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June 2005
How will you spend your Fourth of July?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Members of the 48th Brigade and their families will be apart this holiday. If you are a family member, what will you be doing this weekend? What do you expect it to be like? If you are a soldier deployed in Iraq, what are your plans and what will the observance mean this year?
Unit’s headquarters burns; cause unknown
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Curtis Compton/AJC
Sgt. Timothy Chipman of Chatsworth, Ga., mans a machine gun and keeps an eye on the fire.
Forward Operating Base Michael, Iraq — A day after fire gutted his unit’s operations center here, Lt. Col. John King described the damage as a “minor inconvenience.â€?
“We continue fighting the war,â€? said King, commander of 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment. “It’s not affecting operations at all. We’re still doing as many patrols and before — and we may even do more.â€?
Soldiers from the battalion patrol a restive, mostly Sunni, area south of Baghdad where attacks on American troops occur almost daily.
No one was killed or injured in the fire, the cause of which was still unknown Monday.
The blaze started in a portion of the former chicken processing plant that houses female soldiers and quickly spread through a warren of wood-partitioned living quarters. Then it engulfed the adjoining tactical operations center where sensitive communications equipment and records are stored.
Soldiers were able to save much of the communications gear and records, said King, 41, Doraville’s police chief in civilian life.
The yellow, two-story brick building had recently been rewired and was being repainted inside. Less than a third of the living area was occupied at the time of the fire.
“We were being cautious by not reoccupying the space until we were sure it was safe,� King said. “That caution paid off. We’re very fortunate that no one was hurt.�
Most of the soldiers at Michael live in tents and more tents were being erected Monday to house those who were displaced.
Some soldiers lost nearly all of their personal belongings in the fast-moving fire. A Sudanese translator attached to the unit said he lost more than $20,000 in cash. He said he kept the money in his room because his country doesn’t have a reliable banking system.
The battalion planned to send soldiers to the Camp Liberty post exchange, a Wal-Mart-sized general store at a sprawling U.S. military base about 30 miles away, to replace whatever they can.
Sgt. Michael Wells, 35, of Pickens County, said his personal belongings were saved by other soldiers who hauled them out of the building shortly after the fire began.
“I thought I’d lost the box with pictures of my wife and children,� he said. “Before the building filled with smoke, people went in and grabbed whatever they could. Everybody was helping everybody.�
King said most of the still-smoldering chicken factory is a total loss. But a portion of it can be reused as a command center.
“We’ll re-occupy some of the space,� he said, “and bulldoze the rest.�
Skies of Baghdad safer than ground
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Taji, Iraq — The flares began popping from the Black Hawk helicopter over the slums of Baghdad’s Sadr City.
Intensely red and white, the fireworks would have been right at home in the night sky over any Fourth of July celebration back in the U.S.
But over Baghdad, they mean something far more menacing.
The flares pop out when someone electronically targets the aircraft — a possible prelude to a surface-to-air missile attack.
A mirrored sensor that looks like a 1970s disco ball on the back of the Army helicopter picks up the threat and sends cascading flares as aerial decoys for heat-seeking missiles.
“The system has a mind of its own,” said Chief Warrant Officer Ruben Rivera, 31, of San Juan, Puerto Rico, the pilot. “Sometimes the flares surprise me, too. They go off all the time around here.”
The Black Hawks are regular visitors here, crisscrossing the Baghdad skyline dozens of times a day in a military shuttle service known as the “Marne Express.”
The name comes from the Fort Stewart-based 3rd Infantry Division, whose longtime nickname is “Rock of the Marne” (from a heroic stand it made during World War I). The division sends a pair of Black Hawks three times daily to about a dozen military installations around the city.
The Marne Express has become the main mode of travel for soldiers in the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Brigade Combat Team as they hopscotch from base to base.
Helicopters are preferred because they keep soldiers away from deadly roadside bombs, which are the weapon of choice for the insurgents.
No missiles arose from the sprawling slums this day, just the stench of poverty.
During a two-hour circuit around Baghdad this week, the view from the helicopter quickly changed.
The urban cityscapes gave way to lush palm groves and the blue Tigris River. From there, the fortresslike “Green Zone” appeared below before it was left behind for squalid slums and the arid wasteland south of the city where American bases are encircled by concrete barriers, dirt berms and miles of razor wire.
The helicopters are armed with machine guns and travel in pairs. They rarely fly more than 10 minutes between takeoffs and landings.
Each is equipped with a satellite Global Positioning System. But Rivera, a compact, self-confident flier in the midst of his second yearlong combat tour in Iraq, knows the area by heart and prefers to navigate by looking out the window.
He varies his route and schedule each day to make himself a less inviting or predictable target.
He also flies low and fast for the same reason, sometimes climbing to clear buildings and power lines.
The 11-passenger Black Hawks still come back with bullet holes, though. Fancy flares are powerless against plain, old-fashioned bullets — and the helicopters seem to attract more than their fair share. But, so far, all of the Marne Express flights have come home from their missions safely.
On this relatively clear morning, air traffic controllers informed Rivera and his crew that a portion of Baghdad’s airspace was off limits due to “multiple explosions.” Several suicide bombers blew up themselves and their cars, killing more than 40 people.
Apache attack helicopters were prowling the area around the attacks. Black smoke was on the horizon.
Listening to the conversation between Rivera and his co-pilot, Chief Warrant Officer Brian Hegenbart, as they skimmed the hostile terrain, it sounded like a couple of guys enduring another dull day at the office, not two men risking their lives.
They banked hard over Baghdad International Airport, passed by a huge minaret they call the Space Needle and dropped like an anvil into the Green Zone at a tiny, walled heliport with barely enough room for both Black Hawks and their spinning rotor blades.
Rivera’s helicopter shuddered as it hovered a few feet above the ground, then plunked down and rolled to a quick stop.
Three passengers scurried out and two more climbed in.
“Only six point six hours to go,” said Hegenbart, 30, a career soldier from Sacramento, Calif.
Rivera nodded in agreement.
“Do you want to fly the next leg or should I?” Rivera asked. “On a day like this, I could fly all day.”
Marking time toward homecoming
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Taji, Iraq — More than a month into their year of living dangerously, 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers have begun marking time — each in their own way — toward homecoming.
Here are some of the ways they’re measuring their progress:
Razor blades — Two weeks for each blade, four blades per package. “Each time I open a new pack of razor blades, I know two months have gone by,â€? said Sgt. Britt Smith of Dublin. “I can’t tell you how exciting it is to open each new pack.â€?
Paychecks — Soldiers get paid on the first and 15th of each month. Each paycheck marks two more weeks in the war zone.
Sporting events — So far, they’ve missed the U.S. Open and the NBA Finals. Still waiting for Wimbledon, the World Series, Super Bowl, March Madness and the Daytona 500. When Major League Baseball’s opening day 2006 rolls around, the troops should be packing their bags.
Full moons — Two down, 10 to go. Holidays — Memorial Day and Father’s Day down, Independence Day, Labor Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s Day, Valentine’s Day and Easter to go. The troops should be boarding planes around Mother’s Day.
Meals — “If you’re planning anything beyond your next meal, you’re thinking too far ahead,â€? said Maj. Dave Weis of the 3rd Infantry Division, a veteran of five Army deployments in 20 years.
The 108th’s way — Soldiers from this armor unit have a running joke in which they count down from the artificially high, and totally arbitrary, number 713. The idea is to keep the actual date of departure so far in the future that the soldiers don’t dwell on it. Ask a soldier from the 108th when he’s going home and the standard answer is “Only 679 days to go!â€?
Sharpshooting, diplomacy skills serve Georgia units well in desert
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Curtis Compton/AJC
Capt. Mike Cannon of Newberry, S.C., tries to build goodwill at patrol stop.
Baghdad, Iraq — It was a little after 5 on a sweltering June afternoon when the white Chevrolet Suburban approached Checkpoint 34, an isolated American outpost known as Hotel California on a key highway overpass.
About a dozen American soldiers, most from a Lawrence-ville-based unit of the 48th Brigade Combat Team, were outside their armored vehicles in the shade of the overpass.
The soldiers watched with growing concern as the SUV drove toward them. In Iraq, almost any vehicle is a potential car bomb.
The realities of life and death have been brought home quickly to these soldiers, who have been on the job patrolling areas south of Baghdad for just a few days.
In that time they have been attacked by car bombs and roadside bombs, asked to assist in the removal of a dead body and acted as both law enforcement and diplomats in this largely lawless region.
Here, even the ordinary can suddenly become ominous and deadly.
As the soldiers watched the SUV approach, it accelerated without warning.
Pfc. Justin T. Hair raised his M-16 rifle. There was no time for a warning shot. He fired twice into the windshield of the oncoming Suburban.
‘Well-aimed shots’
The Suburban, crammed with explosives and driven by someone apparently intent on killing himself and any Americans or Iraqi soldiers in the area, exploded in a ball of fire and smoke, the concussion rippling across the desert.
“They were well-aimed shots,” said Capt. Mike Cannon, commander of Alpha Company of the 121st Infantry Regiment’s 1st Battalion. “They killed or incapacitated the driver and caused him to detonate early.”
The blast ripped the SUV into twisted shreds, the largest pieces no bigger than a large cardboard box, and hurled the driver’s mangled and burned torso on top of the overpass 30 feet above.
The soldiers believed the driver was on a suicide mission to kill Americans, destroy the overpass and block the road, Route Tampa, one of the main military supply corridors in Baghdad.
Hair, slightly wounded by the blast, was treated and quickly returned to duty. He was credited with saving fellow soldiers and the overpass. But he was shaken by the incident and asked that information about his age and hometown not be released.
For his actions, Hair has been nominated for a Bronze Star medal with “V” device, signifying valor in combat.
