Today: While searching for another document, I came across this entry from my Iraq War Diary, written seven years ago yesterday when I was embedded in Mosul for the AP. I kept it on a private listserv at the time but published many entries on the fifth anniversary. Reading it again just now, I thought this was an unusually interesting day as I returned from a holiday break in the States. I attached one of my photos from that day above.

Posted by jim on January 15, 2005 at 23:06:03:

I could write a book about the fiasco that was my trip to Mosul, but that would sound angry and maybe boring, and I could write a lot about the security it takes to move around Baghdad now, but that’s a secret, but my first day back in Mosul was nuts; so, I’ll write about that instead.

Ok first, the one thing worth mentioning about the trip is that I flew up here in on a C-130, a cargo plane set up with long canvas benches for passengers, and no windows, exaggerating the effect of the combat spiral landing feeling a lot like you’re in the middle of a plane crash, right up to the thump and grind of the landing which arrive without warning. Also, it’s not pressurized, so you have to keep pinching your nose and blowing to manage the sinus and eardrum pain, and it’s extra funny to watch everybody else doing the same.

I got in at night and got a lot of bad news, that the 1-24 Infantry Battalion lost seven guys since I was here last, including four in the chow hall attack. Next, a young soldier tells me the Lt. Col. I’ll be riding with gets hit like every day now.

Several more US battalions have moved in since I left and the action has been raging, with numerous car bombs, truck bombs, mortar attacks, murders, and so on. This battalion now has a tank platoon attached, but some of the other new units in town are rolling in Humvees, which I find marginally suicidal in the face of car bombs.

The turf had to be divided for the new units, which led to some disagreement and at least one legendary rumble at which one soldier found his nose broken at the fist of another. Brilliant.

My guys started the day handing out teddy bears to little kids but had to dash off after hearing a large distant explosion, in case they were needed to assist. I missed a nice picture of nervous Iraqis looking out from their front door because I was on the run back to the Stryker, the wheeled armored vehicles used up here. It turned out to be a roadside bomb in another battalion’s AO, or area of operation, and it killed one US soldier, but we never went there. I heard on the radio that they were scooting over to the CASH, or military hospital, but didn’t get the news until I logged on later.

Before we went out, the commander told me that a roadside bomb flipped over a Stryker yesterday, more evidence of the larger explosives they’re facing these days. I asked if everybody was alright and he said “Fine; just broken bones.” At least he gave me a cup of coffee with the news.

On the other hand, the troops have been taking down bigger targets and caches up here lately, so things aren’t totally out of control.

Next, we got into a “Cops in Mosul” style foot chase, with everything but the theme song, after a young guy with a spool of wire, often used for roadside bombs, made tracks as the convoy passed. After a month of eating and drinking everything in sight on my break, I thought my chest was going to explode while I was running, but I kept up, thanks again to all the extra weight these kids are carrying, guns and ammo and all. When we mounted up again, I loosened my flak to breathe better and wondered if there’s a better definition of being wrapped too tight.

Somewhere in the middle of the day, we got news that insurgents were telling shopkeepers to close up and go home on one major route but nothing came of it. Not today anyway.

Next, while we were stopped at a strongpoint, a car drove directly toward our vehicle, continuing after warning shots were fired and even after one was fired into the engine compartment. As the driver came closer, two guys in the hatch above me opened up with everything and blew the car full of holes, killing the driver and setting the shitbox on fire.

If there were artillery shells inside, they never exploded but I’ve seen a lot of less justifiable shooting in Iraq, and with all the car bombs in this specific area, including one in exactly this same spot, I can’t say I blame them. Still they were doing a lot of open rationalizing, maybe trying to convince themselves or each other that they felt the same.

Next, EOD, for explosive ordnance disposal, came in to detonate an artillery shell found nearby, exactly the kind used in so many car bombs and roadside bombs around here, and that made for a decent picture.
We got back to the base for about three minutes before the call came in for a bird down not far form the base. Suiting up again and racing over there felt more like riding in a fire truck than a police car this time, and we were on the scene in no time.

