News & Politics >Q&A

Serving Up the New Democracy: Businessmen, Soldiers, & Suicide Bombers
Text & Photos by Lorna Tychostup

When our beat-up taxi arrives at the designated meeting place—the luxurious Hotel Babylon, a huge looming high rise so dark it looks abandoned—two brand new white sedans are waiting. It is 8pm, three-quarters-of-an-hour past the limits of safety in Baghdad. As we pay the fare, our driver, seeing how much I enjoyed the music, hands me the cassette tape we have been listening to—distinctly Arabian with a Native American lilt. I refuse but he insists. Our foursome is spilt—two each into the sedans. A slow moving car is an easy target and the armed drivers attempt to outdo each other in the race to our destination. We’re going to a party for the attendees of the International Teaching Civics Conference at the home of the dapper and modern Hussein Sinjari, a former Kurdish minister turned media mogul and the president of the Iraq Institute of Democracy. He is one of the many Iraqis who have relocated to Baghdad to usher in and take advantage of the new Iraqi freedoms. Sinjari’s message is one of tolerance—of religion, of rights for women—and autonomy—for the Kurds.

In the upscale neighborhood of Jadiriya, we glide gently off the street and under the carport of the modest house that Sinjari is renting, where we are greeted by Kalashnikov-toting guards and our host. Among those assembled in Sinjari’s garden are Mart Laar, the twice former Prime Minister of Estonia; an attorney for Dyncorp, the private police force providing security for the us; an Amman oil business executive; an attractive, black leather–jacketed older gentleman from Kurdistan, a peshmerga (a Kurdish freedom fighter; the term means “ready to die”) who has something to do with software; two Bulgarian contractors working in the Green Zone and acting as spokesmen for Bulgarian business interests; a young woman named Rania organizing a conference; a law professor from South Africa; Tom, a representative from the Cato Institute, a right-wing think tank based in Washington, DC; and a host of other characters who make Hollywood Academy Award winning casting efforts pale in comparison.

The night air is cool and the mood is festive, and we gather around a table of hors d’oeuvres and beverages under the evening stars. Military helicopters occasionally fly overhead. When the energy lulls, Sinjari fills our glasses and invites us to join in the Kurdish toast, “Nosh! Nosh to ourselves! Nosh to our health! Nosh to love!”

The main topics of conversation are the possibilities of democracy and the not yet completed Iraqi interim constitution. Newspaper reports say the Coalition Provisional Authority Administrator Paul Bremer is running the Governing Council hard and won’t let them go until a constitution is produced. The stumbling blocks in the debate over the constitution are Kurdish demands for autonomy, the inclusion of women in the government, and Sharia law. Indeed, Bremer has said he will block any effort by Iraqi leaders to put Islamic law as the foundation of legislation for the interim constitution.

“The Kurds will bring balance to this new Iraqi government,” says Laar, who is jovial and friendly and whose words roll out of his mouth lathered in an accent so thick that listeners are left clinging to his every word to understand him. “While the others will try to cut the rights of women, try to establish religious rule, and bring in unequal modes of governance, the Kurds will pluck these things out. The question is if the new Iraq does not get some control in the form of self rule soon, I am afraid of what will happen—civil war and worse.”

Later we are careening our way home along deserted streets at 1am. The Peshmerga software man is seated up front holding the driver’s 9mm handgun, its barrel resting on lip of the door facing outward. Not wanting to break his concentration, I lean forward and quietly ask, “Is it true the Kurds will be the balancing force in Iraq’s new democracy?”

“What is most important to the Kurds is that we have a Federalist government,” he answers, “one which allows for the seceding of a state if it is dissatisfied.”

We arrive at his new Baghdad home, a second to his home in Kurdistan. As I take his place in the front seat, he tells me, “You take the gun. He cannot drive and shoot at attackers at the same time. You take the gun.”

“Yes, of course I will. No problem, no problem. I will take the gun,” I say casually. Once inside the vehicle I see the driver has already restored the gun to his favored place and we are off to our hotel.

