Thunder Run (47 page)

PURPLE HEART

NOTES ON SOURCES

J
ust before dawn on April 4, 2003, a troop transport truck assigned to the 101st Airborne Division plunged into a canal outside the Iraqi holy city of Karbala. The truck sank to the bottom, taking with it weapons, food, and equipment. All twenty-four soldiers aboard, plus a lone embedded reporter, were fished out of the canal alive. That reporter was me.

The wreck of the truck robbed me of everything I owned at that moment—two satellite phones, a laptop computer, notebooks, cash, a tape recorder, and clothing. Soaking wet, I was tossed into the back of another 101st Airborne troop truck bound for Baghdad. More than twenty hours later, we arrived at Baghdad's international airport, which had been seized the day before by the Third Infantry Division (Mechanized).

This book is the indirect result of that truck plunge, which in turn resulted in my chance encounter the morning of April 5 with the officers and soldiers of the Third Infantry's Second Brigade. I was on the airport tarmac, trying to dry out in the morning sun, when the tanks and Bradleys of the Desert Rogues battalion rolled in at the close of their thunder run through the southwestern corner of the capital. The armored vehicles were smoking and streaked with blood, and the crews inside were drenched in sweat and covered with a fine gray dust.

The first soldier I encountered was Staff Sergeant Jason Diaz, whose tank had been burned and abandoned on the highway into Baghdad. Diaz and his crewmen described a seventeen-kilometer armored charge and firefight along the highway—the first American incursion into the capital after more than two weeks of war. It was a remarkable story, and it intrigued me. Over the next several months, I interviewed more than a hundred men from the Second Brigade, whose accounts form the core of this book.

Thunder Run
is a work of nonfiction. The events described in these pages represent my best professional attempt to produce a thorough and accurate account of the battle for Baghdad. My interviews with the men who fought and directed the battle were buttressed by combat histories of the units involved; the contemporaneous notes and journals of soldiers; written logs of combat radio conversations; photographs and videos taken by soldiers during the battle; and my own experiences and observations while embedded with Cyclone Company of Task Force 4-64 for the duration of the battle and the “postcombat” period. In cases where these sources produced conflicting versions of events, I reinterviewed soldiers involved to obtain a more precise understanding of what had transpired. Many officers and men were interviewed several times, and these sessions served to enrich and sharpen the book's narrative.

The descriptions of actions taken by Iraqi commanders, soldiers, and civilians were based on my detailed interviews of these sources, conducted in Baghdad with the aid of interpreters. For the descriptions of Iraqi civilians killed during the battle, I relied on my interviews with their survivors.

In certain instances, I have relied on the work of others to supplement my own reporting. The account of television interviews of Colonel David Perkins and other commanders on April 7 are taken from a Fox News videotape of the interviews. Some descriptions of events at the Fourteenth of July Bridge on April 7 were graciously provided by my colleague at the
Los Angeles Times
Geoffrey Mohan, who was embedded with Cyclone Company. The description of the wounding of two Rogue battalion crewmen near the airport on April 5 is based on my interviews of the two wounded soldiers, with additional details taken from a first-person account in
Embedded: The Media at War in Iraq—An Oral History,
by Bill Katovsky and Timothy Carlson, with permission granted by Katovsky. The description of the April 14 discovery of the body of Sergeant First Class John W. Marshall is based on my interviews of officers from the Second Brigade, with several details also provided by a
Kansas City Star
account of a postwar speech by Rick Atkinson, an author and
Washington Post
reporter who was embedded with the 101st Airborne. The account of the technician at the Baghdad airport who insisted that the army's combat computer system was accurately depicting Second Brigade units in downtown Baghdad was provided by Major Dane Childs, a U.S. Army historian who is perhaps the world's leading authority on the battle for Baghdad.

