The Return of the Marines Trilogy Page 3

  Over the following years, Gunny Mac served at the embassies in Tokyo, Phnom Penh, Buenos Aries, Quito, Vienna, and Helsinki. He served tours at Camp David and the White House. Now, he was assigned as the detachment commander in New Delhi. And his detachment was on the skyline with the planned arrival of the 48th President of the United States, the former Senator Michael Eduardo: the man who had gutted the Corps.

  Chapter 3

  Late Tuesday Morning, US Embassy, New Delhi

  Gunny Mac left the briefing room where Diplomatic Security Agent Thomas had given a last-minute briefing to the embassy Regional Security Officer and the Agent-in-Charge of the U.S. Secret Service detail. Now they wanted the cordon backed up to the main entrance to the embassy. The Secret Service had wanted to eliminate it altogether, but Major Defilice, the Army assistant attaché, had stepped in and mentioned that after all their preparation, it would hardly seem fair to deprive the young Marines of their chance to see the president. Agent Thomas relented and agreed, but only if the Marines were back off the courtyard (read—where they would not show up on photos of the president’s arrival.)

  Gunny Mac was pissed on principle. However, he did not envy Agent Thomas his job. Part of the State Department advance team, he was to get the president from the airport through the streets to the embassy in a nation where the US had been becoming increasingly unpopular. The Secret Service had wanted the president to helo onto the embassy’s roof, but this was President Eduardo’s second trip abroad, and he wanted to be seen. So this resulted in super headaches for the DSS, the Secret Service, and the RSO.

  Gunny passed Post One on his way to the courtyard. Sergeant Patricia McAllister (“Little Mac” to the detachment upon the arrival of Gunny Mac) nodded. Private First Class Jesus Rodriguez was standing beside her, nervously adjusting his blues. Other than the Standard Operating Procedures doubling of the posts for a VIP visit of this magnitude, PFC Rodriguez’s main mission was to open the hatch for the president and his entourage after Sergeant McAllister buzzed it open. From the look of him, this was akin to lining up on the 40 yard line to kick the winning field goal with 4 seconds left on the clock. He looked terrified.

  Little Mac winked at the gunny. For a second, he had the perverse fear that Sergeant McAllister would take the advice of the other Marines who’d told her yesterday that she should ask the president for his ID, and if he didn’t have it, refuse him entry. That would be something to see, but Gunny rather doubted that neither he nor Little Mac would be around much longer after that. Little Mac had a streak of the ornery. An Arizona honest-to-goodness cowgirl, she had no fear. So if anyone would do it, she would.

  Gunny started to turn back to her. She winked again. With a sigh, he turned back around and walked out. He knew in his heart she was digging at him.

  Walking out into the bright afternoon sunshine, Gunny had to admit that the new embassy really looked good. The front courtyard was paved in granite brought in from New Hampshire. Entering by vehicle or by foot through the front gate, the huge circular courtyard drew the eyes to the vast embassy itself. In reality, the embassy was nothing more than a squat, square building. However, the architect, in what Gunny felt to be a spasm of creativity, added awnings, mirrors and abutments so that the whole building looked like it was almost ethereal. There was a helicopter pad on the top of the building, but that fact would not be evident to the casual observer. Windows in the outer offices were also mirrored, and it was hard to tell where the windows actually were, where the windows began and the embassy walls ended.

  Gunny glanced to the left. The consular building, on the other hand, looked like it belonged in another era. Over the fishpond at the edge of the courtyard, and over a lawn, it rose with columns like a Southern plantation house. Gunny wondered which government agency gave the OKs for the two buildings. It had to have been two different agencies, because no single source could possibly have approved both. They just clashed too much. Separate from the consulate, adjacent the embassy walls and near the street, was a communications tower, disguised poorly to look like a bell tower, or a campanile, as the embassy guide termed it. Oh, there was a bell in the belfry, but it wasn’t fooling anyone. Under the bell, there was a platform which gave technicians access to the equipment in the tower’s cupola, and there were several rooms below the cupola with more equipment in them. The Marines of the detachment liked to go up there and sit. This was probably not allowed, but since the view and breeze were nice, it fell under the don’t ask for permission rule. And until someone said anything different, the Marines would continue to use it.

