Word: rapicault
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...beset by anxiety about why the incident had happened. He went out on patrol the next day carrying with him classic symptoms of combat stress: the emotional, physical and psychological fallout from living through--or under the extended threat of--traumatic events. Said company commander Captain Patrick Rapicault, "You have to get over your feelings and keep on pushing, just for the simple reason that you have another 170 Marines to take care of and make sure they come back...
Whiskey Company faces that stress every day as it patrols the unsettled Sunni triangle. Last Monday, Rapicault and two other men in Whiskey Company died when a suicide bomber rammed their humvee while they were on patrol, raising to nine the number of Whiskey Company Marines killed in action since mid-September. "I'm taking it very hard," says medic Cory McFarland. "But their loss gives us more strength to move on." For many combatants in Iraq, that may be more a wish than a fact...
...identified because he has told his wife he is in Kuwait. Indeed, the response comes at night. Shortly after 9 p.m., another company encounters resistance in the town. The Whiskey platoon, tasked as that night's Quick Reaction Force, gears up, led by company commander Captain Patrick Rapicault. "We'll probably get hit tonight," says his driver, Corporal Marc Ryan, who gazes at a picture of his sweetheart back home before speeding into town...
First stop is the government center, a heavily fortified observation post where two Marines had been wounded by mortar fire earlier that day. The stay is brief. "We're definitely being observed," says Rapicault, but the night seems calm enough, so the units decide to head back. They turn right out of the government center onto Michigan, then right again on Central. Halfway down the street, an IED detonates near the lead humvee. They have driven into an ambush. As Ryan steers through the smoke, red tracers streak through the air and bounce along the ground. RPGs fly from both...
...empty, darkened hallways of the government center, Rapicault huddles with senior officers from both Whiskey and Echo companies, studying a map by flashlight, plotting the next move. Reports arrive that some 25 men are massing south of the ambush site. The Marines debate their options, then head out again to find these insurgents...
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