No True Glory (52 page)

the Fallujah area . . .
Charles Clover, “Falluja’s Message of Hate for US Troops,”
Financial Times,
January 12, 2004, p. 6.

at your throat . . .
Karl Zinsmeister,
Dawn over Baghdad
(San Francisco: Encounter Books, 2004), p. 152.

guerrilla war . . .
Don Van Natta, “Who Is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi?,”
New York Times,
October 10, 2004, p. 4-1.

blood on a wall . . .
Hannah Allam and Tom Pennington, “Troops Battle to Rid Town of Suspected Cell,”
Philadelphia Inquirer,
January 23, 2004.

we get killed . . .
Ibid.

in tactics . . .
Interviews with the 82nd, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, February 2–3, 2005.

firefights . . .
Interviews with commanders in Fallujah, January 14–15, 2004.

grow back stronger . . .
CBS
60 Minutes,
“On Patrol in the Sunni Triangle,” February 8, 2004.

to be removed . . .
Anthony Shadid, “In New Iraq, Sunnis Fear a Grim Future,”
Washington Post,
December 22, 2003, p. 1.

CHAPTER 5

their future . . .
“Fallujah Raids Administer Severe Jolt to US Transition Plan,” DEBKA
file,
February 14, 2004.

promptly canceled . . .
Combined Dispatches, “Iraqi Rebels Strike During Abizaid Visit,”
Washington Post,
February 13, 2004, p. 1.

death to collaborators . . .
Mariam Fain, “21 Killed, Prisoners Freed in Iraqi Raid,” washingtonpost.com, February 14, 2004.

would be well . . .
Jim Michaels, “In an Iraqi Hot Spot, New Iraqi Police Chief Takes the Heat,”
USA Today,
February 10, 2004, p. 1.

twenty-three policemen . . .
Rowan Scarborough, “Inside Job Suspected in Iraq Attacks,”
Washington Times,
February 17, 2004, p. 1.

charges of conspiracy . . .
Tom Lasseter, “U.S. Detains Mayor After Deadly Attack,”
Miami Herald,
February 17, 2004.

Anbar Provincial Council . . .
Dexter Filkins, “ ‘Liberty or Death’ Is a Grim Option for the Local Councils,”
New York Times,
February 15, 2004, p. 10.

pick up a gun . . .
“ ‘This place is crazy’—In Fallujah, it’s not if you get shot at, but when,” March 3, 2004,
www.hodierne.com/iraq2
.

division . . .
The U.S. Army had four divisions with two-star commanders reporting to the three-star JTF. The Marines were sending an experienced three-star (Conway) who would report to the JTF.

a man’s neck . . .
Ron Harris, “Commander Calls Fallujah Most Difficult Area,”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
April 1, 2004, p. 1.

the armed resistance . . .
Carl E. Mundy III, “Spare the Rod, Save the Nation,”
Washington Post,
December 30, 2003, p. A23.

as amicably . . .
Thomas E. Ricks, “Marines to Offer New Tactics in Iraq,” washingtonpost.com, January 7, 2004, p. A1.

fired upon . . .
Steven Komarow, “Favored by Saddam, Fallujah Seething Since His Fall,”
USA Today,
April 2, 2004, p. 4.

attack us . . .
Army Major General Charles H. Swannack, Jr., “82nd Airborne Division Commanding General’s Briefing from Iraq,” U.S. Department of Defense News Transcript, March 10, 2004.

bloodied . . .
Darrin Mortenson, “Army Commander Says Marines Face Challenge in Quieting Iraqi Town,”
North County Times,
March 25, 2004.

CHAPTER 6

to the States . . .
Karl Vick and Sewell Chan, “10 Iraqis Are Killed in Spasm of Attacks,”
Washington Post,
March 19, 2004, p. 15; Capt Zembiec, several interviews by author, Fallujah, April, May, and July 2004.

near the city . . .
Edmund Sanders, “3 Iraqis Killed, 4 U.S. Troops Wounded in Separate Attacks,”
Los Angeles Times,
March 25, 2004.

twenty-six the number of attacks . . .
Eric Schmitt, “The Siege of Fallujah, A Test in a Tinderbox,”
New York Times,
April 28, 2004, p. 1.

made safe . . .
LtGen Conway, interviewed by author, Fallujah, July 24, 2004.

kites flying . . .
Battalion 2/1 After Action Report, March 26, 2004.

in the head . . .
Dexter Filkins, “Up to 16 Die in Gun Battles in Sunni Areas of Iraq,”
New York Times,
March 27, 2004, p. 1.

seeking revenge . . .
Ibid.

mess with the people of Fallujah?” the mob chanted . . .
Sewell Chan, “Descent into Carnage in a Hostile City,”
Washington Post,
April 1, 2004, p. A1.

turned the corner . . .
John F. Burns, “Reminder of Mogadishu: Acts of Hatred, Hints of Doubt,”
New York Times,
April 1, 2004, p. A1.

see this . . .
Jeffrey Gettleman and John F. Burns, “5 G.I.’s and 4 Contractors Are Killed in Separate Attacks,” March 31, 2004.

aggressive . . .
Paul McGeough, “Fallujah Braces for US Reprisal,” theage.com, April 3, 2004.

overwhelming . . .
119 JTF-7 Press Conference, April 1, 2004.