Embedded
Two days later I leave for an embed with the 1st Battalion, 8th Infantry Regiment, part of the Fourth Infantry Division under the command of Col. Nate Sassaman. Stationed near the city of Balad, these soldiers patrol the Sunni Triangle, the region north and west of Baghdad that is generating the most violence against the Americans. Located within this area is the farming village of Abu Hishma, where I have been investigating claims of unfair detention and wrongful death at the hands of American troops.

I am joined by Mike Ferner, a Vietnam vet–peace activist turned journalist who can’t see tanks roll by without snarling. As we arrive at the outskirts of the base we are immediately surrounded by men from Abu Hishma. They are looking for detained relatives and ask us to help them. We take names and say we will inquire but do not promise anything.

Once inside we are greeted by Capt. Blake, a fellow New Yorker with Albany roots. He is the base’s jack-of-all-trades—a press officer and legal liaison who meets with villagers once a week to hear their complaints and settle compensation cases, and greets unexpected guests like me and Mikey. Sassaman is out on patrol and has left no word of our visit.

Capt. Blake takes us to our quarters, a small, bare room at one end of the H-shaped after-school center turned military headquarters. In the lobby is an image of the burning Twin Towers; a sign next to it reads, “Do you want to win?” The glass of the window in our room has been blown out from a mortar attack, and they haven’t gotten around to filling the gap with sand bags. There are two army cots in the room, a portable radiator-type heater, and an electric cord hub with a blown fuse. It has suddenly turned very cold—temperatures are expected to fall below freezing at night. We go hunting for something to plug up the window and find two plywood boards that cover most of the opening.

The base is mortared on a regular basis, we are ordered to stay within specific parameters, especially after dark, when the camouflaged guards on the roof and perimeter will shoot at anything that moves. This information makes the walk to the one porta-potty, with its neighboring open-air “pee tube,” more unnerving than the visit inside. (I have been told there are three women in this battalion and before I leave I have seen all of them.) In addition, we are warned that some time after dark, a series of mortars will be fired from the base onto selected sites from which insurgents have launched attacks in the past. “They make quite a sound and we don’t want you to be frightened unnecessarily...”

Sassaman arrives and asks us to join him on a brief patrol. I beg off, due to last minute deadline commitments, but Mikey goes along. The Internet room has 20 or so laptops and several phones, all in use by soldiers talking to loved ones and surfing the Web. Outside, on both sides of the hallway, is a neat line of their guns and flak jackets. Although there are soldiers of many ages, the majority are young, so very young that I am reminded of my 23-year-old son, who called from college the day after 9/11 to say that he and his best buddy were enlisting. “We’re going to join the military and go fight. We’re smart. They could use smart guys like us, Mom.” “Just who are you going to fight?” I asked calmly as terror filled my heart. He didn’t talk about it with me again and went back to his studies. Looking around the room filled with other mother’s children, I wonder if my negative reaction caused my son to think twice. I wonder what their mothers said when they learned their sons and daughters were enlisting.

After finishing my work, I go back to the room, plug in the heater, and place it in between the cots. There are no blankets. Mikey comes back with his face so blackened by sand and dirt that I barely recognize him. Capt. Blake comes to tell us, “Catch some rack and be ready at 3am. You’re going out on patrol.”

On Patrol
Indeed. As we roll off base with our borrowed flak jackets and helmets, I keep thinking to myself that this is the one thing I had promised loved ones I wouldn’t do: come in close quarters with the military. Much too dangerous. At any moment we could be attacked or roll over an ied, otherwise known as an improvised explosive device.

We meet no enemy combatants, we have no close calls, but for hours we are slow moving targets in an unheated Bradley armored personnel carrier in the black of a moonless, 25-degree night. I stand looking out the top hatch, a constant storm of diesel fuel exhaust spewing in my face, unwilling to miss a minute of this experience, even if it means getting my head shot off. Not Mikey. He is sitting below on a metal box of TNT—everything in this vehicle is metal—wrapped in the two woolen army blankets.

