Lt. Col. Chris Lozano, USMC

Operation Iraqi Freedom Travelogue 2

[email from Bob about the update]

All-

As we anticipated email during the most intense portions of the conflict was sporadic, but Chris did get a few out. Below are excerpts that give a bit of flavor, spanning the second half of the open conflict, which seems to have wound down about 3+ weeks after having started (opening bombing runs on 3/19, statue comes down on 4/9).

Also, our brother Rich has put up a website where we've collected travelogues, updates, a video story, a couple of newspaper stories, and a bunch of the pictures. While this tells Chris' story, in doing so we offer it to honor all of those who've made the same choice to serve. The site is www.amarinestory.com

The Columbia Missourian ran a picture about the Mizzou flag that Chris has been trotting around Iraq last Sunday... you can see the article here. (For those of you who heard about the copycat KU flag in Iraq just remember... Mizzou was there first! ;-) )

Since many pictures are now on the website (including a number of new ones from Iraq), this time I'm including a preview of a poster that Rebecca (our daughter) is working on. This is still being fine tuned, and when it is complete the final version will be posted on www.purplemonkeys.com. Rebecca wrote the poem last year, inspired by everyone (including her uncle) going overseas. She recently took the flag picture and is in the process of creating the poster as a thank you to all who serve.

Since these are email fragments I've occasionally included a bit of context, in italics within brackets. Also, this is the first time we've included those who've been signing up on the website. If there's a problem let me know & we'll fix it. As always, if you don't want to receive these updates in the future just let me know.

May God bless each of you.

Bob

4/1/03
[This was about 1 1/2 weeks into it when it was commonly reported that we'd underestimated the resistance]

They turned on mail for a couple of days so I thought I'd let you know how things are going. I'm not in Kuwait if that's any hint. If you listen to the news things aren't going well because we failed to conquer a nation the size of California in three days. Actually, things are going quite well. I have to give the Hussein henchmen an "A" for effort. Unfortunately, they aren't brave and not very good soldiers. They are willing to die for Hussein and we have been obliging them by the thousands. A couple of days ago an Iraqi soldier surrendered to an Army convoy and told them "If the Ba'ath Party doesn't kill me the Marines will".

The sand storm you read about was maybe the single most intense weather phenomena I've ever experienced. It was just like a raging blizzard except it was brown and not cold. The wind averaged 50mph for two days and you couldn't see 15 feet in front of you. How's everyone there?

Monday 4/7/03
[A good friend of Chris' commands his old unit, which had two Marines killed (drowned) while crossing a canal during the first weekend of the war. Chris knew one of the two men, Sgt. Korthaus, quite well]

I didn't know but heard from Nancy that it was Mike McCarthy's company that suffered the two drownings and that Mike had been there. I had thought it was one of the other company's because Mike wasn't supposed to be that far north at the time. I knew and talked to Sgt. Korthaus just a few days before that happened. He had been one of my squad leaders and was super sharp and conscientious. I told him how good it was to see him and that I was proud to see how well he and the company were doing. It's a very numb feeling. I think the best thing I've read so far was from the family of a 20 year old Marine who was killed. His family said that though they were devastated, it wasn't a waste because he had been fighting for freedom. Wow.

Moving on to other news, we've moved. I can't tell you exactly where I am but I'm somewhere south of the Tigris River. We arrived yesterday. No more sand! But, we have a lot of dust (boooo). This area is much nicer than the last and is all farm land. The drive was long and we drove past areas that had been battlefields very recently. The roads are littered with damaged and destroyed vehicles. Vehicles are abandoned when they break down and then quickly stripped by locals.

The thing that surprised me the most was how many people were on the road sides waving at us or trying to sell us cigarettes and sodas. The country is bountiful and fertile but most are impoverished by Hussein. The thing I will remember the most was an old woman who was on the side of the road moving her hand to her mouth. They had told us not to throw food to the civilians because it might cause an accident but I threw her an MRE. I looked back and she was moving slowly to it. It is heart-breaking to see such poverty when it is so unnecessary.

