Friendly Fire (43 page)

“Colonel Schwarzkopf said, ‘Do you mean that artillery incident?'

“I said, ‘Yes, that artillery incident.'

“‘Mr. Mullen,' he said, ‘I can tell you about that artillery incident.'

“I said, ‘Colonel, I know more about that artillery incident than you think I do. I've been looking for you for a year and a half. I consider you the man who killed my son. I am going to take you to federal court.'”

Gene paused to take a sip of coffee, then continued.

“The colonel said, ‘I wish you would take me to federal court. It would prove me innocent. I would like to talk to you.'

“‘Colonel,' I said, ‘I would like to talk to you, too, but how can I?'

“‘Is your time pressing?' he asked. ‘Why don't you come out to the hospital to visit me? I want to talk to you.' He repeated approximately four times, ‘I want to talk to you.' So we made an appointment to see him at about five o'clock at his wish—very much his wish,” Gene added. “And that's when we telephoned you. We took a cab out to Walter Reed and found Ward One very easily. There were six other patients in the ward, all officers. As I stood in the doorway and looked into the room, I noticed an officer in uniform sitting on the left side of Colonel Schwarzkopf's bed and on the right side, an empty chair. I walked in, and I said, ‘Lieutenant Colonel Schwarzkopf?'

“He said, ‘Yes.'

“I had expected a tall, thin man with the appearance of a West Point officer,” Gene said, “but I was amazed at what I saw. I saw a round-faced, blond, overgrown, boyish-looking man of about thirty-five years of age. He had a cast on, a full body cast. He was not in pain. But he was in discomfort. All during our conversation he was very restless due to the cast.

“I said, ‘I'm Mr. Mullen.'

“He said, ‘I am pleased to meet you.'

“I did not shake his hand.

“Schwarzkopf acknowledged me and my wife, and then he introduced us to this Major Knap. Now he never told us who this Major Knap was or what his business was there. But from the way he had positioned his chair at the opposite side of the bed, it was obvious it had been prearranged.”

“Gene,” I interrupted, “could you tell Knap's branch of the service?”

“I don't know,” Gene said. “Frankly, I wasn't interested. He was Army, that's all I know.” He looked over at Peg, but she didn't know either. “Anyway, we were introduced, and I said, ‘Colonel, I would like to talk to you.'

“‘I would like to talk to you, too,' the colonel said. ‘We could go to a private room if you like. I can be moved.'

“‘No, that isn't necessary.' I said. I went over to the wall and brought another chair for Peg, and we sat down. I was approximately a foot and a half from Schwarzkopf's face at all times, so I could hear and see his expression as we talked. Peg's and my chair were on the right side of the bed. This Major Knap was on the left in a position to view both Colonel Schwarzkopf and ourselves and to hear us. We sat down and I said. ‘Now, Colonel, you can tell your story of what happened.'”

Gene wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “He proceeded to tell us that on the night Michael was killed he, Schwarzkopf, was not with Charlie Company; he was instead on Hill Four Ten, the same hill as the supporting artillery. He told us, ‘When the incident happened, I was notified by Captain Tom Cameron, Charlie Company's commander. I immediately ran down to the artillery unit and told them to stop firing, to lock their guns. I wanted those guns locked because this was the second incident that had happened to my battalion in thirty days! The first time it happened, the colonel in charge of the artillery unit said it was a once-in-a-lifetime fluke and—'”

“That was the Bravo Company incident,” Peg interrupted. It was the first time she had spoken since Gene had started telling their story. Gene looked at Peg as if waiting for her to say something more, but when she remained silent, he continued.

“We don't know how many were wounded then, but the boys told us to ask Schwarzkopf about the time thirty-two men in Bravo Company got hurt.… Anyway, after Schwarzkopf ordered the guns locked, he said, he went to Michael's hill the next morning. I said. ‘Yes, about ten minutes to eight.'

