Dillard Johnson - Carnivore: A Memoir by One of the Deadliest American Soldiers of All Time

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C ARNIVORE . Copyright 2013 by Dillard Johnson and James Tarr. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

ISBN 978-0-06-228841-7

EPUB Edition July 2013 ISBN 9780062288400

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THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO

My loving wife, Amy, for the support, understanding, and sacrifices she has made.

My children, Daniel, Janise, Jaycob, and Max, for understanding when I was gone and for the sacrifices they had to make because I wasnt home.

The Big Three group, David Fortier, and James Tarr for pushing me to write this book.

The best Commanders anyone could ask for, Captains McCoy, Bair, and Burgoyne.

First Sergeant Roy Grigges, SFC Jason Christner, and Lieutenant Garrett McAdams for their leadership and support.

CSM Tony Broadhead for his never-ending support, and for always saving my ass when I bit off more than I could chew. Without Tony Broadhead there would be no Crazy J or CarnivoreBradley or book.

The crew of the Carnivore: Soprano, Sperry, Sully, and Patten, for putting up with all my crap and being the finest fighting crew in history.

My wingmen: Geary, Carter, Wallace, Williams, Miller, Sowby, and Kennedy, and to the Crazy Horse troopers of 3rd Squadron, 7th Cavalry, past and present, the finest fighting force ever trained.

And finally, the lost warriors of 3rd Squadron, 7th Cavalry: SFC Parson, SSG Mitchell, and SPC Williams.

Dillard (CJ) Johnson

February 2013

E merging from the Commanders hatch of my Bradley Fighting Vehicle, the Carnivore, I stared out through my goggles and saw hell. A monstrous sandstorm swirled around us, and in the haze the flames from the dozens of destroyed vehicles that had charged our position cast a devilish glow on the terrain. Their steel carcasses stretched over a mile across the plain before us, but right then I could only view the few that had made it to within shouting distance of our little canal bridge: tanks, cars, trucks, a bomb-laden bus that had tried to ram us, and the tanker truck that had been burning for two days.

The sandstorm seemed as if it had been going on forever, like wed been inside a vortex of dust the entire war, and it was only getting worse. Visibility was down to ten feet. The thick sand made the dancing flames even more orange, and the whole area was bathed in eerie light. The glow from the flames was enough to screw up our thermal and night sights, but not sufficiently bright for us to actually see what we needed to, namely the Iraqis we knew were out there. Luckily, that meant they couldnt find us, either; so in between troop trucks charging our position on the canal bridge we only had to contend with random, inaccurate AK fire.

Crazy Horse Troop, 3/7 Cav, had seen so much action in the first two days of the war that the Commander had decided to give us a break. Hed put us in the rear of the column on the march north, guarding the 100 or so thin-skinned vehicles that made up our headquarters and medical and support elements. Those 100 vehicles were stretched out three-quarters of a mile behind me all the way to the bridge wed crossed over the Euphrates River and made one hell of a tempting target. Especially since we were no longer advancing and had been told to hold both bridges. I was at one end of the convoy in the Carnivore and Sergeant John Williams was at the other, guarding the bridge over the Euphrates in his Bradley, the Casanova.

Stay alert, I told Sperry, my driver, but I was talking as much to myself as I was to him. How long had we all been awake? Four days of near-constant combat, most of two days crossing the desert before that, and three days in Kuwait to start it off, when theyd been afraid of the troop getting hit by rockets, so wed been on the move almost nonstop. How many days was that in a row? With only snatches of sleep here and there. I couldnt count the days. I could barely think. The concussion didnt help. The pain from all the mortar shrapnel in my arms and shoulders and the bullet in my leg wasnt keeping me alert anymore. Everything was just a dull ache.

Lieutenant McAdams was behind us on the road in his Bradley. Sergeant Wallace was to our right in his Bradley, off the side of the road by the canal where he could get a different angle on any oncoming vehicles. The sandstorm roared and hissed, and the engines of the Bradleys were loud anyway, so we couldnt hear any vehicles approaching. I watched and waited.

A truckload of Iraqis rolled up right on usto the far side of the canal bridge, 40 damn feet awaybefore we even spotted them. And they had their fucking headlights on! Wallace got on his gun quicker than we did and killed everybody in the truck with a short burst from his machine gun.

Im getting down! I called to my crew.

Visibility was bad enough without headlights shining in our faces, so I jumped down to turn off the lights of the truck. My knees were so stiff from standing in the hatch, I could barely walk. When I reached the ground and started limping toward the truck, I looked over and saw an Iraqi soldier on foot just 10 feet away from me with an RPG launcher on his shoulder. Before I could react, he fired at the Carnivore. The rocket hit the drivers hatch, flipped up in the air, and exploded over the bridge.

I drew and fired my Beretta, hitting him in the arm and chest, then the pistol jammed. AGAIN. That pistol was trying to kill me. There was an AK-47 on the seat of the truck, and I dove for it. As I went down, I was spattered with gore as the mans head exploded all over me.

Over my shoulder I saw Soprano, my gunner, less than two feet away, holding an AK of his own. He grinned, held it out, and said, Here you go. It shoots a little high. Smartass.

Soprano had gotten off the Bradley to back me up and had moved to my right to avoid the lights of the truck. He had one of the more than 100 AK-47s wed picked up the day before that we hadnt gotten around to dumping in the canal. Wed been too busy keeping one another alive, which meant wed done an extraordinary amount of killing.