Hawza . . .
Charles Snow, “The Political Scene,”
Middle East Review
47, April 12, 2004.

top aide . . .
Larry Diamond, “What Went Wrong in Iraq,”
Foreign Affairs,
September 2004, p. 40.

Terrorize your enemy . . .
John F. Burns, “The Struggle for Iraq; Uprising,”
New York Times,
April 5, 2004, p. 1.

Kut . . .
David Stokes, “Al-Kut, Iraq: After-Battle Report,”
Middle East Quarterly,
January 10, 2005.

Najaf . . .
Senator Joseph Biden, interview by CBS, “Battles Sweeping Iraq,” April 7, 2004.

CHAPTER 7

northwestern outskirts of Fallujah . . .
Darrin Mortenson, “Marines Launch Major Offensive in Fallujah,”
North County Times,
April 4, 2004.

local sheikh . . .
Tony Perry and Edmund Sanders, “Fallouja Residents Brace for Assault by Marines,”
Los Angeles Times,
April 6, 2004.

Tyler Fey . . .
Darrin Mortenson, “Wrap-up of Falluja Battle,”
North County Times,
June 6, 2004.

104 had mutinied . . .
David H. Hackworth, “The Combat Task,”
www.couplescompany.com
, May 1, 2004.

not coming to Fallujah . . .
At real risk to themselves, the Iraqi officers had protected the advisers from the mob on the road, yet they wouldn’t lead their soldiers. Unlike the case in the American military, the officers, not the sergeants, formed the backbone of the Iraqi Army. The sergeants were followers, not organizers. Without the officers, the system stopped.

“It’s a peasant army,” Lane said. “A whole company responds to one officer. If he’s weak, a hundred men are out of the fight. The officers are intelligent enough, but they lack initiative. It’s a mystery to me what will make them fight consistently.”

It is in the Euro-American tradition to press battle to its bloody conclusion. Unlike the case in other cultures, in the West battle is not a matter of posturing. Frequently it is not an extension of politics, where compromise is expected. Battles are fought to the death. Historians trace this attribute and the martial ascendancy of the West to Alexander the Great at the 482 B.C. Battle of Gaugamela, 150 miles north of Fallujah, where he defeated the Persians. And among countries of the West, none has suffered the stupendous casualty rate of the American Civil War, when one in four soldiers, Union and Confederate, died. Added to that tradition, the American Marine was trained as a shock troop and steeped in the traditions of World War II, when Marines crawled over the bodies of their fallen comrades on island after island to wipe out the Japanese defenders. The net result was that nothing in their psyches prepared American Marines for soldiers who walked off the job, as if they were union members going on strike.

The Marines had encountered no such mutiny in prior wars. The Vietnamese soldiers had stuck like glue alongside their advisers, and the Combined Action Platoons, which sent Marine squads into villages to fight alongside Vietnamese farmers, had been a singular success. In the war before that, South Korean soldiers had considered it an honor to fight alongside Americans. Indeed, since the beginning of the twentieth century the Marines had been raising and training constabularies. Fish swam, birds flew, and soldiers fought—that was the law of nature. Mutinies simply did not happen.

CHAPTER 8

$700,000 . . .
Yaroslav Trofimov, “To Find Peace in the Sunni Triangle, Talk to the Sheikhs,”
Wall Street Journal,
November 5, 2003, p. 1.

sheikh system . . .
Mines too was careful not to offend the sheikhs and, to build support, awarded contracts that didn’t always go to the lowest bidder. He referred to the Baathist Sunnis as “cornered tigers.”

“The coalition is not just an occupying power,” Mines wrote to his superiors. “It is a power involved in disempowering the Sunnis, first through military occupation and ultimately by leaving the Sunnis subordinated to the Shiites in the new Iraq.”

ten separate firefights . . .
These include both Chapters 8 and 10. The firefights were: Joker 3-1 at grid 432 993; Rainmaker at 432 994; west of the cemetery, Joker 3-3 and 3-2 at 425 995; Joker 1-1 and 1-2 and Terminator at 434 999; Reaper at 434 994; Bastard Forward at 535 993; Bastard 3 at 434 991; Joker 6 near the stadium at 438 990; Joker 1-3 and Joker 4 at 450 989; Porky 1, 6, and 3-3 south of the fish hook two kilometers east of the stadium at 468 038; and Head Hunter 2 three kilometers north of the stadium at 448 025.

