IRAQ DAY 2–THE JOURNEY TO BAGHDAD AND RAMADI.

Hey all,

I loved reading all your notes and will try to reply to all of them.
The internet connection is incredibly slow, so it might take a while,
but keep sending them!  It is so good to hear from so many of you.

Also, check out our new blog for our film at www.editorialproject.wordpress.com where you can also see photos from our first trip to Pakistan, Lebanon, Egypt!
I’m writing this from Eagle Base, a dusty outpost on the outskirts of
Ramadi.  We just arrived and are getting settled into our new home for
the next few days.  My first platoon sergeant, now an enlisted platoon
commander, is out here and it has been so good to see him.  I’m
waiting for him to get back from a patrol. Gunny Nick Fox and I served
together in 1st Battalion, 1st Marines in 2002 and 2003.  After a
short and uneventful deployment to Iraq and elsewhere, we volunteered
together to go to the next deploying unit back to Iraq.  Nick was
wounded twice on that deployment and on one occasion got into a
firefight wearing flipflops and his tight green silky PT short
affectionately known by Marines as his catch me, f-ck me shorts.
Before the Marine Corps entered the 21st century, we wore the issued
shorts made circa 1970 something.  I’m sure they were in style
then….

Tomorrow, we’ll be on patrol together and he is bringing me to meet
his favorite Sheik.  I’m looking forward to learning more about how
this province, once the deadliest in Iraq, became so peaceful through
cooperative efforts between Marines and the tribes.  In 2004, we were
enemies.  Today, they are our closest allies.  How’s that for
diplomacy?

Coming out here we had to spend a few days in Baghdad so that Brad
could recieve his press credentials. It is quite a hassel and I thank
G-d I’m back out here with the Marines.  I hate to say it, but the
press office is poorly run and often a tad contentious in their
relations with the press.  However, we did get to meet a number of
great young journalists and I have a newfound respect for the brave
men and women of the press corps.

As a Marine, I was very wary of the press, especially in Iraq.  There
always seemed to be a tremendous disconnect between my experience and
what was reported in the news.  I still don’t have an answer for that,
but I do know that I now know a littany of inspiring young
journalists.  They travel outside the wire, often in taxi cabs or with
a loyal driver, but often without an armed escort to find and report
stories.  They head to the hottest spots in Iraq in a moments notice.
And they give voice to the victims who are often unheard of.  They too
wonder why such stories often never appear in print. We had a great
conversation until late in the night about journalistic ethics.

Brad and I decided we could have made our film in that bunk room, but
no one would believe it.  A young kid who is making a movie about
driving his motorcycle from Morocco to Afghanistan, while trying to
overcome a serious case of OCD.  A 63 year old two-tour Vietnam Vet
and Fox news, local affeliate, very gregarious supporter of the war.
During a press conference on Sunday with the head of operations for
coalition forces, he asked a questions- ok, more of a statement in his
very emphatic and gruff voice, “General, sir, I’ve been to Karbala,
Diyanea, Basra, and Fallujah.  Sir, I’ve been north, south, east, and
west in this country over the last four months and one thing is for
certain, this war is over. We won.”  Behind me the NPR, WSJ, and
reuters reporters all gasped in disbelief, before breaking into
giggles. Even the general looked uncomfortable and the Iraqi
journalists were aghast.  Afterwards, a writer from San Diego, who has
spent a lot of time covering the drug war in Mexico, and I took it
upon ourselves to egg on our new friend from the Fox News affeliate.
He had a lot of interesting views on the world and liberal
anti-Americanism.

Fox news affeliates aside, these other young journalists go outside
the line everyday, the live in the red zone, and they report stories
that often don’t make the papers or the evening news.  They are voices
that we need to hear more from.

Yesterday, before our flight out West, I went with two Iraqi
journalists to pick up my translator’s, Abood, stamp collection and
family albums.  He and his family had to flee Iraq in 2006 and
couldn’t take those precious heirlooms because it would alert
authorities at the border that they didn’t intend to return to Iraq.
We walked outside the press center through half a dozen checkpoints
and out onto the streets to meet Abood’s neighbor, who had a box of
the heirlooms for me to ship back to the states.  It was incredibly
depressing.  Police checkpoints at every block and the peaks of
beautiful building peer just above huge concrete “blast” walls that
line the roads.  You become overwhelmed with a feeling of
imprisonment.  Everything is grey- the walls, the sky, the road, the
sidewalk, the faces on the street.  Coming back through we had to get
searched almost a dozen times through concentric circles of security.
It is incredibly sad.

I will continue to write and thank you all for continuing to
read…I’ll try to keep these shorter in the future.

Love you all,

Zach

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