THE NIGHT THE BOOM BOOMS GOT TOO CLOSE

From the third month of our stay at Baghdad International Airport, the base was mortared and rocketed at least once a week. The rounds never made it over to our side of the airport. They usually impacted on the West side, on the other side of the runway, and always at night.

After we heard the explosions, we would scramble out of our building and look to the West, to spot the inevitable flames, black clouds and the flashing red lights of the emergency vehicles. Even though we were in a combat zone, even though we were on the same base as the units that got hit, I always thought of their predicament as Somebody Else’s War. And I would always say to myself:

“I’m glad I don’t live over there.”

Checkpoint One, the main entrance to BIAP, was attacked at night several times in the Fall of 2003. It had to be one of the most heavily guarded gates in all of Iraq, and one of the most important, because it was the entrance to a major transportation hub, and therefore a key to rebuilding Iraq. That’s why the Coalition Forces didn’t screw around when it was time to defend it. They called in the AC-130 Specter gunship, (aka Spooky) an unholy alliance between one of those Hercules transports and one badass machine gun. That gun spit out 6000 rounds per minute and was guided by radar. When it fired, it spit out a seemingly unbroken stream of fire. To give some perspective, every fifth bullet coming down is a tracer, or incendiary marking round. Needless to say, if you get hit by one of those guns, you’re no longer much good to anybody. They say your immune system breaks down.....

“I’m glad I’m not an insurgent.”

For some stupid ass reason, every time Spooky arrived to crash the party, some of us would climb the 8 stories of the Crack House and watch the show from the roof. We would almost always comment that that was not really a smart thing to do. And almost always, we would do the same thing the next time Spooky arrived to clean up.

The insurgents waited until nightfall to attack; the Explosive Ordnance Disposal personnel used the daylight hours to rattle our nerves. Both the Army and Air Force bomb squads would hold controlled detonations just about every hour. We were able to distinguish between both groups’ handiwork because the Army would give a warning over the radio net. The Air Force, because they thought they were better than the Army and chafed at their regulations and procedures, blew off this practice and sent chunks of Iraqi real estate skyward at frequent and irregular intervals.

And then, finally, the rockets made it over to our patch.

I had just come back from leave for 2 weeks in the States. When I arrived on my flight from Kuwait, bringing me back to reality, one of the sergeants in my battalion arrived to take me back to the Crack House. I casually asked him how things had been since I was gone. He began to hem and haw and tried to avoid the question.

“Well…”
“What do you mean by ‘Well’?”
“Well, we’ve been getting hit by rockets on our side for about the last 3 nights.”
“Hey. That’s great…”

The bad guys left me alone that night. I started to feel like I had brought some good luck with me from home. But in any case, the next evening, the luck ran out.

I was downstairs on the first floor, in our internet cafe, christened the Naughahyde Ballroom in honor of the vinyl chairs and couches in there. Just 10 personal computers in a perpetually dusty room with an entertainment center at one end. It was all connected to civilization via satellite; our little pocket of Normal. I was checking my e-mail along with some other soldiers when the keyboard suddenly rose up and hit my chin. The room was shaking and a noise so loud that it seemed to be part of me resonated through the building. Dust and bits of plaster streamed down from the ceiling. The windows above our heads, only weeks before taped up to reduce the spraying of shattered glass, did just that, blowing inwards and sending shards sliding down the walls.

My heart’s pounding. I can’t breathe, choking on fine dust. My body’s shaking like a blender and my legs feel like they’re rooted in the floor. Somehow, I remember I’m getting paid to be decisive and I break into a run, beginning to shout for everybody to get on the floor. But before I can yell anything coherent, I trip over a power cable and perform a Triple Salchow over the back of one of the couches. Just about knocks the wind out of me. My only thought: Four short days ago, I was making a snowman with my two young sons, and now I want to pull my buttons off to get closer to the floor.

“Why did I come back here?”

Another blast rocks the building. And then, silence.

I can hear people yelling close by, and I run outside. Remembering there was an MCI phone trailer in the parking lot outside our courtyard, I’m praying that none of the dozen or so troops waiting in line were hit.

I strain to see into the dark parking lot. And then I see them: a dozen scared kids streaming into our little courtyard. None of them seems to be wounded; at least I see no blood. In the background I can see 3 soldiers who got back in line for the phones, not willing to let the fireworks dissuade them from calling home.

As it turned out, there were 3 rockets, and all three passed VERY close by our building; we’re talking only about 200 yards, judging from the flight path. Two of them impacted near the MCI trailer, but on the other side of some really big trucks, which shielded all those young soldiers. The two missiles also turned a couple of large generators into avante garde metal sculptures. I counted at least 100 holes in one of them.

THE FEDAYEEN ROD AND GUN CLUB

To the west of Abu Ghraib, on the road to Fallujah, there was an open air market where one could buy anything, including weapons. Of course, no self-respecting terrorist would shell out serious money for an AK-47 without trying it out. This made American soldiers somewhat nervous. There was always gunfire coming from that market; you just never knew if you were getting attacked or an Iraqi was merely checking out the merchandise.

Another disconcerting habit of the Iraqis was the practice of firing weapons in the air at weddings and other celebrations. Whatever happened to the Dollar Dance?!

MEET UNCLE SUGAR

That was my unofficial callsign for most of the deployment.
I was one of the guys who carried wads of money around, paying off the Iraqi contractors and buying supplies off the local economy.
This caused me to be very nervous whenever I had to crack open the safe, as evidenced by the very tense expression on my face. By the way, this is a VERY bad picture. I was under considerable stress.

This site is a chronicle of my year as a Civil Affairs Officer during Operation Iraqi Freedom I. These posts will form the framework of a book I'm writing about my experiences during that time. The book is tentatively titled: A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Iraqi Sovereignty. It covers all the stupid, idiotic, funny, ridiculuous, and sometimes heart-breaking episodes of my year in a combat zone.

This blog will not be a bully-pulpit for topics like Bush-bashing, whether we were justified in invading Iraq, should we nuke the whole region, would people welcome a Survivor: Iraq, etc. People who join the military do not have the luxury of choosing which conflict in which they will fight. I love my country. I will NOT trash it or its elected leaders, irregardless of their political affilliation. This book is about what happens when humans are plucked out of their everyday lives and thrown into a stressful situation miles from home. It brings out the best and the worst in people; my chapters will discuss both. My goal is to make you think you were there.