Aaron Kirk - The Hill: A Memoir of War in Helmand Province

The Hill
A Memoir of War in Helmand Province
by Aaron Kirk

Copyright Aaron Kirk, 2020
eBook Edition

Published in the United States of America in 2021
by The Second Mission Foundation.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, by photocopy, recording, or any other method, without the prior permission of the author and the publisher.

Disclaimer: This book is creative nonfiction based on Aaron Kirksexperiences as a combat Marine. It does not represent an official position of the United States Marine Corps or the United States Government. The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.

Edited by Linda Seme
Cover art by Eliyana Beitler
Cover design by David Provolo
ISBN (hardcover): 978173200926
ISBN: (paperback): 9781736200902
ISBN: (epub): 9781736200919
Library of Congress Control Number: 2021906256

The Second Mission Foundation
Charles Faint, Executive Director
1001 Bishop Street
Honolulu, HI 96813
www.secondmissionfoundation.org

This book is dedicated to R.D., and to the lower enlisted, who shoulder the heaviest burdens in all of Americas wars.

This is a work of creative nonfiction. It reflects my interpretation of events that occurred when I was a Marine infantryman a decade ago.

In the interest of privacy I have changed names and details. At times I have combined several people into one person or eliminated people altogether. Some events were relayed to me. Dialogue is re-created from a faulty and ever-worsening memory. I write to the best of my recollection and cannot promise anything more.

This is a highly personal account of my experience during four years in the Marine Corps. A story about wild unwasted youth. About a windswept hill in a desolate field deep in southern Helmand province. About disappointment, adolescence, misery, courage, failure, and redemption. About ordinary menboys, some of usin extraordinary circumstances.

This is a story about grunts.

Garmsir District, Helmand Province, Afghanistan

2011

I am scraping furrows in the ground, searching for a bomb. The device in my hands is called a sickle. Some call it a Holley stick, after the Gunny who invented it. Its a six-foot-long piece of bamboo with a dull iron hook on the end. An opium farmer sold us the hook. We found the bamboo by the river. We used duct tape and nails to attach the sickle part to the bamboo part. We used a rock to grind the edge off the sickle blade. Now the sickle pulls up wires but doesnt cut them.

You dont want to cut the wires.

I draw two-foot by two-foot Xs. I make sure the Xs intersect. I pull from far to near, left to right, then right to left. I make sure not to drop the sickle blade too heavily in the soft dirt. I move forward slowly. I step only where the Xs cross.

Clear, I say to the guy behind me.

I backtrack through the cleared path. He takes my place. He carries a metal detector, and as he starts off in an uncleared direction, he swings the metal detectors head back and forth, back and forth, rhythmically, stepping with each swing. His eyes scan not just the ground in front of him but also the path ahead, which is not a path at all but open field.

We dont walk paths.

His pace is measured but not slow. He misses very little.

I remain stationary as his team leader, my number two, walks up and grabs the Holley stick from me. Wordlessly, routinely, he takes his place five yards behind the sweeper. He guides the sweeper. He nudges him this way and that, grunting rather than speaking. Another Marine passes, a medium machine gun on his shoulder, belts of ammunition across his chest. Tribal tattoos. He carries the Animal Mother vibe. Full Metal Jacket. Except, unlike Vietnam, he also carries thirty pounds of ceramic body armor and Oakley sunglasses.

Ten yards later a wiry, hairy man with a backpack trudges by. I hear the hum of the electronic Thor device hes carrying. The hum means its working. The fact that we havent been blown up with a radio-controlled bomb also means its working. His neck is bright red, burned by the devices signal-blocking radiation. Hell get cancer someday, were all sure of it, but at least we know the Thor is working. I also know its working because it blocked my radio check with the Hill a few minutes ago, before we cleared the goat-trail intersection. We dont walk trails, but sometimes we clear the intersections. Usually the sickle-man does it. Sometimes I do it so he doesnt have to. Sometimes the Thor isnt working.

Ten yards after the Thor-man I fall in line. Number five. Four men in front of me, three behind. Sometimes more behind me, but never more in front, unless Im clearing or walking up to investigate something. Five is the best place to control. Six is my interpreter, Jack, walking a little too close, but I let it go. Seven carries the big radio that can reach our platoon back at Patrol Base Durzay. Eight is an Afghan National Army soldier in green camouflage.

I pull my knees up a bit more as my boots sink into the mud. I step on furrows. I ruin the work of whoever plowed the field.

The movement would have tired me a thousand fields and a hundred patrols ago, but now it is routine. My head moves side to side, noting walled compounds in the distance, rows of planted trees between every three or four fields, a motorcycle driving along a dirt road.

I turn and walk backwards for a moment. Though I am burdened by body armor and kit I move with agility, like a jungle cat, choosing my steps carefully. I shrug my shoulders against the weight of my plate carrier. Check my radios, black and green. Rifle, safety on. Night vision monocle in its pouch. Casio on my left wrist, Garmin GPS on my right. Map and notebook in the slim kangaroo pocket for easy access.

There are four men in front of me.

I am a walking casevac nineline.

Any moment now.

I am a bundle of nerve endings.

I wont hear it. One step, two step, one step, two step.

I expect explosions.

We do not walk where others walk. We do not walk trails. We do not walk paths. And yet with every step I expect blinding flames and deafening noise. I brace for ringing ears. I think about the instant I will be blown up. I am certain it will happen. I fear the earth erupting, and I know it is inevitable. In some ways, I long for it. Every second of every patrol, I wait for the ground to move. It doesnt matter how many bombs we find safely. Theres always another one.

Four men, four chances to step on something before I do.

Our ranger-file formation stops. Nobody speaks. We take a knee and alternate facing left and right as the sickle-man pulls at something up ahead. I check my map. Were two hundred meters from the third village of the day. I need to speak with the village elder before we can return to the Hill. I like him. Hes not as bad as the one I met an hour ago.