Finally, I would like to thank the Janabi family: cousin Abu Muhammad (who asked that I use a pseudonym for even his nickname), aunt Ameer, grandmother Hajia, and sons Ahmed and Muhammad. I am glad that they chose to speak to me when they have spoken to so few journalists. Their grief continues. I have a particular hope that Ahmed and Muhammad may find peace in their hearts and a future free from hatred.
NOTES
A Note on Sources
THE MATERIAL ABOUT the 2005–2006 deployment of the 1–502nd Infantry Regiment is primarily the product of my own reporting in both the United States and Iraq from mid-2006 to late 2009, including two reporting trips to Iraq, one of which involved a three-week stay with 101st Airborne Division units in Mahmudiyah, Yusufiyah, Lutufiyah, the Russian power plant, and other Triangle of Death environs in May and June of 2008.
The sources for most of the information contained in this book are overwhelmingly the soldiers and officers of the 1–502nd themselves. I met scores of men from this unit for in-person interviews. Dozens more who could not connect with me in person agreed to interviews over the phone.
Many of them shared with me their letters, journals, and photos. Some passed along still-classified documents, including the battalion’s major events database known as its “Sig Acts” (significant actions) file, debriefing PowerPoint slides (known as “storyboards”), detailed maps, work e-mail exchanges, and internal reports—all at great professional risk. These documents, which contained invaluable details such as specific times and pinpoint locations of a wide variety of events, informed virtually every scene of the book, but because of their sensitivity I have chosen not to include them in the notes.
Formal and informal interviews with the relatives and friends of many of the soldiers helped round out their portraits as well. A few sources have asked not to be identified by name, but they were a tiny minority. The overwhelming majority of interview subjects readily agreed to be identified, and most interviews were conducted entirely on the record. Unless otherwise stated, I conducted all the interviews referenced in the notes that follow. I have not detailed the interview dates because doing so would be unwieldy and impractical: many interview subjects sat for several days of interviews, often several months apart, and answered follow-up questions via e-mail and telephone.
Supplementing my own interviews and firsthand reporting, I relied heavily on the voluminous transcripts of the many court proceedings that resulted from the March 12, 2006, rape-murders as well as the recordings of fact-finding interviews conducted in July and August 2006 by then-Captain James Culp and David Sheldon, who served as James Barker’s defense lawyers. Likewise, I frequently relied upon the signed sworn statements soldiers routinely submitted in relation to AR 15–6 investigations or criminal investigations, as well as the summaries and findings from the AR 15–6s themselves. These interviews, court transcripts, and sworn statements were particularly helpful for providing the viewpoints of the few soldiers who elected not to speak with me.
To round out these sources and for historical context, I have also made frequent use of the research generated by many government agencies, think tanks, and mainstream news outlets as well as a number of the many excellent general histories of the war that have already been published. These sources are presented more fully in the bibliography.
Foreword
In late September 2008: Lesley Stahl and Richard Bonin, “General O,” 60 Minutes, September 28, 2008.
During their year-long: Leo Barron, interview.
Twenty-one men: 101st Airborne Public Affairs Office.
Including Iraqi locals: Richard Patenia, interview.
More than 40 percent: Ryan Lenz, “Army Works to Offset Combat Stress in Iraq,” Associated Press, June 4, 2006.
For 1st Battalion: Fred Wintrich, interview.
By the end: Presentation of the AR 15–6 Investigation Results to the Family of Specialist David Babineau, PowerPoint slides, undated.
(One expert estimates: J. Robert Lilly, “Rape and Murder in the European Theater of Operations, WWII,” January 31, 2007.
Bravo Company commander: John M. McCarthy, “AR 15–6 Investigation Concerning Leadership Actions in Effect of B/1–502 IN on or about 12 MAR 2006,” July 10, 2006.
Perhaps so: Joseph Giordono, “8,000 Troops Widen Search for Missing GIs,” Stars and Stripes, June 20, 2006.
Prelude
About an hour later: Abu Muhammad [pseud.], interview.
There was another knock: Ibid.; testimony during Article 32 Hearing and at U.S. v. Green.
Socked by dust storms: Crime scene photos.
Abu Muhammad had seen: Abu Muhammad [pseud.], interview.
Each body was: Crime scene photos.
In her right hand: Abu Muhammad [pseud.], interview; testimony during Article 32 Hearing and at U.S. v. Green; crime scene photos.
“Yribe! Hey, Yribe!: Tony Yribe, interview and testimony at U.S. v. Spielman.