A Kiowa attack helicopter was down in a field and the pilots had taken cover in a small building nearby. The chopper had a six inch hole in the side and was scarred with burns that I later learned most likely resulted from a small arms round that struck a rocket motor on a launcher mounted outside during an engagement across the Tigris on the east side of Mosul. Soldiers set up a perimeter and recovered the air crew while several other helos patrolled overhead. I’m not sure what changed, but after a little while they managed to start it up and fly back to the airfield. Ballsy, I thought.

While I was shooting there, an Air Force officer got all over me like a Philly cop at a baby drowning, telling me to stop shooting and not to leave, but a Major with my guys stepped up to cover me. The weird part was when he told the angry dude that I was “a trusted agent,” which made me queasy because I’m not sure if it means they like me or think they own me, but I’m hoping it’s just their terminology for embeds.

When we were ready to return, there were plenty of troops and Strykers around, but mine was missing, away on some other task that must have taken longer than expected. The platoon Sgt. was very unhappy about this, but the driver defused him beautifully when he pulled up, yelling “I had to drop Jimmy off at soccer.”
My shooting was weak today because I just wasn’t into the rhythm of the work yet, plus my gear was giving me a hard time, but it was a nice little report for my first day back, so I felt pretty good, about my work anyway.

After I shot and edited and sent my stuff, I learned that the battalion lost another soldier to an accidental discharge when an Iraqi National Guard soldier screwed up while clearing his AK and shot and killed the poor guy. I’m told the other soldiers wanted to kill the Iraqi, literally. Very sad stuff. Note: war sucks and stupid people suck, so stupid people should not be allowed near wars.

This was the second friendly fire loss here in three days after a tanker handed a loaded 50cal from his hatch to another guy and it somehow fired and shot him in the face the night before I arrived.
I happened to count down the days ’til I’m done last night, and after today it’ll be 99, with a couple of weeks off in the middle of that. I so can’t wait.

Meanwhile, I have another crazy one lined up in the a.m., so I’m off to my sleeping bag.

Mosul, 011505

Mosul: five years ago today.

“The Battle of Two Mosques” – This entry in my Iraq War Diary recalls a battle between American troops and insurgent fighters in Mosul, Iraq, on February 12, 2005; five years ago today. I have made just a few, minor grammatical corrections to the original post, which was then password-protected and available only to friends and family. I was working as an embedded photojournalist at the time.

Posted by jim on February 17, 2005 at 12:27:37:

A lot of people have been asking me about the other day, when my captions said I was in a four-hour running gun battle, but I was too tired to write, and it takes a few days to catch up on my rest before I find spare time again. (Today, as it turns out, I have a lot of time because I skipped my mission while recovering from a little knee strain, but it’s no big problem.)

I was sleeping-in because I had a late mission, planning to go out at 11a.m. with the battalion commander on his daily “battlefield circulation,” but at about 0930, he sent a runner to grab me in the hooch. He said they were rolling out in five minutes because another convoy was having “contact,” which means fighting.

Every night, I lay out my previous day’s clothes in case I have to bounce out in a hurry, a habit I still practice at home as well, going all the way back to when I was freelancing spot news in the 80′s.

This way, you’re never tripped up by a missing button; you never forget your belt, etc. You just might smell bad, but it’s usually not about going anywhere nice anyway, and also helps here, where you have to go out to another trailer if you’re an old-timer who might need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

So, I was out of my sleeping bag, or “fart-bag,” as soldiers call them for their remarkable ability to contain noxious fumes all night, and dressed in no time.

At a quick briefing beside the Strykers before we pulled out, I learned that a company convoy had responded to the area where insurgent mortars had just been launched toward another base, and when they got there, they immediately took small arms and RPG fire from the minaret of a mosque.

I don”t even know what part of town we were in, but when we got there and dismounted, nothing looked familiar. It was a medium-wide street but not a big boulevard, with shops on both sides, in mostly two and three-story buildings, so the mosque really stood out above, even though the main building was set back.

