Closure.

So I left you hanging.  I promised several years ago to wrap up my experience in Iraq and close out this blog with some kind of deep analysis of what it all meant, but a couple things happened.

1. I got really tired of talking about Iraq.

2. I realized in retrospect that what I did there might not have meant anything at all, which is scary.

I don't think many of the bad guys I tried to investigate and prosecute are still in jail.  I don't think the Iraqi police I tried to train are better at being the type of police we thought they should be.  I can't tell you I'm hugely optimistic about Iraq's future.  I'm not as worried as the mainstream media seems to be; I think nationalism will continue to grow as a positive secular motivator there, but I'm confident it's not going to be a vacation spot in my lifetime.  All that would have made for a pretty depressing finale, so I just let it go.

HOWEVER.

An event of perfect and momentous significance occurred last week, and I can't help but interpret it as a clear sign from something bigger than me that this is all happening as it should, and it was the opportunity I needed to put this thing to bed.  I spent the better part of 2009 hot, sweaty, dirty, and ultimately unsatisfied with my utter inability to complete my most basic deployed task.  I truly believed that the opportunity to do so had passed, and I'd come to terms with it and moved on with my life.  While working in my garage last week preparing to leave the job I left Iraq for, I found something that brought it all back.  Believe it or not, finding this thing in a box sitting inches from a patch of carpet on which I regularly work out in my underwear made me smile for like an hour.  I like to think it found me.  I just wish it would have made itself known before it starved.  I would have fed it something better than sandpaper.

FEAST.

Yeah.  Camel spider in my garage.  In California.  Life is insane.

Anyway, thanks for playing along - I appreciated all your comments and it meant a lot while I was there to know that you were interested.  I'll be going to Afghanistan this fall.  My job will be very different, and I probably won't be doing this, but you never know what might pop up.

Mike

This is Amazing.

Have to share this. I found myself liking a good portion of the Iraqis I dealt with. They have a fatalistic sense of humor that is kind of awe inspiring given their experiences of the last seven years, and endearing at the same time. They were always joking, constantly trying to charm our female counterparts (and decent at it - a detainee told a JAG friend of mine he would give her father 500 camels if she'd marry him. 500 is a lot of camels. Dude didn't play.), and we seemed to share a healthy appreciation for mischief that helped me find common ground with key players on a few occasions. Looks like my impression was pretty close to the mark...

From Al Jazeera



From CNN



Baghdad, Iraq (CNN) -- Imagine you're a celebrity heading to a TV station for an interview. Along the way you run into a well-known TV host whose car has broken down. You know each other because you move in the same circles so you offer him a ride to the station since you're traveling in that direction.

Your car is stopped at a checkpoint, when suddenly an Iraqi army soldier looks underneath the vehicle and screams "bomb, bomb, get away from the car!"

There's enough reality in today's Iraq, without reality TV, but not for one network.

The occupants of the car frantically run out, some in circles, others screaming, some faint, others cry, all while the Iraqi army accuses the occupants of being terrorists, members of al Qaeda and threaten dire retribution.

But here's the black joke. The bomb's a fake, the man you offered the ride to is the show's host Ali al-Khalidi, and the Iraqi army is in on it. This is Punk'd: Baghdad-style.

The action is all being recorded with candid cameras for a show called "Put him in Bucca" -- a now closed U.S. detention facility.

Jassim Sharaf, who has been a comedian for 40 years, found himself in the center of one of the show's stunts.

He jumps out of his vehicle, tears off his shoes so he can run faster, waves them hysterically in the air and tries to bolt from the scene. The Iraqi soldiers grab him and accuse him of trying to bring in a car bomb. He falls to the side of the road.

"Why would I come to bomb? I am an Iraqi, I am a son of Iraq," he screams back at them.

"Sit in the car, you did it, let it explode on you," the soldiers yell back. Sharaf says the show is harsh, but as we watch his episode he says he does see the funny side.

"I should be upset," he tells us, "but watching myself now I am laughing."

"I could have been traumatized, I could have died but it's all worth the sacrifice to make Iraqis laugh," he adds.

The show is a special production meant to provide entertainment during the holy month of Ramadan, a time when TV viewership peaks in the Muslim world. But this take on the old "candid camera" routine has sparked as much outrage as it has laughter.

Skeptics say it's all an act, while critics add it's in poor taste in a country still awash with bombings and too close to the reality that too many Iraqis have to live with.

