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Jane Arraf reports from Diyala with the 5-20 INF, 3/2 SBCT.
Baquba - The tattoo circles his left wrist – “Our Fallen Brothers” – the ink etched into his skin almost the same color as the blue in Army uniform.
“I don’t like to wear jewelry,” says Sergeant Michael Alsip with one of those understated explanations common to soldiers.
For most soldiers deployed in what has become one of fiercest fights in Iraq, the names of fallen comrades hardly fit any more on the black metal bracelets some wear to commemorate them.
It’s 14 hours into an operation in Baquba to disrupt al-Qaeda command and control centers – barely the start of it - and the faces of the soldiers in Baquba and the faces of the soldiers in Alpha Company’s 1st platoon, (Stryker's 5th Battallion 20th Infantry Regiment) are caked with dust and fatigue. They’ve been doing this for eight months now. They thought they’d be going home in June but now it will be December before most are back.
The dust filters through the hatch in the Stryker vehicle we’re riding in. A lot of the Strykers are air-conditioned. This one isn’t.
At the mission brief before this operation last week, officers and senior sergeants were told the temperature would be over 100 degrees – for this operation on foot that means carrying about 20 pounds each of water.
But before getting down to those details, Battalion Commander Lieutenant Colonel Bruce Antonia reads a letter from his brother describing the turnout at a funeral for one of the battalion’s fallen sergeants.
“It’s that kind of reason why we are here – the American people are behind us,” he tells his company leaders. He reminds them not to let their losses turn them against the people they are trying to help. “Don’t let the soldiers get frustrated to the point where they think every Iraqi is the enemy because you know it’s not true.”
The battalion, attached to the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division has had 60 wounded soldiers evacuated and 13 killed in action – still a fraction of the losses the brigade has suffered. By the end of the operation all of those numbers would be higher.
[...]