Greitens Eric - Charlie Mike: a true story of war and finding the way home

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First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition October 2015

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Interior design by Lewelin Polanco

Jacket design by Jackie Seow

Jacket photograph by Getty Images

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Klein, Joe, date.

Charlie Mike : a true story of heroes who brought their mission home / Joe Klein.First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition.

Pages cm

1. Mission Continues (Organization) 2. Disabled veteransServices forUnited States. 3. VolunteersTraining ofUnited States. 4. Greitens, Eric, date. Wood, Jake, date. United StatesArmed ForcesBiography. 7. VeteransUnited StatesBiography. 8. PhilanthropistsUnited StatesBiography. 9. Iraq War, 20032011VeteransUnited States. 10. Afghan War, 2001VeteransUnited States. I. Title.

UB363.K66 2015

363.34'5763209270973dc23

2015011026

ISBN 978-1-4516-7730-0

ISBN 978-1-4516-7732-4 (ebook)

FOR

ADAM WALINSKY

LESLIE H. GELB

AND IN MEMORY OF

RICHARD C. HOLBROOKE

Beloved Mentors All

Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.

JOHN F. KENNEDY

Its hard to live a life of high moral purpose if everyone around you thinks youre acting like a chump.

ADAM WALINSKY

The events that follow really happened. In most cases, I have used multiple sources to get as close as possible to the truth. I did make one concession: the names of a few of the characters in the story have been changed, in some instances because they continue to work downrange as special operators.

In the U.S. Military, Charlie Mike is shorthand for Continue the Mission.

Hey? Jake Wood? Its McNulty.

Nick Nolte? Jake knew full well that the voice on the other end of the line was neither old nor gravelly enough to be the actor, but goofing on people was Jakes method of interpersonal exploration.

McNulty.

Stop fucking with me, Jake said. Youre not Nick Nolte.

No, asshole. Mc-Nul-ty. William McNulty. Remember we talked six months ago about doing that Somali pirate thing?

Vaguely. Barely. Yeah, Jake said. What can I do for you?

I saw your Facebook post about Haiti, McNulty said. Im in.

It was January 13, 2010. A day earlier, Jake Wood had been sitting in his apartment in Burbank, glued to the news about the devastation in Haitithe collapsed buildings, wounded civilians, the chaos in the streets. There were reports of looting and banditry. It looked a lot like a war zone. He had been there before, in Iraq and Afghanistan. He realized that he missed it.

Jake had been honorably discharged from the Marines in October 2009. His plan was to make the transition to full-fledged adulthood. He was applying to business schools for an MBA. It had felt premature immediately after graduating from the University of WisconsinJake in a suit? Jake in an office? And it didnt feel particularly wonderful now, especially after a way-too-quick rejection from Stanford Business School had detonated in his mailbox.

Maybe I can do something in Haiti. I want to help, Jake said to his girlfriend, Indra Petersons, a meteorologist for KABC-TV in Los Angeles. They had just started living together, after dating for a year.

He knew that Indra was, at that moment, watching him think. It was amazing how clearly she saw through him, through everybody. They had met at a pickup football game, Thanksgiving of 2008. She was beautiful, Latvianbut the unexpected part was the complete absence of coy. Oh, sure, she had said when hed told her that one of the schools he was applying to was Northwestern. You can go get your MBA at Northwestern. Thats a great place to go. But Im not following you to Chicago. And Im not counting on you coming back.

Jake figured Indra would go along with his Haiti excursionshe was a storm-chaser herself, after all. But he was very much on probation. The bottom line was that he was going to have to prove to her that he was serious, that he was ready to begin the rest of his life after a four-year adrenaline fiesta in the Marines. He felt a visceral pull toward Haiti. It would be for only a week or so. It was a onetime deal.

Well see, Indra thought. Jake was, as she was, a frightening combination of brains and looks. He was six foot six, rippedhe had lost all his extraneous football weightwith soft brown eyes. But mostly he was very perceptive, in a no-nonsense way. He could think along with her; they could see the world the same.

Jake was taking some brush-up economics courses at the local community college, which werent exactly setting his brain on fire. The MBA was something he would definitely do... eventually. But right now, he couldnt take his eyes off the tube. They were saying that no relief was getting into Haiti because of the general chaos and the fear of armed street gangsbut how dangerous could Port-au-Prince be? Would the gangs be an organized threat, real soldiers, like the Taliban? He doubted it. And if they were terrorizing the populace, all the more reason for a Marine to go in and protect the civilians. The airport was closed on account of anarchy, apparently. That was a problem. If you wanted to help, how did you get in there?

He called the Red Cross and talked to a nice lady. He told her that he was a Marine Sergeant with two combat deployments, a college graduate, and that he had experience in disaster relief after Hurricane Katrina.

Are you a Red Cross volunteer? she asked.

Thats why Im calling. To volunteer.

Were not taking spontaneous volunteers, she said. You have to be trained. Its dangerous down there.

Im a... Marine, he said, carefully editing the f-bomb. I can do danger. Dont you need people who can, like, protect the medical personnel?