Oh Say,…

Does that Star Spangled Banner yet wave,
‘Or the Land of the Free,
And the Home of the Brave?

Perhaps you may have seen the American general on TV last night describe the mortality rate of the foreign fighters in Iraq as “very high”. Oh yeah. It’s high alright. American soldiers have been very successful in killing thousands and thousands of enemy here in Iraq. So many, that another insurgent killed here or there doesn’t even make the news anymore. There’s simply too many to interest the public at large.

We Few. We Happy Few.

The question gets asked so many times, “Should the US send more troops into Iraq?”

I think Shakespeare said it best, so I’ll quote him, from the play Henry V, in which one of his Dukes, Westmoreland, bemoans the huge number of French the English are about to fight, something like a 5-1 advantage, on St. Crispian’s Day:

WESTMORELAND O that we now had here But one ten thousand of those men in England That do no work to-day!

KING HENRY V What's he that wishes so? My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin: If we are mark'd to die, we are enow To do our country loss; and if to live, The fewer men, the greater share of honour. God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.

But if it be a sin to covet honour, I am the most offending soul alive. No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England: God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour As one man more, methinks, would share from me For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more! Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host, That he which hath no stomach to this fight, Let him depart; his passport shall be made And crowns for convoy put into his purse: We would not die in that man's company That fears his fellowship to die with us. This day is called the feast of Crispian: He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named, And rouse him at the name of Crispian. He that shall live this day, and see old age, Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours, And say To-morrow is Saint Crispian: Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars. And say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he to-day that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition: And gentlemen in England now a-bed Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

By the time the 8-229th AVN Flying Tigers leave this theater, it will have been a year. Then for us, upon which every day is another battle somewhere here in the Sunni Triangle of Iraq, everyday is St. Crispian’s Day.

Yes, we few. We happy few

The Media in Iraq

Like everything else, the actions of the Media here in Iraq range from the very best of human efforts to the very worst.

At the top of the list goes those folks who daily risk their lives, without the aid of their own weapons, to get the real story of what's going on here out to the world.

One such individual is Michael Yon, with his own blog at :

http://michaelyon.blogspot.com/

Brave, honest, I can't say enough good things about him, and all other good journalists like him. These guys are the best that America has.

And, then there is the other side of the coin. Those journalists that conspire, knowingly, with the Anti-Iraqi terrorists so they can get good copy. Mostly, they go for shocking pictures of the blood, gore, and pain immediately following a car bomb explosion.

I know video clips of the aftermath of car bombs are scary to watch on TV. They make for dramatic scenes; flames rising from burning, twisted wrecks of vehicles smoking in some hard to pronounce Iraqi city center. But, they are more about killing Iraqi civilians to scare you, the viewer, than actually shaping the battlefield or killing US soldiers.

For these people, the scum of the reporter pool, the news is strictly a commercial enterprise. “If it bleeds, it leads” is only a more recent version of their old slogan: “Dog Bites Man” isn’t news – “Man Bites Dog” is news. Of course they emphasize the bizarre, the twisted, the blood and the gore and the tears. For them, it’s a video freak show. Barnum & Bailey with commentary talking heads spliced between scenes from Hell. That’s what gets viewers attention long enough to watch the beer, truck, and hemorrhoid ointment commercials. The Media isn’t the message – it’s an electronic billboard to get you to buy their trash. Pure and simple, it’s dollar and cents, nothing more, nothing less.

For example, at a foiled car-bomb attempt near Tikrit, in which the Iraqi Army spotted and shot up an on-coming car-bomb before it could take out its intended victims, who should “happen” to be standing by with camera in hand, ready for his "scoop"? Why, a fellow carrying press credentials from the Washington Post.

And, who was it that drove wounded terrorists to the hospital after another failed attack near Baqubah? Three reporters, all of whom “happened” to be on scene when the attack commenced: two from Al Jazeera, and one from ABC News.

I kid you not.

This is bloody business, this war. But, to these type of media creeps, in their blind rush towards better and better ratings, business has never been better!

