The Marine On The Cover

We’ve all seen the powerful photo. A bright sun rising against the clear blue sky. Alone, a Marine stands silhouetted by the light. Across his back is a medium machine gun, a symbol of his strength. Hanging on his back are the remnants of a worn American flag. He is a patriot. His face is not visible because he is nameless. His figure is black and shadowed. He is no longer with us.

Cover of Rage Company

This last fact was revealed to me this morning.

I have to admit, I was rather moved. Many of you know that I started writing Rage Company as an attempt to tell the story of what three Marines accomplished in life and death. When my editor asked if I wanted to be on the cover of the book, I quickly said no. This wasn’t about me, it was about them, the 205 Marines of Rage. So when my editor chose to go with the photo of a single Marine, I knew what was coming. People assumed that it was me holding the M240G. I’ve even received hate mail from other Marines, lambasting me for posing with another Marine’s weapon. Now, my editor’s brilliance is revealed, because no longer is this photo just an eye-catcher. It has a purpose: to remind the reader that inside the pages of Rage Company is the legacy of countless Americans sacrifice, a sacrifice which defeated al Qaeda in early 2007.

Please read below, truly a tough story of sacrifice from a great American: Ed Darack.

When another Marine asked me the other day who was on the cover of my book and I, for the bzillionth time, couldn’t provide an answer, I decided to correct my ignorance. So, last night I opened the book jacket, got the photographer’s name, Ed Darack, went to his website, shot him an email, and read this response on my cell phone at 05:10 this morning. I’ve linked to a bunch of photos he sent me in the text, please check them out.

“Hi Tom, Thanks for contacting me.

The Marine is LCpl Michael D. Scholl originally of Lincoln, Nebraska. He was a Marine of Company E, 2/3. He was an 0331, specifically, a 240 gunner, but you know this by the photo. The photograph was taken around October 15, 2005 during Operation Pil, ISO OEF VI. The photograph was made in the morning, after a movement at the start of the op. We began late in the night out of Watapor Village, in the Pech river valley in Afghanistan’s eastern Kunar province. This was a distributed op, and I was with Echo-1. The platoon had ANA attached, as well, some Army National Guard ETTs, one of whom started to become a heat cas, so we went firm so the FAC could get a Dustoff to medevac him. While we were waiting around, I had Mike pose for this shot.

Some other shots before this, not posed.

I first met Mike after I arrived at Camp Blessing, at the village of Nangalam, in the Pech in late September, 2005. I was with him for a heliborne assault on a spot known as TRP-12. The patrol was called Operation Valdez.

Here’s Mike’s M240G during this patrol:

Mike is in the photo on the bottom of this page during the insert for this op:

I stayed good friends with Mike after their OEF deployment, spending time with him in Hawaii when I followed them out there in early 06, meeting his wife, Melissa. I then kept up with him on a regular basis, and we met up again for their OIF PTP at 29 Palms. The main element of 2/3 deployed to Anbar Province in September, 2006. Melissa was pregnant just before Mike left. I’m sure you know where this is going at this point, as if it were a happy ending I would not have put this much information in this email. I got probably the worst phone call of my life around the middle of November, 2006 (maybe like the 15th or 16th). It was Mike’s mother, around 0400. She got the news that he’d been killed. It was on River Road, next to a blown up pontoon bridge, on the way to Barwana. He never got to meet his daughter. The least I could do was to photograph the spot, and bring back a rock or two from there, when I visited the battalion in Jan-Feb 2007. I got escorted down River Road by a squad, of Marines so I could cross with a local boat to see Fox Company at Barwana (near Camp Bastard, which was set up by Marines detached from the 15th MEU). We had to wait around so I made a small memorial with a Lieutenant friend. I photographed it.

Later in the year, when embedded with 2nd MAW for a project for Smithsonian, I recognized the spot from afar, and asked the pilots of a Huey to orbit a few times. The familiy appreciated the photographs.

Here’s the legacy.com write up:

…thanks to sacrifices like Mike’s, we won OIF. Iraq, America, and the world at large will be the better for it in the decades to come. That’s all there really is to say.

Congratulations on your book. I haven’t read it, but I have read some information on it, and I’m glad that certain information got out. 2/3 got hit pretty hard in the Haditha Triad… a total of I think 23 KIA for their deployment; a pretty substantial number these days. I was not there for this. I’m glad, as while the battalion would have told me that I was not a hindrance or excess baggage, I would have been. I got there in January of 07, at the tail end of the last gasps of AQI in the area. It was interesting to speak with the Marines after we all met up upon their return to K-Bay. They told me that the incidents went from something like an average of 350 per month to like 15, right around March of 07–they just fell off a cliff. I guess that is when you were in Ramadi. AQI all cried uncle at the same time throughout the greater AOR, due to the very-unsexy “presence” missions the Marines undertook, and all the frustrating casualties and day-to-day rigors of a true COIN campaign.

Best,

Ed”

Thank you Ed, I wish you all the best. And guy’s, Ed’s written a few books of his own. You can check them out on Amazon.