.AP Weblog: Things change fast in Iraq
Associated Press writer Lauren Frayer is embedded with the Army's 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry, 172nd Stryker Brigade in Iraq. Below are reports of her experiences with the unit.
Friday, Nov. 17
ABOARD A BLACK HAWK HELICOPTER over Balad, Iraq - I'm the sole passenger on a Black Hawk flight from Forward Operating Base Speicher, in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, back to Baghdad. It wasn't supposed to be this way, but a team from the Pentagon missed its connecting flight, so I'm alone with the pilot, co-pilot and two gunners.
The crew takes a liking to this solo reporter, and they toss me a pair of headphones to listen in on their communications with air traffic controllers and one another. Some of it is hilarious - the banter of 20-year-old men who've forgotten a woman, let alone a reporter, is listening. But some of it is tactical stuff I'd rather not know.
They reminisce about flying over crystal blue bays in Hawaii, where the Army's 25th Infantry Division is based, and they place bets on whether they'll make it back to camp in time for "midnight chow" - the hour-long window when the dining hall opens for night staffers.
Then a more serious voice crackles through: "Enemy activity below. Small arms fire. IA (Iraqi army) engaged." Since we've only got one passenger, can we divert mission and check out the firefight below? No problem, the pilot says.
I shudder - this isn't what I bargained for. I've got my story already and am just trying to get home. But it's too late.
Down we dive, in a spiraling flight pattern that makes me glad I haven't eaten in 8 hours. Flying 300 feet off the ground, we're nearly grazing the treetops. "Power lines on the right - look out!" a voice warns from the ether.
Gunfire erupts around a grove of trees, and I can't tell whether it's incoming. I look up at the gunner in front of me, so close our knees are touching. He's grasping his weapon with both hands. A moment ago, he had his helmet off and was chomping on a macadamia nut cookie.
All of a sudden the dark green patch below is illuminated by a search light on the belly of the helicopter, and there's some movement of shadowy figures. They look like Iraqi army uniforms, but I can't quite tell. You can buy the uniforms in the local bazaar, I'm told.
The spiral movement - we must have spun in a tight circle 50 times - creates a wind tunnel between the gunners' windows. Iraq is mostly desert with no humidity, and November is blustery cold. Blasts of brisk air strafe my face, and I try to wiggle down into my flak jacket to stay warm.
Panic is a funny thing - you have no idea how much time passes. But thankfully it does. The pilot radios down to base: "Sorry I have to peel off, sir. We're running low on fuel."
And just as quickly as we entered the spiral, we break off and sail straight for Baghdad - a city I never thought I'd be so excited to see.
---
Friday, Nov. 10, 1:30 a.m. local time
CAMP TAJI, north of Baghdad - Last night, shadowy insurgents lobbed mortars into the empty air field several hours after I'd landed in a Black Hawk helicopter. No one was hurt.
"Some sissies run for cover, but those of us who've been here long enough have learned to sleep through it," says a soldier giving me a lift to the mess hall.
The door of the humvee we're riding in no longer has a latch, and I tie it shut with a shoelace. It's a small example of the adapting soldiers here have had to do. As Donald Rumsfeld famously said, "You go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you might want or wish to have." He submitted his resignation two days ago, but it's business as usual at Camp Taji.
I'm embedded with the Army's 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry, 172nd Stryker Brigade - an infantry unit trained for combat. But every day, the soldiers in this unit find themselves in other roles they didn't train for: policeman, community service coordinator, engineer.
The Stryker vehicles we ride around in are designed to transport large numbers of soldiers to the battlefield quickly and safely. Instead they're being used on slow patrols through dense urban areas. One of the snipers on the squad has never fired a shot from his specialized rifle, after 15 months in Iraq. A fire support officer in charge of outgoing artillery was relegated to a job answering phones, because these troops have never launched an offensive artillery barrage. The phone has rung once in the past week, he said.
---
Thursday, Nov. 9, 10:30 p.m. local time
CAMP TAJI, north of Baghdad - The smell of diesel fuel wafts across this makeshift American city built on the ruins of one of Saddam's military bases. Dust breezes through the brick shells of old Iraqi army barracks the Americans decided not to use. Nice new stucco barracks festooned with U.S. flags and sandbagged windows line the gravely roads, where 20-something American men jog briskly under a clear black sky dotted with stars.
