Lieutenant Don't Know

The Afghan insurgents were aiming at him specifically, he was certain. The closer the bullets were to hitting his head, the slower time appeared to go, and the slower everything seemed to be moving. Jeffrey D Clement was not a high-speed, top-secret recon guy. A logistician, he led combat logistics patrols across treacherous terrain and through frequent enemy attacks to resupply US and British positions. As a Marine Corps lieutenant, he deployed to Afghanistan twice for a total of 14 months. During these deployments, he led hundreds of Marines, Sailors, Soldiers, foreign soldiers (Afghan and British) and even dogs in combat. His experience as an "average guy" is what makes this story important in the history of our War in Afghanistan. It's a story that has not been told yet, not this way. "What the hell am I doing here?" was the frequently asked question, to which he always chuckled to himself and answered with a canned refrain, often heard among the Marine Corps' junior officers to describe their own obliviousness. "The lieutenant don't know." Despite all of his education, "the lieutenant don't know" is the only answer for any number of how and why questions about his experiences. There is a degree of irony in the statement too, and oftentimes the lieutenant "who don't know," had a more clear understanding of what the ground War in Afghanistan was than any individual in a position of great strategic import. The Marines of CLB-6 were average Marines called to do what amounted to average combat tasks, and in the course of doing so, accomplished something extraordinary - something that most Americans cannot even fathom.