Iraq 2008

Fallujah, Al Anbar Province

“I come in peace. I didn’t bring artillery. But I’m pleading with you, with tears in my eyes; If you fuck with me I will kill you all.” – General ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis USMC (Spoken to Iraqi tribal leaders)

Mounted patrol near Highway 1.

Leading up to 2007, the overall situation in Iraq was terrible and rapidly deteriorating. The Sunni and Shia were locked in a vicious sectarian war of epic proportions. It was tit-for-tat violence with no end in sight. Ramadi and Fallujah became insurgent sanctuaries that bred more and more insurgents to the call of jihad by the Sunni imams.

The insurgency consisted of a loose confederation of Baathists looking for a return to power, former military and intel officers from Saddam’s regime, Islamic extremists, radical Sunni imams, and young men motivated by revenge and/or a desire to fight against the infidel invaders.

AQI (Al Qaeda in Iraq) was the hardcore “varsity” Sunni insurgent group in Fallujah. Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi led them. Zarqawi combined to terrible effect the dark, sadistic, medieval vision of beheadings and 21st-century suicide bombs. Zarqawi’s campaign of blowing up Shiite holy sites was intended to provoke retaliation against the Sunnis, leading to a larger-scale civil war.

AQI were experts in psychological warfare. One of their primary goals was to terrify the local population and demonstrate that their government could no longer protect them. The tactic appeared to be working marvelously until 2004.

In April 2004, four American contractors were ambushed and killed in the city of Fallujah. Their bodies were mutilated and strung up from the Jolan bridge that crossed the Euphrates. This event led to the first of two ferocious battles for the city.

The Marine battles in Fallujah and Ramadi were fought in the same fashion as those of Stalingrad in 1942 and Hue City in 1968. It was street by street, house to house, room to room, with no prize for second place. Pitting Marines against battle-hardened fighters in an urban environment, with a war-weary population, weapons galore, and Murphy’s Law, led to some of the worst combat conditions imaginable.

The Marine’s strategy was to coordinate with the Iraqi army to lock down the city and implement systematic, aggressive offensive patrols. They had to own the streets. Every Iraqi male of military age was fingerprinted, given retina scans, and issued ID cards. The few vehicles allowed in were rigorously searched. Concrete barriers isolated entire neighborhoods. During the estimated 21-month struggle for Fallujah, the Marines squeezed the extremists out of the city. One hundred fifty-one Americans were killed, with more than a thousand wounded.

Patrol in the Jolan District of Fallujah.

In 2006, Zarqawi was killed with a five-hundred-pound JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition) and a five-hundred-pound LGB (Laser Guided Bomb) while attending a meeting in a safe house in Hibhib. Some thought the violence would die down after the death of Zarqawi. It did not. He was simply replaced with another asshole, and the violence escalated.

A new strategy was needed. Commanders began to re-position their combat units from their bases into the cities to live with the local population. Iraqi units were taken offline and were retrained and re-equiped. The precision targeting of leaders didn’t have its intended effect.

In January 2007, President Bush announced on television that he was ordering the deployment of twenty thousand troops for combat in Iraq. It was termed “The Surge.” The surge wouldn’t be an immediate fix; it would get worse before it got better. By the end of 2007, 899 US troops were killed trying to implement the new strategy. It was the deadliest year of the Iraq War.

I was part of the massive wave of Marines that surged into Al Anbar Province in August 2008. That year saw a significant decrease in violence due to the new strategy. I deployed for seven months with II MEF (Marine Expeditionary Forces), 2nd Intelligence Battalion, and later attached to Battalion 1/4. Our team worked primarily with 1/4 Scout Snipers, a group of professional, dedicated young Marines. Our primary mission was Counter-IED (Improvised Explosive Device).