Keep traffic moving
For the soldiers of Alpha Company, the suicide bomber was a rude welcome and a sobering object lesson on their first full day in charge of the restive, predominantly Sunni area these Gwinnett County soldiers expect to patrol for the next 11 months.
Their primary mission is to keep traffic moving on their portion of Route Tampa. At first glance, it seems a simple enough assignment.
But after a few days in the field, Cannon said it would take detective work, political skills, investments in community water and electrical projects — as well as a constant military presence — to succeed here.
And, Cannon said, the diplomacy can’t be carried out from the relative safety of a 25-ton Bradley Fighting Vehicle.
It requires face-to-face meetings with Iraqi religious and political leaders, at least some of whom are violently opposed to the American presence.
On one of his first days as the de facto sheriff in the mostly rural, crushingly poor area, Cannon sought out a shop owner he suspected of having insurgent ties.
The man runs a tiny store in a wooden shack near the highway where he sells gasoline in 5-gallon containers as well as fruit, vegetables, soft drinks and other supplies.
The nearby highway was littered with bombs aimed at military vehicles in previous days, and Cannon, 31, a married father of two who works as a civilian Army contractor, figured the store owner knew who was planting them.
Two of Alpha Company’s Bradleys lurched to a stop in front of the store, one ripping the soft asphalt with its heavy tread as it made a tight turn.
Talking tomatoes
Cannon, a calm, bespectacled officer who seldom raises his voice, approached the store owner with a stern demeanor. Through an Iraqi interpreter, he asked about the roadside bombs, known in military parlance as “improvised explosive devices,” or IEDs.
“We want to stop the IEDs so the Iraqi people don’t get hurt and my soldiers don’t get hurt,” Cannon pleaded with the store owner. “I want to be a friend. But in order to be a friend, you have to cooperate.”
The owner, a middle-aged man with a salt-and-pepper beard who gave his name as Najib Achmed Zubeyd, didn’t seem impressed.
“What can I do to stop the bombs? I want you to stop the bombs,” he said defensively. “I don’t have tanks like you. You should stop the bombs so that we can be safe here.”
Cannon did not like the answer and became more confrontational.
“Do you know most of the people who come to your store?” he asked, an edge in his voice. “You’re out here all the time. How can you not know who you see on this road?”
The store owner started to reply, but the Iraqi translator, known only as “Tom” to hide his identity and protect himself and his family, stepped in and pulled the man aside.
Tom later said he told the store owner he was making a mistake by being difficult. The man could play games with the Americans, Tom said, but he couldn’t fool a fellow Iraqi like himself.
When they spoke again a few minutes later, Cannon and the store owner seemed more conciliatory. Cannon bought soft drinks for his soldiers, three for a dollar, from several boys who worked at the store. The dark-haired boys smiled and gave thumbs-up signs.
Cannon asked where the produce came from, and the store owner answered that he grew the vegetables himself.
“I have a garden at home, too,” the captain said. “My tomatoes get about this big,” he said, making a circle by touching his thumbs and middle fingers together.
Both men smiled and laughed, a difficult moment broken by a common love of the soil.
The two men talked a bit more, and just as the meeting was about to break up, several Iraqi police officers arrived in two Chevy pickups.
The police told Cannon they had discovered the tortured and executed body of a young man on a rural road a few miles away. They wanted the Americans to secure the area while they picked up the corpse.
When Cannon and his men arrived, they found a smooth-skinned, 20-something Iraqi man with a stylish haircut, red polo shirt, tan corduroys and two bullet holes in the back of his head.
‘Like the Wild West’
The ground beneath his head was saturated with blood.
His hands were bound tightly behind his back and his fingers were broken and twisted. Cigarette burns dotted his forearms, and welts were evident on his back. It was obvious he had been tortured before being killed.
His belt was cinched tight, but his pants were flung open in front — a final affront in a society in which modesty, even among men, is the norm.
The Iraqis borrowed a body bag and two pairs of plastic gloves from the Americans. Cannon, who doesn’t smoke at home, puffed on a Marlboro Light to mask the stench of the decomposing body on the 115-degree afternoon.
Cannon asked the Iraqis to deliver the body to a hospital in nearby Mahmudiyah, thanked them for their work and handed out bottles of cold water from a cooler in back of one of the Bradleys. After shaking hands with each of the police, Cannon, the new sheriff in town, surveyed the area for which he is now responsible.
The body had been found near a ranch that once belonged to late Uday Hussein, one of Saddam’s sons. The bombed-out remains of what had been a grand home was the nearest structure, and only one wall still stood.
“This place is like the Wild West,” Cannon said.
Combat team makes its presence felt
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Curtis Compton/AJC
Sgt. Ronald Schiefer of Conyers searches an Iraqi blacksmith outside his business. The man reportedly beat up some children for passing information to soldiers.
Camp Stryker, Iraq — Only a few days after the 48th Brigade Combat Team officially took over military operations in a broad sector south of Baghdad, signs of change already are plentiful.
The brigade’s headquarters staff has moved into a brick building near Baghdad International Airport that was gutted during the 2003 invasion. Engineers are grading the area around it and installing new wiring for a vast array of communications equipment.
At smaller, more austere bases such as Michael, Joe and Row near Mahmudiyah, about 15 miles south of Baghdad, the 48th is bringing in generators and showers and putting gravel on roads to cut the choking dust.
But the biggest differences are on the roads and streets, where Georgia citizen-soldiers in their distinctive, pale-green camouflage uniforms are patrolling, manning checkpoints and supplying other units. It’s the Georgia Army National Guard’s first combat deployment since the Korean War.
“People are working long hours but they’re settling into a rhythm,” said Brig. Gen. Stewart Rodeheaver, commander of the 4,400-member brigade that arrived in the Middle East on May 17. “The learning curve has been straight up, but it’s starting to moderate. We’re taking the initiative and doing effective combat missions.”
American military commanders in Iraq have dispersed the brigade among several locations close to Baghdad and replaced an active-duty unit with most of the Georgia Guard’s 1st Battalion, 118th Field Artillery Regiment at Camp Taji northwest of the Iraqi capital.
Rodeheaver said the swap is meant to mix the newly arrived 48th with soldiers who have more experience in Iraq.
“It raises the experience level across the brigade,” Rodeheaver said. “Instead of the whole unit being new to a combat zone, we can draw on their experience and get smart quicker.”
Most of the 48th is spread over a largely rural area south of Baghdad that is predominantly Sunni and where the insurgency has been particularly active. Already, soldiers from the 48th have been attacked with suicide bombs, roadside bombs, mortars and rockets. More than a dozen have been wounded, several seriously, at bases Michael and Liberty.
Rodeheaver knows about the hazards firsthand. While traveling to each of the brigade’s posts during the first two weeks in Iraq, his convoys have been hit by roadside bombs that destroyed at least one Humvee. They have also been the targets of rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and rifles.
But Rodeheaver said his soldiers will aggressively seek out insurgents and fight them wherever they find them.
“We’re absolutely an aggressive unit,” he said. “We won’t be shy about protecting American soldiers, protecting the Iraqi government and destroying [anti-Iraqi forces].”
Camp Liberty a bazaar place
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Liberty, Iraq — It’s not exactly Phipps Plaza or Lenox Square, but the bazaar at this sprawling base is a popular hangout for 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers. Photos of the bazaar
The bazaar is a collection of shops owned by local Iraqis that cater to the eclectic tastes of soldiers, civilian contractors and journalists looking to unload a few greenbacks. In some cases, lots of greenbacks.
Saddam Hussein collectibles include ashtrays, gold-flecked china and paper money with the former dictator’s mustachioed mug on the front. Prices range from 50 cents for old Iraqi dinars — now the Middle East equivalent of Confederate dollars— to $700 for a set of gold-plated Saddam dishes.
Saddam himself resides a stone’s throw away at Camp Cropper, a high-walled prison complex ringed by miles of concertina wire. But apparently he’s not autographing any of the paraphernalia removed from his palaces.
“Too bad,� said Spc. Jose Colon, who was on his way to buy a TV and Sony PlayStation at the Liberty post exchange. “I might even buy some of that stuff if it had Saddam’s signature.�
Iraqi flags are a big seller at the bazaar, and some are embroidered with “Operation Iraqi Freedom: 2005-2006.� An enterprising flag manufacturer is probably already at work on the 2006-2007 version. (Personally, I hope he goes broke!)
Knives are a big hit with soldiers, and merchants at the bazaar stock everything from stilettos and switchblades to Iraqi army bayonets and ornate Arab scimitars.
Getting to the bazaar from Camp Stryker involves a long bus trip.
Actually, it’s a short ride, no more than five miles, but the buses run on “Iraq time,� which is pretty much whenever the bus driver feels like it. The mood seems to strike every 90 minutes or so, “Inshallah,� as they say here, roughly translated as “God willing.�
The Iraqi bus drivers must be related to the DVD pirates because before they drive they personally shake down every rider trying to get them to buy movies. Fortunately for photographer Curtis Compton and me, we were riding with some off-duty soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 295th Infantry Regiment from Puerto Rico who were willing to buy enough Terminator films to get the driver moving.
Baghdad aerial circus
For airplane buffs like me, the best part about being near Baghdad International Airport is the daily air show.
The densely populated areas around the airport provide plenty of cover for insurgents firing surface-to-air missiles and old-fashioned bullets. Several planes have been hit coming or going from in the last few years.
In order to stay over the protected part of the airfield as much as possible, pilots typically stay above 15,000 feet or so until they’re directly overhead. Then they drop the landing gear and flaps and start a steep, descending spiral. They keep the turns as tight as possible until the planes are almost directly over the runway. Then they level the wings at the last possible moment and touch down.
