon in the south. On the 8th of December, Colonel Formica was ordered to return to Baghdad to resume his responsibility as the Multi-National Corps’ reserve. RCT-7 started pulling out of Fallujah to relieve the Black Jack Brigade, and RCT-1 began the process of relieving RCT-7 in place. During the transition, 1/3 would be chopped to RCT-1 while Gary Brandl’s Marines packed up and left the city. Along with the shifting of American forces, two more Iraqi Battalions arrived in Fallujah: the 8th Battalion, Iraqi Interim Force, and the 16th Battalion, Iraqi Army Forces.

The Marines held their belated Birthday Ball in Camp Fallujah on December 4. General Metz was the guest speaker. General Sattler had arranged to bring in 77,000 bottles of beer from Germany so that each soldier, sailor, airman, and Marine of Task Force Blue Diamond could have a cold beer or two for the celebration. The 4th was also the day of the Army-Navy football game. Metz was a West Point graduate (Class of ’71) and Sattler was a graduate of the Naval Academy (Class of ’71). This would have been the perfect time for Sattler to yell at the top of his lungs to “Beat Army!” Instead, when Sattler introduced Metz, he said that after the way the Army had fought beside the Marines, he would never be able to shout “Beat Army!” again.²³

The Marines enjoyed their traditional celebration, with the oldest Marine giving a piece of birthday cake to the youngest Marine. And, of course, they all toasted with their cold bottled beer. Everyone agreed it was the best beer they had ever tasted.

Clearing On the Euphrates River—And Death—Continue

On December 5, 2004, Dan Wittnam’s Small Craft Company went out again on a sweep along the Euphrates River east of Ramadi with engineers from Colonel Patton’s 44th Engineer Battalion, 2nd Infantry Division. After a productive day of clearing caches, the boats turned west to return to Camp Blue Diamond.

During their patrol, the enemy set up a large ambush to attack the soldiers and Marines during their return to their base. They were only seven or eight kilometers from Blue Diamond when the insurgents attacked with RPGs and heavy machine guns. One of the RPGs whizzed across the water and hit the side of Staff Sergeant Iversen’s boat.²⁴ The round pierced the hull and severed the port fuel line, killing the port engine. The starboard engine took a round in its block, making it sputter and cough. Iversen’s boat slowed to a crawl. Now that they were sitting ducks in the hot zone, Iversen’s crew lit up both sides of the river, allowing the other boats to safely navigate through the ambush.

Four soldiers had been hit. One of them, Private First Class Andrew M. Ward, was bleeding heavily from a shot in the neck and was in urgent need of surgical attention. Iversen called for help, so Vasey pulled his boat alongside and Doc Rubio jumped over to attend to the wounded. Rubio had two of the soldiers bandaged before he learned of the critically wounded Ward lying in the bow of the boat. He rushed to the injured private’s side and found him still alert. Soldiers and Marines moved Ward to the stern of the boat and Rubio went to work. He knew that if he didn’t stop the bleeding this young soldier would die. The corpsman sliced into Ward’s neck, located the damaged artery, and clamped off the bleeding with an IV hose clamp.²⁵

Just as he finished, Iversen said, “Doc, we need to move the people off to another boat.” Parrello, driving Vasey’s boat, had remained alongside.

“What?” Replied Rubio. This was not the time to be moving this soldier.

Rubio didn’t know that Iversen’s engines were nearly dead and that they were still in the kill zone. He had been so focused on treating the severely wounded soldier that he hadn’t noticed the bullets whizzing over his head.

But if Rubio had learned anything in his years with the Marines, it was that when you are told to do something, you don’t ask why—you just do it. So the corpsman rallied the soldiers around him to lift Ward. Rubio straddled the two boats, one foot in each one, while bullets zipped past him.

“Oh my God, I cannot believe I’m doing this,” he thought.

The soldiers passed Ward to Rubio and Rubio passed Ward to an Army medic in Vasey’s boat. As they were moving to Vasey’s boat, the Army medic slipped and dropped Ward on the deck, where he started bleeding again. Rubio went back to work to re-secure the clamp.

“Are you good, Doc?” Vasey asked.

“Roger, I’m good.”

Parrello gunned his engines. The stern sank, the water jets kicked up large white plumes, and the boat surged forward at fifty knots.

Three ambulances were waiting when they arrived at the boat ramp a few minutes later. Soldiers and Marines rushed to offload Ward on a stretcher. When they hit the water, one of the soldiers panicked and let go of his corner. The always-attentive Rubio jumped into neck-deep water, grabbed the untended corner, shoved it above his head, and helped get Ward to shore. They rushed him into one of the waiting ambulances where a First Class²⁶ Corpsman blurted, “What are you doing? He’s going to die!”

Anger swept through Rubio’s body. He got in the guy’s face and heatedly spat, “He’s alert and he knows where he’s at. Get his ass to the Battalion Aid Station.” Ward was rushed to a helicopter, which whisked him to surgery.

That night, Lieutenant Thomas came to Rubio, sat down, and told him that Ward had made it back to the hospital and into the operating room, but died while the surgeons were trying to repair his artery.

The next morning, Juan Rubio went to the Battalion Aid Station to confront the First Class Corpsman. “How can I trust my casualties to someone who has already given up?” he asked, though he was not expecting an answer. “I don’t want to see you on my medevac team ever again.”

With that, Rubio turned and walked out.