I could see that the minaret was damaged, looking like it had taken one or two tanks rounds, and I heard that US troops were trying to get up there to check for bodies, but couldn’t get past rubble on the stairs. Strykers and foot soldiers were everywhere, and there were a couple of tanks down the street.

Columns of smoke were rising from a few places, and I saw that the US troops had blown up a few cars, and that smoke was rising from one other building.

And we ran; back and forth, up and down, block after block, often retracing our steps in the search for insurgent fighters. Our Strykers rolled along right behind us, but it was clear that running dismounted was intended to draw out enemy fire, as well as to respond faster.

As the day unfolded, as we got hit from so many different directions, it became clear that this was a coordinated insurgent attack, and not just a combination of random pot-shots.

I can’t really remember the order of events, but here are some of the other moments I remember:

Somebody spotted people hiding in a pickup truck parked on a side street right in the middle of the battle space, and when they pulled everybody out, they found seven guys crammed inside. Soldiers ordered them to the ground and checked them out, but soon let them go when they proved to be local workers just caught in the middle of the shit.

When soldiers searched one car that had been shot up already, they found two mortar tubes, about 15 mortar rounds, an AK, and some “pineapple” hand grenades, the last being one weapon I had never seen or even heard of being used over here. Not a pretty thought.

I was standing on a corner and had just photographed the tanks, which were compressed in an interesting enough way, but a few seconds after I put down the camera, I heard a boom and saw a big orange fireball, maybe twenty feet in diameter, right against the side of one of them. I thought the tank had fired, but the Sgt. Major yelled “RPG!” and it became clear that they had taken a hit.

I followed soldiers down there on foot, and learned that the tankers had no injuries, but that their engine was disabled by the blast. Next, we pushed block by block in the direction of the RPG fire, with the other tank following along side.

Sometime when I was down a side street, the disabled tank took a second RPG strike, this time setting fire to a mechanical area, so the troops were fine again, but it was billowing smoke now and called for some damage control, which they handled.

While with troops searching the ruins of a building that looked like the sight of a former air strike, I suddenly heard the unmistakable pissing sound of another RPG coming very close. I hit the ground but heard it boom in the distance. I think it was fired at us, but passed high overhead, and I was told that it impacted about 50m away, harmlessly. Insurgents often get the horizontal targeting close, but miss on the vertical, um, fortunately; I’ve had this experience many times now.

We moved in the likely direction of that launch, which led us out to another main street, where shops were still open, and soldiers had to gesture to children, leaving a nearby school with their book bags, to run away fast – and they did.

In the distance, I heard a tank round fired, but never got the details. There were roosters and hens running all over the place all day too. They’re ridiculous little critters.

We could see cars passing on a traffic circle a few blocks away, and soldiers would draw their rifles and wave off anybody coming our way, for all the threats that cars might pose – and every one heeded this time.

Two Kiowa attack helicopters were patrolling low overhead now, and when we were running through an open area. I heard a boom and saw a black puff of smoke right behind one of them, an airburst from a RPG that just missed. I wondered if the weapon could be set to explode in the sky like that, or if it was detonated by the concussion of the rotors, but I never found out. It was a close call either way; very close.

Now, I could hear a fighter jet flying overhead as well, low enough to provide dramatic sonic intimidation, but high enough to avoid ground weapons, and probably out of sight, but there’s no time for gazing, so I really can’t say where it was.

We raided another mosque, which was deserted for the day at least, after a radio report of weapons inside, but I only saw one AK. I was about to follow some guys to the roof when one guy coming down said it was tight up there, so a few soldiers and I stayed in the courtyard.

Not a minute later, I heard AK rounds splattering the wall outside, and then soldiers on the roof returning a huge volley. I got up there too late to make any worthwhile pictures, and learned that they had spotted that shooter in a building about 150m away, but we didn’t run that one down for some reason.

A lot of mosques, some ancient, are getting really fucked up here, but I read recently that Muslims have never shared the Western tradition of religious asylum anyway, and that plenty of mosques were also damaged or destroyed in the Iran-Iraq war, and others. It still makes me feel sad, but less guilty.