1: “We’ve Got to Get South Baghdad Under Control”
When Colonel Todd Ebel: Todd Ebel, interview.
The deterioration of Iraq: Tommy Franks and Malcolm McConnell, American Soldier (New York: HarperCollins, 2005), pp. 147, 474; Thomas E. Ricks, Fiasco (New York: Penguin Press, 2006), p. 395; BBC.com, “UK Fatalities in Afghanistan and Iraq.”
After the initial euphoria: Charles H. Ferguson, No End in Sight: Iraq’sDescent into Chaos (New York: PublicAffairs, 2008), pp. 33–34.
The first American: Bob Woodward, State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006), pp. 117, 170, 180.
The White House: Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Imperial Life in the Emerald City (London: Bloomsbury, 2007), pp. 52, 76–84; Ferguson, No End in Sight, pp. 156, 164, 190–224.
The people who worked: Chandrasekaran, Imperial Life, pp. 1–20, 153–63.
Due to the CPA’s: Ferguson, No End in Sight, pp. 296–97.
The CPA failed: Stewart W. Bowen, Jr., Hard Lessons: The Iraq Reconstruction Experience. U.S. Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, February 9, 2009). Electricity was an obsession for Bremer, but only to the extent that his staff could best prewar generation levels of approximately 4,000 MW (one megawatt equals roughly the power needed by about 1,500 homes). “The CPA effort to get electricity production up to 4,400 MW was fleetingly successful in October 2003,” says Hard Lessons, “but the short-term actions taken to meet that goal proved counterproductive to long-term progress.” To date, electrical generation in the country has never topped 5,000 megawatts.
Bremer and the CPA: Chandrasekaran, Imperial Life, pp. 208–9.
He created an Interim: L. Paul Bremer and Malcolm McConnell, My Year in Iraq: The Struggle to Build a Future of Hope (New York: Threshold Editions, 2006), p. 93.
While the Bush: Evan Kohlmann, interview.
The insurgency was not limited: Patrick Cockburn, Muqtada al-Sadr and the Fall of Iraq (London: Faber & Faber, 2008); Bremer, My Year in Iraq.
The first response: James Fallows, “Why Iraq Has No Army,” Atlantic Monthly, December 2005.
Well into 2007: Thomas E. Ricks, The Gamble (New York: Penguin Press, 2009), p. 156.
In August 2003: U.S. State Department Office of the Historian, “Significant Terrorist Incidents, 1961–2003: A Brief Chronology,” March 2004, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/pubs/fs/5902.htm.
When CENTCOM commander: Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor, Cobra II: The Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq (New York: Pantheon, 2006), p. 487.
In his memoir: Ricardo S. Sanchez and Donald T. Phillips, Wiser in Battle: A Soldier’s Story (New York: HarperCollins, 2008), pp. 261–63, 276.
One Human Rights Watch: Human Rights Watch, Leadership Failure: Firsthand Accounts of Torture of Iraqi Detainees by the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, September 22, 2005.
Many in the government: Human Rights Watch, “No Blood, No Foul”: Soldiers’ Accounts of Detainee Abuse in Iraq, July 2
006.
President Bush ordered: Sanchez, Wiser in Battle, p. 356; Ricks, Fiasco, pp. 330–43.
In October 2003: Chandrasekaran, Imperial Life, pp. 214–15.
Ultimately, Bremer handed: Ricks, Fiasco, pp. 390–93.
Casey arrived with: Ibid., p. 413.
A counterinsurgency rule: James T. Quinlivan, “Burden of Victory: The Painful Arithmetic of Stability Operations,” Rand Review, Summer 2003.
During the planning: Ferguson, No End in Sight, pp. 25–32.
The subject was: Bremer, My Year in Iraq, p. 357.
In late 2005: Bob Woodward, The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006–2008 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008), p. 33.
In 2005, the number: Ricks, Fiasco, p. 414.
His plans to reduce: Woodward, The War Within, p. 59.
The 101st Airborne’s: James Page, interview; 101st Airborne Public Affairs Office.
Petraeus would become: Ricks, Fiasco, p. 228.
Books such as: Stephen E. Ambrose, Band of Brothers (New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2004).
But that strength: Page, interview.
During the invasion: Thomas L. Day, Along the Tigris (Atglen, Pa.: Schiffer Publishing, 2007), p. 127.
The son of a lieutenant colonel: Ebel, interview.
Along his rise: Ibid.
