“Tanner!” called Captain Ladd Shepard.

“Yes, sir,” I replied, getting up from behind my desk to make my way to his office.

I stood in the doorway for a couple of seconds while he continued to fill out some paperwork. Captain Shepard had recently been assigned to lead Delta Company as the company commanding officer. Along with Shepard, a few other Marines had come over to flesh out the senior leadership. First Sergeant Michael Sprague, a medium-height, muscular guy had come over from the air wing to take over as the company first sergeant. First Lieutenant Earlie Walker, a short, stern-faced Marine with a thick Southern drawl, was the company executive officer. Gunny Rossignol rounded out the staff and became the company gunnery sergeant. The four of them combined made for quite an interesting work atmosphere—very laid back, something I wasn’t accustomed to.

Captain Shepard looked up from his paperwork. “Go down to the ramp and tell the Marines to get in formation on the field,” he said.

“Yes, sir.” I turned and headed out of the back entrance of the company office. The walk to the “ramp,” our slang term for the parking lot and maintenance hangars that were home to our light armored vehicles (LAVs), wasn’t very long. In just a few minutes, I was walking past several LAV-25s, huge armored vehicles with eight wheels, a troop bay in the back that held four infantry Marines, and a 25 mm Bushmaster chaingun mounted to a turret on top. They were awesome to look at—unless, of course, you were the enemy; then you’d just shit your pants and run the other way.

I went around to all the platoon sergeants and informed them that they were to get their Marines in formation. The platoon sergeants started calling out to their Marines that they needed to head over to the field. One by one, Marines began to appear from behind, on top of, and under the vehicles where they were either maintaining their equipment or scrubbing off rust from the vehicle.

About a half an hour passed before the whole company was formed up on the field. A hundred and fifty-eight Marines were standing in perfect columns at parade rest as Captain Shepard made his way out onto the field. When he reached the front of the formation, First Sergeant Sprague called us to attention and reported in to Captain Shepard.

“At ease, gents!” Captain Shepard said, slowly making his way closer to the formation.

“I’ve got a couple of things to pass down to you all before you head out for the weekend. First of all, I’m pretty sure many of you are aware we still don’t have a company name.”

It was true. We still didn’t have a company name, and it had been nearly a month or so since we had formed up. All the other companies in the battalion had names, and we stuck out like a sore thumb without one.

“First Sergeant Sprague, Lieutenant Walker, Gunny, and I have been discussing it, and we’ve got a few names we want to throw at you.”

He began to rattle off a list of names like “Renegades” and “Warriors.” They were fine but didn’t seem to suit us well. As we continued to reject the names one by one, it became obvious that Shepard was getting a bit frustrated.

“How ’bout the Outlaws?” someone yelled out.

The name seemed to roll off the tongue rather well, and I really liked it the moment I heard it. A lot of heads were nodding in approval, so I could tell the other guys liked it.

“Outlaws,” Captain Shepard said, almost as if he were asking a question. “Outlaws,” he repeated one more time. It seemed as if he was trying to gauge the masculinity of the word, ensuring it represented us as a fighting unit well.

He looked up and could see a lot of us were quite pleased with the name.

“Y’all like the name?” he asked.

“Ooh-rah,” the company shouted in unison.

“All right, Outlaws it is!” he proudly declared.

“OK, Outlaws, I’ve got another thing I want to talk to you about,” Captain Shepard said, his voice taking on a more serious tone. “You may have heard through the rumor mill that the Outlaws may be assigned a certain mission. Well, I’m here to tell you those rumors are true. We’ve been given orders to begin training to deploy to Fallujah, Iraq. I’m not certain exactly when we will be deployed, but I know that it will be sometime in the January to February time frame. Over the next few weeks, we’re going to be going through a lot of paperwork and conducting various training exercises, so just prepare yourselves and your family.”

Hushed whispers could be heard throughout the formation. We had all heard that something like this was coming, but we didn’t know how true it was or how far out it would be. The time frame Captain Shepard gave us put the deployment only three months away, which was not typical for a predeployment workup. It meant that we would be busting our asses to get things done as fast as possible to ensure we would be ready to go when given our actual deployment date.