“Schwarzkopf turned and looked at me. He said, ‘I went down with another officer—'

“I interrupted him again,” Gene said. “‘Colonel,' I said, ‘there were four of you. You and three other officers were at the scene at that time.'

“He looked me in the eye and said, ‘Yes, Mr. Mullen, you are correct. There were three other officers, but,' Schwarzkopf said, ‘I want you to know I was not part of the investigating committee.'

“I said, ‘No, we know that,'” Gene continued. “‘They came out at approximately twelve o'clock noon in a big Sloop helicopter, and they consisted of the artillery, plus some liaison officers between the infantry and the artillery, plus the investigating artillery team from ‘Eye' Corps artillery.'

“And Schwarzkopf said, ‘Yes, you are correct.'

“I then said, ‘The rumors tell us, sir, that three things could have happened: the men were drinking, or the guns were off target, or the wrong coordinates were called in. Now,' I said, ‘what did you find when you got there?' And, Peg, you tell—”

“Well, he replied that the guns were perfect,” Peg said. “They had told Schwarzkopf after the Bravo Company incident that they blamed it on the gun. That is why he demanded the guns be locked. He told us, ‘I could have killed Colonel Kuprin when he stepped off that helicopter because this was the second incident his artillery outfit had perpetrated on my battalion.' Kuprin was the artillery commander,” Peg explained. “And, see, the boys told us it was the same gun that had done it before and the gun had not been repaired. Schwarzkopf, however, insisted the guns were okay. So I said, ‘Colonel, I'm just going to ask you one thing:
Were the men drinking?
' And he looked me right in the eye and said, ‘Yes, Mrs. Mullen, the men had been drinking. Were drinking beer.'”

“See?” Gene said.

I asked Peg if the colonel had stated or implied that the men were drunk.

“No, only that they had been drinking beer. He seemed to want me to know that. I was kind of surprised he said yes because I don't think they should have been drinking. And then,” Peg said, looking down at her notes, “Colonel Schwarzkopf told us, ‘I think you should talk to Colonel Valentin Kuprin. He was the artillery battalion commander. He's in the Washington area and assigned to the Pentagon.' So that night, when we went back to the motel we called Kuprin. I told him who I was and said, ‘Your name was given us by Lieutenant Colonel Schwarzkopf, and I would like you to identify the artillery officer who was reprimanded.'”

Kuprin did not remember the young lieutenant's name. According to Peg, the former artillery battalion commander said, “The gunnery officer neglected to take into account the height of the trees. He failed to use his judgment and he was reprimanded. The procedure was corrected the next day.” Kuprin also told the Mullens that he did not believe Lieutenant Rocamora, the forward observer, had called in the artillery. Rocamora's radio operator had been on duty at the time; Rocamora was asleep.

“Okay,” Peg said, referring again to her notes, “I then asked Kuprin about the rumors that the artillery officers had been drinking beer. He denied it. I told him that's what Colonel Schwarzkopf had said. Kuprin said, ‘I'll take care of Norman.' I told him Schwarzkopf had said it was about time corrections were made because he ‘had had it.' And Kuprin asked, ‘Do you think the artillery just runs around with pistols shooting at people?' He said, ‘Artillery isn't one hundred percent accurate. When we shoot four hundred rounds a night, we're going to kill a few people we shouldn't.' Kuprin said he had offered to remove Rocamora from Charlie Company after this incident, but Rocamora elected to stay with his assignment. He liked Charlie Company, and they liked him. And, well, my feeling is that if Rocamora
had
called in that artillery and
hadn't
alerted the boys, he wouldn't have been allowed to stay there. For his sake. That's why the boys were so upset: they didn't have a chance! When I told Kuprin Webb's comment about thinking it was an attack and sweeping people into their foxholes, Kuprin said, ‘Well, if you call a six-inch sleeping trench a foxhole, then it's no wonder they died!'”