Tuesday I watched an Airbus A300, Boeing 727 and 737 make the plunging arrivals, as well as military transports including Marietta-built Lockheed-Martin C-130s and bulbous Boeing C-17s.
The stubby C-130s make the most dramatic approaches and use far less real estate than any other plane. The C-17s get style points for casting off bright red flares designed to fake out enemy missiles.
When planes take off from Baghdad, they make the same corkscrew pattern going up. As soon as their wheels leave the ground, they begin a sharp turn and stay directly over the airport as they climb above missile range.
I know the soldiers try not to think about it since their scheduled departure dates are 11 months away — but I’m sure they’re looking forward to the day they’ll board one of those planes for the long trip home.
Bringing home the bacon
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Stryker, Iraq — The mess hall here serves bacon for breakfast, ham for lunch and pork chops for dinner.
So how far does the Army have to go to get pork in the porkless Middle East?
Apparently a long, long way.
Photographer Curtis Compton and I have seen lots of cattle, goats, sheep, chickens and geese in Iraq — but not one pig.
It’s all in a name
An Army officer objected to his soldiers using “hajji� to describe Iraqis because he thought the term insensitive.
The officer’s radio call sign? “Assassin.�
What water shortage?
When I arrived at the shower tent on a recent morning, a soldier was already under the spigot in the stall next door. I showered, soaped, rinsed, dried off, shaved, brushed my teeth, flossed, got dressed, and when I left, this guy was still showering!
There’s no shower time limit at Camp Stryker. But water here must be purified, then trucked over extremely dangerous roads at great expense.
Soldiers in the field go for days, sometimes weeks, without showers, and Iraqi children beg for drinking water at the side of the road.
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With faith and foreboding
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dublin, Ga. — Ricky Stanley left for Iraq armed with two Bibles and bedeviled by months of bad dreams.
His family near Dublin prays for his survival — and his soul.
Trainer encounters grim conditions, eager soldiers
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
On his second day in Iraq, a Polk County police officer was informed he had been reassigned to train Iraqi army recruits.
Instead of leading 16 fellow Georgia Army National Guard soldiers in a war against insurgents, Dyer would move to a run-down military compound to live, eat and sleep with newly minted Iraqi fighters while training them for combat.
It is an assignment fraught with more than the normal amount of peril and frustration that is integral to the war in this country.
Killing boredom is a job for Superman
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Baghdad, Iraq — At a bloodily contested highway overpass where a suicide bomber incinerated himself and turned his car into shopping cart-sized hunks of twisted metal two days earlier, a trio of 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers looked out from a makeshift machine-gun nest, vigilant yet bored.
Their perch was a shabby, dusty, cement-and-sandbag lean-to on which someone had spray-painted “Hotel California” — an obvious reference to the “you can never leave” line in the hit song by the Eagles.
During a 12-hour watch on a blistering June day they kept each other alert by swapping gun positions every hour while the third member of the crew rested on a cot.
The off-duty soldier read aloud tidbits from Maxim and FHM magazines as the three compared the virtues of super-models, comic book figures and cruise ship destinations.
Although their mission is deadly serious — rifles, machine guns and grenade launchers were loaded and ready to fire and the soldiers suspiciously eyed every approaching person and vehicle — their banal banter was typical of the ongoing military mission here: hours of stupefying boredom and discomfort mixed with ambiguity and seasoned with moments of stark terror.
“I’ll bet Mr. Incredible could kick Superman’s [butt],” said Spc. Leomar Jackson, 21, of Athens, a square-jawed mischievous member of the Lawrenceville-based Alpha Company, 1st Battalion of the 121st Infantry Regiment. “Throw Kryptonite at Mr. Incredible and he’ll throw it right back at you. Do that to Superman and he turns to Jell-O. Mr. Incredible doesn’t have any obvious weaknesses.”
Cpl. Kevin Everett, 27, of Dallas, Texas, a thin, taciturn soldier, originally backed Superman. But Jackson’s rant persuaded him to switch to Batman.
Jackson slammed that choice, too.
“You’ve got to have superpowers to be a superhero,” Jackson said in exasperation. “Batman can’t fly or spin spider webs. All he’s got is lots of money and an impressive tool belt. That’s no superhero.”
Everett, who is back in Iraq two months after finishing a yearlong deployment on the Iran/Iraq border with an active-duty unit, gave Superman another lukewarm endorsement.
A Dallas Cowboys fan who calls them “America’s Team,” Everett offered that the Man of Steel “is more all-American,” although he said it without conviction.
Action unfolds below
On the street below, soldiers in two Bradley fighting vehicles discovered a pair of rocket-propelled grenades in a farm field about 100 yards from the highway. They called a bomb disposal team to destroy the weapons.
As the gun crew watched the area around the grenades being sealed off, Spc. Vianney Cornejo, 27, a glib native of El Salvador who now lives in Marietta, weighed in on the comics question.
“I like Batman because he’s a real man,” said Cornejo, who has a penchant for singing hip-hop tunes in Spanish.
With his machine gun resting atop a pile of green nylon sandbags, Cornejo said Batman “may not have superpowers, but that just makes him more realistic. He doesn’t have to go out and fight crime. He could just stay home with Alfred and Robin and chase [women] all day. But he fights crime because it’s the right thing to do.”
A pedestrian approached on the highway about 200 yards from the soldiers, interrupting the conversation. That was too close, the soldiers decided.
Everett, who has been married 10 years and has three young children at home, did not want to fire a warning shot. Instead, he raised and lowered his M-16 rifle several times, displaying it to the man on the highway and then pointing the barrel in his direction.
The pedestrian shrugged a sad, “woe-is-me” kind of gesture, then turned and walked away while the soldiers resumed their conversation.
What about the Incredible Hulk? Would his temper help or hurt him in a fight against Superman?
All three of these soldiers had been at this overpass 48 hours earlier when the car bomber struck. One of their fellow soldiers pumped the driver full of lead and suffered minor injuries when the car exploded. The part they all remember was the thunderous sound and concussion.
“I’ve never heard a sound like that,” Cornejo said. “It was so loud, and you could feel it as well as hear it.”
Mysterious gunfire
Another sound suddenly grabbed the soldiers’ attention.
Five or six rifle shots in rapid succession rang out from the highway about a half-mile away. The soldiers searched with binoculars but could not spot the shooter. They watched a blue pickup truck quickly reverse direction and drive away — but they could not tell whether the shots came from inside the truck or somewhere else.
They all said the gunshots had the distinctive, popping reports of an AK-47, the rifle of choice among Iraqis, both insurgents and police.
A few hundred feet overhead, a pair of heavily armed Apache helicopters orbited noisily, searching for the shooters. But the helicopters departed after about 30 minutes, apparently without success.
When the disposal team arrived and prepared to blow up the grenades, the three soldiers turned their attention to the nearby field. There, two soldiers attached a long detonation cord to the weapons and the grenades went off with a white, smoky fizzle — not a bang.
The gun crew was disappointed with the dud grenades. But Jackson soon engaged the others with another rhetorical question that promised to fill at least the next hour.
“If you could take a cruise anywhere,” he asked, “where would you go? Who would you take with you? And what would you bring?”
Passing time in a deadly Baghdad neighborhood
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Curtis Compton/AJC
Vianney Cornejo (left) of Marietta and Kevin Everett of Dallas man their post at a bridge overpass in Baghdad on Wednesday.
Baghdad, Iraq — At a bloodily contested highway overpass where a suicide bomber had incinerated himself and turned his car into shopping cart-sized hunks of twisted metal two days earlier, a trio of 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers look out from a machine-gun nest.
Their perch is a shabby, dusty, cement-and-sand bag lean-to on which someone has spray-painted Hotel California - an obvious reference to the “you can never leave” line in the song.
During a 12-hour watch on a blistering June day, they keep each other alert by swapping gun positions every hour while the third member of the crew rests on a cot. The off-duty soldier reads aloud tidbits from Maxim and NHM magazines and they endlessly compare the virtues of super-models, comic book figures and cruise ship destinations.
Although their mission is deadly serious - rifles, machine guns and grenade launchers are loaded and ready to fire and the soldiers suspiciously eye every approaching person and vehicle — their banal banter is typical of the ongoing military mission here: hours of stupefying boredom and discomfort mixed with ambiguity and seasoned with moments of stark terror.
“I’ll bet Mr. Incredible could kick Superman’s (butt),” says Spec. Leomar Jackson, 21, of Athens, a sunburned, square-jawed, mischievous member of the Lawrenceville-based 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment. “Throw Kryptonite at Mr. Incredible and he’ll throw it right back at you. Do that to Superman and he turns to Jell-O. Mr. Incredible doesn’t have any obvious weaknesses.”
Cpl. Kevin Everett, 27, of Dallas, Texas, a thin, taciturn soldier who is back in Iraq two months after finishing a year-long deployment on the Iran/Iraq border with an active-duty unit, originally backs Superman. But Jackson’s rant convinces him to switch to Batman.
Jackson slams that choice, too.
“You’ve got to have super powers to be a super hero,” he says, exasperated. “Batman can’t fly or spin spider webs. All he’s got is lots of money and an impressive tool belt. That’s no super hero.”
Everett, married for 10 years with three young children, gives Superman another lukewarm endorsement.
Everett’s a Dallas Cowboys fan and calls them “America’s Team.” The Man of Steel “is more all-American,” he says without conviction.
On the street below, soldiers in a pair of armored Bradley Fighting Vehicles discover a pair of rocket propelled grenades in a farm field about 100 yards from the highway. They call an explosives team to destroy the weapons.
Then Vianney Cornejo, 27, a glib El Salvador native who lives in Marietta and has a penchant for singing hip-hop tunes in Spanish, weighs in on the comics question.
