Soon, straggling survivors stumbled to the tunnel entrances, many of them trapped by cave-ins and begging for help. The PG2B teams stood back and ordered Primero to dig themselves out. Knowing their treacherous ways, they might spray their rescuers with machine gun fire out of spite.
Within a half hour, sixty-seven members of Primero—all men—were captured, and several assured their captors that hundreds still lay dead or injured inside.
All tolled, MOAB killed thirteen hundred and eleven people, only nine of whom were believed to be civilians. Such minimal collateral damage made the operation an unprecedented success for most but Terry, who would never successfully force from his memory those nameless nine.
As he surveyed the devastation Terry Gladwyn felt empty, neither jubilation nor
