Marines find help in the skills of big-game hunters

CAMP LEJEUNE -- The enemy hides among civilians on the urban battlefield, walking the same dusty streets and in the same crowded markets where Cpl. Derrick Terrell found himself during a yearlong deployment in Iraq.

The Marine rifleman said he was oblivious to his surroundings, a wartime environment where basic infantry skills of shooting straight and heading out onto patrol were no longer enough. It's a potential weakness that led Terrell and hundreds of other Marines to spend time with big-game hunters and police, learning to hunt for targets among the human landscape.

"I wish I had this training when I was there before," Terrell said of his time last year in Iraq. "It helps take away the enemy's advantage on us. I know what I am looking for now."

Called Combat Hunter, a two-week program at Camp Lejeune and Camp Pendleton is designed to teach Marines how to observe, profile and track potentially dangerous individuals.

The program, which started in April 2007, grew out of a concept by Gen. James Mattis, who saw the need for hunting-related skills while overseeing combat forces at Camp Pendleton in California.

Instructors teach Marines how to pay attention to small details and problem solving. Marines are taught to detect anomalies in the regular behavior of a village, picking out irregularities and tracking people who may be insurgents.

"All terrorists and criminals follow the same patterns," said Greg Williams, a police officer and big-game hunter who teaches the profiling portion of the program to the Marines. "We give them the ability to think like the enemy."

In the first week, Marines learn profiling techniques.

The second week focuses on tracking, as Marines learn to see "the unnatural," said Randy Merriman, a Camp Lejeune civilian instructor. They're taught to notice even minor disturbances such as a broken branch.

The final exam requires a six-man sniper team to track two instructors with a half-hour head start for several miles through thick pine forest and swampy terrain near Camp Lejeune.

A recent chase began when trainee Cpl. Charles Flaisher spotted a branch and noticed it was freshly broken.

"We can now see if anybody has been there and if we are being tracked," said Flaisher, 25.

Meanwhile, perched on a barracks several football fields away, more than a dozen four-man teams of Marines scour a mock village for the enemy.

Peering through binoculars and using infrared sensors, the Marines watched and catalogued every detail. Terrell watched the townspeople mingle in the market, kick a soccer ball in a nearby field and rake up debris along a ditch.

The team observed the natural patterns of the villagers, and everything appeared normal. But over time, Terrell noticed a man dressed in jogging pants marking distances by counting his paces and dropping a small cup to mark the distance. A few moments later, a police officer was shot, and the village erupted in panic as a sniper opened fire. Terrell quickly called in the location of the sniper, but it was too late: The police officer was "dead."