This is no luxury vehicle, and the pounding inflicted on the body is considerable. (It carries itself with me into the next night, making sleep impossible because of the incredible pain sluicing through every inch of my body. Is this the flu, adrenaline poisoning, or was my body simply so tense that it cannot unloosen itself from this fear-inflicted grip?)

There is a Bradley ahead and a Bradley behind us. Our vehicle has a driver, a gunner up in the turret, and another soldier below. The patrol is under the command of Capt. Mathew Aaron Shirley, a likeable 30-year-old from Michigan. He joined the battalion only six weeks before and has not yet acquired the bad taste in his mouth that so many soldiers complain of, due to their negative experiences with local villagers.

It is an interesting phenomenon. These soldiers came here in the guise of liberators, saving the Iraqis from Saddam while making America safe from terrorists. Yet the people in the Sunni Triangle did not necessarily want saving. They believe Americans are the enemy, and many participate in the elusive insurgency by direct attacks against the troops or by withholding information about the insurgents when questioned. Most are dismayed by the seemingly schizophrenic behavior of the troops, who hand out goodies during the day—pencils, crayons, blankets, and a few soccer balls—and return in the night to break down doors in anti-insurgency raids where absolute terror reigns for the first 45 seconds leaving residents stunned. The raids are carried out in this way to ensure the safety of the troops. In an atmosphere in which an insurgency attack on the troops results in villagers’ being taken from their beds into the night air, men blindfolded or having bags placed over their heads and made to sit for hours, or worse—taken away and detained—some villagers disdain the troops’ daylight kindnesses. When patrols such as ours go by, many villagers smile and wave, but others throw stones and give the finger—and, at various times, a few lob mortars or plant ieds along the sides of roads.

We spend a couple of hours rolling around the roads surrounding Abu Hishma, and a couple more parked on the highest spot in the area. From this vantage point we will be able to see an attack and ensure a speedy response. The sun begins to rise and we are off to patrol the village. Women and children of all ages run from their homes to watch the parade go by. Mikey is now standing and looking about, but he refuses to wave. This becomes a debate. He will not wave as part of the conquering army; he believes that many of the villagers are waving simply out of fear. Yet the sheer delight on most of the children’s faces is undeniable, as is the smile on Capt. Shirley’s face. Yes, there is this moment of hesitation on some adult faces, yet others wave easily. And yes, some of the young boys thrust their thumbs up as we approach only to turn it downward after we’ve passed. But the slow hesitancy of most, especially the women, turns to obvious delight at sight of the movement of my hand, which is warmly reciprocated.

Ali Baba and the 40 teachers
At the main entrance/exit to the village, I disembark the armored personnel vehicle and I am immediately surrounded by a throng of young men and boys waiting for the school bus. All want their photo taken and many show me their books. They have been studying English and a few of the bravest talk to me. All ask for pencils, saying, “Our teachers Ali Baba. They took our pencils. Ali Baba teachers. They took our notebooks...”

When I ask one of the soldiers if he can deliver pencils to these boys, he shakes his head. “We have given them pencils more than once. Their teachers or parents take them.” How could this be, teachers taking pencils from their students? The soldiers tell more.

“The men in these villages are lazy. The women work from morning until night. Do you see them walking on the side of the road carrying those huge bundles of wooden sticks on their backs? They cook the meals, wash the clothes, take care of the kids, work in the fields, and the men just squat by the side of the road watching, talking among themselves and never lifting a finger. They have three and four wives and thirty to forty children. This one old guy took a nine-year-old wife and was sharing her with another man.”

