Cards from Kids

The second set of cards, courtesy of Ms. Matzuk's 5th grade class in Doylestown, PA

One of the favorite and fortunately repeating episodes of life here in Iraq is the multitude of cards and letters we get from school kids. The first round came from a fifth grade class in Doylestown, PA taught by Melissa, the sister of one of my colleagues back home at the civilian job (ohhh, civilian job . . . how I miss you). The set of letters, one from each child, came and I rallied the office and friends in the building to respond to each. I told Melissa that one of the kids, Sam, would even be getting a letter back from a Colonel in the Australian Army, to which Sam was reportedly very excited about, until he became worried and inquired "Will the letter be in English?"


Nate from Ms. Parker's 2nd grade class at Los Alamitos Elementary, looks like he might be a future Navy guy himself with this fine rendering of a Navy supply ship above.

And then there were the cards from Ms. Parker's 2nd grade class at Los Alamitos Elementary - each one exquisitely had crafted in crayon with festive holiday scenes (like Santa on a tank).

But Jack's card . . . well, who ever thought of replacing Santa's sleigh with a tank pulled by reindeer (except Jack)? I'm hoping that the red crayon color in front of Rudolph indicates the glow from his nose and not a casualty . . .

Here is an assotment of more cards from more kids that were put downstairs for the staff in the building to enjoy.

You are being watched!

Like most companies or organizations, the Army blocks any websites it believes are detrimental to good morale and welfare or would result in abuse of the computer system. If you try to access one, you get the beloved "Your activity is being monitored and logged for review and possible disciplinary action" message or something like that. I hope that really is the case, because whenever my buddy Josh leaves his computer unattended, I type in as many restricted sites as I can think of.

The system might be a little overactive. The satirical "Onion" newspaper is banned due to "adult/mature content" and I was given the "monitored and logged" warning when I tried to read an article about one of the last American WWI vets passing away - clearly an insidious threat to coalition forces in Iraq. Oh, but don't worry, I still get emails on my work account begging me to help Mogatu in Namibia who has $20M his late father earned but just needs my banking information to transfer it to me. I sent that right away.

A Baghdad Christmas

At my desk with my "Tree in a Box."


Merry Christmas from Camp Victory. We did what everyone else around here does on Christmas . . . we worked. We did take some time though to do a Secret Santa gift exchange followed by a jolly and rather contentious white elephant gift exchange wherein, after seeing the quality of the first few gifts, I just chose the same one I contributed. After seeing the rest of the gifts, my initial instinct was confirmed. Good call on my part.

Our little tree on Christmas Eve . . . I was so excited for Santa to come I almost couldn't sleep. Well actually, I was on watch that night so in fact I really couldn't sleep. We have someone on watch each night in the building to make sure if the phone rings someone picks it up and doesn't allow the telemarketer to change our long distance service unless it is a REALLY good deal. Seriously, I don't know anyone who has actually had the phone ring . . .

The tree was a care package to a fellow who has since returned home (or "redeployed" as we might say in the military) but using Contingency Expeditionary Wartime Care Package Guidelines (CEWCPG) developed when this package arrived by, well, our boss the Colonel, we declared the tree unfit to return to the states and set it up so we could keep an eye on it. Luckily for me, the nieces had sent along two tree ornaments which were among the first to be hung.



Contary to the conventional wisdom of many, it is not hot all year round in Iraq. Christmas morning was a chilly 40 degrees. A 90 degree difference to the temperature here in July and August.

The stockings were hung on the cubicle with care, in the hopes that no rockets would fall near.

Annie Lesher is a lovely woman no one in the office has ever met. She works as a civilian for Defense Logistics Agency back in the states and has taken it upon herself to ensure that everyone assigned to DLA in Iraq (about 60 of us throughout the country) gets at least one care package a month. She is the one who made the stockings for us all. She is immensely generous, especially given that she has never spoken to, much less met, any of us.

My Tree in a Box sat above my desk along with other important stuff, like the burn box and the college bowl game schedule.

Winter Wonderland: The IZ

The pool at the embassy compound early one morning before the rush.

I’ve been back and forth between the International Zone (IZ) formerly called the Green Zone, a couple of times this month and the longer I am in Iraq, the more surreal the IZ feels, in a very civilized way. As always, lets compare and contrast:

Camp Victory bulletin board posting - “Safety Warning: Small Arms Fire coming over the wire [perimeter] in location xxxx”
IZ bulletin board posting – “SCRABBLE TOURNAMENT! This weekend!

