Chapter 14
King Rat, aka SSG Juan D Rodriguez, my first platoon sergeant was a large swarthy Puerto Rican, very loud spoken, and as I learned, prone to many different moods. He was your best buddy one moment, and the devil incarnate the next. He ruled over the 2nd platoon for almost the entire time I was in B 2/9 Cav, until the day his vices caught up with him. For some things he did, we loved him, but for others, we hated him. He was what my father would call, a character.
One thing that caused me to dislike him was later to be the start of his demise, he played favorites, he had his pet soldiers who could do no wrong, and no one dared complain without fear of reprisal. To mess with one of his cronies was to invite extra duty. One of his most favored was a private from New York named Ross, who had grown up in the same area of New York City as the Rat, and thus had Homeboy status. Ross was an obnoxious little bastard, and reveled in his status as King Rat’s pet. He taunted and provoked anyone he could, and with the full knowledge that he was protected.
We suffered through Ross’s antics, his taunts and threats, occasionally someone would challenge him, or on occasion punch him out, but the wrath of King Rat that followed kept those incidents at a minimum. He strutted around like a bantam rooster in the hen yard, bowing up and crowing about how tough he was. In the field however, it was a different story, he’d grown up on the streets of New York and had zero experience with being in the woods, and a great fear of the dark. This coupled with a very superstitious character worked to our advantage, and we sought our revenge on him on every field problem we went on. The field was about the only place that Ross lost his protection.
There is no such thing a spare room on a tank, each crewman has his assigned duties, and space and every other space on the tank is dedicated to equipment or ammunition. Ross being a cavalry scout, was assigned to one of the personnel carriers, and thus spent the majority of his time in the field away from Rodriguez. At first, the Rat had tried to assign him to the platoon leader’s vehicle with me, but after one brief day, the lieutenant had sent him packing, so he ended up on the M113 in the second section, which was under the control of the platoon leader, the platoon sergeant controlling the first section. Ross was isolated from his protector, and revenge was always in the making. That we would suffer upon our return to garrison there was no doubt, but that was in the future.
On one of the first field exercises Ross attended, we were doing a recon ahead of the Troop and our route went through several swampy areas, all of which had to be cleared of any obstacles, attackers, but most importantly, had to be tested to see if the tanks could make it through them. Areas that a 113 might go, a tank with its extreme weight, would sink, so we were often required to dismount and inspect on foot. This entails great difficulty as you are walking through mud, brambles, vines and anything else that a swamp can toss at you. Close encounters with thorns, snakes, hornets nest and the occasional alligator were to be expected, no one in their right mind wanted to do it, but that’s life in the Cav. Drivers were not exempt from this, because none of us wanted to sink our vehicle, much less a tank, so we frequently dismounted ourselves.
The first time Ross was told to dismount; he climbed out of the hatch and moved forward on the deck of the vehicle to peer over the side. “Oh Fuck That, I not going in that shit.” He announced, and jumped back down into the vehicle. There was a moment of stunned silence from Sgt Meehan, and then the fireworks began. “THE FUCK DID YOU SAY PRIVATE?” “I said I not going into that shit sarge.”
From my hatch on the lieutenants’ vehicle I watched the exchange; this was going to be interesting. Meehan was known for his temper, which would explode like a mortar round, striking anything and anyone in its path. His face was getting redder by the minute, and he looked around with an incredulous look on his face.
“Is my hearing going or something?” he asked, “I could have sworn I just heard Ross refuse a direct order.”
“Ya heard right sarge, I am not going in that shit, that’s final” replied Ross. He leaned back against the hatch cover and lit a smoke. “You know as well as me that SSG Rodriguez won’t make me go either.” The lieutenant, who’d been looking over his map during this exchange, looked up suddenly and spoke.
“Sgt. Meehan, is there a problem here?”
Meehan climbed out of his hatch and stretched, then as he moved towards the rear hatch of the vehicle said over his shoulder to the lieutenant, “No problems here sir.”
As he spoke he grabbed Ross by his shoulder and his equipment belt and with a quick turn he tossed him off the front of the vehicle. There was a yell of surprise, quickly followed by crashing and thumping as Ross flew off into the brush, ending up on his back among the thorns and a large ant bed. He scrambled to his feet brushing ants off his arms and started towards the vehicle, his face twisted with either anger or fear, it was hard to tell. Meehan stood at the front of the vehicle with his hands on his hips, as Ross reached the front of the vehicle and reached out to climb, Meehan kicked him in the helmet, knocking him back down.
