The Fragging

By

David Beakey

We were in the bush, on a two or three day operation. We were running daytime patrols, then moving on, setting up a platoon-sized perimeter at dusk, and then, of course, moving the whole perimeter several hundred yards when it became dark. We did this, since we knew we were being watched at all times. This night we set up around an abandoned village. Most of the huts had been destroyed and there wasn’t much left to the village, just holes and mounds of dirt which we improvised for defensive purposes. Of course the grunts were on the actual perimeter. The Lieutenant, Sergeant Groton, the radioman and the corpsman set up the command post (CP) in our center. They were inside of the only structure remaining, a hooch made out of some type of clay or cement. It had four walls and an opening that was formerly a door. It had no roof.

We settled in for the evening, one grunt from each fire team standing (really laying down, facing out, watching and listening for activity) watch. After three hours, he would wake up another of their fire team members for his turn. At about 0100 I heard a grenade explode, close enough so that I thought that we were being attacked. Within two minutes, another grenade exploded. I heard men running and my throat went dry, my chest went ice cold, as I thought we were being overrun. Then it was quiet. We were all up, rifles in our hands, trying to figure everything out. Then there was a commotion from the CP. I was a squad leader at the time. I went to the CP. I could smell the smoke from the grenades. There were several other marines standing around, so it started to become clear to me that we hadn’t been attacked.

Inside the CP, three men had been slightly wounded; the radioman, the corpsman and Sergeant Groton. I realized that someone had fragged them. I knew at once who that target was: Sergeant Groton. He was a by-the-book marine. This was his second tour. A lot of the men didn’t like him because he was not tolerant of certain things. He disapproved of those of us who smoked pot, even though we never did it in the bush, only at firebases, when we were technically “off duty.” He was a “John Wayne” type who never goofed around, was always in battle-mode and didn’t like complainers. I really wasn’t fond of him, but secretly respected him.

None of the men were badly wounded. They had small shrapnel wounds. Surprisingly enough, after about an hour, we all went back to our positions and those not on watch went to sleep. I don’t know exactly what was decided later at the CP that night, but in the morning, we ate breakfast and moved out. Nothing officially was ever said. Of course there were rumors about who did it, but there was no proof.

About a month later, we were out on patrol and Sergeant Groton was wounded by enemy fire. He had a leg wound. We were on our way back to a base camp when it happened. We were about 1000-2000 yards from the base camp. Two marines started to carry Sergeant Groton to the base camp. He wouldn’t hear of it. He insisted on hobbling in under his own power. Some of the men mumbled that he was showing off, others whispered that they were glad he got hit. Several of us were quiet and said nothing. I remember thinking somehow, he knew something that I didn’t know, that somehow he wasn’t so bad after all.

I sometimes hear 55 year old marines talking about fragging, and how that is “just part of war.” I’m not so sure about that. I think if you hate a man enough to kill him, that there are other ways to do it.