Furthermore, I’ve learned that the US ROE, or rules of engagement, have recently been altered, taking away any such protected status from any mosques store weapons, and it’s hard to argue with that logic.

Next, we came upon an Iraqi man, face down, all by himself on an Army stretcher on a street corner. An Army interpreter talked to him and he looked up and answered, and didn’t look so bad, but another soldier said he could hear that the guy was sucking air through a chest wound.

He appeared to be an innocent, but less than brilliant bystander, shot in the crossfire of one of the many small arms exchanges, in through the hip and out through the chest. I heard that he was left on a stretcher by troops from another company who stopped to treat him, but had to leave him and return to the fight when they came under fire again.

Soldiers flagged down a passing car and tried to get the occupants to take the wounded guy to a local hospital, but they refused, leading to a loud, angry argument. Troops were still trying to get the stretcher into the back seat when another soldiers spotted a similarly disagreeable couple of guys in a pickup truck, put the stretcher in the back, and gave them the same orders. They drove off, and that’s the last I know of it.

A moment after, we were walking back to the Strykers when an incoming small arms round hit a building behind us, prompting the Sgt. Major to yell “That’s close!,” and I don’t know if he was referring to the shooter or the impact, or maybe both, but we all hurried to take cover behind the nearest Stryker. They narrowed down the origin enough and returned fire, but nothing came of it.

Finally, we raided a junkyard, where troops had spotted a car that matched a description on one of the shooters. A crowd of men were gathered in the area, but none admitted to driving the car. A worker said it had been parked there all day, but the engine was hot, so we knew he was full of shit, but had nothing more to go on, and there were too many innocent people around to detain everybody, and no extra vehicles to transport them in; so. soldiers just searched the car, came up empty, and left.

The fight had been quiet for a while now, so we headed back to the base as quickly as we had arrived.

Final score: I ran at least three miles, usually one to three blocks at a time, and saw three car fires and two building fires. One tank and one Stryker had been disabled by enemy fire, lots of weapons were recovered, and there were no US casualties. At least nine insurgents were killed.

The soldiers have been calling it all “The Battle of Two Mosques.”

Jim, 
Mosul, 
021605

The Battle of Two Mosques

01.30.05 - U.S. troops take cover from sniper fire near a polling station in Mosul.

Happy Birthday to me! I survived the first Iraqi elections.

I’ve been up for 18 hours and I’m too jittery to sleep. Plus, I am still waiting for my roommate, a photographer from another wire service, to return. I’ve been using his power supply for my satellite modem for several days now – since mine was destroyed by a power surge, the second time that happened this year – and now I think he might need to use some of my gear.

When I saw him last, at one of the polling stations today, I learned that he and another colleague had survived, unharmed, after a roadside bomb struck their Stryker. Yet, when bailing out under the threat of a coordinated ambush, there just isn’t time to grab your gear.

Thus, they had both been unable to transmit their pictures when last I saw them. I had the same problem in Sadr City last September, and it took about 12 hours to get reunited with my stuff. Man, I’m feeling their pain.

(Oops. I just stalled in mid-sentence as mortars began falling nearby, the closest to my hooch during this embed. Ok, I think they stopped. Anyway; back to the diary.)

It’s 10:23 p.m. Iraq time now; so, I’m definitely 44 years old. I remember my mom telling me I was born at 2:22 but I don’t remember if it was a.m. or p.m., but I’ve gone around the bend either way now, even with the eight-hour time difference.

I’m glad I made it, too. I was pretty nervous when I got up at 4 a.m. today, knowing I’d be on the street for 12 to 14 hours, unlike the two-to-four hours I spend in the field most days.

Before we rolled, I actually found myself kneeling in prayer next to my rack, something I’ve done maybe a dozen times in my adult life, so there’s a clue to what I thought I might be facing today. In other words, everybody was expecting the insurgents to “Rock the Vote,” and not in an MTV-way. The night before, I also found myself gazing at the stars and asking for peace, something that worked for a couple of days in Najaf once.

