COMPOUND 57. SULAIMAN MOUNTAINS. SOUTHERN AFGHANISTAN.
This time it was different.
Captain John Wright had set up his rifle company in three defensive fighting positions shaped like semicircles a thousand yards from the front of the compound.
Wearing USNV PVS-7 night vision goggles attached to his helmet—as was his entire rifle company—Wright huddled next to newly promoted Gunnery Sergeant Eugene Gaudet, behind an array of large stone formations, with a clear line of sight on the Taliban force exiting the gate and spreading evenly across the clearing.
Just a little closer, he thought, finger on the trigger of his UMP45 as dozens of figures loomed above the bend in the trail, dark silhouettes wearing loose clothing and headdresses, holding AK-47s.
As he prepared to give the order to fire, the same deafening sound of an M2 Browning that he’d heard yesterday, during their retreat, reverberated across the hillside. The insurgents, who appeared momentarily confused, dove for cover as their left flank fell to a volley of .50-caliber machine gun fire.
Bastards think we stepped on their mines, he thought, before saying, “Light ’em up, boys.”
The entire hillside came alive as the muzzle flashes of three rifle platoons, or almost 130 United States Marines, stabbed the sparse forest, cutting down the enemy.
Wright picked his targets carefully, lining them up one at a time, even the handful that turned around and started running back to the compound when they realized their mistake. And in the middle of what was quickly turning out to be a turkey shoot, he spotted four figures off to his far right, firing their way into the compound.