Posted on 12/05/2003 11:02:51 AM PST by SandRat
Edited on 12/05/2003 11:32:43 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
The text from the email (cleaned up a little to stay inside FR Posting runles).
To All,
The forwarded note is from Lucian Truscott. Luc is an old friend. He can be a real pip sometimes, and he's been known to annoy the military and others on a regular basis. But he was very good to me when Bill was overseas and for that I will always be grateful. Right now he is in Iraq writing for Harper's Magazine. Aside from the fact that he might want to research some alternative adjectives, I thought you might want to read what he has to say.
Kathy Pardue
From Lucian Truscott in downtown Mosul: ...which is what the troops call downtown Mosul, and I can't say that I disagree with them. Rainy, cold, smelling of diesel mixed with dishwater and turds from the open sewers running down the center of the Biblical era alleyways across the street...
This [delete] place is a treat for ALL of the senses and then some...
But an Infantry platoon is still an Infantry platoon. They act, sound, move, and smell just like they used to -- guys from rural areas around the country, from 19 to a nearly unbelievable 37 year old Spec 4 who lost his civilian job and signed on for Three Years of Fun -- they're really a delight to be around. I think I'm leaving for Tikrit tomorrow night, and if I do, it will be with mixed emotions.
I've had one warm bath in the last week, and shave with icy water every morning and eat two meals a day -- only breakfast and supper is delivered to this Company CP basecamp in the center of the Old City -- out of mermite cans, hut still, the feeling of being in this particular hell hole with this particular group of oof-goofing and half-stepping guys is something to behold. They are very, very good at what they do.
Walking a patrol with them at night through the streets of Mosul, you might as well be in the [delete] jungle in VN.
They know what they're doing.
They've lost only one soldier since the beginning of the war, and that was the spec 4 driving the Sgt. Maj. last Sunday...and the Sgt. Major [messed] that up by going out in a civilian SUV without a gun-truck convoy, which is against every rule there is.
Nearly every LT in the 101st and in the 2/2 Cav (where I was last week) is a West Pointer, and although they look impossibly young and wet behind the ears, they've all been to war, and they go about their jobs with a ruthless efficiency I find hard to believe, even though I've been watching it for two weeks.
They're good guys, they pay attention to the lst Sgt in this company, who's a real pro -- a dream lst SGT, to tell the truth --and they're close to the Joe's. They also smell bad and [curse] a whole lot, which, strangely, makes you feel real, real good when you're around them...in fact, it makes you feel safe and lets you get a good night's sleep every night.
I've decided the key to surviving the dangers of Mosul in particular, and Iraq in general, is to stay the hellaway from the Palestine Hotel and keep close to stinking, muddy, grinning [people].
They are also far better armed than media whores in Baghdad. All you need in a [delete] RPG attack is some blonde in curlers with a microscopic cell phone stuck in her ear watching your back, right? Right.
I had one of the most talented senior officers in the U.S. Army (who will go nameless here for obvious reasons) tell me last night that every order they receive is delivered with next November in mind, so there is little doubt at and near the top about what's really going on over here.
The resentment in the ranks of the civilian "leadership" down in Baghdad and back in Washington is palpable. The senior officer described the ongoing fight between the two forces at work -- no matter how you describe them --
Bremer v. Sanchez, state v. defense, etc etc -- as "the Kabuki dance." He called one of the senior CPA civilians up here in Mosul "a Bremer plant," and I won't even go into what he had to say about Bechtel and Kellogg Brown and Root...but I recall the word chickens*** being used.
I saw the news about Bush in Baghdad. It was clearly a political stunt, but the troops loved it, and I'll give him at least this much. Flying in and out of there at night -- when it's actually the safest -- is not for the faint of heart.
You haven't lived until you've made a C-130 approach into Baghdad, dodging and banking this way and that, gaining and losing altitude. Hanging onto one of those web-seats by only a seat belt (no shoulder harnesses), you're nearly upside down half the time...it's like the ultimate roller coaster ride, only the ride doesn't have to break for you to take a cab...
You guys are gonna love this. I was walking patrol with a squad yesterday and this old guy in traditional dress from Mosul comes up to me and in pretty good English he says: "Excuse me sir. May I ask, what are you doing here?"
I was walking along in civilian clothes, without a weapon, but wearing a flak vest and helmet. I've heard that the "bad guys" would like nothing more than to snatch a journalist, or an NGO worker -- not that they stood a snowball's chance in hell of grabbing me from heavily armed squad -- so I stopped and turned and looked him straight in the eye and said, "I'm the new commanding general and I'm out for a stroll with my men."
That [delete] guy started bowing at the waist and backing up and bowing, and crossing his chest with his palm -- a kind of a local salute of respect -- and then he started whispering to some other [folks] lounging around the street, and they took a walk. I told one of the local colonels about it later, and he almost fell down he was laughing so hard.
I may be a 2LT (Resgn'd) back in the USA, but in Mosul, I am Major General Truscott...
With respect to The Harper's Story, I've got more stuff than can fit in the magazine.
This war isn't badly reported.
It's not reported at all.
I sat down for 3 hours with the commander of the 2nd Brigade of the 101st last night -- he's a tall, bald, charismatic guy everyone says will be Chief of Staff by the time he's 50 -- and he uncorked before I even said a word. From the first sentence out of his mouth, he was laying things bare. We walked outside his CP and were standing on a little road overlooking a nice stretch of the Tigris, and I told him I would quote him by name very judiciously, and he said something like, I know you know what you're doing, and I trust you.