Camp Victory bulletin board posting – “Ensure your weapon is on safe and you do not have a magazine loaded”
IZ bulletin board posting – “The pool is closed today” (this one I think might have actually elicited some form of organized protest, but everything returned to normal by the time “Salsa Dance Night” rolled around that evening).

Camp Victory bulletin board posting – “For sale: tactical overvest, slightly used”
IZ bulletin board posting – “For sale: Lava Lamp, like new”

The embassy is located in the palace that use to serve as Sadam's primary residence and office.


A common street inside the IZ. Many regular Iraqis live inside the IZ.

A reflection of the Rhino commander shows through the ballistic glass as the convoy makes its way to the IZ.

The road to the IZ, with one of our guntruck escorts ahead of us.

Armed Forces Network (AFN)

AFN is the official network of the military and runs eight channels. As one would expect, there is a news channel (mostly FOX News), a sports channel (mostly ESPN and games), two movie channels, a family channel, etc. But that is all secondary to the commercials on AFN. Imagine one big set of goofy public service announcements. If you were an anthropologist and you knew nothing else about the military than what you saw on these commericals, it would be a reasonable conclusion that everyone in the military was a complete moron.

We have one with an emotionless military surgeon talking about pandemic flu. His inspriration obviously came from Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller. Then there is the "how to mail a package at the post office" commercial. And the Air Force seems to constantly run commercials about how cool it is to be the Air Force, showing Air Force members in camoflauge running around the forrest with high tech guns (knock, knock Air Force - uh, who's there - REALITY!! Get back to your desks and put the paintball guns back in the closet).

But my favorite is a commercial about not letting kids play in a construction zone. It shows heavy construction and earth moving equipment and in the middle of it all, five little kids playing. So you know that this happened someplace and now the military not only has a commercial about it but I expect to soon be notified that all members must take a one hour online course about child safety in construction zones.

I’m Dreaming of a Brown Christmas . . . Well, not really, but why set my self up to be disappointed?

Looks like the Camp Liberty PX has a great sale going on everyone’s favorite family board game “Hit the Deck!” Something tells me that sales might have slumped on this item. Why buy the game and PRETEND when we get to do it for real so often?


The holidays are here in lovely Victory Base Complex. The crowds at the PX, the loads of cookies and treats on the conference table and special coupon deals. The check out lines are always long. The PX closest to me is open 24/7 so even if I need to find out at at 0300 that they don’t have anything except size small boxer shorts in stock, I can.

The gift that keeps on giving: the IRAQ TRAVEL MUG!! Fits perfectly into Humvee cup holders! (er, well, I guess it WOULD fit perfectly if the Humvee had cup holders . . . ).

Among the holiday mysteries (well, year-long mysteries) that I have yet to crack is why anyone here, in the land of huge quantities of free food at all the DFACs would instead choose to pay to buy food from Taco Bell, Burger King, etc. but each day there are lines of soldiers at these places.

USC Alumni Club of Baghdad Holiday Greetings

Thanks to USC's Marshall Alumni Association, led by fellow Navy Reservist Robin Doty, for the alumni sign. As you can see, it is currently on the office door . . .

Well it shouldn't surprise anyone that I rallied the Trojans at Victory Base Complex. I worked with USC and the Rose Bowl committee to make sure this got to the right people. For those of you going to the Rose Bowl, hopefully you see this on the big screen. For those of you not going to the Rose Bowl, here it is on the small screen.

Fighton and Beat the Illini!

Secret Video Teleconferencing [CLASSIFIED]

I work in what is considered a “secure container building.” That means that we can handle classified information throughout the building. We even have a secure video teleconference room that is pretty high tech by most standards. Each morning we can tune in the live video feed from the Joint Operations Center of the Battlefield Update Assessment or “BUA” (Hooah BUA) which is the daily briefing for General Patreaus. The room is used countless times each day.

But the biggest draw? The standing room only crowd in the conference room? The one that includes near beer and pretzels? You guessed it – the 108th Annual Army Navy Game. Not deterred by the late night start nor the almost certain fate of the Army team, the room was teeming with members from all the services. With a handful of grads from both schools in the room, the trash talk was persistent but diligently followed by a “ . . . . sir” when required. As usual, I made friends and influenced people by just talking about USC the entire time.