“I like Batman because he’s a real man,” the machine gunner says, his weapon resting atop a pile of green, nylon sandbags. “He may not have super powers, but that just makes him more realistic. He doesn’t have to go out and fight crime. He could just stay home with Alfred and Robin and chase (skirts) all day. But he fights crime because it’s the right thing to do.”
A pedestrian approaches on the highway about 200 yards from the soldiers. That’s too close, they decide. Everett doesn’t want to fire a warning shot, so he raises and lowers his jet black M-16 rifle several times in a row, displaying it to the man on the street and then pointing the barrel in his direction. The pedestrian shrugs a sad, woe-is-me kind of gesture, then turns and walks away while the soldiers resume their conversation.
What about the Incredible Hulk? Would his temper help or hurt him in a fight against Superman?
All three of these soldiers had been at the same overpass 48 hours earlier when the car bomber struck. One of their fellow soldiers pumped the driver full of lead and suffered minor injuries when the car exploded. The part they all remember is the thunderous sound and concussion.
“I’ve never heard a sound like that,” Cornejo says. “It was so loud, and you could feel it as well as hear it.”
Another sound suddenly grabs the soldiers’ attention.
A series of five or six rapid rifle shots ring out from the highway about a half-mile away. The soldiers search with binoculars but can’t spot the shooter. They watch a blue pickup truck quickly reverse direction and drive away - but they can’t tell if the shots came from inside the pickup or not.
They all say the gunshots had the distinctive, popping reports of an AK-47, the rifle of choice among Iraqis - both insurgents and police.
Overhead, a pair of heavily armed Apache helicopters orbit noisily a few hundred feet above the highway. The two-person helicopter crews are searching for the shooters, too. But the helicopters depart after about 30 minutes, apparently without success.
The explosives team arrives and prepares to blow up the grenades. Two soldiers attach a long detonation cord to the weapons, and the grenades go up in a white, smoky fizzle — not a bang.
The gun crew is disappointed with the dud grenades. But Jackson soon engages them with another rhetorical question that promises to fill the next hour at least.
“If you could take a cruise anywhere,” he asks his fellow soldiers, “where would you go? Who would you take with you? And what would you bring?”
Curtis Compton/AJC
Vianney Cornejo of Marietta jokes with his fellow soldiers while he takes his break time at the ‘Hotel California’ post. At left is Arista Cowan of Jasper.
Forward base grim, ‘tolerable’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base Joe — Perhaps it was best that soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment’s Charlie Company arrived here at night.
In the light of day, the former potato factory known as FOB Joe barely looks habitable. The factory has been bombed and looted. With no plumbing, the Iraqi soldiers posted here used some of the buildings as outhouses.
The cantankerous Egyptian-made generator works only occasionally. And residents of the nearby town of Yusufiyah often glare with ill-disguised contempt as soldiers drive by in armed convoys.
“The conditions here are grim but tolerable,” said Staff Sgt. Scott Brown, 42, a millwright from Trion. “We’ve got some electricians and mechanics in our unit, and we’re already planning ways to make things better.”
Charlie Company, with about 90 soldiers, and the 108th’s similar-sized Bravo Company have taken up residence at two satellite forward operating bases south of Baghdad where living conditions are more austere than the comfortable confines of larger, more established military facilities.
The 108th’s soldiers will patrol the restive Sunni towns that U.S. officials say have been used as staging areas for insurgent mortar and rocket attacks and a manufacturing center for deadly mines, roadside and car bombs.
Unlike many soldiers in Iraq who dine on catered meals, live in air-conditioned trailers, have unlimited shower use and constant telephone and Internet access, members of Bravo and Charlie companies eat pre-packaged meals, get to shower only every three days and sleep in a windowless former vegetable storage room.
Lt. Col. John King, commander of the 108th, visited Joe last week and said the place has some good points.
The building has a large, concrete apron, which is a big plus for soldiers who operate 70-ton tanks and other heavy equipment. The sleeping quarters are well-insulated and stay relatively cool, and the building has electrical wiring and water that can be purified for showers and drinking.
These soldiers from the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Brigade Combat Team plan to use Joe and another facility known as FOB Row to push the American military presence into lawless areas, where they hope to bring some security and political stability.
The base used to be known as St. Joe, but the “saint” was ordered removed from it and St. Michael because of concern for Muslim sensitivities.
“There hasn’t been a significant military presence here yet,” said King, 41, Doraville’s police chief in civilian life. “There’s no formal government here or local police. We’re it.”
King plans to start practicing “random acts of kindness” to help win over the Iraqis.
Right now, however, he’s sending some diesel mechanics, bringing in portable generators and installing telephone lines to improve the daily lives of the soldiers who have taken up residence here.
King says he plans to shut another military facility and consolidate the equipment at Joe. The other satellite operating base is in a former school, and King wants to return the ramshackle three-story building to its previous use.
“It’ll be great to return it to the community and let them turn it into a school again,” he said. “Over time, those kinds of changes can really make a difference in people’s lives.”
In Iraq, boring can be good
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Stryker, Iraq — Spec. Chris Monk and Spec James Allen, both of Eastman, have suddenly come to like being bored.
The two were riding in an armored Humvee around midnight Monday with Sgt. Justin Duren, 24, of Douglas talking about how boring all their previous patrols had been when a roadside bomb exploded next to them.
“It came out of nowhere,� said Monk, 22, a machine gunner. “There was a big yellow flash and sand and rocks were flying everywhere. But none of us were hurt and there were only a few nicks and scratches on the side of our vehicle.�
The attack took place along a black-top road in a rural area southwest of Baghdad.
Other soldiers from the Valdosta-based 2nd Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment, searched the area but were unable to find the insurgent who set off the blast.
Monk was married in March and his wife, Mindy, is pregnant with the couple’s first child. His father, Spec. Terry Monk, is a truck driver with the Dublin-based Alpha Company, 148th Support Battalion, and also is based at Camp Stryker.
“Now,� said Monk, “I think I like boring.�
The saints go marching out
American political correctness has come to Iraq. In deference to Muslim sensitivities, Army officials dropped the “saint� titles from forward operating bases St. Michael and St. Joe, where the 48th Brigade Combat Team has soldiers based.
The two dusty outposts are now known simply as Michael and Joe. Army brass apparently was concerned the old names carried too much crusader baggage and could upset Muslims.
Meanwhile, the unsaintly insurgent mortar attacks on Mike and Joe continue unabated.
Time and effort not well spent
While the Army has outsourced a wide variety of what previously were military tasks, it still reserves some of the most useless jobs for its own people.
A pair of sergeants spend 12 hours a day in the Internet room making sure soldiers observe 30-minute time limits. Others do the same job at night, even when there aren’t enough patrons to fill the place.
And, while the 48th Brigade has its own cooks, a private contractor, Kellog, Brown & Root, does the cooking at Camp Stryker. Instead of cooking, the military cooks spend their time monitoring KBR’s cooking.
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Front-line soldiers stay upbeat
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Stryker, Iraq - It’s puzzling but obvious that the 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers who have the most reason to be miserable are actually the happiest.
At dangerous, uncomfortable, squalid outposts like camps Row and St. Joe south of here near the city of Mahmudiyah, soldiers face insurgent bombs, rockets, mortars and gunfire almost daily.
They are surrounded by abject poverty and hostility in the so-called Sunni Triangle of Death, yet the soldiers are strangely, almost incomprehensibly, cheery.
“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Staff Sgt. Scott Brown, 42, a millwright from Trion, said of life at the bombed out former potato factory where members of the 1st Batallion, 108th Armored Regiment, have taken up residence.
“The unit we’re replacing survived it. We will, too,” Brown added.
At relatively plush camps like the Baghdad International Airport, where soldiers wake up to custom omelets, fresh Kiwi fruit, ripe avocados and unlimited coffee and ice cream, they gripe about the slow speed of Internet connections, crowded weight rooms and unreliable bus service to Camp Liberty’s swimming pool and Super Wal-Mart-sized PX.
There seems little, if any, linkage between objective reality and soldier moods. If there is one, it’s backwards.
Some say front-line fighters are more robust and optimistic by nature, but there are plenty of tough, hardy men and women at Camp Stryker. And as a recent mortar attack at Camp Liberty shows, no one in Iraq is completely out of harm’s way.
Others suggest the front-line units are populated by younger, more enthusiastic soldiers who want to prove themselves in combat and seek out hazardous assignments.
But there are plenty of 30- and 40-something combat veterans at the austere forward operating bases here. They’re not shy about saying they’d rather stay home with their families, fish and play golf than push themselves to exhaustion in this cruel and desolate place. But as long as they’re here, they’re going to laugh at their fate and make the best of it.
Tom Draude, a retired Marine brigadier general, wrote of a similar experience in Vietnam. There, some communications specialists were sent to a rifle company to learn how their equipment was being used in the field. Despite the drastic change in lifestyle, several communicators soon asked to leave their relatively cushy, air-conditioned confines and join their comrades in the jungle.
Maybe they wanted to be part of the camaraderie that seems to develop so naturally among people who share hardships. Maybe they saw purpose in the things the front-line soldiers were doing and thought they could contribute.
At the very least, there’s immediacy and consequence to the decisions front-line soldiers make on every mission. The same can’t be said of camp-bound soldiers whose lunchtime conversations inevitably turn to mundane discussions of retirement, insurance and mortgage rates.
As a sergeant at spartan FOB St. Michael paternally told the lower enlisted soldiers in the squad he leads, “If you ain’t a Joe, you’re nobody.”
Wound worsens in dirt and dust
Curtis Compton/AJC
Spec. Bobby Morris wipes his face as he recalls getting injured in a rocket attack.
Spec. Bobby Morris, 23, of Vidalia had been in Iraq less than 24 hours when he was wounded in a May 31 rocket attack outside the Camp Liberty PX.