The show generated a public campaign slamming its concept and opposition to the program hit the web. In addition to an online petition to stop it, more than 1,600 people signed up to a Facebook page called "No to put him in Bucca." Most of the comments call the show insulting and ridiculous. But there are plenty of fans who do find the show hilarious.

Opinion among Iraqis we spoke to in Baghdad was mixed.

Farouq Fuad says: "It's a very good show, it's amusing and it reflects the suffering of the Iraqi people but in a humorous way." But he adds that he dislikes the pressure that it puts on the actors by scaring them.

Ahmed Abdul Sahid disagrees. He says "the show is a failure. We hope that anything similar to this show is stopped. We want to see more pleasant themes of peace and laughter not terrorism, weapons, and gunfire."

Al-Khalidi, the host, defends his program, saying the aim was to inject humor into Iraqis' misery and educate the public.

"The show is an educational one, we send a message through it so that people are aware," he explains. "People need to be alert and check under their cars before getting in."

Most Iraqis however, including Sharaf, say that's already part of their daily routine.

If there is a silver lining at all for the "victims" it is this -- their health is allegedly checked before they are subjected to such stress.

"And after we have them on the show I tell them congratulations -- you don't need to go see any doctor because you are in good shape," al-Khalidi says, bursting into laughter.


Real Bucca:

Time to dust this thing off...

Greetings friends. It's been a while, huh? Considering my last post was from Kuwait, a lot has changed for me and I'm sure for you as well. It's been weird. Good, but weird. I've drydocked a fair amount of material from the end of my IA and redeployment - I can honestly say that coming home and trying to plug back in to normality been the strangest and most profound experience of my life.

Amongst all the oddity, I really just haven't known what to write - glad I held off - early posts would have been really bizarre stream of consciousness word vomit about spazzing out on my family on the BW parkway coming home from the airport, getting lost in the grocery story and being sad about it, or my buddy being overwhelmed by the amount of choices available while approaching an intersection in DC and having to turn around and go home. Really, really weird, and we had cakewalk tours compared to the real heavy lifters.

Taking a few months to gather my thoughts on the experience and recent happenings in Iraq have had me thinking about writing again. The story below was the tipping point - one of the last soldiers killed during OIF was attacked at the Baqubah MCU where I spent several days last summer. We knew they were up to no good at the time, and it was a super shady place to hang out. Wouldn't be surprised if it was one of the cops that tossed the grenade. Baqubah is a hell of a place.

The news on this side of the world is celebrating the end of OIF as the end of combat in Iraq. I bet it still feels like combat to Sgt. Rhett and the Diyala P-PTT. Fact is we've got 50,000 or so "non-combat" troops in a combat zone, and regardless of what you want to call their missions, the fight is still there. Keep them in mind. A few Baqubah memories below. More to come.

Spent more time sitting on the couch than actually doing anything. The cops weren't really fans of our visits.

Except this guy. Pictures with Americans get Iraqis killed, but this dude was willing to take the risk. 180 degree response to us depending on who was looking.

Washington Post
August 28, 2010
Pg. 1

Left To 'Follow Through' In Iraq

For soldiers in Operation New Dawn, no relief from danger

By Leila Fadel

FORWARD OPERATING BASE WARHORSE, IRAQ - Col. Malcolm Frost knew there would be questions. The official end to the U.S. combat mission in Iraq was approaching, but his soldiers, operating in two of Iraq's most dangerous provinces, would still be here.

He sat down and penned a letter to the soldiers' families. "01 Sept. 2010 does not mean a light switched on or off in Iraq," the brigade commander wrote. ". . . The weight of responsibility upon our shoulders is great, because we must follow through to the very finish."

For the soldiers in Frost's brigade, Sept. 1 will mark an arbitrary milestone. There are fewer troops here, just under 50,000 now, consistent with an Obama administration pledge, and the troops leave base less often. But Americans still die in Iraq, and the fight for stability is far from over.

Iraq remains a battleground, American soldiers say, even if they are no longer kicking down Iraqi doors.

Instead of carrying out combat missions, Frost's unit has been designated an "advise and assist" brigade, like five other American brigades left behind in Iraq. Its task is to train Iraqi security forces, gather intelligence, assist Iraq's fledgling air force, and, ultimately, close up shop and go home. The lower-profile approach under Operation New Dawn is the latest step in a transition that began more than a year ago when American soldiers were pulled back from Iraq's urban centers and for the most part retreated into their bases.