  Post 2 was in the consular building. Staff Sergeant Harwood and Sergeant Chen were at the post right then. Harwood was the SOG and should actually be at the embassy checking Post 1, but Gunny Mac knew he was probably trying to stay away from the procession. In days gone by, he would be leading a react force, but the DSS and USSS now took over that function. Gunny would have to speak to him later about hiding out at Post 2. He didn’t have time now.

  One of the Secret Service agents went up to Crocker and Ashley, asking to see their weapons. Crocker rolled his eyes, but handed his M18 over. The agent checked to see that there were no magazines in the weapons, then checked the chamber. As the agent stepped away, Crocker held up four fingers and mouthed to Gunny Mac that this was the fourth time he had been checked. Gunny smiled back. He also had been checked three times so far, and although he had no round in the chamber, his three magazines were full. Regulations, he told both the Secret Service and the DSS. They chose not to make an issue of it.

  Gunny Mac went up to the cordon and had them move back almost to the embassy’s front entrance, under the awning. Two on one side of the walkway, two on the other. He checked out Princess. Her marksmanship badge was straight now. Someone had fixed it. Standing further back was cooler, at least. The overhead covering which provided protection from the elements kept the sun off of them. Staff Sergeant Child and the two honor guards were stuck standing out in the full brunt of the late morning sun’s heat.

  He walked down the red carpet that had been laid an hour ago, and approached Child. “Everything OK?”

  “Sure Gunny. We’re ready.”

  Staff Sergeant Child didn’t even look like he was sweating, unlike Crocker who had a dark patch forming between his shoulder blades.

  Gunny looked out at the street through the Embassy’s main gates. There were a couple hundred protesters milling about out there, listless without someone upon whom to focus their attention. Lance Corporal Shareetha Wynn was manning the front gate with a DSS agent. Although in reality the purview of the Indian security employees, Captain Leon-Guerro had suggested a Marine be at the gate when the president arrived, and since the detachment was on a temporary port/starboard watch, there was the manpower to do it. Lance Corporal Wynn had just reported for duty two weeks earlier, so she got the job with the easiest requirements—come to attention when the president drove through, salute, and go back to parade rest. Of course, coming from Camp David, this was old news to her, thought Gunny Mac.

  Looking back at the protesters, Gunny remarked, “Well, I guess he isn’t getting a popular reception.”

  “No, I guess he wouldn’t,” responded Child. “His campaigning on bringing jobs back to the US and his stance on the Kashmir issue sure wouldn’t have won him any friends here.”

  Gunny looked up at Child. He really didn’t know much about that issue. Oh sure, he was briefed about the decades-long problem in the Kashmir, but jobs? What was that all about? Child continually surprised him.

  The shoulder mic of the Secret Service agent standing at the head of the red carpet came to life. “Grizzly turning onto Sadar Patel Marg. ETA 5 minutes.”

  Chapter 4

  Late Tuesday Morning, US Embassy, New Delhi

  “Grizzly turning onto Sadar Patel Marg. ETA 5 minutes.”

  Staff Sergeant Child looked at Gunny Mac. The Gunny obviously had not understood his comment about the president’s popularity in In
dia, or lack thereof. Gunny was a good Marine, a good guy. But for someone who had been a reporter, he really did not seem to follow the news or world events much.

  Staff Sergeant Child straightened up. “Well, here we go.”

  “I guess I had better get out of the way. You’ve got it.” Gunny turned and walked back up the red carpet and into the embassy.

  “Crocker, Ashley, let’s form up.” It felt a little strange standing there without the Marine Colors to his left.

  Staff Sergeant Child had been in more than a few Color Guards in his career. And, God willing, he would serve in many more. So standing there with only the National Colors and flanked by two riflemen felt disjointed. But he could adjust. He always did.