“Peg,” I said, “the boys wrote they had dug foxholes, didn't they?”

“Everybody dug a foxhole that night,” she said. “A foxhole and a sleeping position. But they were in their sleeping positions when the shell hit.”

“Can I use one of your pieces of paper?” Gene asked. He started to draw as he spoke: “Now, there was a group here, one, two, three, four, with a guard. And then there was Michael … Polk … Hamilton … another one here and a guard. The First Platoon was here, Second Platoon in the middle, the Third Platoon was over here. Webb and Culpepper were Third Platoon … Culpepper had just got off guard at two o'clock and he was changing positions with Schumacher. Schumacher was saying, ‘The artillery's coming in closer,' and then, all of a sudden he says to Culpepper, ‘My God, they're walking them right in on us! They're trying to kill us!'” Gene drew an asterisk with little lines radiating out from its center. “Right here was a high knoll. There was a tree here. This is Hill Seventy-six
*
—known as ‘Seventy-six' because in the court-martial of Private Polk that's how it's referred to. And Hill Four Ten was back over here.” Gene drew a series of elevation lines on the other side of his drawing. “The shell came right over this way”—Gene's finger followed the arc from the top of Hill 410 to the asterisk he had drawn before “—hit the tree here and”—Gene gestured as if flicking water from his fingers—“came down. It killed Michael, Leroy Hamilton and wounded six or seven others.”

Gene and Peg both fell silent. I suggested we break for lunch.

If during our morning session Gene had spoken in the short, chopped phrases of a witness giving testimony, after lunch he assumed the more expansive role of a hard-charging prosecuting attorney. In turn, the conciliatory and beleaguered “Schwarzkopf,” a man who had seemingly agreed with and confirmed everything Gene Mullen had said, became, in the afternoon version, a pathetic and defensive invalid crushed by the overwhelming evidence the Mullens had accumulated against him.

“I said, ‘Colonel, what did you accomplish during your second tour in Vietnam? Did you do any good?'

“‘I don't know,' he said. ‘What I did was try to save boys' lives by enacting discipline, by teaching them to wear their helmets, their flak jackets, by teaching them to protect themselves …'

“And I said, ‘Of the one-hundred-twenty men you lost in your battalion in ninety days, or in Bravo Company from which you lost thirty-two men because of your own stupidity of marching them through a minefield—'

“‘Did you know I was wounded?' he asked and I said, ‘Yes, Colonel, and I know
how
you were wounded. A young man who served under you told me all about it. Did you know you were suckered down out of your helicopter into that minefield by an officer?'

“‘What officer?' he said.

“I said, ‘I do not want to repeat this man's name. But when you got out of your helicopter, you walked approximately fifteen feet and tripped a mine, and that was how you were wounded. You were directed onto that mine and you know that!'” Gene paused for a moment and picked up one of my pens. He tapped its base against the yellow pad as though he were tamping down a cigarette. “He looked at me. I can see Schwarzkopf lying there in that bed. The expression in his eyes was that of a man thinking back on what had happened to him. ‘No,' he said. ‘I didn't know that.'” Gene let the pen drop. “He didn't believe me. I could tell.” He leaned back in his chair. “I feel that Lieutenant Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf lying in the hospital, looking back on his career in Vietnam, has suddenly had a change of attitude about the military. Two things have given me this opinion. First,” Gene said, holding up one finger, “his straightforward words telling us what had happened because we could either correct him—we had the information, the
signed information
. And second,” Gene said, holding up a second finger, “his wanting to get the blame off himself. When he named Kuprin, he went against the book. No officer ever places the blame on another officer unless it's the truth under oath, or the man is truthful unto himself because he knows what has happened.… The more I think about Schwarzkopf,” Gene said, “the more I think he went back that second time to Vietnam to get his rank. His colonelcy. But now he knows he's over the hill with that back injury. He sees the handwriting on the wall and realizes he will never get any higher, that he's accomplished nothing.”