Here it is O’ faithful reader. I have been procrastinating on publishing the next installment and for that I apologize. This one has been harder to write as it brings up memories that are less than pleasant. I figured you all deserve to see the good, the bad, and the ugly of a warzone and the majority of you voted to hear it. Do not fret my brothers as I still have many funny stories to share with you, but this one is a little darker. It is the mildest one in the repertoire as no US Service members made the ultimate sacrifice. Without further ado here is my story.
Before I was reassigned to the ETT (embedded tactical trainer) team I was a Platoon Leader of a motorized Infantry platoon. Our Battalions sector was on the East side of the Tigris River, and in that sector were the fabled Baghdad Sheraton Hotel, the Baghdad Hotel, and the Palestine Hotel. They were all in close proximity to each other and we rotated platoons down to the Sheraton Hotel to provide security for it. The Sheraton hotel housed all of the major news network reporters, ie CNN, FOX, NBC, CBS, BBC, Reuters, and AP news. The Sheraton hotel was a skyscraper in downtown Baghdad and had a commanding view of the surrounding area. It was key terrain that needed to be held. By controlling this building you were able to control access over the bridges into the Green Zone, overwatch the markets, and control the flow of traffic thru Abu Nuwas Park. We would station snipers on the roofs, and yours truly made a rappel off of the top of the building to install mounts for a Mark 19 grenade launcher on the 13th floor. I got yelled at for doing a rappel off the side of the building because I removed my body armor and helmet to do it, but no way in fuck was I rappelling 13 stories up in the air with an extra 60 lbs strapped to my body.
Pic of bridge
From the roof top looking West into the Green Zone.
Pic of sniper on the roof
Pic of Mark 19 grenade laucher
Pic of Mk 19 overlooking CNN mosque
The hotel overlooked the square where the statue of Sadam was taken down. You may all remember the footage of 1st ID rolling into Baghdad and pulling the statue down while the locals danced around. After the statue was taken down the traffic circle that surrounded it was also key terrain and controlling traffic flow with the Mark 19 and a Tow anti-tank missile launcher with ITAS thermal sights was critical. Hence the reason we secured and controlled the hotel.
Pic of Sadam square.
Pic of ITAS
Pic of Tow anti-tank missile launcher
There was the Al Kindy Mosque across the street from the hotel which we nicknamed the “CNN Mosque”. Unfortunately you didn’t realize it, but the reporters were a bunch of prima donnas and would park their ass on the 6th floor of the hotel and film themselves with the mosque in the background. It looked like they were on the street, but they were nice and safe in a secured hotel compound. They would also simply go into the alleyway behind the hotel and film the “street scenes” but were still within the walls of the compound. It was bullshit reporting on their part, and they would even hire the local nationals that worked in the hotel to stand around in the alleyway when they got off work to make it look like they (the reporters) were out in the heart of the city reporting to you the news. In all reality they never left the safety of the hotel and would hire local nationals to go out and film events and bring them news stories. Of course the enemy was aware of this and would attempt to feed the big news reporters slanted stories, and you the viewer never got a true picture of the war.
Pic of CNN Mosque
Pic of Geraldo at his finest
Across the street from us a group of mercenaries occupied the Baghdad hotel. Blackwater was the most famous of the merc outfits and you probably heard about them. I had a few friends who went back to Iraq as mercenaries for Blackwater and made a shit-ton of money. It isn’t chump change to be signed up with the premier mercenary outfits in the world, plus you keep what you can acquire ie steal. No accountability, no having to adhere to the Laws of War, shoot first mentality and being composed of mostly ex Rangers, SF, marine Recon bad boys. I would horse trade with the Merc outfits for equipment because they always needed ammo and I always needed the cool toys like collapsible stretchers and medical equipment for my boys. I had an opportunity to go back as a mercenary for Raytheon conducting field testing of new weapons systems in a combat zone and almost did it. Being a combat experienced Lieutenant with a secret security clearance was a hot commodity in 2005, and not having a job after coming off of active duty was a real pisser. I turned down a job offer of over 6 digits a year because I had been gone from my family for over 3 years at this point. Instead I ended up in dental school, but that is another story.
Pic of Baghdad Hotel
Blackwater had a very bad habit of shooting up anything that moved if something went off down in the market. If a car bomb went off or a rocket attack hit every window was filled in that hotel with rifles and they would shoot anything that moved. You could always tell when something was going down because the market would get very empty and quiet right before an attack. Blackwater created that atmosphere by shooting anyone that was standing around when the attacks occurred. The civilians learned very quickly to unass the area if an attack was coming. While I strongly disagree with their procedure of shooting unarmed civilians during an attack it did have the desired effect of creating a very primitive and effective early warning system. They had no repercussions because they were not a government agency and the Baghdad police/government was not going to stop them. Their actions fostered that “We hate America” mentality and I am glad that they were finally held accountable for their actions. One time I was out on a patrol near the hotels and a rocket attack hit the hotel complexes. Blackwater did what they always do and started shooting at anything moving. That included me and my platoon. My little man children meat-eaters did the correct thing and returned fire. Blackwater got their head out of their ass real quick when accurate 50 cal and M240B return fire started peeling their hotel apart. After that little incident we were given the word that no interactions with mercenary outfits was allowed so trading for cool shit came to an end. They got the word to be more careful in target identification because my BC (battalion commander) informed them that next time they fired on his troops we would assault the building and wipe out every single one of them. No further problems resulted after that.