The Black Hearts name: Page, interview.
Knowing that the 101st: Ebel, interview.
2: The Kunk Gun
As part of General Casey’s: Todd Ebel, interview.
When Tom Kunk: Tom Kunk, interview.
Kunk served in: Ibid.
As the battalion: Fred Wintrich, interview.
First Strike’s operations officer: Rob Salome, interview.
Commanding HHC: Shawn Umbrell, interview.
Captain Bill Dougherty: Umbrell and Bill Dougherty, interviews.
“There was still: Dougherty, interview.
Years before: Dennis Largent and Tim Norton, interviews.
Immediately, 1st Battalion’s: Umbrell and Jared Bordwell, interviews.
Bordwell went afoul: Bordwell, interview.
That approach: Bordwell, Dougherty, Umbrell, Largent, John Goodwin, Mark Belda, and others, interviews.
By Army culture: Belda, interview.
He routinely ridiculed: Norton, written sworn statement in McCarthy, “AR 15–6 Investigation;” Matt Shoaf and Eric Lauzier, interviews.
If anyone disagreed: Dougherty, interview.
If, initially: Belda, interview.
The relationship continued: Bordwell, interview.
The captains became: Umbrell, interview.
Several first sergeants: Belda, interview.
First Sergeant Largent: Largent, interview.
As the senior company: Umbrell, interview.
Kunk never had: Salome and Wintrich, interviews.
Other subordinates not: Leo Barron and Dennison Segui, interviews.
This is a discrepancy: Brian Lohnes, interview.
HHC commander Shawn: Umbrell, diary entry.
“Ebel said it was: Kunk, interview.
“We started having: Steve Cisneros, interview.
“Open-source information: Shoaf, interview.
“I lost my first sergeant: Bordwell, interview.
As the wheels-up date: Umbrell, diary entry.
3: “This Is Now the Most Dangerous Place in Iraq”
In one sense: Charles Tripp, A History of Iraq (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); William R. Polk, Understanding Iraq (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006).
You cannot easily get: Tom Kunk, testimony at U.S v. Green; Kunk, Jared Bordwell, Bill Dougherty, and Leo Barron, interviews.
Some families from: Ali A. Allawi, The Occupation of Iraq (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2007), p. 244.
Eight miles west: Lauren Frayer, “Derelict Power Plant Symbol of Iraq Woes,” Associated Press, February 11, 2007; Sergei L. Loiko and John Daniszewski, “Russia Launches ‘a Planned Withdrawal’ of Its Citizens from Iraq,” Los Angeles Times, March 7, 2003.
Two of the most powerful: Evan Kohlmann, “State of the Sunni Insurgency in Iraq, 2006,” December 29, 2006; Dr. Ali Al-Naimi (spokesman of IAI), interview with Kohlmann, July 2008.
After the American invasion: Mary Anne Weaver, “The Short, Violent Life of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,” Atlantic Monthly, July–August 2006.
Near Yusufiyah: Mike Starz, interview and diary entry.
One suicide bomber: Ireland Online, “Suicide Bomber Attacks Iraqi Wedding Party,” January 21, 2005.
The Sunni groups: Associated Press, “Iraq’s ‘Triangle of Death’ Includes Bounties,” November 19, 2004; Alissa J. Rubin, “Religious Hostility Surfacing,” Los Angeles Times, December 20, 2004.
Roads were littered: Rubin, “Religious Hostility Surfacing,” Los Angeles Times, December 20, 2004.
The area was just as dangerous: Associated Press, “Iraq’s ‘Triangle of Death’ Includes Bounties,” November 19, 2004; Anthony Shadid, “Iraq’s Forbidding ‘Triangle of Death’: South of Baghdad, a Brutal Sunni Insurgency Holds Sway,” Washington Post, November 23, 2004; Ahmed Mukhtar, “Deadly Triangle,” Al-Ahram Weekly, November 4–10, 2004.
On October 3, 2004: Agence France-Presse, “Two Bodies, Including Beheaded Man, Found South of Baghdad,” October 3, 2004.
As the United States: Thanassis Cambanis, “2 Pictures Emerge of Militants’ Power,” Boston Globe, October 18, 2004.