And something apparently worked this time too, for not only am I well, but Mosul was surprisingly peaceful. There were a bunch of bombing in Baghdad, with 44 killed, so I guess it could have gone better down there, but in the most selfish sense, it went well enough.

There was a hot breakfast ready before dawn, and a Sgt. Major was talking to other soldiers about how you always know there is “a push on” when they take good care of you like this.

Next, I went in the battalion TOC – short for tactical operations center I think – and waited for the commanders to get rolling. It was quiet and they were drinking coffee and telling stories about their wives giving birth when we heard the first explosion of the day in the distance.

They got into their body armor pretty quickly and made for the Strykers, where the crews were ready to roll. There was a quick briefing – reminding soldiers to try not to shoot the voters if fighting broke out near a poll – and I learned that our convoy was also tasked as first responders to any mass casualty incident.

Car bombs were unlikely today, since “no-roll” enforcement, communicated on local television and radio and in newspapers, meant that nobody would be driving besides the Army and the Iraqi forces, thus making it pretty hard for insurgents to roll up on a site unnoticed. Still, barricades, barbed wire and lots of other secret military ops would have made it impossible to get close to the polls for anybody who tried.

I learned that the first boom was a rocket strike on the east side of the Tigris, the other half of Mosul which is out of my battalion’s AO, or area of operation. Mortars soon began falling on both sides.

I heard – on the military radio on the Stryker – that they had the first two voters at one site, then three more. Soldiers offered to take our Iraqi interpreter in to vote, but he passed. A commander joked that troops should detain anyone who voted Sunni, since he was probably just in the polling station to recon the site for an insurgent attack.

The polls opened at 7a.m., and by 8, our AO had just 22 voters – and 25 mortar impacts, though there were no casualties. A soldier in my Stryker said something about this being a big day, and I said “yeah, the whole world is watching.” “Except my mother,” he replied.

The convoy stopped at a combat outpost which had a nearly adjacent polling station, and I went in to take pictures. U.S. troops were not allowed even inside the outer security perimeter of the polls today, but there were Iraqi national soldiers inside and out, plus the U.S. outpost had “overwatch” or “eyes on;” so. there was no risk of me getting dragged away. Of course there was some risk of snipers and suicide bombers, but it didn’t feel much worse than any other day.

Before I walked off, the commander walked over to a wall to relieve himself, and his personal security detail followed close, not knowing where he was headed – and leading him to quip “Give me a three-man detail, to shake!”
Inside the polling center, the few voters I saw trickling through would first present IDs and then went through what looked like a simple on-the-spot registration process. They took their ballots to little cardboard booths, made their mark, and then folded their ballots and put them in clear plastic tubs which were sealed with wire ties to prevent tampering.

In typical Iraqi government confusion, I saw voters dipping their fingers in ink to mark the ballots, but I read everywhere else that the finger-inking was supposed to be the last task, preventing voters from coming in more than once. A handwritten sign on one of the cardboard booths was translated for me: “For you Iraq, we participate in the elections,” and I have to admit I was honestly moved.

I mean, I’m the most cynical guy I know, and I still don’t think this mission, if ever it may succeed, will have been worth the human toll of well over 1,000 American and 100,000 Iraqi lives so far, but it was still truly heartwarming to see Iraqis bravely come out and vote in the face of constant death threats, plus the immediate risk of attack.
At the same time, huge machine-gun holes on one wall, and smaller bullet holes in a door were just a small reminder of what usually goes on around here.

I saw the first voter come and go, but then another ten came in the next 15 minutes. I saw a steady trickle all day, and heard on tactical Army radio that there were lines of hundreds in a few places later in the day.
When we got rolling again, the interpreter called out in Arabic on a megaphone from inside the Stryker, encouraging Iraqis to vote, saying things like: “Face the terrorists; We are here to secure you. We shall be free today; do not be afraid.” Not so convincing from a guy in an armored vehicle if you ask me, but I felt that he really meant what he was saying.

Small arms fire was being reported here and there, including reports of celebratory fire on the east side.
I was so sleepy, not just from the early start, but also because I never sleep well before an important, early-morning event, mostly because I’m so scared that I’ll oversleep. I even set my spare watch-alarm this time, and I still couldn’t relax.