But less than two months into the unit's deployment, two of Frost's men have already been killed. The mission still involves risks as the soldiers escort commanders and trainers to appointments with Iraqi officials. Around them, assassinations and violence seem to be on the rise, although at drastically lower levels than during the darkest days of Iraq's civil war, between 2005 and 2007.

Last week, as news reports in the United States hailed the departure from Iraq of the last designated combat brigade, family members eagerly called their loved ones here, asking whether they too were headed home. No, the soldiers told wives, mothers, fathers and grandmothers. They have more than 300 days left in Iraq.

The day after other troops celebrated their exit from Iraq, soldiers at FOB Warhorse mourned the passing of Sgt. Jamal Rhett, a young medic killed on Aug. 15. A grenade was lobbed into his vehicle as he and his platoon left federal police headquarters in Baqubah, northeast of Baghdad. They were escorting a police training team.

Despite their new title, soldiers know that the battle is not over, not for them and not for Iraq. The names of Rhett and 1st Lt. Michael L. Runyan, both from the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, were added to a memorial of the fallen that spans at least five concrete blast walls at the base.

At the trailers where the Charlie Company of the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment lives, Staff Sgt. Gilbert Ayala, 28, limped to the showers. Shrapnel ripped into his side and legs about two weeks ago, when Rhett was killed.

Ayala said it doesn't matter to him what the mission is called. This is his third deployment, and he has been wounded and lost friends before. But this wound was the deepest, this loss the hardest.

"I find new holes in me every day," Ayala said. He scoffed at the idea that the war was over. "It can't be, because things like this are still going down. Boom, and my friend is gone, right in front of me."

"On a lighter note, we got coffee," joked Staff Sgt. Rick Penkala, 32, nervously trying to change the subject.

"I just hope we leave this place better than when we came," added Staff Sgt. Paul Roderick Jr., 29.

A 'tactical taxi'

In many ways, Iraq is better, the soldiers said. There are more Iraqi forces, they are better equipped, and the violence is down compared with the days of the U.S. troop surge, when U.S. casualties spiked and Iraqis were being killed in far greater numbers. But the soldiers' interactions with the community are limited, and they see very little of what happens outside their bases.

First Lt. Mike Makrucki briefed his men outside their Stryker armored vehicles. "Yesterday there was a [car bomb] in Baqubah that killed two and wounded 12 others. The [Explosives Ordinance Team] disabled another bomb targeting the provincial government," he said. "Assassination attempts are running rampant."

Their mission on this day was to escort their captain, Burt Eissler, to a meeting with an Iraqi commander in Muqdadiyah, just outside the provincial capital. The road was new for them, and Makrucki warned that roadside bombs were prevalent. He told the soldiers to keep their heads inside the vehicles as much as possible.

"We're a tactical taxi now," said Spec. Joshua Johnson, 25, the gunner on one vehicle, as he put on his gear and assumed his position. On most of their missions they escort people to their destination and sit outside.

"Pray for the best," he told the four other soldiers in the vehicle. They rolled out of the base. Halfway to their destination they stopped and waited for an Iraqi police escort before continuing. Eissler went in to meet an Iraqi army commander as most of the soldiers waited outside. They rolled down the hatches of their vehicles and took off their helmets.

"We're pretty safe in here now," said Staff Sgt. Justin Austin, 23, as he gestured toward the towering concrete walls surrounding the area. "Muqdadiyah is one of the worst spots in Iraq right now. The war may be over, but combat is definitely not. People still die here."

Sudden violence

Since the death of their brother-in-arms the soldiers have been more careful. They train their weapons on people to scare them away, he said.

"It was a lucky day for them and unlucky for us," Austin said. "It's kind of a slap in the face to see on the news that all combat troops are out. We're infantry guys, and that's just a name change. It means nothing."

"We're going to do our mission, no matter what," Johnson added.

"It seems a lot better. The Iraqi security forces seem a lot better," Austin said. "But honestly I don't really care. I just care that we go home."

Then a powerful blast rocked the vehicle, and Austin threw on his helmet.

"Start the truck," he yelled to the driver. They closed the hatch, and the soldiers rolled out to see what had happened. "I don't know what's going on right now," Johnson said. "It's a car bomb, I think."

At the time they didn't know that Sunni insurgent groups were setting off bombs in at least a dozen towns and cities across the country in what seemed to be a message that they were still here as U.S. troop numbers dwindled.