Capt. Blake confirms some of this later. “We delivered twelve slate blackboards, and the teachers said ‘Thanks, but what we really need are cars.’ We hired a contractor and gave him $30,000 up front as he requested, to pave a section of road through the village. He did a small length and has since disappeared. One woman came to the compensation hearings and told me her husband had begun sleeping with their nine-year-old daughter and would not stop. She asked if we could help her.”

the 9/11 connection?
After two days, we say our farewells. As we leave we see the base's intelligence officer turn his ire on an older Shi’ite man. He is shouting over and over again, “Is it true you are going to beat the shit out of yourselves? That is just crazy! What is that to beat the shit out of yourselves?!” Williams is referring to the 10-day Shi’ite observance of Ashoura, when men parade down the street while slowly striking chains across their backs. First over one shoulder and then over the other, sharing in the pain of Hussein, son of Mohammed, who was beheaded after falling in a 7th-century battle. There is also ceremonial bloodletting, wailing by women, and cooking of great heaps of food that is given out freely to all, especially the poor. This is the first time in 35 years that the Shi’ites have been allowed to publicly celebrate this event that was banned under Saddam’s regime.

Back at the hotel I sleep for a few days. On March 2, the day of the attacks that killed over 200 people at the Ashoura observances in Kerbala and Kadhimiya, I send Col. Sassaman an e-mail thanking him “for the opportunity to experience a very tiny slice of life on your base. To tell you the truth it took me a few days to detox and begin to make sense of the complexities. As we were leaving, an Iraqi translator told our driver about a man killing his wife and blaming it on the troops and asking for compensation. On the other side of the coin, as a New Yorker who was in the city on 9/11, to see the pictures of the 9/11 Twin Towers in your lobby was equally disturbing. Even the President has said there was no connection between Saddam and Bin Laden. I can’t imagine why those photos are there supporting the fallacy that 9/11 and Iraq are somehow connected.”

Sassaman’s e-mailed response begins, “So misguided...you should have mentioned the 9/11 photos to me if they bothered you so much...you missed the point completely...like it or not, Iraq is a battleground for the war on terrorism...if you have a problem with that, take note of the Al Qaeda attacks on Shi’ites today throughout Iraq...you should be thankful we are fighting that war for you here in Iraq and not in Manhattan...missed you today too…since we had two significant mortar attacks on our base...fortunately no one hurt...”

A suicide bombing
The night before I am to fly home, another suicide bomber strikes, this time just blocks from my hotel. A small group of us, five Americans and two Iraqis, are enjoying a send-off meal of pizza and spring rolls at the bustling Saj Reef Pizza place. The blast shakes the windows and we are on our feet and out the door—the Americans, that is. Our Iraqi translators stay seated, such is the norm of their lives. Our two photojournalist friends take off in a taxi. We pay the bill and drive one of the translators home to her wary husband, who has been locking her out of the house each night in an attempt to dissuade her from working with us. His motive is fear—they are killing people who work with the “Amerikee”.

Our driver’s favored detour empties us out onto the main drag of Sa’adoon Street, where entire blocks of storefront glass lie shattered on the ground. In our hotel, the floor-to-ceiling glass wall of the first-floor restaurant is gone, as is another window in the ground-floor lobby. A chilly stream of air makes its way up the stairs and through the halls, and it is hard to tell whether the internationals huddled around the TV in the lobby are cold or simply holding themselves for comfort. Most are Americans, journalists of the progressive persuasion. The hotel is cheap and clean, and word of the availability of Internet in the privacy of individual rooms has made it the place to stay for many. This is the week of the one-year anniversary of America’s war against Iraq, and delegations of these folks have flooded the hotel “to get the story”—their mere presence a glaring invitation for such an attack.
Anna, Nathan, and I—we set out together on this journey to Iraq six weeks earlier—walk the short distance to the site of the bombing, the Mount Lebanon Hotel. Soldiers and military vehicles block entry to the street, and we are told to wait for the commander to come out to brief us. Standing in a lot full of fresh trash and running sludge, we don’t speak.

