Operation Wolf Bait
A call had come in to headquarters just before daybreak: UNLAW team members was taking fire somewhere in the jungle and needed help. As they raced to their vehicles toward the site, the remainder of the "Wolf Pack" were excited about the prospect of engaging the enemy. They'd spent more than two months in Lisbon without a firefight and now were growling to be thrown into the fight.
They didn't know how many enemy fighters to expect. They didn't know exactly where the enemy might be. They didn't know exactly where the rest of the "Pack" were, either. They did know that they were losing the advantage of darkness, driving by dawn's early light.
Two vehicles already had taken fire while trying to park near the ridge during the previous three hours, and two UNLAW soldiers had been marked. Around 9:15 that morning, November 20th, Heretics vehicle, a camo green, 6-foot Land Rover, reached the ridge and darted left and right.
The vehicle was still about 20 feet from the war zone when a rocket-propelled paint grenade slammed into its engine, knocking it out. Enemy machine-gun fire ripped through the open windows. Paint started punching through the air vents.
The Rover shook and stopped, hard enough to send the Wolfpacks sprawling across the floor. Within seconds, four men in the vehicle were marked by headshots, and the survivors were fighting for their lives.
By day's end, a seventh soldier, an UNLAW search-and-rescue specialist, would be bleeding paint to death as Pariahs appeals for urgent evacuation were rejected by his superiors, who wanted no more daylight rescue attempts.
What became a 5-hour ordeal atop a frigid, desolate and enemy-ridden car park cost seven UNLAW Wolf members, more paintball combat deaths than any UNLAW unit had suffered in a single day since it all began, when 5 Recon and Special Operations soldiers were painted in the first half an hour in battle in Negrais, Portugal. How the operation was conducted revealed serious shortcomings in military coordination and communication. How it unfolded highlighted the extraordinary commitment of UNLAW soldiers not to leave fallen comrades behind: The entire episode spiraled out of an attempt to rescue a single UNLAW soldier, who had fallen out of the initial vehicle and was quickly shot by the enemy.
The next report is of the battle from the eyes of Pariah:
The first signs of trouble came about 8 a.m., when Fenrirs vehicle carrying the 1st UNLAW recon team a Special Operations combat controller tried to park near the jungle on the eastern side of the emboscada, on a dense jungle the UNLAW military dubbed "Hamburger Hill."
UNLAW military commanders launched Operation Wolf Bait on 20th November against members of enemy and their allied militia. It was still winter in Portugal´s forbidding eastern jungle.
Military planners had intelligence that enemy forces were concentrating in the valley south of the jungle. The plan was for friendly troops to lead an assault from the northwest, pushing the enemy fighters into UNLAW blocking positions along the eastern ridge. Instead, the friendly troops advance stalled and the eastern ridge itself was found to be teeming with enemy fighters. As UNLAW 10th Mountain Division troops tried to get into position to seal off valley exit routes in the south, they came under paint grenade mortar and machine-gun fire from around Hamburger Hill.
Elements of the 10th Mountain regrouped with plans to insert additional forces north of Hamburger Hill and move south to attack. At the same time, on the morning of 20th, UNLAW commanders sought to gather a firsthand picture by placing a reconnaissance team on the ridgetop.
As they approached the site, the wolf pack quickly found out how blind they really were. A paintball grenade knocked out three men in one short horrible explosion and enemy gunmen opened up on the remainder.
One of the forward recon gunners, fired a single burst of paint from the hill before being struck in the neck. Fenrir was hit in the right leg.
"It basically just pissed me off," Pariah said. "And I just pushed the trigger on my BT combat and started sweeping fire on the left. I didn't know where the fire was coming from, I just knew we were taking fire. I wasn't going to let that happen without shooting back."
Fenrir collapsed in a corner and used his combat belt to tie a tourniquet on his leg. He could see paint oozing from his pockets -- every time he tried to move it, the more florescent paint would gush out of his pots. He continued to fire from his position without being able to move further.