Now, he says the shrapnel wound in his thigh has become infected and he blames the dusty conditions at Camp Stryker for ongoing medical problems.
“I can’t keep it clean in this place,” said Morris, a member of the 148th Support Battalion’s Dublin-based Alpha Company. “I’ve got to walk a quarter-mile on crutches just to get the bandage changed.”
Morris said he had gone to the PX to buy sunglasses and call his girlfriend and let her know he had arrived safely in Iraq when the rocket struck without warning.
The explosion killed one soldier and seriously injured two members of the 48th Brigade. Morris said his wound was considered minor, but he says he hasn’t returned to work because his leg is too swollen to wear his military uniform.
“All I heard at the time was the blast,” he said of the 7:15 p.m. attack. “It didn’t seem real. It was more like something you’d see on TV.”
Three seriously injured in mortar attack on St. Michael
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Stryker, Iraq — Three Georgia Army National Guard soldiers were seriously wounded Sunday in a mortar attack on Forward Operating Base St. Michael south of Baghdad that left four other soldiers and one civilian injured, military officials here said.
The three were members of the 1st Battalion 108th Armor Regiment of the 48th Brigade Combat Team that is occupying Forward Operating Base St. Michael in the city of Mahmudiyah.
The civilian casualty also was seriously wounded, and he and the three 108th soldiers were taken to a military hospital in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, said 2nd Lt. Selena Owens, spokeswoman for the 48th.
The other four “were treated at the aid station and returned to duty,” Owens said.
The names of the injured and the extent of their injuries were not released.
This is the second incident in less than two weeks in which 48th Brigade soldiers were seriously injured in rocket or mortar attacks in Iraq.
On May 31, Pfc. Vanessa Harris, 21, of Hephzibah and Clyde Miller, 47, of Colquitt were hurt in a rocket attack at Camp Liberty near Baghdad International Airport.
Harris suffered a closed skull fracture and was flown to Germany for treatment before being sent to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.
Miller was being treated at a military medical facility in Germany, but National Guard officials would not release any additional information about him, including his rank.
Three Illinois Army National Guard soldiers attached to the 48th Brigade also were wounded in that attack.
After Sunday’s attack at the St. Michael base, low visibility because of high winds and a sandstorm prevented helicopters from airlifting the casualties to Baghdad. They were taken to the hospital in a ground convoy. St. Michael is about 20 miles south of Baghdad, and a one-way drive to the Green Zone typically takes about 90 minutes.
The attack occurred at 8:51 a.m. local time, 12:51 a.m. EDT.
St. Michael, a relatively small base, has been the target of frequent insurgent mortar and rocket attacks throughout the U.S. occupation.
Marines who initially built the camp around a bombed-out chicken-processing plant nicknamed it “Camp Incoming” because of the amount of insurgent fire.
There have been relatively few mortar or rocket attacks since the 108th moved into the facility about two weeks ago.
Their move coincided with a major Iraqi army and American military sweep of the predominantly Sunni area that netted 263 suspected insurgents.
Soldiers attached to the 108th also are based at several smaller facilities in the Mahmudiyah area.
Compared to other camps, Stryker is the Four Seasons
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Camp Stryker, Iraq —- The 48th Brigade Combat Team’s headquarters here is considered the low-rent district in the sprawling military complex that surrounds the Baghdad International Airport.
Originally built as a transition area for soldiers on the move, Stryker’s dust-covered tents and trailers are likely to be home to about 3,000 of the brigade’s members for most, if not all, of their year-long deployment.
Compared to the far smaller facilities to the south like Row, St. Joe and St. Michael, however, Stryker is like the Four Seasons.
There’s 24-hour food provided by KBR — not Army cooks — and it’s excellent. The tents have full-time electricity and wood-framed doors that cut down on dust and allow soldiers to walk in and out without crouching. There’s Internet access around the clock and AT&T phone service. Indian barbers charge $3 for a haircut, and that includes a neck-snapping chiropractic adjustment — whether the customer asks for one or not.
The outhouses are emptied twice a day without fail — an important consideration in a place where daytime temperatures commonly reach 115 degrees.
Knowing they’re likely to be here awhile, soldiers from the 48th have launched into home improvements with gusto. Many have swept and mopped their plywood floors, added partitions and purchased refrigerators, chairs and fans.
Foam mattresses are big sellers at the PX and privately owned “hajji shop.”
Soldiers place the mattresses on top of their military canvas cots, a move they say is well worth $12.95 price for thin mattresses and $20 for thicker ones. Both come in washable, zippered sleeves.
“You’ve got to do what you can to make it more like home,” said Spc. Lawanda Brown, 25, of Dublin, a human resources specialist at Rockwell Automation in civilian life and a member of the 148th Service Battalion’s Alpha Company. “Family pictures, sheets, comforters, music and DVDs. All of those things help get you through.”
DVDs are particularly popular here because they’re cheap. Pirated copies of current movies such as “Cinderella Man” are openly sold in the hajji shop for as little as $1, and no one seems particularly concerned about thorny intellectual property issues.
In fact, the knowledge that movie makers get stiffed is a plus to some.
Sgt. David Parrott, 33, of Americus, a firefighter and emergency medical technician at home, bought a double feature containing Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9-11”, a critique of the Bush administration’s war in Iraq, because he knew the controversial Moore wouldn’t get anything out of the transaction.
“The only reason I felt good about buying it was that I knew (Moore) wasn’t going to get one cent of my money,” said Parrott, who works at the 48th Brigade’s headquarters. “I’ve read the reviews. I want to see other points of view. But I couldn’t have bought it in good conscience knowing it was going to make that guy one cent richer.”
From the absurdity file
48th Brigade soldiers ona two-day convoy to Baghdad were ordered to remove plastic labels from their water bottles before they entered Iraq. The labels showed the water had been bottled in Kuwait, and at least one officer was afraid they would betray the “secret” that American military personnel and equipment have been flooding into Iraq from massive staging bases in Kuwait since the 2003 invasion. (When the convoy got to Iraq, soldiers found Kuwaiti water on sale at every stop.)
About mail:
Letters and packages can be sent to 48th Brigade members using the following address as an example. Letters can arrive in as little as one week, and packages take about three weeks. Even if units move, this mailing address will stay with them.
Pfc. Audie Murphy
HHC 48th BCT
APO AE 09372
IEDs can spell death for patrols
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base, St. Michael, Iraq — In a crumbling brick hut set about 100 yards off the narrow, two-lane road U.S. soldiers call Route Fat Boy, the lookout had waited patiently for many days for a military convoy to pass.
Dozens of water bottles had been emptied and discarded in a corner of the barren earthen structure, as well as a few cans of fish and plastic wrappers that once held crackers.
A small fireplace used for cooking was in one corner of the hut and flimsy metal cot had been placed beneath the tiny window that provided the spotter’s only view of his target.
The window itself was about a foot square, bordered by a splintery wood frame. The hut had no plumbing or electricity — but it had everything the spotter needed to detonate an “improvised explosive device,” the most deadly weapon insurgents now in use against American soldiers.
The lookout had a clear line of sight to the road and could instantly trigger the explosive hidden there with a cell phone or other wireless device. Next to the road, a line of evenly spaced power lines provided a low-tech but effective way to gauge the convoy’s speed.
“All he’s got to be able to do is count,” said Lt. Col. John King, commander of the 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment, who discovered the hiding place on an impromptu patrol with Sgt. Tim Hass. “Once they know how long it takes for a vehicle to go between two poles, they can anticipate how long it will take to get to their IED.”
King, of Doraville, and Hass, of Kennesaw, came upon the lookout’s hiding place at the end of a spontaneous hour-long search that highlighted some of the difficulties they face here.
Fat Boy - named for a Harley-Davidson motorcycle - parallels an irrigation canal. Insurgents can quickly tunnel horizontally into the soft soil underneath the blacktop and place IEDs - usually artillery or large mortar shells, but occasionaly bombs as large as 250 pounds.
In this part-urban, part-rural area south of Baghdad, IEDs have destroyed large armored military vehicles and killed dozens of soldiers.
The 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers were on their way home from a nearby military base when a member of their convoy spotted a freshly dug mound beside the road that they suspected concealed an IED.
The soldiers stayed away, drove some of their vehicles off the road and began searching nearby homes and buildings for suspects.
Two soldiers entered a rural family’s home, a ramshackle place with a large chicken coop attached. Without an interpreter, they used hand motions to describe their intentions.
While they searched the home, another soldier spotted what he described as a man running away from the road, and the soldiers hurried to catch him. They came upon another home where they discovered the person they were looking for — a tall, lanky boy who appeared in his early teens.
The soldiers spoke to a man, apparently the boy’s father, who communicated that the boy had been playing with his brother. Then the soldiers left to search other homes and buildings in a more populated area on the other side of the road.
After inspecting several homes, King and Hass — both police officers in their civilian lives — discovered the lookout’s hiding place near the road.
A quick burst of several rifle shots rang out and the soldiers rushed toward the sound of the firing. They discovered the shots had come from a member of their own team as a warning to several approaching dogs.
The search almost finished when an American bomb detection team arrived. They soon determined the suspected IED was a fake.
Was the whole exercise a mistake? Or are insurgents using a new tactic by intentionally producing false alarms?
Lately, the bomb disposal teams have become high-priority targets. Insurgents call in false reports and shoot at the bomb specialists or set secondary explosives to try to kill them.
Certainly, the soldiers had helped their cause by finding the lookout’s hiding place. But had they alienated people with their aggressive tactics?
It was impossible to know.
Hass, a Cobb County motorcycle cop, said the soldiers had responded appropriately and professionally. He said they will continue to refine their tactics and build confidence in each other and Iraqis during their year-long deployment here.
