HADITHAH DAM, Iraq — After months of patrols and countless firefights in Iraq, the only Small Craft Company in the Marine Corps has been temporarily beached after suffering its first combat death.

But the Marines who man the boats say they are eager to get back onto the water and continue their mission, which has taken them from hot spot to hot spot along the Euphrates River in Anbar province.

“Once we started proving ourselves as an asset, it just hasn’t stopped,” said Sgt. Andrew Vasey, a 29-year- old 4th Platoon Marine from Olsburg, Kan.

“We’ve been used as a recon tool, to conduct security patrols up and down the river, a transport for personnel, to go on raids and draw contact … we’ve been a medevac, too.”

Small Craft Company, normally based at Camp LeJeune, N.C., is currently operating with the 1st Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment at Hadithah Dam, northwest of Fallujah. The unit has seen action in Fallujah, Ramadi, Habbinayah and numerous other locations since arriving in Iraq.

And it has been been the first to test the Small Unit Riverine Craft, or SURC, which replaced previous vessels used by Marine small craft units. The 39-foot boat, armed with a Gatling gun and several other heavy weapons, carries a crew of five, along with up to 15 ground troops.

With its speed and maneuverability, the boat can overtake anything on the waters, Marines say. And with its relatively flat bottom, it can beach itself on shore and deliver ground troops at sites Humvees or other vehicles can’t reach as quickly.

In November’s assault on Fallujah, the unit patrolled the Euphrates River on the west side of the city. During the aborted assault on Fallujah last April, several high-ranking insurgents were believed to have escaped the city via the river. Small Craft Company’s role this time was to cut off that exit.

The unit has also worked with combat engineers, Army infantry units and Iraqi special forces. It has recovered weapons caches and intercepted smugglers heading downriver from the Syrian border. At one point, it found three large weapons caches within 1,500 meters of one another along the riverbanks.

Despite its success, the Iraq mission will likely be the last operational deployment for Small Craft Company. Marine Corps officials plan to disband the unit, as early as this summer.

Members of 4th Platoon say they will be disappointed if that happens. Part of that reluctance is because the unit believes it has proven its versatility and durability in Iraq. The first elements of Small Craft Company arrived in March; they were relieved by other platoons in September.

“We’ve been in more gunfights than we care to talk about. Everywhere we’ve been, we’ve had at least two or three serious engagements,” Vasey said Friday as he perched on a SURC tied up near the Hadithah Dam.

Sgt. Anthony Czerwinski, who was wearing a black watch cap Friday emblazoned with “Amphibious Raid Instructor” in gold lettering, served three years as a small-boat tactics instructor at the Special Operations Training Group. He believes the performance of the SURC crews far exceeded what the doctrine had anticipated.

“No training can take the place of doing it for real. You couldn’t ask for a better group of guys, but you couldn’t prepare them for what they’d see here,” said the 29-year-old Painesville, Ohio, native. “They’ve shined since we got here, and I credit a lot of that to the leadership of the platoon.”

And the boats have been better than advertised.

“They’ve saved our asses more than once,” Czerwinski said, of the Gatling guns and the boats’ other weaponry.

Over the course of its deployment, 4th Platoon has watched their enemy’s tactics evolve.

“At first, it was small arms fire from the shore and then they’d run,” Vasey said. “Then they upgraded the ambushes, and they’ve thrown in mortars, [rocket-propelled grenades], medium machine guns. Pretty much anything.”

The Jan. 1 ambush that grounded the boats was well planned, 4th Platoon Marines said. It began when a routine patrol was fired upon from an area of shoreline just outside Hadithah city. The crews fired back, then returned to base to pick up more Marines.

“This time they stayed and waited for the ground element. They stayed and waited for us to come back,” Vasey said. When the ground teams landed, an explosion — nobody is sure whether it was an improvised bomb or a mortar — hit them almost immediately. That was followed by small arms and machine gun fire.

One Marine, a 19-year-old coxswain, was killed. Several others were severely injured, including an engineer who lost part of his right arm.

Vasey and Czerwinski estimate that the first ambush was carried out by fewer than five attackers. When the Marines returned, some 15-20 insurgents laid in wait. The firefight lasted around 20 minutes, they said.

The Marines of 4th Platoon admit the incident has taken its toll, but say they want to get back on the river. Even then, though, they expect more.

“It’s started getting silly,” Czerwinski said. “It’s a surprise every time we get hit. It’s never the same scenario twice.”

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