A Humvee crashes slowly over the largest heap and parks itself next to a tank. Reporters swarm—cameras flash, vans unload, mikes are thrust to people’s mouths—in frantic action among a few Iraqis who have gathered. “They are beasts,” says an Iraqi translator, Rania, of the press. I have not seen her for weeks and she is now working with a German reporter. He comes close, they speak in whispers, and he scurries off. Disgust clouds her face, and we watch the scene together for a moment. “They have come to feed.”

A young Iraqi man on crutches makes his way through the scene. He is pointing to the sky and saying, “Apaches. Apaches.” He claims that the Americans fired a missile at the hotel. The soldiers take him aside and tell him to stop trying to incite a riot. He saunters off to join his friends, of high school or college age, smiling as if he has pulled off some great prank. An Iraqi man walks up to the tank and says he lives on this street—something about his family’s being down there, he points, where he is not being allowed to go. The press catch his scent, and he is immediately surrounded. Flashes pop, mikes are outstretched... When a few photographers use the tank to raise themselves up in order to “get the shot,” the soldier in the turret lifts his machine gun and points it to the air. “OK, get back now! Get back!” he shouts. The herd stampedes past me and Anna and almost knocks us down.

I say hello to a young British woman I met last February in Baghdad and had not seen since; she is here as a human shield. She has long brown dreadlocks and several earrings in one ear. “We would never harm such a person who looks like this,” an Iraqi woman whispers in my ear. “Iraqi people can see how much she is hurting.” A crowd of young Iraqi men gathers around the young woman, and there is some sort of exchange I cannot hear. Suddenly she begins to shout at the nearby soldiers, who look no more than children in uniforms carrying large weapons: “How could you know?! You don’t know what it is like! There were no Americans killed tonight! No Americans! You don’t know what these people have been through!!”

“No Americans were killed, huh?” says one soldier. “Yeah, right. OK, no Americans were killed. Yeah, you know what you’re talking about.”

Another soldier begins talking to no one in particular. “I have to wash the blood off my hands.” I look down and see surgical gloves cover his hands.

“How did you get blood on your hands?”

“I was the first one on the scene. Got here before the troops. I started working on two people right away—Americans. We Medivaced them out. Pretty bad shape. We work fast. While I was working, my guys brought others to me. Some could walk and others had to be carried. I was the first to get to the restaurant bombing too. This always happens on the holidays. I don’t want to be here for Easter.”

Emerging from down the street where the fires are still blazing, another soldier shouts, “Is there anyone from FOX here? Anyone from FOX here?”

Reuters and CNN report a roving death count: 29 to 27 to 17. MSNBC report a count of 7, but state that “Iraqi authorities put the toll at ‘about 20.’”

Home
I am back home now. I am out of the loop and no longer riding on the cusp of history. Although I exchange e-mails every day with friends who are still there, the lifeline has been cut. I cannot decipher a trusted truth about Iraq from American media reports—be it progressive or conservative; radio, print, or TV. The reports—viewed through the various American filters that cannot see an entire culture so different from its own—are absurd compared to what I have just witnessed and lived. The last media depiction I saw that I trusted was in Amman, Jordan, the night before my flight home. Gathered in the hotel lobby with staff and others who have become friends—all men, Iraqi and Jordanian—we watched video provided by Al Jazeera of a row of Palestinian olive trees in being pulled from the ground by Israeli backhoes. Elderly men and women watched in horror. Some crying, others desperately speaking out. These are images never seen on American TV. There is quiet tsk-tsking in the room. The next images show Osama bin Laden walking through some forest glen. He enters from the right of the screen never looking at the camera, crosses, and exits left. Just before disappearing, he turns, faces the camera for a spilt second and then continues on. I don’t understand Arabic and ask if this is a live report. There is no clear answer but the men sit up and begin to talk, clearly agitated. ”Let them catch him. Americans will no longer be safe. Terror will erupt in America as his followers will take their revenge.”

Lorna Tychostup will be speaking about her recent experiences in Iraq on April 14 at 7pm at Spackenkill High School, 112 Spackenkill Rd., Poughkeepsie. The talk is sponsored by the American Association of University Women. For more information, call (845) 635-1474.