Bullets were zooming through the jungle. A round shattered onto Pariahs shoulder twisting him to the ground, another knocked off his face mask, but didn´t explode. Heretic, burst through the trees to the right and flopped onto the mud. Paintballs exploded around showering him in yellow. A paintball bounced off his thigh without bursting, two others scraped his helmet, another finally explded on his wrist. He staggered out of his position toward better cover, holding his wrist as it spurted paint.
The incoming machine-gun fire was turning the trees leaves into confetti. An RPG shot through the right, hit a tall tree and exploded covering us in more paint. "It was hell and we loved it!!!"
An hour later and it seemed that the enemy had been reinforced as more and more paint was being fired onto our position. Viper, who we had not seen for a while, came crashing out of the thick bush to our left, he was followed but what seemed like a thousand paintballs. He threw himself to the ground as they whipped over his head. He reported that the enemy where trying to flank us and it was time to move out. Instead we consentrated our fire on our left and drove the enemy from their flanking postion which compromised theirs. More paints shattered onto trees, Fenrir dragged himself slowly, firing with every inch of ground he scraped. Heretic fired one handed as the other was bandaged to his chest. Pariah and Viper flanked the enemies right driving them back and finally releaving Fenrir and Heretic in the center.
All told, five wolf members were KIA on Hamburger Hill that day and four were seriously wounded.
As for the number of enemy killed, military officials do not have an exact count. Recon figure they shot at least 10 enemy fighters during the course of the day. Other tallies, based on accounts of the firefight involving the 10th Mountain Wolves rescue team, have put the total enemy killed at as high as 40 or 50.
"It really wasn't our concern to have a good enemy body count when we left," Pariah said. "But hell, it was funny!"
Operation Wolf Bait ended inconclusively on the same day. The military disrupted the enemy on Hamburger Hill, but an unknown number of enemy fighters slipped away to regroup over the border.
In the end, UNLAW accomplished their mission. They retrieved the bodies of all Wolf members in the jungle, leaving no one behind.
"Anyway.... That´s how I saw it that day.... Didn´t you???"
They didn't know how many enemy fighters to expect. They didn't know exactly where the enemy might be. They didn't know exactly where the rest of the "Pack" were, either. They did know that they were losing the advantage of darkness, driving by dawn's early light.
Two vehicles already had taken fire while trying to park near the ridge during the previous three hours, and two UNLAW soldiers had been marked. Around 9:15 that morning, November 20th, Heretics vehicle, a camo green, 6-foot Land Rover, reached the ridge and darted left and right.
The vehicle was still about 20 feet from the war zone when a rocket-propelled paint grenade slammed into its engine, knocking it out. Enemy machine-gun fire ripped through the open windows. Paint started punching through the air vents.
The Rover shook and stopped, hard enough to send the Wolfpacks sprawling across the floor. Within seconds, four men in the vehicle were marked by headshots, and the survivors were fighting for their lives.
By day's end, a seventh soldier, an UNLAW search-and-rescue specialist, would be bleeding paint to death as Pariahs appeals for urgent evacuation were rejected by his superiors, who wanted no more daylight rescue attempts.
What became a 5-hour ordeal atop a frigid, desolate and enemy-ridden car park cost seven UNLAW Wolf members, more paintball combat deaths than any UNLAW unit had suffered in a single day since it all began, when 5 Recon and Special Operations soldiers were painted in the first half an hour in battle in Negrais, Portugal. How the operation was conducted revealed serious shortcomings in military coordination and communication. How it unfolded highlighted the extraordinary commitment of UNLAW soldiers not to leave fallen comrades behind: The entire episode spiraled out of an attempt to rescue a single UNLAW soldier, who had fallen out of the initial vehicle and was quickly shot by the enemy.