I have many stories that center around the hotels as you can tell, but this one is about a VBIED (vehicle born Improvised Explosive Device ie the carbomb) It was a hot fucking day, like any other. The smell of garbage and smoke was in the air as always and we were pulling security at the hotel. Half the platoon was resting and the other half was manning the gates and overwatch positions. The market emptied in a hurry and it got quiet, way too quiet. The little hairs on your neck go up, your sphincter slams shut, and you know all hell is about to break loose. Sent out the alert, rousted the rest of the platoon and as I was hauling ass downstairs to link up with the rest of my platoon all hell broke loose. I heard the 50’s going off and then a massive explosion just outside the gate went off. It rumbled the building and shattered windows for a city block. My gate security had seen a car with the suspension slammed to the ground moving through the market at high speed. Anytime you saw a car riding on the frame you knew it was overloaded with a high amount of weight which indicated it was filled with explosives. They engaged the vehicle and shot the ever living piss out of it. The best we can figure is that the vehicle was wired with a dead mans switch or the driver detonated the bomb early knowing that he wasn’t able to reach the gate. The VBIED went off in the market area and created complete chaos. It destroyed quite a few cars around it, wounded many locals, and killed two local nationals that were in the blast zone. I took my platoon and proceeded into the blast zone to complete a damage assessment.
Pics of car that was carrying the bomb
The weirdest part about a car bomb is that certain parts of the human anatomy always survive a catastrophic explosion. The body will be ripped limb from limb and damn near vaporized, but you always seem to find an eyeball, feet, a small section of ribs, and the penis. I knew many soldiers that got “meat tag” tattoos which is a tattoo with your dog tag information tattooed onto your ribcage. It is the same reason soldiers will lace one dog tag into their boots as the feet cleanly separate from the legs during an explosion.
Pic of car bomber’s foot
One of the LN’s (local nationals) was torn in half by the blast. I can’t help but wonder if he knew what was happening when he died. What went through his head? Did he have time to think of his family? Here was a guy who probably worked at the market trying to sell vegetables just to provide for his family and ended up becoming collateral damage. He surely didn’t ask for this, and seeing his destroyed corpse makes you realize the price a warzone can extract on those just stuck in it who are trying to survive. We covered the body in an effort to provide some dignity to the man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
LN killed by car bomb
Be grateful you don’t have to live with shit like this every day, and while your job may suck at least you can be reasonably certain you will come home at the end of the day, smack the wife on the ass, pop a cold one, and play some COD.
We proceeded to secure the area and the Iraqi police showed up along with their fire department. Once they had the area secure we helped clean up the mess.
Pic of Iraqi Firefighters
Pic of collected guts
Walking around with garbage bags picking up parts of people is an interesting memory that I am sure will go to the grave with me. I remember one of my soldiers picked up a piece of flesh and was standing there holding it and asked me what it was. It was strangely comical to see this soldier holding a penis in his fist and when I told him he was holding a dick he freaked out and dropped it on the ground. The rest of the platoon had a great laugh and once again a terrible situation devolved into a strange form of comedy. It was very surreal to see soldiers who had just about been blown up laughing, joking, and making dick and fag jokes. I think it is a human reaction to something horrifying. If you can’t fight back and have no target for your rage it is turned into comedy because you have to let it go somehow. We continued to police up the body parts and then turned the rest of the work over to the local Iraqis and proceeded back into the hotel compound. We weren’t too shaken up by the event because it was just another day on the job. Like the old saying goes, “The only easy day was yesterday.” It’s always amazing what the human mind can adapt too.
So ends the 4th chapter in the Chronicles of N8. Hopefully I did not offend any with the pictures and you learned a little more what it was like. I thinned the herd down on pics as I had to sift thru tons of photos and I didn’t want to slow the loading down or overwhelm the story. Next time we will go to a happier place and tell a story that doesn’t make you ponder your own mortality. What will it be? My experience with how I learned Toby Keith is the biggest douchebag on the planet or the Baghdad Harley Davidson shop we found out while on patrol.
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Tue Mar 10, 2015 2:54 am by 
Subject: The Chronicles of N8 Part IV (A New Hope) 
I probably wouldn't do well at it unless I was running for Sheriff. I could see myself being a Joe Aripo clone. His constituents love him, he takes no shit from anyone, and he lives to enforce the laws even the less than popular ones. I think he is doing something right. I lived in Maricopa county for a bit and go figure. Crime dropped pretty substantially, especially for its population size once he started enforcing hard time and made prison an uncomfortable place.