“Driver, move out.” He said to the private in the drivers hatch, “run over anything in the way.” He climbed back into his hatch and picked up his map, Ross seeing that the choices were either move forward or be run over, began to move out of the way. He found several wet spots, at least two wasps nest, and many thorns before the obstacle was cleared and he was allowed to mount back up. He was almost in tears by the time he got back onto the truck, but no one seemed inclined to care.
I wondered why the lieutenant didn’t get involved, but later that evening, he explained. “A smart officer, he said, knows when to get involved, and when to let a NCO handle things Duke.” My respect for Lt. Newbill increased tenfold that day. Had he gotten involved, it would have required disciplining both Ross and Meehan, but by his inaction, he allowed the situation to handle itself. If only more officers were like that, perhaps the Army would run a lot smoother.
During another field problem, I drew the short straw and ended up on an observation post with Ross and another private. We were sent out dismounted at the edge of a swamp and had to march about a mile to our assigned position. Night was falling, and as the shadows lengthened, Ross got closer and closer to us, until he was almost walking on our heels. At every new noise, he would startle and ask, “What the fuck was that?” “A bird, or a frog” would be the answer, and we moved on.
We got into our position, settled into a foxhole left by someone on some other field maneuver. We set up our machine gun, drew our range card, checked in with the platoon, and settled down for the night. I was the senior private, having been promoted to PFC earlier in the month, so I assigned a watch rotation, and we prepared to spend the night. Ross of course had bitched about his watch, threatened to have King Rat deal with us when we returned, but as we paid no attention to him, he soon quieted down. Night settled, and darkness rolled in on us, and it was dark, a moonless night, and soon we couldn’t see much further than our noses. Even with night vision goggles, it was hard to see, visibility was about 100 feet.
The other private, who himself was from Alabama, sat quietly smoking, hiding the glow of his cigarette in his hand. He had been quiet the entire march out, saying nothing that wasn’t necessary. I leaned back against the side of the foxhole, looking up at the stars and occasionally swatting a mosquito that found his way past the insect repellant I’d bathed in. Ross sat close by us, talking to himself under his breath, no doubt plotting some revenge.
Suddenly, the loud call of a Whip-poor-will rang out in the woods behind us. It was so loud and so unexpected that we all jumped. Realizing what it was, I settled back, but Ross was unnerved. “What the fuck was that?” he asked in a panicked whisper, “I never heard anything like that.” Before I could even form a reply, our other member of our small team spoke up.
“Whippoorwill Dumbass, shut the hell up afore it gets you.”
I said nothing, content to sit back and see where this was going. I had never really spent much time talking with the other guy, he was quiet and kept mostly to himself, so I was totally unaware his ability to spin a tale. He quickly proved to be a master at the art of bullshit, and he played Ross like a finely tuned instrument.
“Iffen you was from the South, ‘stead of being a Yankee, you’d know, now shut the hell up afore it comes after us.” He lit up another smoke, then said “Hell, you don’t hear Duke running his mouth, he from the South too, he knows.”
“The hell is he talking about Duke?” Ross asked, his voice had a nervous tone.
“Ask him yourself, and keep it down” was all I said. This might be interesting.
“The Whippoorwill is a haint, some folks think it’s a bird, but it ain’t. It’s the spirit of somebody what done been killed, and it can’t get to leave this earth less it catches somebody’s soul to take its place. Dat’s why you got to be quiet, lessen it gets you.”
“Bullshit” Ross said, “you rebel fucks are just trying to scare me.”
“Keep talking then Yankee boy, you’ll see. Mo you talk, the easier it is for it to find you. Mark my words, it’ll keep getting closer.”
We sat quietly for a few minutes, the woods around us were alive with the sound of insects and the occasional frog, for its rarely quiet in the woods, only when man is around do the animals get still. In the distance, I could hear a raccoon squall, a fox barked, nearer the rustle of small animals moving about. Ross sat still and quiet for a while, then, spoke.
“I knew you were full of crap, there isn’t…”
At that moment the whippoorwill sounded again, loudly and sounding even closer than before.
“Damn, I told you Yankee, now he getting closer, hope he alone.”
By this time Ross was nearly sitting in our laps, “Shut the fuck up, shut the fuck up, you guys are fucking with me right?”