CHAPTER 9

gingerly . . .
Douglas Jehl, “U.S. Says It Will Move Gingerly Against Sadr,”
New York Times,
April 7, 2004, p. 9.

miles per day . . .
Major Martha G. Granger, “The 1st AD in Operation Iraqi Freedom,”
Military Review,
Nov–Dec 2004.

situation worsened . . .
David E. Sanger and Douglas Jehl, “The Struggle for Iraq: War Policy; Generals in Iraq Consider Options for More Troops,”
New York Times,
April 6, 2004, p. A1.

more trusted . . .
Anthony Shadid, “Iraqi Council Halts Arab TV Network’s News Broadcasts,”
Washington Post,
November 24, 2003.

channel called Al Iraqiya . . .
Alan Sipress, “For Many Iraqis, U.S.-Backed TV Echoes the Voice of Its Sponsor,”
Washington Post,
January 8, 2004, p. 15.

closure of offices . . .
Isabel Hilton, “Al-Jazeera: And now, the other news preferred Jazeera,”
New York Times Book Review,
March 6, 2005.

suspension of the network . . .
Shadid, “Iraqi Council Halts Arab TV Network’s News Broadcasts.”

crew . . .
Aljazeera online, “Aljazeera News Crew Inside the Town,” April 8, 2004.

the Israelis . . .
Barbara Slavin, “Mosque Strike Seen Stoking Rage,”
USA Today,
April 8, 2004, p. 1.

for Fallujah . . .
Karl Vick, “Shiites Rally to Sunni ‘Brothers,’ ”
Washington Post,
April 9, 2004, p.1.

for rebelling . . .
Rajiv Chandrasekaran, “Anti-U.S. Uprising Widens in Iraq; Marines Push Deeper Into Fallujah,”
Washington Post,
April 8, 2004, p.1.

across the city . . .
Pamela Constable, “Marines Fight for Control of Fallujah, Inch by Inch,” washingtonpost.com, April 7, 2004.

rallying point . . .
Edward Wong, “Battle for Fallujah Rouses the Anger of Iraqis Weary of the US Occupation,”
New York Times,
April 22, 2005, p. A14

infidel occupiers . . .
Karl Vick and Anthony Shadid, “Fallujah Gains Mythic Air,”
Washington Post,
April 13, 2004, p. A1.

175,000 stories . . .
As of October 17, 2004, the count on Google was 713,000 stories about Fallujah.

initial impressions . . .
Peter Braestrup,
Big Story: How the American Press and Television Reported and Interpreted the Crisis in Tet 1968 in Vietnam and Washington
(Novalo, Calif.: Presidio, 1994), p. 517.

is lying . . .
BrigGen John Kelly, 1st MarDiv headquarters, May 9, 2004.

CHAPTER 11

morning of April 7 . . .
Battalion 1/5 began the day by launching a raid across Highway 10. After studying a detailed overhead photo, an informant had pointed out the home of Qhalil Hawadi, an entrepreneur who sold rockets and mortars at bargain prices. First Lieutenant Josh Glover of Weapons Company—call sign Red Cloud—jotted down the ten-digit GPS coordinates, which would place him within ten meters of Target 204. At two in the morning, Glover pushed north across Route Michigan with a platoon mounted in four trucks. Racing up to the designated building, the platoon blew the locks on the courtyard gate, smashed in the front door, and burst into an empty store. Emerging sheepishly, Glover knocked on next door, politely inquiring through a translator about Hawadi’s whereabouts. A woman pointed to a nearby house, and again Glover knocked. A portly man in a white dishdasha answered, protesting that he was a car salesman. A quick search turned up several documents identifying him as Hawadi, and Glover drove with the prisoner back across Michigan before dawn with no shots fired.

Alpha and Bravo were working their way west toward 873 Easting or Phase Line Violet, a wide street two kilometers inside the city that ran perpendicular to Route Michigan. As Bravo Company approached Violet from the east, the volume of fire picked up. Glover’s platoon, Red Cloud, was mounted in two highback Humvees and four gun trucks, two Humvees with .50 cals and two with Mark 19s. When Red Cloud headed south on Violet to provide fire support for the infantry approaching from the east, they ran into a hornet’s nest of bullets and RPGs. Oil barrels were scattered at intervals on the west side of Violet as target reference points, and each time the Humvees passed a barrel, there would be a flurry of fire from nearby alleys and cross streets. Twenty minutes into the fight the front ends of the four gun trucks had been peppered, yet no Marine was seriously hit. A heavy slug had punched a hole the size of a silver dollar in the windshield of Glover’s command vehicle, inches from the head of Lance Corporal Charles Williams, who shrugged and grinned. The lead gun truck had ripped through 1,100 rounds of .50 cal, and the next truck in line had fired 800 rounds of 7.62 ammo. The radiators on both trucks were steaming and leaking from numerous hits, and Gunnery Sergeant William Paulino had them hauled off the street and into an alleyway.