While I spent Christmas in any of the countries during the American conflict, the one I remember most was in Iraq in 2005. Over time, it turns out that the general flow of life begins to bury the past. For many veterans, we bring back memories of a position that no one will have for decades to come, and for me, Ramadi, Iraq is that position.
In 2005, Ramadi was a city of about half a million people and was considered the center of the insurgency in Iraq. Infantrymen and Marines were embroiled in a contentious war with al-Qaeda militants and local Sunni insurgents that became one of the deadliest battles of the war. Located on the eastern flank of the city is Camp Corregidor, a small battalion-sized outpost. which was once a university in Anbar province. I first arrived there in June 2005. This would be my home for the next twelve months.
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I am a member of a Pennsylvania National Guard sniper team that was attached to an active duty unit, 2/69 Armor of the 3rd Infantry Division. Coincidentally, when I arrived, I waved through a boy I hadn’t noticed since high school. My unit replaced him but seeing a familiar face was a pleasant surprise, a kind of abbreviated high school meeting. He gave me some maps of the city, boxes of ammunition, milk, grenades and claymores, commenting that we were lucky to have trucks because they had all exploded. through improvised explosive devices, so they most commonly made foot patrols. His parting words to me: “You are in combat now, stay small and never avoid moving. “enter?
Summer and autumn were blurred. It was hot, dusty and violent. As a sniper in an urban conflict, most of me was at dusk and much of the city I saw was through the phosphor-green glow of my night vision goggles. The insurgency kept us busy, and our biggest task was to ban FDI delivery teams. About 800 meters from Camp Corregidor was a multi-story concrete design known as the “OP Hotel,” a prime target for the local insurgency. In August, the guys from Able, 2/69 Armor, 3rd Infantry Division suffered a stunning attack that fortunately only killed the suicide bomber. I felt the explosion more than a mile away while lying on my bunk in a concrete building.
One afternoon in early July, I first saw the OP Hotel as we passed from Corregidor to our hiding place. He was busy in a patrol. The hotel is an ominous design at night, like a Mordor outpost. When our small detachment passed by the hotel, I even thought that we would encounter an insurrection that night or that the hotel might mistake us for the enemy. This is probably why I pointed with my infrared projector on my PVS-14s while traveling, even though we knew that pre-coordination had been done prior to the mission. It wasn’t long before our leaders forced us to form a team to increase the peloton at the hotel. We occupied a small space above the hotel which we call “crow’s nest”.
The crow’s nest gave us an amazing view of the city, especially to the north and west. Often, this gave us sizzling sunsets as the sun disappeared over the western horizon; sometimes it gave us surreal perspectives of the Marines guarding the center of government while we dined quietly listening to Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire. “As autumn turned into winter, there was a dramatic decrease in rebellious activity. Winter brought bloodless nights and even bloodless mornings. The proximity of the Euphrates gave the air an additional cold, a cold that only subsided until mid-morning.
As Christmas approached, the platoons we shared the hotel with changed. Our brothers from Able Company returned home in December after months of hard fighting. Animal Company took the reins of this transition and while seeing new and familiar faces was a welcome change, I miss our old friends. Winter also brought cloudy skies and bloodless rain. Interestingly, Christmas decorations began to appear in the hotel. Mainly in the room where we ate and in the tactical operations center (OCD). The table of contents was nothing remarkable apart from sandbags, a bank of spokes and maps. It was as austere as the village in which we fought.
That replaced almaximum overnight. With some undeniable lighting fixtures and moldings, but temporarily included what would be Ramadi’s ultimate Christmas tree an American infantryman could evoke.
At an impressive height of seven feet, this was no ordinary Frasier fir tree logged on their local forest farm, as, unsurprisingly, conifers were in short supply in this part of the world. With sandbags as a base and an accordion thread that offers the classic symmetrical triangle. The shape of a tree that any mother would be proud of, it was clear that ingenuity and care created this Christmas symbol. The 7. 62 mm ammunition belts spiraled down from the most sensitive part to the base. Since running to the target in search of ornaments was not an option, the M67 fragmentation grenades with the right red and green ribbon (for safety, of course) and the Array50 caliber armor-piercing incendiary cartridges were hung conscientiously. . OCD was not a place where other people gathered, however, it was certainly a place where other people felt and admired for a while before returning to their figure. combat positions.
Santa never made it to the hotel that night, but we were visited by our brigade commander, Iron 6, the colonel’s call sign at the time. We called it Iron Balls 6 because it had a great reputation among our top leaders down to the team level. He genuinely cared for his infantrymen and moved through the brigade’s command of operations in a four-vehicle convoy, which in Ramadi acquired a sure audacity given the strength of the insurgency even though enemy activity had slowed since the fall.
To this day, Major General Gronski, now retired, still remembers this steel tree of death. “Since 2005, I think about this tree every Christmas season,” he told me recently. “And when I do, it fills me with deep feelings for the admiration and pride I have for the foot soldiers who fought a fierce battle in the position of greatest damage in the world against a very violent and ruthless enemy. “
Christmas came and went that year with little excitement. At the Hotel, we were a band of infantrymen like all the infantrymen before us, far from home but probably with space in mind. Infantrymen shared stories, drank their Rip Its and ate while offering security. At Crow’s Nest, we huddled around the glow of our electric heater just like our predecessors in the Ardennes, a pause in the Battle of the Bulge decades earlier. Eventually they arrive and with it, new struggles for control of the city, yet at Christmas we enjoy a small measure of peace.
Joseph Bennett served as an infantryman and Army airman in Apache helicopter deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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