The soldiers stayed in their vehicles and waited for the bomb squad. A half-hour later, another explosion ripped through an Iraqi army truck in front of them. A man was carried away. "At least it's not us this time," said Pfc. Stephen James Lapierre, 23. Rhett had been his roommate.

They waited in their vehicles and watched as people walked by, cars drove around them and Iraqi security forces blocked off the area. After the bomb squad had finally come and gone, they left.

Johnson handed Lapierre a slab of wood.

"Knock on it for luck," he said.

Meet Me In Mosul

And speaking of not gathering any moss, I made another trip up to Mosul a few weeks back. For the safety of those involved, I will have to speak pretty generally. I was there to support a prosecution we've been working with CCCI in Baghdad. There were some elements that couldn't be completed on their end, so I went up to get hands-on with our investigators there and try to take a scalp on my way out. Results were mixed.

Our effort on this case is kind of representative of the situation across Iraq these days. All of the pieces are in place. We haven't fixed all of their problems, and we have undoubtedly caused quite a few. But I'm confident that we've done enough to put them in a position to choose their own fate. The problem is, this is all based on their willingness to make a choice and move forward, and as you can see from the recent ass-hattery going on with their elections, they don't seem too inclined to get it together until we're out the door and they absolutely have to. Slightly frustrating. We did everything we possibly could to get a very, very bad person put in a noose, but the final piece of the puzzle is in Iraqi hands. As of my departure, they have yet to pick the damn thing up.... one wonders if they'll realize they should care about these things before it's too late to make a difference.

They're definitely not used to the democratic concept of self-determination just yet. I don't know if dictatorship fits their culture, or if their past dictatorship has simply left a big dent that hasn't worked itself out, but at this point it seems like Iraqi society as a whole is still expecting to be told what to do, and to have things done for them. We definitely haven't been weening them off that latter tendency. I thought the picture of the tank tread running up against the wall up there was a good representation. You can only do so much with a military... I think we've done all we can here.

I had planned to stay a few days, but the weather was looking ominous after one night and I am terrified of getting stuck after my nightmares in Baghdad and Baqubah during the summer. Luckily I've got connections by now, so I was able to ditch my scheduled flight and get out a day ahead of the storm on a somewhat... special flight. We're in the process of releasing a whole lot of detainees all over the country at the moment, and we've got a full-fledged Con Air operation going to get them where they need to be. That night it just so happened we had a flight oming through Mosul and stopping at Speicher on it's way home. So instead of sitting at the terminal praying I could catch catching a helo space-A like all the contractors and regular saps, I sat around at the edge of the runway until about 0300 when the flight came in. Watched some detainees get led off, completely dumped on the AF crew that tried to deny my pre-arranged boarding, linked up with the soldiers pulling guard duty and hopped on a C-130 packed tight with my favorite people in the world - insurgents. Good times..... pretty surreal experience.

Anyway, FOB Marez is cool and I actually brought my camera this time.

"Inject the Venom!" Apparently we have poisonous wolves. I feel like we should be making a bigger deal about this.

The Marez DFAC was blown up by a suicide bomber in 2004 - this is one of the memorials to the people who were killed, outside the rebuilt facility.

But for the death and destruction, Ninewa province looks a whole lot like parts of California. I definitely didn't expect this view.

Jut over the wall there you can see the mosque that I think produced the crazy call to prayer that I listened to on my last trip here. Pretty sure they point the speakers at the base to mess with us.

The view from Marez is both very picturesque and somehow hard to take pictures of at the same time. On my first trip the air was a lot more clear and you could see much more of the city from this spot.

I imagine that somewhere there's a dude named Hesco who's swimming in a giant bin of gold, Scrooge McDuck style (yeah, I'm that old), because of these things.

Luxury knows no end in the transient CHUs.

Drink it up ladies, those glasses are 100% real and on my face.

Be Kind, Rewind

I'm in Kuwait now, deployment winding down, and I've finally got some free time to write again. I'll post my going-home thoughts at some time in the future, but for now let's suspend disbelief and pretend I haven't been sitting on about two months' worth of material and completely failing to update. SO - let's break out the flux capacitor, kick it up to 88 mph, and pretend it's... like, August again.