“If another one come we in trouble” said our partner, “they work in pairs most times.”
As if on cue, in the distance another whippoorwill called, and the one near us replied even louder than before. Ross began crossing himself and repeating Hail Mary’s like a auctioneer, he dropped down into the bottom of the foxhole, ignoring the mud and water there, his voice almost like a sob.
“Shut the hell up Ross, you gonna have all them on us, Shut the hell up.” I looked across at our storyteller who was grinning so broadly I could see the shine of his teeth in the darkness. He leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Reckon that’ll keep him quiet.”
We spent the rest of the night quietly, with only the occasional rustle of Ross crossing himself each time a whippoorwill sounded. My partner would occasionally toss something into the woods and nudge Ross with his boot, “What was that?” he’d ask Ross, “You hear something?”
There were other incidents of the same sort, on one dismounted patrol, someone forgot to let Ross know they were moving out again after a short break, and he became separated from the patrol and spent the night alone in the woods. When he was found the next morning, he was covered with scratches where he’d tried to climb a tree to avoid the vicious “polecats” he’d been warned of. To say we tried to make life miserable for Ross in the field was an understatement.
Back in garrison, he reverted to his usual self, but by the time we’d been in the field a week, he was a nervous wreck, with dark circles under his eyes from lack of sleep. We enjoyed the field, but he and the Rat made us pay in spades upon our return. While the majority of us spent hours in the motorpool, washing tracked vehicles, cleaning gear, and repairing damages from the woods, Ross would draw duty as the first sergeants runner, or assisting the unit armorer in taking in weapons, or other such duties. We’d be muddy and nasty, while Ross walked around in a clean uniform, happily rubbing it in our faces.
It was getting close to being unbearable, until the day Ross and King Rat went into business together.
There is always a shortage of money amongst the lower enlisted, especially those who lived in the barracks and were prone to partying hard and often. The pay for a private soldier at the time was around $535 a month, with those married getting a bit more for quarters allowance and rations, still it isn’t much money. This creates a market for the unscrupulous who take advantage of the less fortunate. Into this market came Ross, with the full backing of his mentor, to be truthful, it was King Rat who funded the operation, with Ross fronting it. He began to make small loans to people in the company, loaning ten dollars with the pay back being twenty, twenty for forty, etc. And as anyone with any sense at all can see, it doesn’t take long for this to add up, and for those who were struggling anyway, to get deeper and deeper into a hole they can’t get out of.
Ross never worried about collecting as anyone who didn’t fork over would immediately be dealt with by King Rat, which never failed to produce results. The operation spread through the Cav barracks and spilled out into the surrounding units which was the downfall. Ross had made a larger loan to one of the men in the neighboring Air Defense Artillery battalion, to the tune of two hundred for four hundred, and was having difficulty collecting when the deadline came. He reported this problem to the Rat, who decided to have a little chat with the offender. The offender made it clear that while he was willing to return the initial loan and a fifty dollar loan fee, had no intention of coughing up another hundred and fifty. The Rat refused the counter offer, and instead made threats to take the matter up with his platoon sergeant or higher if needed, hoping to intimidate the man into paying up. It backfired on him as the man in question called his bluff. At that point the Rat and Ross decided to formulate another plan.
Unknown to them, the soldier had already reported the details of the loan and the threats made by King Rat to his platoon sergeant, who had in turn reported it to his first sergeant. The first sergeant had gone to both our first sergeant and the sergeant major, who started his own investigation. Finding out the extent of Ross’ and Rat’s operations, and a few borrowers who’d been roughed up a bit in the collection process, they turned it all over to the Criminal Investigation Division on post. A few days later, Ross went AWOL and the Rat appeared in the orderly room in handcuffs and ankle chains. The mighty had fallen. The final fate of Ross was unknown to me, he was still at large when I rotated out to Germany, but the Rat had been reduced in rank and remanded to custody.
The platoon rejoiced, and life improved, except in the field where it became a bit boring.
NOTE: A few days ago, by accident I learned that the Officer mentioned her, 1Lt Lee Newbill, a fine officer and a damn good man, was killed in the line of duty as a police officer in Moscow Idaho. He was shot and killed on 19 May 2007, by a deranged idiot who was shooting up the court house. Officer Newbill had just went off duty but responded anyway and in the process lost his life. A tragic waste of a damn good man. Lt Newbill, Rest in Peace, you were a damn good man.
