Written by Tom Davis – My last tour in the Army with Special Forces was as the Inspector General for the United States Special Operations Command (USASOC) at Ft. Bragg, NC. My job called me to conduct investigations that involved higher ranking officers or high profiles incidents. There was one interesting investigation I did that took me from Fort Bragg to Stuttgart, Germany, and on into Bosnia.

Tangney, my old friend and boss, now a three-star general and the USASOC Commander, sent me to investigate the discharge of a 9mm pistol carried by a Special Forces (SF) Medic. He had shot a Navy SEAL in their Teamhouse. Go figure.

At the time, Special Forces had teams scattered across Bosnia, serving as eyes and ears for the Combined Command which fell under NATO. The SF Teams were augmented with two to three SEALs each. They actually lived in the villages in rented houses and mingled regularly with the people there as well as the mayors and other village officials. Each Teamhouse had an armory along with a communications center. The Teams provided valuable and timely information to the Joint Special Operations Task Force, who would then pass it on to the Combined Command’s Headquarters.

When the word first flowed up the chain of command about the shooting, they thought the men involved were horsing around playing “quick draw” and the SF guy shot the SEAL. If true, this would prove embarrassing to say the least. The command sent me to find out what had really happened and report my findings to the commander of Special Operations Command Europe or SOCEUR, BG Jeff Lambert. Jeff and I had commanded battalions at the same time but in different Groups. I had an in-briefing with Jeff in Stuttgart, got my in country ID made, then caught a C-130 out of Ramstein Air Force Base to Sarajevo, where the Combined Command and the Joint Special Operations Task Force (JSOTF) were located. From there I’d visit the Team at their Teamhouse and interview the SF Medic who shot the SEAL. I’d also interview the SEAL currently in a US medical facility in country.

When I arrived in Sarajevo, I checked into the Holiday Inn. The once grand building now sat scarred by small arms fire and shrapnel. I rode a creaking, shaking, and halting elevator up to my room on the fifth floor. After I stepped off the elevator, I decided I’d take the stairs from then on. The room, small and devoid of color, had no pictures on the wall or curtains on the window. Only a small bed, desk, and night stand with a bedside light filled the room. It did have a bathroom, though. I’d stayed in a lot worse.

I first interviewed the SEAL. He was typical of the SEALs I’d known. Happy-go-lucky in a professional way. He told the story of the two of them dry firing at people on the Teamhouse’s TV, when the SF Medic, thinking his 9mm unloaded, had an accidental discharge (AD). The result put a hole in the SEAL’s shoulder. He laughed as he described the look on his buddy’s face when the pistol went off. Oh, those SEALs.

I would be in Bosnia for a couple of weeks during which time I visited several of the Teamhouses throughout the country, including the one where the AD had occurred.

On one day, we drove north through mountains shrouded in fog and snow to Bugojna, a small village sitting about 100 kilometers northwest of the once great and majestic city of Sarajevo.

Snow blanketed the ground as our two-vehicle convoy eased out of Sarajevo. As we rolled through the countryside, I flashed back to scenes from a former tour with the 10th Special Forces Group in Bad Tolz, Germany. Had it not been for the festering wounds of war, I’d have thought we were cruising through Bavaria’s rugged Alps and quaint villages.

The carnage created by the warring factions robbed the Bosnians of more than just their homes and land. Rarely did anyone we passed standing beside the road smile at us. The Bosnians seemed totally neutral to NATO’s presence there. A sad quiet veiled their faces, reflecting the years of senseless conflict that had ravaged this once proud and pristine country.

We drove along treacherous icy roads in our armed convoy. The lead Land Rover, driven by the most experienced driver – on this day a Navy SEAL – would pass a car then radio back over a hand-held brick radio when it was safe for the trail vehicle to pass. This system worked well. Even so, we rarely exceeded 20 KPH (12 miles per hour) for most of the five-hour, one-way trip. While driving through the mountains, I’d look to my right and down hundreds of feet into the valley below. I remembered the NATO soldiers who died when their automobile slid off the road and down the mountain about this same time of year.

All along the narrow two-lane road snaking through the mountains we saw evidence of ethnic cleansing – houses totally destroyed, not just pockmarked by gun fire. In the cleansing process, the opposing sides would place large mines inside each corner of a home and tie them in with detonation cord. When they set off the explosives, the charges effectively blew out the four corners, causing the house to cave in on itself. We would see rows and rows of houses destroyed, then rows and rows of untouched homes. Who invaded whom (Muslim or Serb) determined which houses were left untouched and which were destroyed.

