Real Stories From Iraq

i'm a little disappointed, guys.

the idea of this thread was to tell us about your personal experiences in iraq from the soldier's point of view.

i know it must gall the f*&k out of you to get called names and have unfair accusations made about your motivations and all. but, $hit, we already know what people stateside and abroad that were/are against and for the iraq war have to say. there's a gazzillion threads for both sides of that discussion. and neither side has said anything new or enhanced in years.

maybe i'm hitting it wrong.

try thinking like it's an online diary or newsletter.

not being a dork, just trying to provide you with a non-partisan/non-political thread that gives you a place to talk about it.

rock on, dudes...

Mysteryman

If you had imbedded reporters with you.......what was your opinion of them and the messages they were sending back..........or would they ever show you what they sent back?

bookmarking...Thanks for sharing your stories.

now that is a great question...

Sorry I didnt answer sooner,I was out of town.

We didnt have any embed reporters with us most of the time,but we did have a camera crew with us when we moved on Nassiriyah.
I'm sorry,but I dont remember who they were with,but I think they were with CNN.

Most of the time,they stayed out of the way,and did their jobs.
We explained the ground rules to them,and they followed them.
The rules were simple,they didnt go anywhere without us,they did EXACTLY what they were told (by this I mean when we said stop,they stopped, or when we said down,they got down)

They almost never showed us what they were sending back,but then again,we didnt ask to see it.
They were really good about getting names right,but they sometimes acted as if they were invincible,or that their press credentials would protect them.

Personally,my biggest problem was that they sometimes got in the way when I was trying to treat wounded.
My priorty was to treat our wounded first,then civilians or noncombatants,then enemy wounded.
There were times they would question my priorities,or get in the way when I was busy.
I know they were just doing their job,but they would sometimes stop me from doing mine and I would have to order them to move.
Other then that,I had no problem with them.
To be honest,I think it was a good idea to have them with us.

thanks mystery. i appreciate you staying involved here.

it's kinda funny. you and i have switched places. i'm from "luavull" ( :wink:) and the first place i lived in california was san diego, right across the street from (what was then) nas miramar.

maybe you could tell us more about the navy's involvement in iraq, such as air support, etc. ?

I really cant answer that question,becaused even though I was in the navy,I was a combat medic with the marines.
I served with a marine rifle company,working,sweating,eating and sleeping with marines.
Navy corpsman with the marines are treated like marines,so we identify more with the marines then the navy.

yeah, i should have thought of that.

anything else ?

The Lieutenant's story is inspiring. In a few years, we will read more from our Soldiers who served there. We may also read stories from Iraqis who are not quite secure yet to share their thoughts with us. There is one constant which appears to run through all of the tales told by witnesses to wars the US has fought and stories from the US soldiers themselves--and that is the beneficent way in which our military has always treated the innocent.

Thats because a professional soldier does not make war on civilians,or on any noncombatant.
That includes captured enemy troops,civilians,wounded enemy troops,or anybody else that is not shhoting at us or cannot threaten us.

When I was in Iraq,members of my platoon repeatedly risked death or injury to themselves by not firing when there were noncombatants in the line of fire.
Also,we left food,water,medical personnel,and medical supplies at almost every village we went thru,just so the locals could survive.

I served in the US Army, Mysteryman, and know you are correct. The annals of the military, despite the attacks from the peaceniks, are filled with stories of the compassionate American soldier. Certainly there are and have been instances in which American soldieds behaved brutally but it is clear, reading recent stories about court martials, that the US military is miles ahead of any fighting group in policing their ranks.

I look for the publication of many stories from the men and women who served in Iraq. Those accounts will give us a look into the heart and mind of the American soldier.

i do too. that's what this thread was posted for.

Dont Tread- I am sorry. I should have enlarged on my statement. I meant books and long articles--hardly feasible for a venue like this.

nuthin' to be sorry for chiczaira. as time goes on there will be more and more stuff written about the iraq war. books, movies etc. but, yeah, we're trying to get some input here from the folks that are just back from, or still in iraq.

and honestly, i'm surprised that we aren't getting more in the way of personal experiences posted up. but i keep hoping that it'll kick in. :wink:

Green Witch- You may indeed be correct that the war would not have happened if GW Bush had needed to serve in the battle like the Medieval Kings did.