The next report is of the battle from the eyes of Pariah:
The first signs of trouble came about 8 a.m., when Fenrirs vehicle carrying the 1st UNLAW recon team a Special Operations combat controller tried to park near the jungle on the eastern side of the emboscada, on a dense jungle the UNLAW military dubbed "Hamburger Hill."
UNLAW military commanders launched Operation Wolf Bait on 20th November against members of enemy and their allied militia. It was still winter in Portugal´s forbidding eastern jungle.
Military planners had intelligence that enemy forces were concentrating in the valley south of the jungle. The plan was for friendly troops to lead an assault from the northwest, pushing the enemy fighters into UNLAW blocking positions along the eastern ridge. Instead, the friendly troops advance stalled and the eastern ridge itself was found to be teeming with enemy fighters. As UNLAW 10th Mountain Division troops tried to get into position to seal off valley exit routes in the south, they came under paint grenade mortar and machine-gun fire from around Hamburger Hill.
Elements of the 10th Mountain regrouped with plans to insert additional forces north of Hamburger Hill and move south to attack. At the same time, on the morning of 20th, UNLAW commanders sought to gather a firsthand picture by placing a reconnaissance team on the ridgetop.
As they approached the site, the wolf pack quickly found out how blind they really were. A paintball grenade knocked out three men in one short horrible explosion and enemy gunmen opened up on the remainder.
One of the forward recon gunners, fired a single burst of paint from the hill before being struck in the neck. Fenrir was hit in the right leg.
"It basically just pissed me off," Pariah said. "And I just pushed the trigger on my BT combat and started sweeping fire on the left. I didn't know where the fire was coming from, I just knew we were taking fire. I wasn't going to let that happen without shooting back."
Fenrir collapsed in a corner and used his combat belt to tie a tourniquet on his leg. He could see paint oozing from his pockets -- every time he tried to move it, the more florescent paint would gush out of his pots. He continued to fire from his position without being able to move further.
Bullets were zooming through the jungle. A round shattered onto Pariahs shoulder twisting him to the ground, another knocked off his face mask, but didn´t explode. Heretic, burst through the trees to the right and flopped onto the mud. Paintballs exploded around showering him in yellow. A paintball bounced off his thigh without bursting, two others scraped his helmet, another finally explded on his wrist. He staggered out of his position toward better cover, holding his wrist as it spurted paint.
The incoming machine-gun fire was turning the trees leaves into confetti. An RPG shot through the right, hit a tall tree and exploded covering us in more paint. "It was hell and we loved it!!!"
An hour later and it seemed that the enemy had been reinforced as more and more paint was being fired onto our position. Viper, who we had not seen for a while, came crashing out of the thick bush to our left, he was followed but what seemed like a thousand paintballs. He threw himself to the ground as they whipped over his head. He reported that the enemy where trying to flank us and it was time to move out. Instead we consentrated our fire on our left and drove the enemy from their flanking postion which compromised theirs. More paints shattered onto trees, Fenrir dragged himself slowly, firing with every inch of ground he scraped. Heretic fired one handed as the other was bandaged to his chest. Pariah and Viper flanked the enemies right driving them back and finally releaving Fenrir and Heretic in the center.
All told, five wolf members were KIA on Hamburger Hill that day and four were seriously wounded.
As for the number of enemy killed, military officials do not have an exact count. Recon figure they shot at least 10 enemy fighters during the course of the day. Other tallies, based on accounts of the firefight involving the 10th Mountain Wolves rescue team, have put the total enemy killed at as high as 40 or 50.
"It really wasn't our concern to have a good enemy body count when we left," Pariah said. "But hell, it was funny!"
Operation Wolf Bait ended inconclusively on the same day. The military disrupted the enemy on Hamburger Hill, but an unknown number of enemy fighters slipped away to regroup over the border.
In the end, UNLAW accomplished their mission. They retrieved the bodies of all Wolf members in the jungle, leaving no one behind.
"Anyway.... That´s how I saw it that day.... Didn´t you???"