Even amidst this senseless destruction, I saw children pulling sleds, throwing snowballs, and chasing each other through the snow. The resilience of these youths amazed me.

I had also heard this country had some of the most beautiful scenery in Europe. I saw evidence of this as we slowly made our way through the mountains. Ice-choked waterfalls tumbled down steep cliffs. Crystal waters raced over stream beds dotted with rock islands. Evergreens wrapped in snow produced a blanket of green and white covering the valley floor. Shear granite-grey rock walls stood imposingly in the distance, a challenge to any mechanized force that might oppose them.

As we climbed higher and higher into the mountains, we discovered a snow plow had pushed aside the snow and piled it high on the shoulders, further narrowing the passage. Passing trucks barreled by, edging ever closer to our Land Rovers. Often, forty-passenger Mercedes buses blew by inches to our left. The SEAL driving handled it as though we were taking a leisurely Sunday drive. I, on the other hand, held my breath, waiting to hear the sound of metal grinding followed by the eventual tumble, end over end, down into a ravine.

Each day during our travels, we saw wrecked vehicles lying beside the road, wheels up, like giant road-killed armadillos. The driver and passengers would invariably be standing around with their hands shoved in their pockets, shoulders hunched against the driving wind and snow, wondering what to do.

As we passed through the various towns, I saw laundry hanging above the balconies. How could anyone expect it to dry in the snow and rain and sleet and fog? Another curiosity was the number of people walking beside the road, day and night. I don’t mean just in the cities but along mountain roads, weaving through miles and miles of rural nothing. Where did these people dressed in their dark clothes and wearing their sad faces come from? Where were they going?

Bosnia was a country with great contrasts. Why it had done these unspeakable things to itself is buried in centuries of distrust and hatred spewed out over the years by one ethnic group toward the other, all done in the name of religion. It is truly one of the most tragic things I have seen in my travels, even rivaling the sad plight of the Northern Iraqi Kurds. This carnage stood as a true testimony to the ignorance of mankind. However, before one turns up his nose in disgust, let’s remember what happened in America between 1861 and 1865.

At the time, I thought what grand potential Bosnia would have if only the people could live together in some semblance of harmony. Only time would tell.

When I interviewed the SF medic who had the AD, he parroted a story similar enough to the SEAL’s to be believable. I could see he was still very upset with what had happened. I wrote up the incident as an accidental discharge, which, while serious, not something I could let ruin the guy’s career. I believe he went on to later attend Physician’s Assistant school.

Before I returned to Stuttgart to out-brief the SOCEUR Commander, I dropped back by to check on the SEAL.

“So, how you doing?” I walked in and took a seat beside his bed.

“Great, sir. But they’re sending me back Stateside.” His face reflected his disappointment.

“That’s okay. You’ll be back with the SEAL Team. Plenty of crap to get into there. Just checking to see if you needed anything.”

He waved me off. “So what’s going on with the investigation?”

I told him what I could and he didn’t have to worry about his buddy being in any big trouble. We talked a while longer, then I stood up to go. Curious, I said, “So. What have you learned as a result of all this?”

The SEAL perked up, smiled, then said, “Sir, you know I’ve got me a 9mm back home for personal protection. As soon as I get back there, I’m selling it and getting me a 45. This little 9 didn’t even knock me down. I gotta have me something with more fire power.”

What can you do?

_______________________________________________

From the author’s memoir, The Most Fun I Ever Had With My Clothes On: A March from Private to Colonel. www.oldmp.com/davismemoirs

Tom Davis’ publishing credits include: Poets Forum; The Carolina Runner; Triathlon Today; Georgia Athlete; The Fayetteville Observer’s Saturday Extra, A Loving Voice Vol. I and II, Special Warfare; and twice in Winston-Salem Writers’ POETRY IN PLAIN SIGHT program. He’s authored the following books: The Life and Times of Rip Jackson; The Most Fun I Ever Had With My Clothes On; The Patrol Order; and, The R-complex. He has publishing rights to over 50 eBooks found at  www.oldmp.com/e-book. Tom lives in Webster, NC.