Free Republic

INJURED US Marine Corporal Michael John Mead wants his boots back - so he can get back in the fight. The 20-year-old, from Newberry, Michigan, was among several Marines injured when their armoured personnel carrier was ambushed by Iraqi troops in the southern city of Nassiriyah, a key river crossing point, last Sunday. Fighting back tears, he spoke to journalists on board the USNS Comfort hospital ship, about the war that has changed forever his life and the lives of many others. Cpl Mead suffered severe burns and shrapnel wounds to his right leg and has undergone several operations to...

'We want to know what is going on,' say frontline troops By Andrew Buncombe in Camp Coyote, Kuwait 13 March 2003 Out in the desert, the lads from the 7th Armoured Brigade had been listening to the radio and the comments they heard from Donald Rumsfeld, the American Defence Secretary, did not impress them. "I was a bit pissed off really," said Richard Ashley, 18, a crew member on a four-man Challenger II tank. "We want to know what is going on. It does make you angry." Mr Rumsfeld said on Tuesday that America had plans to invade Iraq without...

SADDAM'S SOLDIERS SURRENDER Mar 9 2003 Mike Hamilton reports from Camp Coyote in Kuwait TERRIFIED Iraqi soldiers have crossed the Kuwait border and tried to surrender to British forces - because they thought the war had already started. The motley band of a dozen troops waved the white flag as British paratroopers tested their weapons during a routine exercise. stunned Paras from 16 Air Assault Brigade were forced to tell the Iraqis they were not firing at them, and ordered them back to their home country telling them it was too early to surrender. The drama unfolded last Monday as...

CAMP COYOTE, Kuwait ---- Some of the Marines kicked the dirt, turned away or cursed the "damned liberals" on hearing news of global anti-war demonstrations. Hayne Palmour/Staff Photographer Marine Cpl. Thomas Barnes, 22, takes a close look at a photograph of fellow Marine Cpl. Nick Fredrick kissing his girlfriend, Danielle, as Cpl. James Fuller, right, who didn't get mail, stands nearby as Marines begin their day at Camp Coyote in Kuwait on Sunday. "When I was in boot, that was my worst nightmare," said Jared Hubbard, a 20-year old lance corporal from Fresno and a member of the Camp Pendleton-based...