Obviously these reporters had prior knowledge of the attacks. The same kinds of attacks that resulted in over 1,000 Iraqi deaths last month. Did these reporters feel they should report to the Iraq or US Army that these terrorist attacks were about to occur?

They did not.

No, they stood there, waiting for the blood and the gore, with dreams of Pulitzer’s dancing in their heads. Rather than dime out their Al Qaeda sources, they stood by and filmed the approach of the terrorists in each case, hiding, the whole time, behind Iraqi bushes and American First Amendment Rights.

8-229AVN (ATK) Flying Tigers showing off Old Glory.

An 8-229 Flying Tiger ground crew member prepping an Apache for the next mission. No wonder he looks so happy!

One of the 8-229th Flying Tiger's Apaches lifting off on another mission. These guys fly enough missions over here, they probably know Iraq better from the air then they know Texas or Kentucky. And, the next day, they put on their gear, go to their briefings, pre-flight the aircraft, and yes, by God, do it all over again.

Saddam-era Iraqi MiG-15 at the dump. Kind of like Saddam and his dreams for conquest, power, and glory. They all ended up trashed.

What the Marines Found

Of course, the focus of this blog is the 8-229th Flying Tigers. Obviously, we’re not the only unit fighting in Iraq. There are thousands of other good soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines here as well. And, each of them has a story worth telling.

So, today, I wanted to let you all know what the Marines found.

Now, as happens so many times in this country, a patrol of Marines or US Army soldiers is sent out to a particular place with intelligence gleaned from various sources to search for weapons. And, on this particular patrol, many weapons were found. Hundreds of artillery shells, and mortar rounds, and anti-tank mines were discovered, along with a large cache of small arms and rocket-propelled grenades.

But, the Marines found something they never expected to ever see. Not in Iraq, and not anywhere but a horror movie.

They found four young children. Each of the children were between ages four and ten years old. And each one of the children were chained to a cinderblock.

The Marines took a picture of these four young children, sleeping, huddled under the plastic ponchos the Marines threw over them. It's a strange sight, because, they just look like anybody's little kids taking a nap.

As far as anyone can tell, the children were chained up because they had illnesses, either physical or mental. In this poor, backward village in Iraq, a nation that has almost as much oil as Saudi Arabia, oil that should allow the people here to be rich as kings, chaining the mentally ill to a cinderblock is pretty much the standard "treatment".

It was not a typical find.

But then again, this is not a typical war.

SSG Tuel in typical attire. You can't tell, but he's really a very friendly guy. Okay, to his FRIENDS, he's a friendly guy. Not so friendly towards terrorists.

Iraq, as seen from space. Note the sandstorm down South in Kuwait.

Former Saddam era weapons are scattered all over Iraq. Lots of cash down a dusty hole. This is one captured anti-aircraft piece.

The Madness of Al Qaeda

QUESTION: Are the people running Al Qaeda truly mad?

In general, when does religion become madness?

In the extreme, it’s easy to spot. When “Son of Sam” tells the world that his neighbor’s dog told him the people he killed were the Anti-Christ, well, it’s pretty easy to label this as pure madness.

Or, in the case of any number of people Israelis doctors pick up on the streets of Jerusalem each week, people who believe they are either the Virgin Mary or Jesus Christ, depending on the individual’s gender, most of us are fairly confident these folks are off their respective knoodles in a most serious way.

Now we turn to a more still troubling example, the suicide car bombers that plague Iraq.

First, a few facts that may or may not be generally known to the public. Not because the information is secret, but because the media can’t help but focus on the blood and the flames and the pain, and less on the details of how the killings are planned and carried out. It’s only natural to stand and stare at such a horrible act, dumbfounded.

Fact number one: by far the largest percentage of people killed and wounded by the car bombers are Iraqis, not US service men or women. Hard to tell why such a brutal act could be considered part of an insurgency against US occupation if the very target of these attacks is most often Iraqi civilians. And, I mean by the hundreds. These are not isolated misfires of the car bombs resulting in the accidental wounding and killing of innocent bystanders. This is the cold blood execution of Iraqi men, women and children. The very ones Al Qaeda claims to be defending.