At this U.S. Army base north of Baghdad, there are five Christian chapels, a swimming pool, a movie theater and your choice of Burger King, Pizza Hut or Taco Bell. There's Fox News, Georgia drawls and real bacon.
It's the only place I've been in the Middle East where I can't hear a mosque's call to prayer.
We're smack in the middle of a Sunni Muslim area, somewhere between the Iraqi capital and Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit. The towns surrounding us are exactly where Saddam's fellow Sunni loyalists could rise up and unleash a barrage of attacks in response to the deposed leader's death sentence a few days ago. It hasn't happened yet, but these soldiers are on guard for it.
They're also wary of more IEDs - improvised explosive devices, or roadside bombs - that mostly Sunni insurgents plant along our route into the city. There could be more in these days following Saddam's verdict, but we won't know for sure until we hit one.
We've been patrolling some of Baghdad's roughest neighborhoods, and so far I feel safe in the Stryker vehicle we're in - a sort of half-tank, half-humvee with lots of armor and fast tires. It's designed to get 10 men into a battle zone quickly. When one of these guys is injured, it's faster to peel out in the Stryker and take them to a field hospital ourselves than call for an airlift. The guys here say they run over IEDs and just keep driving, the armor is so strong. I hope I'll just have to take their word for it.
---
Wednesday, Nov. 8, 5:30 p.m. local time
LZ Washington, Green Zone, Baghdad - We're all wearing earplugs to deaden the roar of the choppers, so we read lips and use hand gestures to communicate. "Sit there, strap yourself in," the airman motions to me. And then we're off, rising high above Baghdad on my first Black Hawk ride.
We swerve from side to side and I see tiny plumes of smoke rising up toward us from two-story buildings in nondescript slums. I learn later that it was someone shooting at us from below and the pilot's back-and-forth swerving makes it difficult for snipers to hit us.
The city is beautiful from above, blocks and blocks of square squat stucco houses painted pink and yellow. Dilapidated old cars cram tiny side streets but on the highways there are only convoys of SUVs spaced equidistant from one another, racing toward the airport or the Green Zone. Parts of the city are verdant, with small vegetable plots behind houses, and there's a grove of fir trees in one spot.
From here, it's hard to imagine the killing going on below.
Mercury News
Friday, Nov. 17
ABOARD A BLACK HAWK HELICOPTER over Balad, Iraq - I'm the sole passenger on a Black Hawk flight from Forward Operating Base Speicher, in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, back to Baghdad. It wasn't supposed to be this way, but a team from the Pentagon missed its connecting flight, so I'm alone with the pilot, co-pilot and two gunners.
The crew takes a liking to this solo reporter, and they toss me a pair of headphones to listen in on their communications with air traffic controllers and one another. Some of it is hilarious - the banter of 20-year-old men who've forgotten a woman, let alone a reporter, is listening. But some of it is tactical stuff I'd rather not know.
They reminisce about flying over crystal blue bays in Hawaii, where the Army's 25th Infantry Division is based, and they place bets on whether they'll make it back to camp in time for "midnight chow" - the hour-long window when the dining hall opens for night staffers.
Then a more serious voice crackles through: "Enemy activity below. Small arms fire. IA (Iraqi army) engaged." Since we've only got one passenger, can we divert mission and check out the firefight below? No problem, the pilot says.
I shudder - this isn't what I bargained for. I've got my story already and am just trying to get home. But it's too late.
Down we dive, in a spiraling flight pattern that makes me glad I haven't eaten in 8 hours. Flying 300 feet off the ground, we're nearly grazing the treetops. "Power lines on the right - look out!" a voice warns from the ether.
Gunfire erupts around a grove of trees, and I can't tell whether it's incoming. I look up at the gunner in front of me, so close our knees are touching. He's grasping his weapon with both hands. A moment ago, he had his helmet off and was chomping on a macadamia nut cookie.
All of a sudden the dark green patch below is illuminated by a search light on the belly of the helicopter, and there's some movement of shadowy figures. They look like Iraqi army uniforms, but I can't quite tell. You can buy the uniforms in the local bazaar, I'm told.
The spiral movement - we must have spun in a tight circle 50 times - creates a wind tunnel between the gunners' windows. Iraq is mostly desert with no humidity, and November is blustery cold. Blasts of brisk air strafe my face, and I try to wiggle down into my flak jacket to stay warm.