But why be so niggardly? Why not include the 296 members of the House of Representatives and the 77 Senators who voted on Octgober 10th and 11th 2002, to grant the president the full authority to attack Iraq unilaterally?

You would also have to include EVERY member of Congress in 1973 that approved the War Powers Act.
After all,its that Act that gives the Presidents the right to use military force.

One of the things that moved me the most in Iraq during the invasion was the hundreds of kids that wanted to see me.
Actually,their parents wanted to see me.
Once they found out I was a medic,they would bring their kids to me for treatment.
And 90% of the kids had simple problems that could have been prevented by a visit to a Dr.
I talked to one woman that brought her daughter to see me. Through an interpreter she told me that her daughter had NEVER seen a Dr,because they were Kurds and it wasnt allowed.

The daughter had problems with her eyes that will lead to blindness,but a Dr could have prevented it with an eye exam when she was a little girl.
I had parents bring me kidsd that had sprains,muscle tears,and even simple childhood diseases that we are immunized against when we are babies.
Measles,whooping cough,rubella,and every other childhood disease.
According to my interpreter,I was the nearest thing to a Dr that many of those people had ever seen.
I treated as many as I could,and called a navy Dr in to look at the rest of them.
All of the people I treated got a Tootsie pop,and many of them didnt even know what that was.I had to show them how to eat it.
I hope I helped dispel the rumors they were told about us by their Govt.
According to what they were told,we were going to kill all of them,without exception.

Thanks to Don't Tread for starting this thread, and please, guys, more responses. I'm sure you can count on a supportive group of people here who will listen open-mindedly. My brother is in Iraq now (Mosul) and he isn't a talkative guy so I don't have any idea what he is going through, but I would so like to have a more real picture of what it is like for all of our brothers sisters sons and daughters there. I too question the motivations for our military action there, but support and respect our soldiers with all my heart. I can't tell you all how sorry I am that anyone has ever treated you badly for serving in the war, and hope that any soldier who has had an experience like that will not take it to represent the feelings of the rest of us who were against the war. I am sure that the vast majority of those against the war would never be against our brave soldiers. thank you for your incredible sacrifices and service to our country.

Intrepid writes:

"As a Canadian, perhaps I don't have a right to comment in this arena. However, I too am against the war in Iraq. I am against the administration that somehow justifies this in the face of logic. The soldiers are there because they are under orders to be there. We cannot fault them for doing their duty when called upon by their country. It is sad that so many of them either will never come home, or come home and leave something of themselves in the desert.

It is easy to sit in the chair and send the kids into battle. GW gets to sleep at night in the comfort of his own bed. I wonder if the last war in Iraq would have been initiated by George Sr. if George Jr. had to go. I also wonder what the situation would be if Mr. Bush had sons instead of daughters. I have to ponder why it is the Bush family that goes to war. Mr. Clinton had some personal flaws, but American boys were not being killed when he was President.

They say that it is better to do something than do nothing. Perhaps, in this case, it would have been better to do nothing."

Well, Intrepid, I agree with the majority of your reply, but the last set of statements is faulty. So, to begin.

Not only did Clinton have personal problems but also he had administrative problems. The man was very versatile and open in front of a panel or an audience (which explains his commissions for his speeches nowadays), but not as versatile in his administration, in the face of logic as it were. Read up on Bosnia, Somalia, and his intelligence operations during that period and I am certain you will be surprised. Also, I believe you will find a number of American soldiers and operators were KIA in those hot-spots.

As for the last statement, it is unqualified: when is it better to act, or not to act? What criteria must be brought in to assess the possibility of action? And, finally, if it is better to "...do nothing," what are the reasons for this sort of inactivity?

Thanks Intrepid.

breaking my own rule here, but is important to remember that the somalia deployment was enacted by george bush sr., in either november or december of 1992. it was supposed to be a humanitarian aid effort as opposed to peace keeping.