And since it's now August, let's talk about my recent trip to Baghdad, which was my 5th since April. My life has a whole lot of downsides here, but gathering moss is not one of them - this stone has kept rolling pretty well. I rode down with the Division SJA, who was traveling to the IZ for a conference, and the pilots were gracious enough to drop me off at VBC after taking them all to the IZ. Three Blackhawks for 5 people. That's how we roll. Daytime flights are hard to come by, so that was very cool. Got some really sweet pictures that would be awesome if the 150mph wind hitting the camera hadn't blurred most of them out.

This particular trip was for a command-wide "where are we/where should we be/how do we get there"-type meeting at our HQ in the Hussein sons' pool house. Very enlightening. I spent the majority of my weekend on back Camp Liberty, right down the street from the area I first started this deployment in. Most of my friends from TF 134 were around and it was great to get to see almost everybody again, although the occasion wasn't exactly cause for celebration and the trip was extremely brief for most. Spent a little time on FOB Cropper getting humiliated by a buddy of mine who has obviously been honing his Call of Duty skills, perhaps while the rest of us are working.

I left freshly talked at, motivated to head home and finish out my remaining 3 months far, far away from Baghdad..

This guy.

We picked up Little Country in the IZ on our way in. I tried to convince him everything was going to be OK, but we were SO high up and it was so loud and windy, poor little guy was scared!

Saddam's Waterpark-O'-Death. Word on the street is the cadaver dogs that we use to search for bodies in rubble go crazy around these lakes.

OCI HQ. I watched a supply convoy take small arms fire from the roof on my first night in Iraq. Fun place.

CHU life in the Stryker Stables, with my entire existence in a backpack. Living so large.

I see you're admiring my hat.

Please also take some time to admire the pain that Little Country and I bring.

THIS. IS. SPEICHER.
!

My Life is a Face-Palm

WELCOME TO MY NIGHTMARE.

New York Times
November 4, 2009
Pg. 1

Iraq Swears By Bomb Detector U.S. Sees As Useless

By Rod Nordland

BAGHDAD - Despite major bombings that have rattled the nation, and fears of rising violence as American troops withdraw, Iraq's security forces have been relying on a device to detect bombs and weapons that the United States military and technical experts say is useless.

The small hand-held wand, with a telescopic antenna on a swivel, is being used at hundreds of checkpoints in Iraq. But the device works "on the same principle as a Ouija board" - the power of suggestion - said a retired United States Air Force officer, Lt. Col. Hal Bidlack, who described the wand as nothing more than an explosives divining rod.

Still, the Iraqi government has purchased more than 1,500 of the devices, known as the ADE 651, at costs from $16,500 to $60,000 each. Nearly every police checkpoint, and many Iraqi military checkpoints, have one of the devices, which are now normally used in place of physical inspections of vehicles.

With violence dropping in the past two years, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has taken down blast walls along dozens of streets, and he contends that Iraqis will safeguard the nation as American troops leave.

But the recent bombings of government buildings here have underscored how precarious Iraq remains, especially with the coming parliamentary elections and the violence expected to accompany them.

The suicide bombers who managed to get two tons of explosives into downtown Baghdad on Oct. 25, killing 155 people and destroying three ministries, had to pass at least one checkpoint where the ADE 651 is typically deployed, judging from surveillance videos released by Baghdad's provincial governor. The American military does not use the devices. "I don't believe there's a magic wand that can detect explosives," said Maj. Gen. Richard J. Rowe Jr., who oversees Iraqi police training for the American military. "If there was, we would all be using it. I have no confidence that these work."

The Iraqis, however, believe passionately in them. "Whether it's magic or scientific, what I care about is it detects bombs," said Maj. Gen. Jehad al-Jabiri, head of the Ministry of the Interior's General Directorate for Combating Explosives.

Dale Murray, head of the National Explosive Engineering Sciences Security Center at Sandia Labs, which does testing for the Department of Defense, said the center had "tested several devices in this category, and none have ever performed better than random chance."

The Justice Department has warned against buying a variety of products that claim to detect explosives at a distance with a portable device. Normal remote explosives detection machinery, often employed in airports, weighs tons and costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. The ADE 651's clients are mostly in developing countries; no major country's military or police force is a customer, according to the manufacturer.

"I don't care about Sandia or the Department of Justice or any of them," General Jabiri said. "I know more about this issue than the Americans do. In fact, I know more about bombs than anyone in the world.

He attributed the decrease in bombings in Baghdad since 2007 to the use of the wands at checkpoints. American military officials credit the surge in American forces, as well as the Awakening movement, in which Iraqi insurgents turned against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, for the decrease.