But the big, affable former Marine said he was frustrated by his inability to communicate with Iraqis — particularly the young ones.
“I hate scaring little kids,” Hass said. “They look at me like I’m a giant, and for all they know, I’m about to pick them up and eat them. I wish I knew how to reassure them and let them know that I’m really here to help.”
Blackhawk flights hone in on sniper posts, Saddam weapons site
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq — A dozen staff members of the 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment had something akin to a 45-minute out-of-body experience when a pair of UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters took them skimming over the area the Georgia soldiers’ will soon be patrolling.
With the side doors off, the soldiers had a breezy, unobstructed view of the 40-square kilometer area where they plan to live, work and fight for the next 12 months.
As the helicopters flew low Wednesday afternoon over the palm trees, power lines, neighborhoods, canals and the impoverished villages south of Baghdad, soldiers marked potential trouble spots on paper maps. The whole purpose of the aerial reconnaissance was to learn the area and spot places where insurgents might ambush them or hide bombs.
Afterward, Capt. Scott Jackels, commander of the 108th’s Bravo Company, said he was encouraged.
“Now that I’ve seen the terrain, our task seems less daunting,” said Jackels, a DeKalb County police officer. “I know I can put my tanks just about anywhere they might have to go.”
Capt. Brad Buek (pronounced “Book”), a full-time National Guardsman from Chattanooga, Tenn., who spends most of his working hours inside the battalion headquarters, said the flight made the area real to him.
“It’s more than just a picture on a map now,” he said. “It’s a known quantity. I’ve got a better idea of exactly what our patrols encounter when they go out.”
The 108th’s area is marked by stunning contrasts: Mud huts with satellite TV receivers; the emerald Euphrates River, palm trees and irrigated farmland next to parched desert where shepherds, goats and donkeys roam while multi-million dollar, computerized helicopters fly overhead.
The soldiers flew over a vast Saddam-era ammunition factory and storage area that had been ripped apart with savage precision twice in the past 14 years - the 1991 gulf war and again during the 2003 invasion.
Acre upon acre of seemingly impregnable cement buildings surrounded by sand berms were smashed and vacant. The skeletal structures that still stood had telltale holes in the roofs marking where bombs had hit, strewing rubble on all sides.
There were obvious environmental problems, too. Raw sewage flows directly into canals and streams and garbage, abandoned vehicles and industrial waste are strewn haphazardly across the landscape. Still, the soldiers saw flocks of doves, pigeons, egrets, ducks and geese proliferating in the harsh environment.
This area between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers is reputed to have been the site of the Garden of Eden. There are verdant farm fields, and every place that has water is lush and green. Buek, who grew up on a Kansas farm, said he was impressed by the ingenuity of the Iraqi canal builders.
“They really do a good job of moving the water around,” he said. “Not only is it channeled, but they rotate the irrigation system for different crops at different times of the year. That’s not easy.”
Buek said there was only one thing he regretted about the flight.
“The thing I really hate about flying helicopters is that, when I get down, I think, ‘Geez, maybe I should have been an aviator,’” he said.
Deployment can leave families in financial lurch
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
When Sgt. Luther Boyett deployed to Bosnia in 2000, he wanted to make sure his wife had reliable transportation while he was gone.
He leased a new Ford Explorer that he figured would keep Donna Boyett well-wheeled for the five-year term of the deal.
But before the lease ended and before Boyett left for another deployment — this time to Iraq with the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Brigade Combat Team — the car was gone.
Shortly after Thanksgiving last year, just days before Boyett, 55, reported for training at Fort Stewart, a tow truck pulled into the driveway of the Boyetts’ Gulf Breeze, Fla., home. The couple watched their Limited Edition Explorer being carted off, repossessed by the finance company.
For Donna Boyett, 64, who was already having a hard time coping with her husband’s imminent deployment, the repossession seemed grossly unfair.
“It was heartbreaking to see them take it away,” she said. “I knew he was going to go and I wouldn’t have a way to get anywhere. That was the only vehicle we had.”
Car repossessions, home foreclosures, evictions and other financial headaches are not uncommon for soldiers and their families. Money woes can be especially difficult for Guard and Reserve soldiers, who often have to make a rapid switch from civilian to military life when they get called up.
Financial stress at home can also be a distraction for soldiers on military missions.
“I’m in no position to deal with car problems, financial problems or lawsuits at home,” Sgt. Boyett said. “I just want to do what’s right and focus on my mission the best way I know how.”
June Walbert, a certified financial planner and a major in the Army Reserve, said the letter informing a part-time soldier he is about to deploy can sometimes feel like a sucker punch.
“Deployment affects every aspect of a soldier’s life,” said Walbert, who works for USAA, a company that provides insurance and financial services to soldiers and their families. “It’s something they really need to think through and have detailed discussions on.”
Hurricane rebuilding
Although the Boyetts admit they were financially overextended, they managed to keep up with the payments on the auto lease until last summer, when four hurricanes ripped through Florida within six weeks. The Boyetts spent months helping relatives rebuild broken homes. That’s when they fell behind on the payments.
Sgt. Boyett said World Omni Financial Corp. not only repossessed the car but socked the couple with more than $15,000 in penalties and fees that he says were unjustified.
The finance company would not discuss details of the case, citing confidentiality rules.
With the help of a military lawyer in Iraq, Boyett is trying to end the aggressive collection calls he said his wife has been getting and settle the dispute that threatens to distract him from his mission in Iraq.
“My wife is dealing with the stress of me being gone and the financial stress of me taking a pay cut while I’m on active duty,” he said.
Sgt. Boyett, a Vietnam veteran, said his income was cut nearly in half when the 48th Brigade was activated in January and he left his job as an Air Force civilian employee, which he has been for 20 years.
About 30 percent of National Guard soldiers endure pay cuts when they are activated for full-time military service, 40 percent stay at about the same wage level and 30 percent earn more, the Government Accountability Office said.
Boyett said that as a sergeant in a war zone he expects to make about $30,000 over the next 12 months.
“I’m not trying to get out of paying my bills,” he said. “But I’ve already paid for that car.”
Boyett said he has paid $43,000 in lease payments and fees for the Explorer over the last four years. The original sticker price of the car was about $27,500, he said.
But the Boyetts said the company sold the Explorer at auction for about $4,500 and sent them a bill for $21,964. World Omni later offered to settle for $15,000, Sgt. Boyett said.
“It was like when he told them he was going to [Iraq], they really came down hard on him,” his wife said.
Capt. Phil Botwinik, 39, an Atlanta lawyer who is on the 48th Brigade’s legal staff, faults World Omni for failing to give Boyett proper notice of its intention to repossess the car. He suggested the company may have violated the law that gives active-duty soldiers extra protection from punitive actions taken to force payments.
The 2003 law, which replaced the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Civil Relief Act of 1940, was designed to help soldiers who deployed on short notice and found themselves in disputes with landlords, credit card companies and other lenders.
A deployed soldier’s family, for example, cannot be evicted for missing a rent payment that is $2,465 or less a month if the soldier’s ability to pay has been affected by a cut in salary.
“The notice World Omni gave in this case appears inadequate,” Botwinik said. “They didn’t give him enough time to fix the problem, they didn’t allow Sgt. Boyett to be heard, and they bullied him into giving up his car.
“The company ought to realize it’s been adequately compensated already,” the lawyer added.
In a statement, World Omni said the company “has helped many customers with Servicemembers Civil Relief Act claims and will continue to do so in a timely manner. Currently, our records indicate that we have not received a SCRA request for relief from this customer.”
The statement went on to say that World Omni takes “the rights of our service men and women very seriously and encourage them to apply for the benefits provided by the [SCRA].”
33-year-old truck
Rich Strickler, the deployment assistance team manager for USAA, said the law is intended to protect soldiers in trouble but if the Boyetts were unable to make payments before the deployment, they might not find much relief through the law.
Donna Boyett said she is now driving a 1972 GMC pickup that her husband inherited from an uncle. Sgt. Boyett said he worries about his wife’s safety in the 33-year-old truck.
“I bought that [Explorer] because I didn’t want to have to worry that my wife would be stuck by the side of the road while I was deployed in a war zone halfway around the world,” he said. “I’m an old soldier, I was born on the Fourth of July and I’m here because us old soldiers have a responsibility to pass along some of the lessons we’ve learned to the young ones.”
Dave Hirschman can be reached at dhirschman@ajc.com, Moni Basu at mbasu@ajc.com.
Don’t go out without body armor
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq — The Marines used to call this place “Camp Incoming” for the daily rockets and mortars Iraqi insurgents fired at it.
It’s one of the few forward operating bases in the country where soldiers must wear helmets and body armor every time they step outside, even if they’re only making a short trek to an outhouse or shower.
There’s also a total blackout at dusk to make the base less of a target at night.
Only a few insurgent fireworks have landed in or near this dusty compound since soldiers from the 48th Brigade Combat Team arrived, and the troops tend to regard them like springtime lightning; dangerous to be sure, but usually more sound than substance.
Commanders here hint that if all goes well the body armor restriction could be lifted during their yearlong deployment.
“We’re working on expanding the perimeter,” Brigadier Gen. Stewart Rodeheaver, the 48th commander, said during a visit last week. “Hopefully, we’ll make it safe enough our people won’t have to wear their [individual body armor] all the time.”
Unlike other forward bases that tend to be set apart from populated areas, St. Michael is right off Route Jackson, a heavily traveled military supply corridor. That’s part of the reason it’s such a mortar magnet.
Insurgents know that if they launch rockets or mortars from neighborhoods, Americans will be reluctant to shoot back with their heavy artillery for fear of inflicting civilian casualties.