Fact number two: a large majority of those driving the car bombs aren’t even Iraqi. They come to Iraq, often across the Syrian border, from Yemen, Jordan, Libya, and yes, of course, Saudi Arabia. So, it’s not a case of Iraqi nationalism that drives these young men to drive into a crowd of Iraqi civilians and turn themselves and those innocent people around them into scattered piles of burning human flesh.

Fact number three: Though some of the car bomb drivers may be killed against their own wills just like the Iraqi civilians around them, many other of the vehicles used in car bomb attacks have the detonation button right next to the steering wheel. Yes, some of the car bombs themselves are remotely detonated. Suggesting that many of the car bomb drivers probably don’t even know they are about to commit “suicide”. And, yes, like the Japanese kamikazes of WWII who were locked into their cockpits flying aircraft in which the wheels could retract on take off but not come back down, there is amble evidence that backing out is made very difficult by the car bomb designs. We have even found feet of car bomb drivers strapped to the vehicle’s accelerator. If the young man changes his mind, fleeing will only set off the bomb anyway. Nonetheless, the button next to the steering wheel says loud and clear that many of these people, without argument, know what they are about to do. The martyr brigades are real. This is undeniable.

Fact number four: The largest portion of the car bomb drivers are trained, funded, and directed by Al Qaeda. Zarqawi has declared to the whole world that he works for Osama Bin Landen. It’s less of a secret and more of a boast.

And so, the questions: Who are committing these killings?

They are Al Qaeda operatives killing innocent people here, just as they did in New York and Washington a few short years ago. When you see those dead Iraqis in Baqubah, Baghdad, or Tikrit on the evening news, you should know the same people who planned the mass murders that happen daily in Iraq are the same people that planned to kill as many Americans as they possibly could on 9-11. Al Qaeda each time.

Why do they kill?

Religion, according to their own words. It is to bring about a more religious world that they kill so many. Though they may not share the same believes, it is the same basic motivation that led Son of Sam in his killings in New York that leads these people to kill in America, Iraq, Pakistan, Spain, or Indonesia.

Why do they kill so many Iraqis, who are also Muslims?

Again, according to their own words, because many of the killers are Sunni, while the majority of those killed are Shia. Differences, at least to the madmen running Al Qaeda, large enough to spill blood for. Gallons and gallons of it.

Are thy truly mad, or is their madness, like that of Hamlet, a cover for something else?

It is noticeable that neither Zarqawi nor Osama have offered up the scent of their own spilt blood as “the perfume of martyrdom.” In each and every case, though their words are of absolute faith that paradise is the result of suicide and murder, it seems more convenient that others prove their point.

Suggesting, then, that their actions are not at all based on religion. Instead, one might assume there are more earthly rationales for their doings.

Like power, or money, or fame. There is, after all, a lot of cash pumping out of the Iraqi ground every day.

Iraqi Ink, that is,
Kuwaiti Koolaide,
Saudi Suds.

And who ever controls Iraq, when all is said and done?

Well, the first thing you know,
Old Zaraqwi’s a billionaire!

No, the brand of blood thirsty religion that they preach is no more than an evil con game that they use to induce others to die and kill so that those cheering on the young men to die may accrue the riches of the earth.

Which means, the folks running Al Qaeda aren’t mad at all.

Not in the least.

Flying Tigers prep for a night time raid somewhere in the Sunni Triangle.

Leave your troubles outside. Here at FOB Speicher, life is beautiful!

8-229th AVN (ATK) hard working ground crews keeping the Flying Tigers flying in Iraq.

Evening in the Desert

On occasion, it gets a little dusty here. Ask 1LT Todd. He'll tell you!

AH-64As ready to rock in Iraq.

Who doesn't love a cool drink of water, especially one that smiles back at you!

Many operations involve both Blackhawks, seen here, as well as the Flying Tigers' Apache helicopters

Salam Alakeum - Peace be with you!