And now for the December installment of Meet a Member of the Coalition!

The Baltic country of ESTONIA contributes a 30 man platoon to the coalition forces. A whopping 27 more troops than neighboring Latvia. Latvia you slacker – the Estonians toast to their country and scoff at yours! Take that neighbor. So let’s hear it for Estonia, whose official tourism motto is “Estonia! Positively Transforming.” I don’t know what that means.

Things I’ll miss about Iraq when I come back home:

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Signs of the Times

Just a sampling of the signage around Camp Victory and elsewhere . . .

Remember the rules at the pool? They don't change much at the helicopter terminal . . .



In an effort to defeat remote detonation IEDs, convoys blast electromagentic energy to jam the signals of cell phones, radios and other devices commonly used to activate an IED.

Another great feature of the Rhino - everyone gets their own gun port. Taking the bus in the states just wont be the same . . .

A Camp Victory Thanksgiving

Although the sign behind me is intended to remind people of good convoy and security habits, it also came in handy as I tried to manage my serving assignment on Thanksgiving . . . .

Many people have asked me what Thanksgiving was like here at Camp Victory and I have to tell you, it was pretty well done. But lets compare and contrast:

Home: 25 relatives and family friends to feed
Camp Victory: 45,000 military, civilians, contractors and workers to feed

Home: Alcoholic beverages
Camp Victory: Near beer and egg nog

Home: Loud relatives
Camp Victory: Loud rocket warning alarms

Home: Served by Aunt Jenny
Camp Victory: Served by Deepak, the contract laborer from Sri Lanka

Home: Talk about how great it is to see everyone
Camp Victory: Talk about how great it will be to see everyone next year.

In all seriousness, it is an immense undertaking to feed everyone. Since this war started, over 100,000 tractor-trailer loads worth of food destined for coalition bases have come across Iraq’s borders. Next time you are at your local grocery store, ask them how many trucks they get in a day or a week and compare.

The serving team is geared-up and ready to go in the prep area of the DFAC.

A Tradition Continued
It is a long and storied tradition that the officers serve the troops on Thanksgiving and Christmas. In the past, it allowed the troops, who usually did the serving, to be on the other side of the line for a change. These days contract workers do the serving but the tradition goes on and the officers in my section worked the serving side dishing up Thanksgiving fare. I was in charge of the prime rib, white meat turkey and dark meat turkey. To my right Josh was in charge of the ham and Cornish game hens and to my left Colonel Manning was dishing up sweet potatoes, stuffing and green beans. We had a great time playing host as I am sure the hundreds of other officers who served throughout the day did too.

The DFAC was superbly outfitted with holiday decorations and the culinary handicraft of the contract worker staff (99% of whom are Indian, Sri Lankan, Bangladeshi, and the like). They won the all-Iraq decoration contest and proudly displayed their enormous plaque.

This alligator, made almost entirely from pinapple skin, was a centerpiece on the shrimp cocktail table.

Incredible sculptures in watermelon were prevelant throughout the DFAC.

A good Thanksgiving for sure, but it will be even better next year . . . at home.

Old Geezer PT

For the last 15 months, the Resources & Sustainment Division has developed a bit of a tradition led by our commanding general, BG Anderson. Every Friday is “Old Geezer PT” – a 30 minute, three mile run done in six legs. The “old geezer” is the general himself, but what that doesn’t tell you is that he is probably the fastest man on the entire base. No one, young or old, can keep up with him. Old Geezer takes place around Lost Lake – a manmade lake that was previously the home to Uday and Qusay Hussein. The remnants of their dilapidated and crumbling villas remain a constant reminder of what a 500lb bomb can do when it rings the doorbell on your roof. The road around the lake use to be a favorite of the local snipers (which I guess would motivate one to run that much faster) but is now as safe as anywhere on base to run.

In honor of the last Old Geezer PT, some of the office really got into the "old Geezer" look. The bottle of O2 was my favorite prop. That's General Anderson in the middle.

This being the last Old Geezer PT prior to the General’s departure for home and the end of his Iraq tour, the more established senses of humor went all out to make it memorable and five of the guys from the office got dressed up as geezers (keep in mind, no costume store at Camp Victory), somehow finagled a bottle of oxygen from the troop medical clinic, hiked-up their gym shorts and set up to watch the PT, with an occasional comment about their backs. One kept yelling, at everyone, tongue in cheek, to “get off the lawn.”