Next, we dismounted and went on a little foot patrol in central Mosul, where the commander talked with shopkeepers and others, encouraging them to vote, chatting about local prices, while mildly interrogating them. I noticed smoke for a trash fire starting about a block away, and worried that it was a signal for insurgent mortar targeting, or just to spread the word that the convoy was nearby, but nothing came of it.

When we hit the road again, one of the soldiers looked at my notebook while I was writing and asked “Is that Arabic?” I laughed, but it did make me wonder if even military intelligence folks could even decipher my lifelong personal shorthand at this point.

From inside the vehicle, I could see the crowds on the street – via the video monitor used for targeting the RWS, or remote weapons system – and they looked somehow unusually festive to me, no kidding; maybe because of the way they were more often gathered together in groups today, or because they were closer to the street, not hanging back in doorways like they often do. Of course this all changes when they’re on camera, because when you point the RWS lens, you are also pointing the remote 50cal machine gun their way too.

Meanwhile, by 1030, I was feeling almost surprised that there hadn’t been a mass casualty incident, but I wasn’t complaining. It’s just that I expected it earlier, to discourage voting.

I had learned the night before that the local Mosul stringer for another agency had been contacted by insurgents, threatening him if he covered the elections, but telling him it would be ok to cover “the bombings.” Chilling, I thought at the time.
Just before 11 am, we got a radio report of a small arms attack on a polling station, and later learned that Iraqi soldiers had engaged an insurgent sniper, but no casualties were reported.

A few minutes later, the convoy stopped and the ramp dropped without warning, as it often does; our signal to dismount. I figured it was another polling station – and to be honest, I was just looking for a place to pee – when I saw this Iraqi staggering toward us, completely covered in blood.

As U.S. and Iraqi soldiers moved to help him, I saw that he had been shot in the face, just under the eye, and was somehow still walking. The sniper got him, right near the polls, but I never fond out for sure if he was on his way to or from there, because he was clearly in shock.

That reminds me, every time someone asks where somebody was shot, the clear response you always get is “do you mean anatomically or geographically?” Well, you know both answers for this one already. Just a thought.

He was still walking and they sat him down on the edge of the Stryker when two more shots followed. The sniper was still at work and we took cover behind some barriers while the medic – in this case it was a surgeon traveling with the commander today – looked him over and arranged transport to a local hospital in another Stryker.

The poor guy was a mess, and a cup’s worth of blood would gush from his nose and mouth every few seconds, but he was expected to survive. Amazingly, the medic said it appeared that the round entered behind his head and came out under his eye, but had whipped around under the skin but outside the skull. Lucky; very lucky. I made some pictures of the guy but had no idea if they would make any sense, for I still had no clue whether or not it would be a bloody day in the main story, or not.

I thought next about a conversation I had a few nights ago with another photographer. He said that he had noticed that he had covered the three main post-war events in Iraq; the capture of Saddam, the handover of sovereignty, and now the elections, and that none of them had any meaning. I responded that none of them had led to any decent pictures either, but now I was feeling differently about this election day on both counts, for better and worse.

Next, we got a radio report that intelligence had been gathered, predicting a rash of attacks at 1300, just after the noon prayers in area mosques. So, we dashed back to the base to “refit,” basically to get fuel and a bite. I scooted to my hooch to recharge my camera batteries a little, as they have been performing poorly of late, and also to grab extra cards, forgotten in the sleepy start of my day.

I grabbed an MRE too, “Beef Teriyaki,” which basically tastes like dog food, but which I have learned always comes with a bag of chow mein noodles, and for some reason, four desserts: Tootsie Rolls, M&Ms or Skittles, cheese and peanut butter crackers, and a bigass cracker with jelly. I tossed the main dish aside and ate the rest, a tradition called “rat-fucking” an MRE.

I should write more about the Army vernacular sometime, but they have no better term than rat-fucking; it usually applies MREs but can also describe what happens when you leave your packs around where “Joes” from other units can loot them, and I think it’s a wonderful word for our business, for what editors do to us sometimes.

