Last Email from Iraq

[Mike]

Hi everyone ....a good friend of ours is on his way Home ! I thought I'd share his final Email with you --

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Hello All,

So this will most likely be my last long email to the entire group. Before I go into anything else, I just wanted to thank each and every one of you for the past year. Whether you sent a box, email, or just said an extra prayer, it has been greatly appreciated on this end of the world. You?d be surprised how the smallest things to you can mean so much more on the other end. I will do my best while I am home to make up for all of it, but considering the size of this email list, that may be damn near impossible. Thank you will have to suffice for now.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone and yes it is rather belatedly. My Christmas consisted of a pretty good meal, a bunch of meetings, and a nap. The best thing to do around here is to ignore the holidays completely as it can get pretty depressing if you think about it. It will be like I stepped into a time machine and skipped the entire year. As usual, I will get over it soon enough I am sure. I have moved FOB?s to LSAA Anaconda. That means nothing to you, I know, but the danger level for me and my platoon has dropped significantly and we no longer have to patrol a thing. For those of you who may have suspected, yes, perhaps I did slightly underreport the amount of danger I have been in for the past year. I will reveal nothing more except to say that the war stories I will tell in the bars of (******) will be infinitely more exciting than what I shared in my emails. Yes, I do require a free drink first.

Now of course I have been asked quite often what is Iraq really like, are we winning this war, how is morale, etc. All of these are great questions that are not very simply answered. I will do my best to answer them but I refuse to go into the politics of any of this. The reason being as an officer in the Army, I am not a political creature, and if this email is forwarded as I expect it to be, I could find myself in a whole lot of trouble. Plus, I refuse to deal with Tommy Holmes any more than I need to as far as politics are concerned.

Are we winning? Of course we are. TV makes it look like we have no chance to win, and that are losses are too high, and that we need to leave. First of all, we can win ANY war; it all depends on the stamina of the American people, not the American military. With the way the war is being reported, I am sure that it will not be the military who decides to leave here. We build schools, we capture terrorists, we train security forces, we deliver supplies, and yes we get shot at while doing it. The losses we suffer are too high some say. I say that?s pretty obvious. Losing one soldier is too many. We never want to lose a single soldier, but did some people actually think we would fight a war and not suffer a single fatality? We are fighting a war against people that are plain scum. There will be casualties. The real question is how many is too many? That is your choice as an American and a voter. I would like to point out that many politicians voted for this war and now denounce it. I would like to point out that my friend Mike C. was killed two weeks ago. He doesn't?t get to have his life back, so they don?t get their vote back. People want an exit strategy, but I would like to point out that our mission is not done yet. We don?t fight to a time standard; we fight to accomplish an objective. Did we talk about an exit strategy while we were storming Normandy?

How is morale? It?s just fine. We don?t like this place particularly, but then again who the heck would really like a desert with huge explosives in the ground? I can tell you that our recruiter in theater met his quota 2 months into our deployment. I can tell you there is plenty of complaining. I can also tell you a lot of the same people would be complaining when they are home in the states as well. I think the most telling part of our outlook is the amount of people who wonder what it will look like in ten years. They plan on showing their children this place at some point. You see, while the media will tell you this is a losing effort, we can?t picture anything else but success. Maybe we are naive, but then again we are the ones actually fighting the war.

What is Iraq really like? It?s a desert. There really isn?t all that much to expound on there. The weather is pretty awful 100% of the time. If you have ever been to Egypt, I would compare it to that, minus pretty much anything that reminds you of civilization. There are a lot of farmers, who walk their cows, and no camels. Baghdad, from what I understand, is almost like most major cities, as far as the Western influence. I have not had the pleasure (ha!) of visiting so I won?t comment on that one any further. I was in the middle of nowhere just south of Samarra. There was nothing there.

What are the people like? Now this is a complicated question. Let?s start with the average farmer. He has a farm, a wife, kids, and a donkey. All he knows is his wife, farm, kids, and donkey. All he cares about is his wife, kids, farm, and donkey. Nothing happens to them if he shuts his mouth and ignores the fact that bad guys keep putting bombs in the street and they blow up American vehicles. I have had an extremely hard time trying to decide how I truly feel about these people. How would I be in their situation? Why would I care about Americans when it could possible put me and all I know in jeopardy. I have decided that I neither like them or dislike them. I pity them. They will always be prisoners to someone willing to hurt them. I suppose that is the biggest difference between an American and an Iraqi. You can train any Iraqi all you want, equip him to the utmost, but courage is something you are born with. The best way to illustrate my point would be to look at Rosa Parks. She just got sick of putting up with something that didn?t make sense to her. She didn?t know what would happen maybe she?d get lynched, beaten, whatever. She just got sick of it and decided to do something about it. I have yet to meet someone like her here. Someone willing to bring about change even if it means losing all they have. Perhaps it is an oversimplification of the entire thing, but then again, doesn?t everyone know exactly who Rosa Parks is?

The children are an entirely different story. They are extremely happy to see us due to the fact we always give them things, but they are also very curious about anything and everything American. As I have said in previous emails, many of them can either read English, or even speak it fluently. They almost always wave when we went by, and even helped out in our cause from time to time. I specifically remember one time where we were blocking off a road from any traffic. We gave the kid and his father some candy to spread around, and then they proceeded to be our traffic cops for the rest of the day. They set up rocks in the street so no cars would even make the turn, and waved away any foot traffic. So the children are for the most part the only saving grace of this place. The adults can range from helpful to totally useless.

The last group of people are the bad guys. What I like about them is they give me reason to fire my tank. They are evil, conniving, and a slew of other things. One thing they are not is dumb. I saw very few bad guys in my time here because they knew the sound of the tanks, and they knew they had no chance. They usually left explosives behind for us to run over, but IED?s to a tank are inconvenient more than anything else. Allow me to go off on yet another tangent.

I love my tank. Emma saw me through good times and bad. Leaving her a couple days ago was a hard thing, but I gave her a kiss and went on my way. Emma and other tanks just like her are the most beautiful beasts on Earth. Many of you have seen the video of a tank being destroyed. That is about as rare as a Republican liking Barbara Streisand. Also, tanks don?t catch on fire. I laughed my butt off when CNN reported that an American tank was set on fire. I assure you, it was not the case. It was some equipment on the outside of the tank. However, that isn?t news now is it? Tanks are like a drug. It is indescribable the feeling of supremacy you have while riding on one. I know my mom always worried that I had too much faith in them. They aren?t indestructible. Well, they are close enough for me!

Finally, the most important thing that got me through the last year was my soldiers. Many of you may or may not know this, but soldiers get paid next to nothing. A private in the army can make barely $20K a year ( reg pay) . They do all the maintenance, the horrible jobs, the interminable guard shifts, and yet find the strength to continue to do it and sign up for more. It is quite amazing just how they do it each and everyday. I cannot say enough to explain what they mean in the great scheme of things. I have attempted in previous emails to articulate this, but ended up deleting it every time. It is their blood, sweat, and tears that keep our amazing military machine running.

And now to lighten the mood, the Top Ten Things I will miss about Iraq:

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See you all real soon.

P.S. If you do forward this, please ensure my name is NOT attached.

[stevo4361]

Thanks for sharing that Mike, glad your friend is coming home!

Kind Regards,

Steve

[buellmeister]

Mike, Thank you for sharing and thank your friend for his service for me will you?

Joel

[Mike]

Thanks guys , I thought you'd like to see it because it wasn't a typical Email ...and it's not what we hear on the News at night ..dif perspective.

I'll let him know

[Bob Hunter]

Welcome home, trooper!