“I’m sure you all have a ton of questions,” he continued, “and we’ll do our best to answer them when we get more word. For now, go back and begin to mentally prepare yourselves for the deployment. First Sergeant Sprague, inform the Outlaws that they’re dismissed for the day.”

First Sergeant Sprague snapped to attention and saluted Captain Shepard. “Yes, sir,” he said, ending his salute and turning around to face the company.

“Outlaws! Atten-hut!” he shouted, proudly calling out our new name.

In perfect harmony, we all snapped to attention. “Platoon sergeants, dismiss your Marines,” he said.

“Yes, First Sergeant,” the platoon sergeants said in unison as they saluted. The platoon sergeants turned to their individual platoons and began dismissing them one by one.

I began making my way back to my barracks room. So many things were going through my head. The deployment wasn’t really news to me because I had overheard the officers talking about it in the office. Being the company clerk did have its advantages. It still rattled me a bit because the time frame for deployment was coming up quickly. There was also a part of me that was annoyed I was the company clerk now that we knew we were being deployed. The last thing I wanted to do was waste my skills as an infantryman sitting behind a desk out in the middle of Iraq. I have to figure out something, I thought, or I’ll go crazy out there.

My thoughts quickly turned toward the new name. The Outlaws. It had a ring to it, and it certainly represented us well. Over the past couple of months, our company had begun taking on Marines from various companies within the battalion as well as units outside of it. Some of us had worked together in the past, but the majority of us were strangers to one another. We constantly butted heads with one another, and our company as a whole had butted heads with the battalion on more than one occasion. We were the outlaws of the battalion, so the new company name was very fitting.

The next couple of months were a whirlwind of madness. We eventually found out our deployment date was going to be sometime in February of 2004. They couldn’t give us a firm date due to security issues. With only three months to prepare, we worked from dawn to dusk getting our vehicles to combat-ready status. All of the platoons trained nonstop for different scenarios and missions. Wills were being written. Personal finances were being sorted out. New equipment was being issued constantly. Personal effects were being sent back home. This was the chaos and turmoil typical of a hasty predeployment.

In January of 2004, I decided to press Captain Shepard and First Sergeant Sprague to allow me to go over to one of the line (infantry) platoons; I didn’t want to be the company clerk when I was in Iraq. I wanted to put the knowledge and skills I had learned from my previous leadership and experience to the test. First Lieutenant Knox Nunnally and Second Lieutenant Ronny Rowell knew of my desire to go back to being a scout, and they also pressed the captain. Eventually he gave in but put me in the platoon that I had not wanted to be in initially, First (Red) Platoon. The platoon commander and sergeant were new to the company, and many of the Marines in the platoon complained that they were overachievers and too rigid.

First Lieutenant David Snipes was in need of a scout team leader for one of his vehicles. He tested my knowledge and decided I was fit to be a team leader. I was happy; I might not have been in the platoon I wanted, but I was doing something I was trained for and enjoyed.

Our platoon constantly trained to become a well-oiled machine right up until we deployed. A few of us were sent off to different schools to learn new skills that would aid us in our deployment. I, along with seven other Marines and sailors from the company, went to an Arabic class, where we learned how to read and speak basic Iraqi Arabic. Additionally, the platoon received various classes introducing us to Arabic culture, urban warfare, improvised explosive device patrols, and other subjects that pertained to our overall mission in Iraq. We needed to learn how to win “the hearts and minds” of the Iraqis.

We deployed to Kuwait on February 28, 2004. We left for our new seven-month “vacation” home, Fallujah, Iraq, on March 15, 2004. When we left the United States, we went with 158 Marines. There was a one-in-five chance that a Marine would be seriously wounded, slightly wounded, or killed. Eight of our brethren, our brothers, died during combat missions. Another seventeen were seriously wounded or were sent back due to various medical reasons. The Outlaws returned to Camp Lejeune on September 28, 2004 with 133 Marines.

Throughout my four years in the United States Marine Corps, I witnessed many things, but nothing compared to what I was about to experience over the next seven months.