What he told me would have him on a plane to Washington tomorrow. These guys are P***ED OFF, even though they're proud of what they've done.
But of course, what they're proud of is stuff they were never told to do, stuff they made up as they went along.
This guy is the King of Mosul, and even the local hoo-haa sheiks and muchtars treat him that way,and he'll be going home in Feb, and he'll be replaced by a clueless guy who is already involved in turf battles with another colonel and a brigadier general over who's got the biggest **** and who will occupy the biggest Saddam palace.
This [stuff] is fun, but it's no picnic. I'm in a small former schoolhouse in downtown Mosul right across the street from the stone and mud-brick ancient buildings and alleyways of the Old City, which is Bad Guy Central. This company CP took two RPG rounds a couple of days before I got here, and there is AK fire on the street every night all around us.
I went out on a patrol the other night that caught two of the guys who killed the Sgt. Major and the Spec 4 last Sunday.
It was a revenge killing because a guy's brother was killed by a stray .50 caliber round about 4 months ago.
Kick down their [delete] door and grab them at 2 a.m. Not pretty.
Thanksgiving night I was on another patrol that ran into the "chai guy"(the tea-boy, who serves tea all day)to two Fedayeen commanders. He cowered and cried downstairs for 3 hours until a convoy from Brigade HQ came by to pick him up and take him for "questioning". That little encounter made this CP Fedayeen Target Numero [delete] Uno.
They've got two guys manning M-249 saws on top of the building in bunkers with special infra-red night scopes, and there are defensive patrols on the surrounding streets all day and all night.
These guys roll out of the rack at 3:00 a.m. and put on their boots and pick up their flak vests, helmets and M-4 carbines and about 300 rounds of ammunition without complaint and hit the streets like they're going to Pizza Hut.
But it's very, very dangerous outside the wall and wire, and very, very scary, and I know, because I've been out there with them at 3 a.m.
I came over here to do the reporting that media whores aren't doing and to get the story that media whores aren't getting, and I'm doing it all right.
I can give you the exact location of muscles I haven't used in years -- physical and psychic muscles, both.
The sat phone I rented saved me from wasting about 3 days at the Baghdad airport earlier in the week when me and about 40 soldiers on their way home on leave were thrown off a C-130 when it was grabbed by unseen big "ambassadors" who I now realize were part of a White House advance party.
My [delete] Cipro bill alone would be enough to put me in the poorhouse if I didn't have WGA health insurance. They've got bugs and intestinal worms and the smoke of burning, stinking garbage heaps out the window and piles of human dung, donkey dung, and goat and sheep dung in the street I have walked through every damned day that would quite literally make you puke, not to mention the nightly pop-pop-pop of AK's down the alley across the street. I wouldn't wish this place on a CAA agent, and you can imagine what I think of them...
I'll be leaving tomorrow night (I think) for Baghdad and thence to Tikrit for a few days in that Garden Spot, and then I'll catch another Air Insallah (Air God-Willing)C-130 for Kuwait and try to get 3 seats across in coach on British Air and go home.
Meanwhile, crack back a glass of vino for me and raise a toast to the [folks] in Bravo Company, 1st of the 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Abn Division...they have kept my (now) skinny [self] alive, and these dirty, smelly, profane men and boys sure as hell deserve some kind of salute from the Folks Back Home...
Major General Truscott (street-commissioned)
Like I said can't verify the accuracy but it's still a good read.
Even though it's supposedly a personal note, I'm having trouble believing this came from a professional/freelance writer.
Apparently he's already back in the states. :-)
Good read. There's a convincing authenticity there. And yes, our guys are very, very good. God bless 'em and keep 'em safe...
Nearly every LT in the 101st and in the 2/2 Cav (where I was last week) is a West Pointer, and although they look impossibly young and wet behind the ears, they've all been to war, and they go about their jobs with a ruthless efficiency I find hard to believe, even though I've been watching it for two weeks.Thanks for posting this article. It gives us another perspective on the risks and vicissitudes of these young men and women who are fighting for our freedoms.
Happy holidays to all of them. May God protect them and bring them home alive and well.
These guys roll out of the rack at 3:00 a.m. and put on their boots and pick up their flak vests, helmets and M-4 carbines and about 300 rounds of ammunition without complaint and hit the streets like they're going to Pizza Hut.
But it's very, very dangerous outside the wall and wire, and very, very scary, and I know, because I've been out there with them at 3 a.m.
....Nearly every LT in the 101st and in the 2/2 Cav (where I was last week) is a West Pointer, and although they look impossibly young and wet behind the ears, they've all been to war, and they go about their jobs with a ruthless efficiency I find hard to believe, even though I've been watching it for two weeks.
They're good guys, they pay attention to the lst Sgt in this company, who's a real pro -- a dream lst SGT, to tell the truth --and they're close to the Joe's. They also smell bad and [curse] a whole lot, which, strangely, makes you feel real, real good when you're around them...in fact, it makes you feel safe and lets you get a good night's sleep every night.
.. crack back a glass of vino for me and raise a toast to the [folks] in Bravo Company, 1st of the 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Abn Division...
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P*i*n*g*!
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