  Joseph Child came from Detroit, from an area where, if pressed, he would admit was “perhaps not the best.” That was an understatement. He lived with his mother and father in a small tenement, where electricity was seemingly out off more often than it was on. He walked to school past the corners, amongst pushers and hoodlums, past gangbangers and hookers. Yet even then, there was something about him that made him special. People knew he was going somewhere, he was going to be somebody, and they left him alone.

  His teachers knew it, too, and they felt validation for long hard hours in trying conditions when they saw Joseph (never “Joe,” always “Joseph”) soak in the knowledge. By high school, he knew more about certain subjects than his teachers. They knew he was destined for college where he would shine.

  So it took them all by surprise when he enlisted into the Corps. How could he waste such an opportunity to become a mere soldier? That was OK for other kids who needed to escape the ghetto, kids with no other choices. But not for Joseph.

  But Joseph was more than a child of the classroom. He was more complex than that.

  Joseph’s father, Will Child, had served in the Navy as a young man. He hadn’t seen combat, but he had participated in a humanitarian relief effort in Bangladesh. When his tour was up, he got out and returned to Detroit where he was never able to land a good, steady job. He regretted leaving the Navy, and he let young Joseph know that. He also instilled in Joseph a love of the country. Even though Will never seemed to get the break he wanted, he never blamed anyone else for that. He insisted that the US was the land of opportunity, and it deserved the love and support of all of its citizens.

  Joseph was a bright kid with a quest for answers, but he also loved to compete. A natural athlete, he ruled the b-ball courts for his age group, and he was able to play with the older guys. He found an old skateboard, and he loved to play tricks on it. The school had long dropped its wrestling program, but Joseph found a dojo where he learned taekwondo. It seemed whatever he wanted to try, he succeeded.

  Truth be told, Joseph liked to fight. There was something so basic, so primeval about being able to vanquish your opponents. When he was 9 years old, walking home from school one day, a stoned fiend was mugging strange Old Lady Williams who refused to let her purse go. This was in broad daylight, but no one moved to stop it. Something came over Joseph, and he dropped his books and charged. The suddenness of his attack, his fury, (and the fact that the mugger was stoned, most likely) overcame his youth and undeveloped body, and he beat the mugger into unconsciousness. He then dragged the body up the steps of the crack house nearby and dropped him on the stoop, a warning to others.

  The neighborhood gangbangers thought it was funny and called him Little Big Man. He became sort of a mascot, so the dope fiends left him alone for attacking one of their own. Later, as his body matured and he picked up taekwondo, he didn’t need anyone else. He could take care of himself.

  In the back of his mind, Joseph also had the beginnings of an interest to serve in government. He knew he would have to go to school for that. But serving in the Marines certainly would not hurt should he want to go into politics. And it would give him a chance to see more of the world. But most of all, it was a challenge he could not pass up. So he enlisted.

  During boot camp at Parris Island, Recruit Child shone. It seemed he could do no wrong. Well, almost no wrong. Initially, he worried about himself, and his performance became a competition against the other recruits. During week 3, after a junk-on-the-bunk one evening where he excelled and his bunkmate failed miserably, Sergeant Parton, one of his junior DIs, took him aside for some “extra instruction.” Five hours later, after some “patient explanations” and arms which could barely move any longer, Recruit Child realized that the Corps was a team. Individuals can shine, but they shine more when the team shines. A renewed Recruit Child became the driving force in the series. It was a foregone conclusion that he would be the series honor grad.

  Then the dismemberment became a reality. The series was in flux. What was going to happen? Graduation was both joyous and somber—joyous for making it through, somber because only one recruit would stay with the Marines, Private First Class Child. And for the graduation parade, Will Child, leaving Detroit for the first time in years, wiped away the tears as PFC Child led the entire company in the pass-in-review.

  Going to Quantico, PFC Child was given odd jobs until the incoming Marines arrived for re-training at the Security Guard School. And despite being in class with Marines up to E-7, he was once again the honor grad. Marines looked at Child and knew he was going places.