In the fall: Kim Sengupta, “‘This is now the most dangerous place in Iraq. We are coming up against Zarqawi’s people,’” The Independent, November 22, 2004; Military Channel, Combat Zone (season 1, episode 7), “Triangle of Death,” 2007; John F. Burns, “With 25 Citizen Warriors in an Improvised War,” New York Times, December 12, 2004; Anthony Shadid and Bradley Graham, “Troops Hit Sites South of Baghdad: Raids Involve U.S., British, Iraqi Forces,” Washington Post, November 24, 2004; CNN.com, “Iraq: New Push Against Insurgents,” October 5, 2004.
The Marines decamped: John King, interview.
Throughout 2005: Charles H. Ferguson, No End in Sight, pp. 362–63.
4: Relief in Place, Transfer of Authority
On September 29: Shawn Umbrell and Les Fuller, diary entries.
Lieutenant Colonel Kunk decided to: Tom Kunk and Umbrell, interviews.
Kunk gave Charlie: Kunk, interview.
This was Bravo Company: John Goodwin, interview.
The 48th lost four: Moni Basu and Anna Varela, “Four More from 48th Killed in Iraq,” The 48th Goes to War blog, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Online, July 31, 2005; Jeremy Redmon, “New Buddy Sorely Missed,” The 48th Goes to War blog, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Online, October 27, 2005; Jeremy Redmon, “48th Will Redeploy in Iraq by Thanksgiving,” The 48th Goes to War blog, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Online, October 4, 2005, http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/index/iraq.html.
One 101st soldier: Daniel Carrick, interview.
Another said some: Justin Cross, interview.
The 48th men: Umbrell, interview.
The living conditions: Chris Payne, Carrick, Eric Lauzier, Rick Skidis, Justin Habash, and others, interviews.
First Strike’s intelligence: Leo Barron, interview.
The 48th intelligence: Todd Ebel, interview.
First Battalion’s eight-man: Barron, interview.
As the battalion: Kunk, interview.
And what little: Kunk and John King, interviews.
There was no: Ebel, interview.
Many, the Americans’: King, interview.
Kunk suspected: Ebel, interview.
Two of the battalion: Kunk and Ebel, interviews.
Delta’s company commander: Lou Kangas, interview.
Within a few days: Jared Bordwell, interview.
Down in Lutufiyah: Bill Dougherty, interview.
On the battalion level: Rob Salome, interview.
As Goodwin and: Goodwin, interview.
The magnitude of Goodwi
n’s: Ibid.
Twenty-four-year-old: Jon Mark Beilue, “Ben Britt: Never a Taker, Always a Giver,” Amarillo Globe News, January 1, 2006.
“He wanted a piece: Tony Yribe, interview.
Despite Miller’s considerable: Kunk, interview.
Miller jumped at: Phil Miller, interview.
When Second Lieutenant Mark: Mark Evans, interview.
If First Strike’s: Ebel, Kunk, and Goodwin, interviews.
“We couldn’t get: Ebel, interview.
On his early: Kunk, interview.
Upon Bravo’s arrival: Goodwin, interview.
5: 1st Platoon at the JS Bridge
Goodwin decided to send: John Goodwin, interview.
Living conditions were: Chris Payne, James Downs, Eric Lauzier, and others, interviews.
“From the moment: Justin Habash, interview.
First Platoon filled: Lauzier and Phil Miller, interviews.
Forty-one years old: Shelly Nelson, Collin Sharpness, Miller, and Phil Deem, interviews.
Nelson’s Alpha Team: Miller, eulogy of Casica, Remembering Our Fallen Heroes: Staff Sergeant Travis L. Nelson and Sergeant Kenith Casica, DVD, December 16, 2005; Renee Casica, Lauzier, and Payne, interviews.
Spielman’s grandmother was: Nancy Hess, interview.
He married just: Sarah Bowles and Hadley Robinson, “Trying to Understand the Mahmudiyah Massacre,” Gelf Magazine, May 6, 2009.
His superiors found: Tony Yribe and Lauzier, interviews.
Private Steven Green: U.S. v. Green.
Along the way: Green, interview.
With the Army strapped: Andrew Tilghman, “The Army’s Other Crisis,” Washington Monthly, December 2007.
One lieutenant was surprised: Mark Evans, interview.
Second Squad was: Payne, interview.
He was Sergeant: Miller, interview.
Captain Goodwin came: Goodwin, interview.
This was his second: Lauzier, interview.
Woe to the smart: Shane Hoeck, interview.
He had several: Lauzier, interview.
Lauzier called Yribe: Ibid.
“I would joke: Goodwin, testimony at Article 32 Hearing.
Yribe saw no need: Yribe, interview.
Living in motel: U.S. v. Cortez; Payne, interview.
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