All the buildings are made of mud and everyone seems to have a small herd of goats or sheep that they herd around. We saw a few large groups of camels being herded too. I'll have some photos to send you later. My camera broke so I have to rely on others taking pics.

While the Marines have suffered nearly 70 KIA since this started we've killed tens of thousands of their "elite" soldiers. They are true cowards, nothing else explains it. We kill them by the basketful and in direct battle they tend to quit rather than fight. Time after time we have found their base of operations in hospitals, schools, mosques and private homes. They hide their weapons among civilians, dress as civilians, travel in school buses, fake surrender, use civilian human shields, kill dissenters and civilians who will not commit acts against us. Recently, they have even begun to force civilians to run our roadblocks by holding half the family as hostages. They aren't a government and they aren't a movement they are gangsters and common criminals. The smiles on the faces of the civilians in the areas we have liberated are proof enough.

4/9/03

I'm close enough I can see flashes on the horizon but that's it. I just heard about the statue thing. The Army had said absolutely no American flags and I hear the Marines draped one over Hussein's head, lol. This still isn't over by a long shot. It will take a while to clear out the bad guys and not everyone is thrilled to see us. On the other hand we've suffered <80 KIA to their umpteen thousand.

The one thing that I kept thinking as I was reading the quotes in the other stories you sent was the depth of feeling from people who have never known anything but oppression and the desire of the human spirit to be free. The key will be for the Americans to follow through and enable the Iraqis to lead themselves rather than make Iraq dependant on foreign aid. This will be hard because in a dictatorship there is fear but there is dependence. Hussein controlled everything about these people's lives and their movement to democracy will be filled with the same sort of growing pains that former communist countries went through. It will happen though, because this country has the resources to be one of the most prosperous countries in the world. With time and private investment, this country will become a global economic power, perhaps in ten years.
[I had sent Chris a bit of the kind comments that people have sent about the last travelogue]

Thanks for the e-mail someone sent about the travelogue. It's so strange to see people react to what I write. The real heroes are the young men way out there in the fight. I will say the biggest satisfaction I got so far was from planning the bombing of a bridge and then watching the video of it, destroyed by an F-18! Something symmetrical about that, eh? [Our dad was a stress engineer, part of the original F-18 engineering team]

Sunday, 4/13/03

We had a good laugh last night. I was hitting the rack late and as I got to my tent I was overcome with the smell of JP8 fuel. There bent over a wash bucket is an Army officer attached to us swearing. He didn't know that in the Marines we always put water in black cans and fuel in brown cans and had just poured 2 gallons of diesel on his uniform. I didn't want to laugh but I did, then I helped him get soap and water to try and clean it.

This is on the Tigris River. The area is beautiful and very peaceful. It was full of children and rural people who live in mud huts. There were palm trees everywhere. The group of Marines was Todd Kaminski's old company, so they were glad to see him. They told a neat story. A couple of days ago a 2 year old got a hold of some diesel that was in a plastic bottle and swallowed it. The mother came rushing up with the baby and the Navy corpsman treated the baby, then medevac'd the child to the Marine camp where the doctors treated him. He's fine now. The family was so grateful that they presented the Marines with a huge feast yesterday of roast goat, rice and fresh vegetables, enough to feed all of them. These are very poor subsistence farmers so it must've been a great sacrifice to slaughter one of their goats, but they did it out of gratitude. On our way out to the site today the roads were lined with people waving and smiling. I met a young man who knew some English, and he said that they were so grateful for what we had done because Hussein was a dictator and all they wanted was to live free. On our way back there was a tractor with about 10 people hanging on it, and they were whooping and waving like they'd just won the super bowl. It makes it all worth it.

Click here to see the latest pictures

- Lt. Col. Charles C. "Chris" Lozano
4/13/2003