The General hams it up with the oxygen mask for the group photo.

AFLAC!!!

A soldier enjoys the setting sun on top of his armored assault vehicle.

AFLAC!!!

The suspected insurgent fowl attempt to hide their identities from the camera . . . .

The power of nature shone forth today as I was driving down the road in front of the Al Faw Palace on base here. The palace is surrounded by a manmade lake which serves as home to a surprising variety of wildlife. I could see up ahead there was a convoy element with six gun trucks headed my way. That is, they WERE headed my way until nature subtly but forcefully stood in the way. A flock of geese decided to cross the road. I had a front row seat on the other side of the street as a large and valorous male goose strutted in front of the five-ton lead humvee mounted with a 50 cal machine gun. The goose spread it’s wings and quacked, ferociously. The convoy came to a sudden stop. A parade of a dozen geese casually crossed the road, one even breaking stride to leave a little something extra in front of the humvee. As the male goose started to cross himself, the lead humvee inched forward, only to once again draw the ire of the fearless bird who waddled back over, with wings spread anew. “You don’t want a piece of me.” Two amused troops passing by snapped pictures as these pugnacious waterfowl made their way into the lake. Geese 1, Military 0. Aflac commercial coming soon.

A giant American Flag hangs in the main rotunda of the Palace for Veterans Day.

Your Insider Access Pass to the Al Faw Palace

Multinational Force Iraq is headquartered in the Al Faw Palace, a grandiose structure in the middle of camp. I’ll tell you one thing, Saddam sure liked his ceilings colorful.

The ceilings are ornately painted in pastel hues.

Every door in the palace has an artistic renedition of Saddam's initials

And now, for another installment of "Everything is More Difficult in Iraq."

Our topic this week: Courier Service
Why is it more difficult in Iraq? Because it does not exist. I am getting a new cell phone. The people who issue the cell phones are located in the Green Zone. Only 10km away! No problem! I’ll just hop in my car during lunch and run over there. Easy. But wait! This is IRAQ! You can’t do that. You have to make a reservation on the Rhino (see previous post) or get on a helicopter to go over there. “Sure honey, I’ll be home in time for dinner. I just need to put on my body armor, load my weapon and hop in the helicopter to go pick up my new cell phone.” Then hope I don’t get bumped from the return flight and end up having to spend the night. If I come home and the limited patience you remember me having seems to be galactically expanded, this is why.

Nehi Night: Socializing (or not) in a War Zone

This oddity was here when American troops rolled onto the palace grounds. Although a murdering psycopath, Saddam was pretty practical with this and the little insect devouring machines that live in it. And Batman would be jealous. It's a man-made bat cave. Talk a about good material for a pick-up line . . .

What does one do to socialize in a war zone without an officer’s club, where you are encouraged to leave the dining facility as soon as possible so others can take a seat and where general order #1 is NO ALCOHOL (which really blows, by the way)? The answer? Nehi Night! For those of you who may remember the diligent yet easily befuddled character of Corporal Radar O’Reily on the TV series M*A*S*H*, you might also recall that Radar’s favorite drink at the MASH canteen was the non-alcoholic Grape Nehi. So our general, the chief logistician in theater, hosts a monthly Nehi night for his staff (about 65 of us). The last one was a few nights ago. I’ve decided that I’m going to wait to mobilize again until I too am a flag officer. It’s good to be a general.

My boss, CAPT Brantley, and I pose with the General we all work for, and the host of the evening, Brigadier General Anderson.

My office mate Manny and I enjoy some steak. Manny is a civilian employee of the Department of Defense. Note my combat utensils loaded in my tactical breast pocket . . .