INTERVIEWS IN IRAQ AND THE UNITED STATES

Specialist Benjamin Agee

Captain J. O. Bailey

Lieutenant Robert Ball

Captain Edward Ballanco

Captain Steven Barry

Staff Sergeant John Beck

Staff Sergeant Joe Bell

Lieutenant Colonel Michael Birmingham

Major General Buford C. Blount III

Marine Gunnery Sergeant Daniel Brown

Lieutenant Mark Brzozowksi

Captain Larry Burris

Captain Anthony Butler

Captain Christopher Carter

Major Rod Coffey

Captain Jason Conroy

Marine Captain David Cooper

Sergeant First Class Phillip Cornell

Private First Class Angel Cruz

Sergeant Walter Daniel

Sergeant Robert Davis

Marine Gunnery Sergeant William (Butch) Deas

Lieutenant Colonel Philip deCamp

Sergeant Jason Deming

Staff Sergeant Jason Diaz

Major Michael Donovan

Sergeant Jeffrey Ellis

Air Force Major Jim Ewald

Sergeant First Class Robert Ford

Sergeant First Class Ronald Gaines

Command Sergeant Major Robert Gallagher

Lieutenant Colonel Kenneth Gantt

Sergeant David Gibbons

Staff Sergeant Shawn Gibson

Private Joseph Gilliam

Captain William Glaser

Private First Class Adam Gregory

Lieutenant Roger Gruneisen

Sergeant Eric Gubler

Staff Sergeant Eric Guzman

Lieutenant Matthew Hanks

Marine Corporal Trevor Havens

First Sergeant Robert Hay

Sergeant John Heath

Sergeant Carlos Hernandez

Specialist Joe Hill

Captain Andy Hilmes

Specialist Shaun Holland

Captain Stephen Hommel

Captain Harry (Zan) Hornbuckle

Captain Daniel Hubbard

Captain Shannon Hume

Marine Major Mark Jewell

Captain Ronny Johnson

Special Joseph Kalinowski

Sergeant Shawn Kemmer

Major Everett Denton Knapp

Specialist Kenneth Krofta

Specialist Mason Lowery

Staff Sergeant Michael Lucas

Sergeant First Class Jonathan Lustig

Captain Philip Xuan Luu

Lieutenant Jeffrey McFarland

Private First Class Jacob McLaughlin

Private First Class Jarred Metz

Lieutenant Maurice Middleton

Lieutenant Matthew Miletich

First Sergeant Jeff Moser

Captain Christopher Nixon

Major Ricky Nussio

Staff Sergeant Matthew Oliver

Sergeant Quincy Oree

Private Chad Ortz

Sergeant Steve Oslin

Lieutenant Edward Panetta

Marine Sergeant Dennis Parks

Staff Sergeant Jamus Patrick

Colonel David Perkins

Sergeant First Class Vincent Phillips

Captain Aaron Polsgrove

Captain Sherman Powell

Sergeant Tony Rankin

Major Mark Rasins

Major Patrick Ratigan

Lieutenant Jason Redmon

Major Kent Rideout

Lieutenant Colonel Scott E. Rutter

Private First Class Don Schafer

Captain Erik Schobitz

Lieutenant Colonel Eric Schwartz

Private First Class Chris Shipley

Major Roger Shuck

Staff Sergeant Thomas Slago

Sergeant Michael Smith

Captain William Todd Smith

Specialist Gary Techur

Sergeant First Class Timothy Terpack

Staff Sergeant Joe Todd

Chris Tomlinson, Associated Press

Staff Sergeant Chad Touchet

Staff Sergeant Christopher Turner

Lieutenant Colonel Stephen Twitty

First Sergeant Dale Vanormer

Major Charles Watson

Lieutenant Colonel Eric Wesley

Captain Phillip Wolford

Captain Josh Wright

INTERVIEWS IN IRAQ

General Ahmed Rahal

Brigadier Baha Ali Nasr

General Omar Abdul Karim

Colonel Raid Raik

General Juawad al Dayni

Jaffer Sadiq

Nabil al Qaisy

Ahmed Sardar

Harith Ahmed Uraibi

Talal Ahmed al Doori

Hashim Mahmood

Faleh Khaiber

Mohammed Neaimi

Zubida Rida

Mervet Jawad

Salar Jaff

Ahmed Jaffer

Hassan Issam

Ziad Taha

Yusef Taha

Thafar al Kassab