We hit the road back into the city and it wasn’t long before our commander called out that he could see that first yellow, then red smoke canisters had been ignited from a rooftop position; red being the signal that you need a medic.

As we rolled up on the building, loud shots rang out but proved to be “friendlies,” the soldiers on the roof firing on an enemy position with (high-explosive) “H-E” rounds. Insurgent mortars simultaneously started falling on a nearby polling center, but again there were no casualties. Eventually, we learned that the rooftop smoke was not a call for help, but confusion resulting from some poorly communicated plan to target the enemy, and those involved got pretty well chewed for it before we carried on.

Moments later, while more small arms fire was being reported around the brigade, we heard another boom – an IED that struck another Stryker nearby, probably the one that later proved to be full of photographers.

As we rolled toward it, we were brought to a stop when the commander noticed an unexploded artillery shell in our path, probably thrown from the nearby IED but without detonating. Another responding Stryker drove pretty much right over it, without harm, but it led to another public ass-chewing on the radio – and it felt like the battalion was falling apart for a few minutes, but they bottomed out there and soon pulled it together for the rest of the day.

At 245 p.m., we dismounted by another polling station, and except for the usual Iraqi garbage and sewage filth and stink, it was like a whole different place, very peaceful and quiet, with lots of kids playing nearby and soon gathering around the soldiers, looking for candy and soccer balls.

In case I never mentioned it, I think the US has handed out soccer balls to every third Iraqi kid by now, all part of the old “hearts & minds” mission from before everything fell apart, and if you ask me, this nation should be the global soccer powerhouse in a decade or so, if only because they have soccer balls and nothing else to do when they’re not running for their lives.

I still needed to whiz so badly from before, and tried to quietly relieve myself against a wall when the battalion commander yelled “hey somebody take a picture of the photographer pissing on the mosque!”

Technically, it was the outer wall of a mosque complex, but it was so far from the buildings, and surrounded with garbage, that I honestly hadn’t noticed – maybe because I was also distracted by the mortars falling in the distance again.

At 4pm, we had an hour until the polls would close, but got another radio call, this one reporting that the Army had “very reliable intel on a suicide bomber” hitting a specific polling station in the next 60 minutes. Damn, I just wanted this day to be over, but the 1pm attacks had never materialized, and so I hoped this one would pass too.

At 430pm, we went to one more polling station, where, under duress from the troops, our interpreter, the one code-named “George Bush,” finally got out to vote. I went in to the poll with him, hoping to make a few last pictures, and mostly looking out for that suicide bomber, but we came and went without a problem. There was one distant explosion, and the last few guys in the place just made “tsk-tsk,” sounds, the usual, subdued Iraqi response in recent times.

It later proved to be another IED hitting another battalion, with one casualty that had to be med-evac’d, but I never got more details.
After the polls closed, and without that last attack – thank God – I was stuck out there for another two hours while the battalion commanded visited a few more sites to check on security as the ballots were transported and the sites were broken down and reconstructed into schools and mosques again.

I was really sweating because I had been on the run all day while two of my competitors had planned instead to work entirely from one polling station, but it was when I found them on the last stop that I learned that they had been stranded without their gear after the IED attack – and that they had also yet to send pictures.
When we got back to the TOC, I noticed that all of the guys who ride in the hatches all day – and always come back filthy – were covered in some kind of green shit today, but I didn’t mention it, too busy myself, trying to blow a day’s worth of God-knows-what out of my own nose again.
So, I popped into the hooch and un-tucked my shirt the way I always do when I’m under pressure – though I really have no idea why – and I sent a bunch of pictures, and now I’m done.

I wish there was someplace to go celebrate.
Jim

An Iraqi national soldier smokes at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Mosul,Iraq Thursday, Nov. 9, 2004. Iraqi commandos backed by U.S. forces raided a hospital in northern Mosul allegedly used by insurgents, detaining three people overnight, as Iraqi forces elsewhere in the city fought off militants, killing 15 and capturing 10 others.