There was a BBQ in back with steak cooking away and expeditionary lighting. “Expeditionary lighting you say Bob? Ohhhh, so it was like all red light to prevent the enemy from seeing you?” No, sorry folks. Expeditionary lighting was in the form of a Ford Explorer with the headlights turned on so the cooks could see what was going on. We had a petty officer who was given the collateral duty of turning the lights back on every time they automatically turned off. The base is filled with near-beer though, so you can still get the swilly taste of a bad beer but without the desired effects of a bad beer, which is why people buy bad beer in the first place, isn’t it? The downer is that all of the usual pick-up lines have to be completely re-tooled for a war environment because
1. There aren’t that many women around
2. There are even fewer available women
3. There are even fewer attractive available women
4. There are even fewer attractive available women who are my same pay grade.
5. There are even fewer attractive available women who are my same pay grade AND have a relaxed attitude about the Navy’s regulations on fraternization . . .
So not a whole lot going on here. The military is fond of saying “train like you fight and fight like you train.” I feel as though if that is the case, I should train like I flirt and flirt like I train. I don’t feel as though the Navy is supporting my personal development on this front . . . . “Dear Congressman . . . . .”

And now for a special feature I’d like to call, “Meet a Member of the Coalition”

This month’s coalition member – the Pacific island nation of Tonga! Tonga has a small group of Marines here at Camp Victory. They do a lot of the sentry duty at key points in camp. These are REALLY tough looking guys. As if they bench press each other in their off time. But once they see the appropriate ID card, you always get a huge toothy grin and warm greeting. There are 48 Tongan Marines in Iraq, which equals approximately 25% of the entire Tongan Marine Corps. As a percentage of national population, Tonga is contributing about the same number of troops as the U.S.

With Al Faw Palace in the background, welcome to this month's edition of Meet a Member of the Coalition!

Moving Day

Note the 12 foot concrete "T-Walls." These are arrayed to compartmentalize the trailers and minimize collateral damage if a mortar or rocket strikes close by.

Who knew I would ever be so happy to live in a trailer! Well, really 1/3 of a trailer. Okay, since I have a roommate, I guess it is only 1/6 of a trailer. But that 1/6 is ALL MINE. Does Home Depot have a trailer improvement section? I’d like to get rid of this linoleum floor and go for some hard wood, maybe get some crown molding installed as well as plantation shutters. I think it will go well with the warm, rich look of the faux wood paneling you see here . . .

The TV was left by the prior roommate. I think he was so happy to leave, he did not even bother selling it.

Seriously, I was happy to move to a trailer and finally settle-in. My roommate, Erick, also a LT, is a submariner (or a “nuke” as we might refer to them). Given that there is a huge fleet of submarines here in the, uh, hold on. Hmmm. How deep is the Tigris river again? Wait . . . no. Erick is assigned to the office of the Army Inspector General so he gets to deal with complaints and injustices large and small, both real and, in some cases, real ridiculous. He was happy to see me mostly because he was happy I was not his last roommate, an Air Force Judge Advocate (attorney) who apparently talked incessantly about his Duke law degree and had a penchant for working out at 0300. Ahh, the Air Force . . . that guy was probably also highly agitated that Camp Victory does not have a golf course or anyplace he could get his back waxed.


The Office

Now, I can make fun of the other services because we all make fun of each other. The commanding officer of my parent unit is an Army Colonel but most of his people are Navy. He loves to say “You know what happens when you send 100 sailors out to sea? They come back as 50 couples.” Boy does he think that one is funny. And truth be told, it kind of is. But even if it wasn’t, he’s a colonel.

The office has a neat tradition. We celebrate birthdays each month. Not just our own but family birthdays too. Remind me to not tell you about the conversation I fell into with a co-worker who told me the birthday of all her cats. That’s 1o minutes of my life I’ll never get back. So the general we all work for comes to the office to help us celebrate and we take a photo to send back home to wish everyone happy birthday. So if your birthday is in November, thanks for the cake – it was delicious. The members of Defense Contingency Support Team - Iraq (or at least the ones in the office that day) say happy birthday to all of you November birthday folks. That's the general behind the cake.


And now, W O R D O F T H E W E E K !

This week’s word of the week is “Hooah.” Yes, I know, not a word, but don’t tell the Army that. The Army as whole might have sufferred from a largely untreated speech impediment when it was young, completely eviscerating their ability to pronounce the letter R in the word “hoorah.” Each service has a different way of expressing motivation, etc.

Navy: Hoorah!
Army: Hooah!
Air Force: Hip, hip, hooray! (and you have to clap your hands super fast to do this one right)

In any case, “Hooah” is the Army catch-all word for “I can’t articulate a complete sentence.” Some Army folks, I kid you not, start and end every sentence, as short as they may be, with “hooah.” It essentially means anything but “no.” Try it out next time you are at a loss for words. I think we could really get this going.