Someday, Iraq, believe it or not, will make a heck of a great tourist spot. The climate is a lot like Arizona. The historical sites around here are incredible. The Iraqis I have met are fairly friendly, especially considering I usually am carrying an M16 automatic rifle and an M9 semiautomatic pistol when they greet me. They smile and wave. Funny.

They’re greeting is “Salam Alakeum”, “Peace be with you”.

When the war settles down, by which I mean when the freaks sending car bombs into Iraq to kill innocent Iraqis finally either quit or are all killed, and the economy here starts going again, and these people FINALLY get a chance to feel their freedoms, well, this place is going to take off, Brother. That’s for sure.

I guess that’s what so many of Iraq’s non-democratic neighbors are worried about.

That a Free Iraq will be a free, strong, and very, very rich.

Me, I say, "Good for them!"

One of Saddam's many palaces, this one along the Tigris River, in Tikrit, Iraq.

Sunrise over desert in Kuwait. The Flying Tigers were stationed there before coming to Iraq.

The guy here, whom we dubbed "Flagman", was spotted by the pilots of the 8-229th AVN (ATK) Flying Tigers on his walk from Mosul to Baghdad. Heck of a guy, don't you think?

Spiral Minerette in Samarra, Iraq, is about 1,200 years old. Almost new compared to other structures in this country.

Iraqi children running up to get toys from soldiers of the 8-229th AVN (ATK) Flying Tigers

The Hit on Zarqawi

There seems to be a bit of uncertainty as to who exactly shot up Zarqawi. Much less doubt that indeed, "Zonker", the hashish smoking religious fanatic who uses God's name as his excuse to kill hundreds of Iraqi men, women and children, was shot up pretty good.

As far as the Flying Tigers are concerned, we have a message to pass on to Zarqawi, if he isn’t already dead:

Mr. Zarqawi, please recover from your wounds quickly and return to Iraq. The 8-229th Flying Tigers are anxious to shoot you again!

The Battle of the Palm Groves

An air weapons team of two Apache attack helicopters from the 8-229th Aviation, the Flying Tigers, no less, were providing aerial security on a raid somewhere in the Sunni Triangle. A near by ground unit had surrounded a group of insurgents in a small building in a palm grove, had been exchanging small arms fire the whole while, and requested aerial security from the team of Apaches.

“No problem, Gentlemen, help is on the way”, was the calm reply to the request. Troops in contact, as one might imagine, is going to be at the top of anybody’s “to do list”. The two Apache helicopters flew immediately to the fire fight, directed by ground forces to a particular building in the palm grove.

“Is this the right building?”, Mr. Krystal, one of the pilots on the mission, asked the ground unit’s commander.

“That’s it. We’re still taking fire from it. Fire it up.”

As the attack helicopters flew lower and closer to the small building in the palm grove, one of the pilots spotted one of the insurgents sticking an AK-47 out a small window directly at the helicopter. Without hesitation, the front seater pulled the trigger, and fired up the hut.

The Apache weapons team began to rake the small building with their chain guns. An unbelievable number of rounds exploded, punching holes through the mud brick walls. Rockets were drilled in the walls as well, bursting in bright flashes. The surrounding palm trees shook each time a shock wave from a near by explosion detonated.

“They just fired an RPG [Rocket Propelled Grenade] at you guys”, one Apache called to the other, “We’re you hit?”

“An RPG? Nope. We’re still here”, was the answer.

The RPG had been fired, but it flew harmlessly between two Apaches, exploding too far from either one to cause any harm. The gunfire from the two aircraft, their rotors beating the air, continued to pound the small building, killing all inside.

At the end of the short engagement, a number of insurgents lay dead, next to piles of weapons. No US losses or wounded that day.

The Apaches returned to base.

For the dead terrorists who lay inside the destroyed building in the palm grove that morning, their days of blowing up market places, mosques, and slaughtering unarmed Iraqis had come to a sudden, and very violent, end.

Gunsight view, Battle of the Palm Groves