Since returning from my embed in the wild west Iraqi city of
Ramadi at the end of April, I’ve gotten some wonderful e-mails from
relatives of the troops, some of which I’d like to share.
First some background. Despite the constant flow of news out of
Baghdad, which to many reporters is where Iraq begins and ends,
terrorist-infested Ramadi is probably block-for-block the meanest
place in country. Asked where in the city I wanted to be embedded I
told the military “The redder, the better” (“Red” means hostile).
So they packed me off to Camp Corregidor with the 1st Battalion,
506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division — the “Band of
Brothers” made famous by author Stephen Ambrose and HBO.
Four minarets stand within sniping distance of the camp and the
gentlemen in these erstwhile places of worship regularly shoot at
the observation posts and often into the camp itself. Huge
122-millimeter mortars explode in Corregidor on average every other
day. I photographed a crater where two men were blown up just
before reaching shelter.
Because of the constant attacks, body armor is required whenever
outside a protected building — something I’ve seen nowhere else in
Iraq. I went on two-day patrols and we were attacked in force both
times. Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) pop up like
mushrooms.
One chilling statistic: Charlie Company arrived in January with
132 men. By late April it was down to about 100 from deaths,
wounds, and injuries.
These horrors I described and photographed for my blogs from the
camp, which many family members read. I discovered from their
letters that ignorance is not always bliss. Here are excerpts from
two:
Thank you so much for the excellent pictures of Ramadi.
My son is in Camp Corregidor and these are the first really decent
pictures of the area I have seen. It at least gives me an idea of
what it is like. He doesn’t say much about the conditions so I have
to prowl the internet to find what I can. He doesn’t want his mom
and dad to worry more than we have to.
* * *
My son is there at Camp Corregidor — an Army sniper with HHC
1/506th — and although he doesn’t tell the stories as well as you
did, the firefight you experienced is a daily event for them. I
appreciate the fact that you are not spinning the story to fit a
personal agenda. We need more articles like yours. Enjoy your time
in Ramadi.
Enjoy, huh?
Another told me:
It’s hard to talk [to my husband in 1st Battalion] on
the phone and not be able to know what he is doing or what all is
happening. It always makes me feel better when I know what’s
happened even if it is good new or somewhat scary news. So what I
am getting at is that I enjoyed reading your articles and seeing
the pictures. Just hearing what they are going through for our
country makes me so proud that I married into the
military!
So “No news is
bad news.” Repeatedly I found troops were
trying to spare their parents, but the parents didn’t
want
to be spared. One wrote: “As a mother, I
need to know what
he’s going through — not to torment myself but to better prepare
for his state of mind when he returns.” Another: “[My son] can not
say what he does. All I get is ‘I am good’ but he sounds tired. You
gave me some insight into his life.” It was signed, “Scared mom of
Spc. [omitted].”
Others were grateful the world was hearing of the men’s
sacrifice. Predictably, not many reporters go to Corregidor, and
often they cut their trips short if they do. (One embed there
was recently shot twice by a sniper.) “Damn —
at last!” read one of the e-mails. “Someone finally went into
Ramadi and stayed for more than 15 minutes to cover the real deal.
I speak to [my brother] once or twice a week and have heard only a
little of what you observed. The activity and hardship endured by
these soldiers is incredible — huh?”
Indeed.