Aqeel al-Turaihi, the inspector general for the Ministry of the Interior, reported that the ministry bought 800 of the devices from a company called ATSC (UK) Ltd. for $32 million in 2008, and an unspecified larger quantity for $53 million. Mr. Turaihi said Iraqi officials paid up to $60,000 apiece, when the wands could be purchased
for as little as $18,500. He said he had begun an investigation into the no-bid contracts with ATSC.

Jim Mitchell, the head of ATSC, based in London, did not return calls for comment.

The Baghdad Operations Command announced Tuesday that it had purchased an additional 100 detection devices, but General Rowe said five to eight bomb-sniffing dogs could be purchased for $60,000, with provable results.

Checking cars with dogs, however, is a slow process, whereas the wands take only a few seconds per vehicle. "Can you imagine dogs at all 400 checkpoints in Baghdad?" General Jabiri said. "The city would be a zoo."

Speed is not the only issue. Colonel Bidlack said, "When they say they are selling you something that will save your son or daughter on a patrol, they've crossed an insupportable line into moral depravity."

Last year, the James Randi Educational Foundation, an organization seeking to debunk claims of the paranormal, publicly offered ATSC $1 million if it could pass a scientific test proving that the device could detect explosives. Mr. Randi said no one from the company had taken up the offer.

ATSC's promotional material claims that its device can find guns, ammunition, drugs, truffles, human bodies and even contraband ivory at distances up to a kilometer, underground, through walls, underwater or even from airplanes three miles high. The device works on "electrostatic magnetic ion attraction," ATSC says.

To detect materials, the operator puts an array of plastic-coated cardboard cards with bar codes into a holder connected to the wand by a cable. "It would be laughable," Colonel Bidlack said, "except someone down the street from you is counting on this to keep bombs off the streets."

Proponents of the wand often argue that errors stem from the human operator, who they say must be rested, with a steady pulse and body temperature, before using the device.

Then the operator must walk in place a few moments to "charge" the device, since it has no battery or other power source, and walk with the wand at right angles to the body. If there are explosives or drugs to the operator's left, the wand is supposed to swivel to the operator's left and point at them.

If, as often happens, no explosives or weapons are found, the police may blame a false positive on other things found in the car, like perfume, air fresheners or gold fillings in the driver's teeth.

On Tuesday, a guard and a driver for The New York Times, both licensed to carry firearms, drove through nine police checkpoints that were using the device. None of the checkpoint guards detected the two AK-47 rifles and ammunition inside the vehicle.

During an interview on Tuesday, General Jabiri challenged a Times reporter to test the ADE 651, placing a grenade and a machine pistol in plain view in his office. Despite two attempts, the wand did not detect the weapons when used by the reporter but did so each time it was used by a policeman.

"You need more training," the general said.

Riyadh Mohammed contributed reporting.

Correction: November 5, 2009
An article on Wednesday about a bomb detection device used by the Iraqi security forces that is considered useless and costly by the American military misstated the surname of the leader of ATSC (UK) Ltd., the London-based company that has sold hundreds of the devices to Iraq’s Interior Ministry. He is Jim McCormick, not Mitchell.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yes, this is really happening. I really have no words. I hope this puts my IED story from Mosul in perspective.

And there are no shortage of farm animal stupid suckers elsewhere in the world...




Original story at NYT.com

Real posts coming soon...

Welcome to my world

View Larger Map


COB Speicher is the darkish square about 2 clicks outside of town, roughly 10 o'clock from the Tikrit sign on this map. Whole lotta brown around here.

Interestingly enough, Saddam had a lot of vegetation planted here. There are Cypress trees and a fair amount of shrubbery, and apparently when we first came through it was well-irrigated and pretty green, unlike the dusty wasteland we live in today. the idea was apparently to hide the activities of the Air Force and whatever other nefarious crap he had going on here (assuming there are all kinds of nasty chemicals bouncing around here that I won't know I should care about for another 5-10 years). I guess it worked to keep things incognito from the ground, but from the air it makes it completely obvious there's a base here - hence the big dark square in the middle of the desert. If you know what you're looking for, you can clearly spot the base in satellite photos wide enough to show the entire middle east. The Google maps pics aren't quite contrasty enough to really show the effect, but I have access to a little better system at work that makes it quite obvious from way out in space.

Sweet hiding spot.