Panic is a funny thing - you have no idea how much time passes. But thankfully it does. The pilot radios down to base: "Sorry I have to peel off, sir. We're running low on fuel."
And just as quickly as we entered the spiral, we break off and sail straight for Baghdad - a city I never thought I'd be so excited to see.
---
Friday, Nov. 10, 1:30 a.m. local time
CAMP TAJI, north of Baghdad - Last night, shadowy insurgents lobbed mortars into the empty air field several hours after I'd landed in a Black Hawk helicopter. No one was hurt.
"Some sissies run for cover, but those of us who've been here long enough have learned to sleep through it," says a soldier giving me a lift to the mess hall.
The door of the humvee we're riding in no longer has a latch, and I tie it shut with a shoelace. It's a small example of the adapting soldiers here have had to do. As Donald Rumsfeld famously said, "You go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you might want or wish to have." He submitted his resignation two days ago, but it's business as usual at Camp Taji.
I'm embedded with the Army's 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry, 172nd Stryker Brigade - an infantry unit trained for combat. But every day, the soldiers in this unit find themselves in other roles they didn't train for: policeman, community service coordinator, engineer.
The Stryker vehicles we ride around in are designed to transport large numbers of soldiers to the battlefield quickly and safely. Instead they're being used on slow patrols through dense urban areas. One of the snipers on the squad has never fired a shot from his specialized rifle, after 15 months in Iraq. A fire support officer in charge of outgoing artillery was relegated to a job answering phones, because these troops have never launched an offensive artillery barrage. The phone has rung once in the past week, he said.
---
Thursday, Nov. 9, 10:30 p.m. local time
CAMP TAJI, north of Baghdad - The smell of diesel fuel wafts across this makeshift American city built on the ruins of one of Saddam's military bases. Dust breezes through the brick shells of old Iraqi army barracks the Americans decided not to use. Nice new stucco barracks festooned with U.S. flags and sandbagged windows line the gravely roads, where 20-something American men jog briskly under a clear black sky dotted with stars.
At this U.S. Army base north of Baghdad, there are five Christian chapels, a swimming pool, a movie theater and your choice of Burger King, Pizza Hut or Taco Bell. There's Fox News, Georgia drawls and real bacon.
It's the only place I've been in the Middle East where I can't hear a mosque's call to prayer.
We're smack in the middle of a Sunni Muslim area, somewhere between the Iraqi capital and Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit. The towns surrounding us are exactly where Saddam's fellow Sunni loyalists could rise up and unleash a barrage of attacks in response to the deposed leader's death sentence a few days ago. It hasn't happened yet, but these soldiers are on guard for it.
They're also wary of more IEDs - improvised explosive devices, or roadside bombs - that mostly Sunni insurgents plant along our route into the city. There could be more in these days following Saddam's verdict, but we won't know for sure until we hit one.
We've been patrolling some of Baghdad's roughest neighborhoods, and so far I feel safe in the Stryker vehicle we're in - a sort of half-tank, half-humvee with lots of armor and fast tires. It's designed to get 10 men into a battle zone quickly. When one of these guys is injured, it's faster to peel out in the Stryker and take them to a field hospital ourselves than call for an airlift. The guys here say they run over IEDs and just keep driving, the armor is so strong. I hope I'll just have to take their word for it.
---
Wednesday, Nov. 8, 5:30 p.m. local time
LZ Washington, Green Zone, Baghdad - We're all wearing earplugs to deaden the roar of the choppers, so we read lips and use hand gestures to communicate. "Sit there, strap yourself in," the airman motions to me. And then we're off, rising high above Baghdad on my first Black Hawk ride.
We swerve from side to side and I see tiny plumes of smoke rising up toward us from two-story buildings in nondescript slums. I learn later that it was someone shooting at us from below and the pilot's back-and-forth swerving makes it difficult for snipers to hit us.
The city is beautiful from above, blocks and blocks of square squat stucco houses painted pink and yellow. Dilapidated old cars cram tiny side streets but on the highways there are only convoys of SUVs spaced equidistant from one another, racing toward the airport or the Green Zone. Parts of the city are verdant, with small vegetable plots behind houses, and there's a grove of fir trees in one spot.
From here, it's hard to imagine the killing going on below.
Mercury News
posted by madtom at 10:29 PM
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