Baghdad Bulletin: Dispatches on the American Occupation

May 2004

The generals say it and so do the brass: “It’s not another Nam.” I say they can blow it out their ass. Don’t ‹re here and don’t ‹re there Even though mortars are falling everywhere. —Part of a poem delivered by a U.S. soldier on the street in Najaf, May 13 May 2004 Faluja 5.3.04 I’ve decided to make my ‹rst trip out of Baghdad since returning to Iraq. While waiting at the checkpoint into the city, we met a family who had left during the ‹ghting three weeks ago. They’ve agreed to allow us to follow them to their house. We were duly invited for tea, then lunch, then tea, more tea, tea, tea, tea, tea, tea, tea, tea . . . There’s a joke about Faluja: a man’s house is burning, so he calls the ‹re department. The ‹re‹ghters arrive, but he refuses to let them begin putting out the ‹re until they’ve had lunch. These people have been away from their home for nearly four weeks, and they act as if their goal in life is to make sure that we’re comfortable. I feel terrible because I’ve already lied to them by telling them I’m Belgian. Rana, the translator I’m with, always kicks me under the table if I hesitate when someone asks me where I’m from, but I’d be screwed without a translator , so I don’t have many options. I’ve also noticed that changing my nationality in a cab, especially to French, seems to mean I pay considerably less than I would if I were American. 146 The men of this family are proud of the fact that the Americans have been forced to pull out and proclaim that the next time the United States comes, “even the women will be holding guns.” The matriarch of the family smiles and winks from her corner of the sitting room. She seems to have the dozen or so kids who are running about the house in line. I’d hate to see what kind of damage she could do with a gun. Faluja 5.6.04 We go back to Faluja eliciting surprise from the marine whom we’d met at the same checkpoint on Monday. “You clowns again?” the marine addresses us, offering a bag of sun›ower seeds. “Actually, we left the clowns in Baghdad.” He’s a nice guy from Pennsylvania who helps us get through but can’t stop complaining about the lazy Iraqi soldiers who are supposed to be manning his checkpoint. For their part, the Iraqi soldiers say they plan to dismantle the checkpoint as soon as the Americans are gone. “It’s hot here, and the families shouldn’t have to wait in line,” one of them explains. There are also multiple points of entry into Faluja, which the marine tells us. “Just in case my of‹cer won’t let you guys through, you go about a mile around that way . . .” Jassim, the driver Rana works with, is bumping the same Bob Marley tape he plays every time we come to Faluja. The city is in much the same condition as it was on Sunday. We see more pancaked houses (excavation has yet to begin, and the smell of rotting corpses hangs over them like a cloud); look for clusterbomb evidence (we ‹nd the telltale patterns in one neighborhood that housed a high concentration of mujahedeen but uncover no actual munitions); and shoot the bull with some of the locals. One of the sheikhs tells us that marine snipers used his minaret to pin down a pair of neighborhoods. I’m sure digMAY 2004 147 ital pics of a pair of marines grinning high above a lovely aerial view of Faluja will surface soon enough. The shaheed cemetery continues to ‹ll. A lot of the fresh graves belong to children. We watch the burial of an old man who had just been returned to his family after he was cut down by a sniper more than three weeks ago. The rumor is that the marines are going to resume patrols on Monday. If they do, things will de‹nitely explode again. Baghdad 5.10.04 Some of the toughest conversations are the ones in which someone asks me why I would ever leave the States for a place like this. But...