The heart of St. Michael is a military command post set up in a three-story brick building that used to be a chicken processing plant. The non- descript, good-enough-for-government-work structure is still pockmarked from hundreds of bullets that struck it during the 2003 invasion. Now, it bristles with antennae from a vast array of communications gear packed inside.
The Marines, who first took over the chicken factory, and the factory’s current Army residents set up a warren of offices and sleeping quarters on the first floor.
Soldiers consider the chicken factory the high-rent district because people inside sleep on beds instead of cots and the air conditioning runs day and night.
Any American fire marshal would be appalled by the miles of dangling wires and pigeon roosts inside. And any self-respecting building inspector would condemn the place.
Lookouts are posted around the clock in a series of turret-shaped, Medieval-looking guard towers. Any civilian vehicle that stops along the roads by the base is greeted with warning shots.
It’s not uncommon for firefights to break out between guards and insurgents, but they seldom last more than a few minutes because the American firepower is overwhelming.
St. Michael is one of the most austere forward operating bases in Iraq.
Most of the soldiers live in 10-person, Army-issue tents. They’re dark green but quickly turn desert tan when coated with a thick film of moon dust.
The kitchens are manned by soldiers, not civilian contractors known for their better food and service.
The Internet Café is hopelessly jammed at peak hours, and it’s hard to get a telephone line that works reliably.
But the 48th Brigade has plans for upgrades. When the Georgia Army National Guard soldiers replace the current inhabitants near the middle of the month, they plan to rewire the place, clean it and paint it.
They’ve started putting down gravel on the roads to cut down on the powdery, choking dust.
Outside the gates, soldiers encounter scenes that are almost biblical and are replete with shepherds, donkeys, camels and extreme poverty.
Also waiting just outside the gates is the ever-present danger of attacks by insurgents.
There’s little charm in Mahmudiyah itself, a midsized town at the eastern edge of the so-called Sunni Triangle of Death. A ferocious, close-quarters tank battle was fought on the city’s narrow streets three years ago when the 3rd Division based at Fort Stewart plowed through with its Abrams tanks.
The place was shabby then and has grown worse, with buildings falling apart and wrecked cars and garbage strewn everywhere. Now, more than two years after that battle, it’s just about impossible to tell where it took place.
But on the outskirts of the city are spacious, well-kept homes with lush palm groves and well-tended yards. The land looks tremendously fertile with tall grass and trees, and there’s an extensive network of irrigation canals.
Those irrigation canals run parallel to the roads and represent grave danger to the soldiers. Insurgents use them to tunnel into the soft ground underneath the narrow roads to plant bombs � some of them large enough to destroy American tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles.
The roads are deeply cratered in places from violent explosions aimed at U.S. and Iraqi soldiers, and the scrap yard at the base holds the carcasses of military vehicles mangled from the force of the blasts.
Surprisingly, soldiers from the 1st Armor Division who have been here for more than four months say they are reluctant to leave.
First Lt. Alan Hill of Powder Springs, a Georgia Tech graduate, said he wants to continue the progress the group has made. “We know the area, and we’ve learned the enemy’s tactics,” said Hill, 30, a former platoon leader.
“We’ve worked our tails off here, and we’re starting to see results,” he added. “There’s less insurgent activity here now than when we got here, and we expect that trend to continue.”
American greenbacks buy comfort items
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq — Members of the 48th Brigade Combat Team’s finance department arrived here Monday and soldiers started lining up to see them an hour in advance.
Few of the Georgia soldiers brought much cash to Iraq and there aren’t any ATMs around these parts.
The finance department’s arrival enables front-line soldiers to draw against their earnings and buy the big-ticket items they believe will make their lives more comfortable here. Television sets, refrigerators, PlayStation2s, satellite phones and international cell phones are all on the shopping list.
The local PX, or post exchange, stocks a few of those goodies. But discriminating shoppers tend to patronize the “hajii shop,” a locally owned and operated concession run by an enterprising Iraqi family. The owners, who asked not to be identified by name, have a knack for procuring just about anything the soldiers want ranging from electronics to foam mattresses to pirated DVDs.
They don’t offer credit, though, so they’re expecting a surge of business from soldiers suddenly flush with American cash.
The discussion of what soldiers planned to buy quickly shifted to talk of what they wished they could buy but can’t. In no particular order, here are some of the things they listed:
The color green; dogwoods; azaleas; toilets that flush; three-ply toilet paper; running water; Desperate Housewives; walking outside without body armor; clean sheets; their own beds; peanut butter & jelly sandwiches; fried chicken; bass fishing and golf.
Sgt. Joe Dyer, 33, a Polk County police officer from Cedartown, scoffed at his fellow soldiers’ list of absent creature comforts.
“The only thing that matters to me is being away from my boy and my wife,” said Dyer. He and his wife, Raleigh, have a 7-year-old son Ethan and another child on the way.
“You could say I miss golf, too,” Dyer continued. “But it’s the people I play with - not the game itself. The rest is just a bunch of insignificant details.”
From the Absurdity File, Part 1
Despite extremely limited space for equipment and personal gear, soldiers were required to bring bulky biological warfare protection suits to Iraq. No matter that the military has long since given up looking for weapons of mass destruction here.
From the Absurdity File, Part 2
A group of junior enlisted soldiers were swinging a sledgehammers and manually breaking concrete on a sweltering morning when their sergeant informed them, with a straight face, that they were required to perform 30 minutes of daily “PT,” or physical training, because higher-ups were concerned they weren’t getting enough exercise.
Iraqi army buoyed by sweep of rebels
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mahmudiyah, Iraq � Late Saturday night, as Operation Lightning drew to a close after five difficult days, Iraqi soldiers came back to their post with some tangible results of their efforts.
In the cargo bed of each of a dozen brand-new Chevy pickup trucks were five or six suspected insurgents.
The ragged-looking, blindfolded men were hunched down with hands tied and heads bowed, their features spotlighted in the warm desert night by the headlights of the trucks behind them. None of the captives spoke during the slow procession, but scores of off-duty Iraqi soldiers lining the drive hurled taunts and insults at them.
Iraq’s newly minted and largely untested soldiers have been the main targets of a murderous insurgency. Using roadside bombs, suicide bombs and deadly ambushes, insurgents killed more than 700 Iraqis last month, many of them police or military, in addition to 80 American troops.
Now, after the five-day sweep of the cities and towns south of Baghdad involving two Iraqi army brigades, Iraqi soldiers backed by U.S. air and land forces seized tons of explosives and weapons caches, killed 28 suspected insurgents and detained 263 more.
Americans helped plan Operation Lightning and provided much of the hardware and logistical support, including food and water for the Iraqi soldiers. But the Iraqis were up front manning roadblocks and searching houses.
“It was an Iraqi operation,” said Lt. Col. John King, commander of the Georgia Army National Guard’s 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment, which is taking over the U.S. forward operating base here. “They’re the ones who know the area best, and they can spot people who should and shouldn’t be here. We can’t do that.”
Interrogations were taking place at an Iraqi military base where U.S. soldiers said they had little access.
Human rights advocates have accused the Iraqi army and its U.S. advisers of using harsh interrogation techniques that may include torture. But U.S. officials say Iraq is a sovereign nation and the U.S. military cannot intervene.
For the top Iraqi army officer in this region, who goes only by the name Gen. A. Muhammad, going on the offensive and finding so many suspects was a sweet victory.
“We still need to be wary,” said Muhammad, two of whose sons have been killed in ongoing clashes with insurgents. “But these last few days have been good days.”
King said the sweep was designed to ease the transition as soldiers from the Georgia-based 48th Brigade Combat Team take over responsibility for this restive area within the so-called Sunni Triangle of Death.
But he said previous raids in Baghdad have been followed by quick and deadly insurgent reprisals. The day after Iraqi army raids ended in Baghdad a week ago, insurgents detonated six car bombs in quick succession.
“This puts us on the offensive,” said King, 41, Doraville’s police chief in civilian life. “But we have to ramp up security quickly to make sure there’s no power vacuum. We’re not going to sit still and allow the [anti-Iraqi forces] to return.”
Reflecting on smaller Coca-Colas
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq — Soldiers with the 48th Brigade Combat Team seldom discuss the reasons for the war they’re fighting in Iraq.
It’s fairly pointless since they’re already here and their chances for a safe return depend largely on their ability to focus on the specific military tasks at hand - not abstract geo-political debates.
But in a rare moment of reflection, Sgt. Tim Hass shared his theory on the nature of Arab rage against the West.
“It’s all about Coca-Cola,” said Hass, 33, who was drinking from a red soft-drink can at the time.
“You see,” he continued, “the Coke cans are smaller here. They’re about 10 ounces each instead of 12 ounces like we get back home. Hajjis are smart. They’ve probably figured out that they’ve been getting shorted two ounces on every can for all these years. I’d be mad, too.”
The soft-drink cans here typically hold 330 milliliters, about 40 fewer than 12 U.S. ounces. The cans are noticeably shorter, and they have the kind of detachable pull tabs that have been banned in the United States since the 1970s.
Pvt. Dustin Taylor, 19, of Morganton, N.C., an M-1A1 Abrams tank driver for 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment, seemed fascinated by the tabs themselves.
“They look like little exclamation points,” said the sandy-haired soldier born in the mid-1980s. “I’ve never seen them before. They’re pretty cool.”
Note: Last week’s directive not to refer to Arabs as Hajjis has had no impact, except perhaps, to increase its usage.
One town goes to war: Hitting home in Dublin
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Across Georgia, citizen soldiers of the National Guard have marched off to Iraq. In the coming months, the AJC will tell the stories of those left behind in Dublin, home to the 48th Brigade. FIRST ARTICLE
Zap! Bing! Electronic gadgets much in demand
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq — The “Baby Wipe Phase” of the war in Iraq is over.