  PFC Child’s first duty station was the White House where he served an uneventful tour. It was at his next duty station at the Embassy in Lima where Child became part of Marine Corps history.

  One aspect of the dismemberment was that Marines on Embassy Duty would not carry firearms. Carrying firearms was deemed too “militaristic,” and an insult to the security forces of the host country. Colonel Byrd, the new Marine Commandant, resigned over this in protest. But the Marines were disarmed. “Every Marine is a rifleman” became hard to defend anymore.

  Then on April 26, 2022, in a coordinated attack, mobs overran the embassies at Lima and Caracas. The local “security forces” either disappeared or joined the mob. Without weapons, the Marines were overwhelmed. In Caracas all the Marines were killed along with the ambassador and all but three of the American staff. A large amount of classified material also disappeared into the hands of the mob.

  At Lima, the mob hesitated for a few moments as the ambassador, Hank Stellars (a political appointee who had contributed heavily to the then president’s election) confronted them and asked for their grievances. This gave the Marines time to destroy the classified materials. Coming back out, the Marines arrived just as the mob surged. The Marines, aided by some members of the staff, charged the mob and dragged back the ambassador who had been knocked to the ground and injured. In a running retreat, Lance Corporal Child and others brought the ambassador back to the crypto room. Down to Child, another Marine, the RSO, and a Navy ensign on temporary duty to the Naval Attaché, the three stood over the ambassador and beat members of the mob who tried to enter the door with pieces of broken furniture. By the time the Peruvian Army arrived to drive the mob back, only Child and the ambassador were alive.

  Lance Corporal Child was meritoriously promoted to Corporal and was awarded the Silver Star for his actions. And the regulations were changed. Marines would be armed again. The doors to all the Army’s armories were opened, and the new Marine Commandant could take what he wanted to arm his detachments.

  Corporal Child could have left the Corps then. He was a minor celebrity with his 15 minutes of fame, and he could have gotten into any university, or possibly even skipped school to enter right into politics, if he really wanted. But he liked the Corps. He liked being around others like him. He had found a home.

  He was observant, too. He was aware that others thought he could make Sergeant Major. Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps. It still had a nice ring to it.

  Several years later, Staff Sergeant Child stood in the courtyard of the embassy in New Delhi waiting for the president to arrive. He was well-trained, and he was thoroughly capable. Nobody could throw anything at him that
he couldn’t handle.

  Special Agent Freely, whose shoulder mic had just announced the president’s imminent arrival, turned to Child and needlessly announced, “The president will be here shortly.” Freely had been part of the advance team, and Child had formed a rapport with him. It was Freely who had told him that while the president’s code name was “Grizzly,” some members of the secret service had pushed for “Enchilada,” as in “The Grand Enchilada.” Given that the president was the first Hispanic to hold the office, cooler heads prevailed. Still, some agents privately referred to him as “TGE.” Child thought it was rather funny in a lame sort of way.

  Staff Sergeant Child gave Crocker and Ashley one more look. Crocker was sweating heavily now, but there was nothing to do about that. He took his place at the edge of the red carpet, flanked by the other two. He could see the new Marine, LCpl Wynn come to a more formal position of parade rest. Evidently the DSS service agent standing next to her had given her the heads up.

  Over his left shoulder, he could see some of the higher ranking embassy officials and their spouses milling in loose order against the front of the building to the right of the main entrance. Most of the staff and guests from the diplomatic community were already over at the consulate for the reception, but these select few would be there to bask in the twenty seconds it took the president to walk from the vehicle down the red carpet to and into the embassy.

  There began to be some motion outside the gate. The Indian police were moving the crowd further back off the road. Sensing something was about to happen, the crowd started chanting “Down with Eduardo, down with USA.” They pronounced the president’s name as “e-dar-do,” instead of “ed-war-do.” They seemed to lack the fervor he experienced before the attack in Lima, so Child was not too concerned. Demonstrations against Americans were common happenings.