U.S. soldiers now have broad access to running water, hot showers and personal hygiene that they lacked during and shortly after the 2003 invasion when they camped in the desert for weeks and months at a time.
They don’t need Gatorade or soft drinks, either. The Army buys that stuff in quantities that would fill Olympic-size swimming pools.
The ongoing conflict has now entered what could be called the “Circuit City Phase.”
Soldiers covet expensive electronic gadgets. Satellite phones, international cell phones, Blackberries, DVD players, PlayStations, GameBoys — those are the things they feel would most improve their lives here.
“When you’re on duty, you’re on duty and you have to be totally focused,” said Sgt. 1st Class Omar Patterson, 39, of Calhoun, attached to the 108th Armor Regiment in Mahmudiyah. “But when you’re off, you need to do something completely different.”
The post exchange here, a military version of a general store, is about to get a pallet-sized load of PlayStation 2s — and soldiers are already lining up to buy them. Two sergeants from the 108th offered to pay for theirs in advance. When the store clerk pointed out he hadn’t told them how much the gadgets would cost, the soldiers said it didn’t matter.
“Price is irrelevant,” said Sgt. Timothy Hass, a Cobb County motorcycle cop. “We’ve just got to get those PlayStations as soon as they come in.”
Road rules are no rules in Iraq
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
If there’s such a thing as driver “re-education,” the Georgia soldiers are going to need it when they get home.
On the roads here in Iraq, they drive military convoys down the center — and everyone else has to get out of the way. They don’t slow down for pedestrians, and any car that tries to pass or get in between the military vehicles is likely to get shot.
If U.S. soldiers get stuck in traffic, they’re taught to push other cars out of the way, jump curbs and medians and do whatever they have to do to keep moving.
The reasons for these Darwinian rules have been learned through bitter experience. Insurgents place deadly explosives on roadsides and detonate them when convoys pass. Suicide bombers turn their cars into rolling, four-wheeled explosives and target military vehicles. And U.S. soldiers are most vulnerable to ambush when they’re stopped.
Cpl. Rodney Bettis, a member of the Atlanta Police Department’s motorcycle squad, says the first rule for driving in Iraq is knowing that “There are no rules.”
“There are no street signs, stop signs or speed limits,” he said. “The bigger vehicle, the faster vehicle, always wins.”
Sgt. Joe Picon, a member of the Gordon County Sheriff’s Department, has been astounded by Iraqi driving practices.
“I could fill my ticket quota in an hour,” said Picon, 40. “Road rage is normal here. Get out of the way or get dinged.”
Five members of 48th injured in mortar attack; two treated in Germany
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
One soldier was killed and 16 wounded — including five from Georgia’s 48th Brigade Combat Team — in a rocket attack near the Baghdad airport, military and congressional officials said Thursday.
Two of the soldiers are from Georgia, one of whom suffered serious injuries and was flown to Germany for treatment.
The other three are from an Illinois unit attached to the Georgia brigade. One is also being treated in Germany. The others suffered minor injuries and were treated and returned to duty, said 2nd Lt. Selena Owens, a spokeswoman for the 48th Brigade.
According to authorities:
— Vanessa Harris, a member of the 148th Support Battalion, Bravo Company, suffered a depressed skull fracture and was flown to a U.S. military hospital in Germany.
— Sean Broderick, a member of the Illinois-based 2/130 Infantry, suffered shrapnel wounds to the head, back and abdomen and also is being treated in Germany.
— Clyde Miller, a member of the 148th Support Battalion, Alpha Company, was being treated at a temporary military hospital in Baghdad’s heavily fortified “Green Zone.”
Tracy Colber and Jack Dorset, both of the 2/130, were treated and returned to duty.
Soldiers at the sprawling Camp Liberty complex near Baghdad International Airport are not required to wear helmets and flak jackets while they are within the walls of the compound.
Doug Moore, spokesman for U.S. Rep. Jim Marshall, said the Pentagon notified Marshall’s office of the incident. The 48th is headquartered in Macon, which is in Marshall’s district.
In addition, Owens said two of the Georgia soldiers were with the 148th Support Battalion, which is based in Forsyth, just north of Macon.
The injuries were the first combat casualties suffered by the 48th since the brigade’s combat team started arriving in Iraq about a week ago for a yearlong deployment.
It was not known how long the wounded soldiers had been in Iraq, but some members of the 148th arrived only Monday.
Lt. Col. Steve Boylan, a military spokesman in Baghdad, said the dead and injured “were a combination of civilian and military casualties.”
Boylan said the slain soldier, whose name has not been released, was with the 155th Brigade Combat Team from the Mississippi Army National Guard.
Several of the wounded were from the 256th Brigade Combat Team from the Louisiana National Guard.
The rocket attack was the second at the base in the last four days.
The blast occurred about 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in a plaza area at Camp Liberty on the north end of the airport where soldiers gather to board shuttle buses for other parts of the sprawling complex.
Most of the 48th’s units are at Camp Stryker, on the south end of the airport, which has fewer amenities. The 48th initially was supposed to be stationed at Camp Liberty but its orders were changed just a few weeks ago.
The plaza is near a large post exchange that includes Popeyes Chicken and Burger King restaurants.
The PX at Camp Liberty is famous in Iraq for its wide selection of goods that help soldiers feel a little bit closer to home.
Soldiers can get anything at the PX from a 50-cent granola bar to a 42-inch plasma-screen television set that sells for $3,499.
Spc. Rakesh Pal, 23, of Modesto, Calif., told The Associated Press that he likes to hang out at the Liberty PX even if he doesn’t buy anything.
“It reminds me of being back home at the mall,” he said. “It doesn’t feel like I’m in Iraq when I’m in the PX.”
The PX shut down immediately after the attack but reopened Wednesday morning.
AJC staff writers can be reached at: Dave Hirschman, dhirschman@ajc.com; Ron Martz, rmartz@ajc.com. Staff writer Moni Basu in Atlanta and wire services contributed to this article.
Staying connected is a chore
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Curtis Compton/AJC
Sgt. Monte Franks, 35, of Rock Mart holds a picture of his son, Tristan, 8, and daughter, Rose, 5, as he talks with them and his wife, Cari, from the Internet Cafe. Franks said his daughter said, “Daddy, you can hold a picture of me when you talk to me on the phone.”
Forward Operating Base St. Michael, Iraq - As a result of numerous e-mails from families and friends of 48th Brigade Combat Team soldiers asking why they haven’t heard from their loved ones yet, I thought it appropriate to provide a short description of some of the things they must do here to reach out to people at home.
The “Internet Cafe” at this base is about the size of a double-wide trailer. It sits in a dusty corner of this dusty place, surrounded by concrete walls that protect it from daily mortar and rocket attacks.
Soldiers are required to wear helmets and body armor whenever they venture outside, but they can shed them once inside. A wooden rack between the walls provides a place to stow the heavy, protective gear while the soldiers are online.
Inside the trailer are 10 phones and 20 personal computers, only about two-thirds of which are functioning at any particular time. That average is remarkable since most of the computer equipment is at least 10 years old. If there’s a heaven for office equipment, this stuff will surely go there because its life on this earth has been hellish.
Laptops with smashed and broken keys are linked to separate keyboards so that they can still function. And even those keyboards are cheap throw-aways whose springs are worn out and keys stick from years of hard use.
The one I’m working on now, for example, requires forceful pinky fingers to make capitals because the “shift” keys must be held down firmly.
To get to the phones and computers, soldiers have to wait for 30 minutes or more at peak times. The most desired online times are first thing in the morning, while it’s still late evening at home, or, late at night, when it’s early afternoon at home. (Iraq is eight hours ahead of Georgia time.)
Soldiers, particularly the younger ones, prefer Instant Messaging and video conferencing to straight e-mail, so they fill the Internet Cafe during hours their friends are likely to be online. In “researching” this story, I glanced at the computer screens of a few instant messagers around me to find out what they were talking about.
I was always pretty good at sneaking peaks at smarter kids’ test sheets at school, so I figured my chances of getting caught in this breach of Internet etiquette were pretty slim.
But my blushing face might have easily given me away. These Army boys and girls aren’t shy about describing exactly what they intend to do to each other when they get home, the manner in which they will do it or the duration of the activities.
The computers operate at a glacial pace, especially when the Internet Cafe is full of phone users. The phones work on “voice over Internet protocol,” so they demand lots of bandwidth.
When the phone lines are full, which is virtually all the time, the Internet slows to a trickle. Simply checking e-mail or sending a few text messages is a time-consuming process — and each soldier is limited to 30 minutes.
Some soldiers say they prefer e-mail or even hand-written letters to telephone calls. There’s an awkward pause as the signal makes its way around the world, and it’s easy to feel tongue-tied and clumsy. The soldiers want to put on a brave face, but hearing loneliness and hurt in a spouse or child’s voice is almost too much to bear when they know there’s nothing they can do to fix it from 8,400 miles away.
Also, it’s hard for those of us who have never been in the military to realize how hard soldiers in a war zone work. It’s not an 8-to-5 job.
On the short walk here, I passed a group of soldiers in about half a dozen armored Humvees who had recently finished a combat patrol. Evidently, they were still on call because their vehicles were idling and they were dressed in full “battle rattle” despite the stifling mid-afternoon heat.
I nodded at one of the drivers but he ignored me. Then I noticed the soldier in the back of his Hummer was flopped face-down in the baggage area, sound asleep atop a mountain of gear. As I continued walking, I encountered a group of about five more soldiers who had found a rare bit of shade. They were sprawled on the filthy ground, rifles beside them, exhausted.
It was only then that I realized the driver who had ignored me wasn’t being rude. Strapped into the driver’s seat, rifle on his lap, he wasn’t even awake.
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