Sabotaged oil pipelines have been burning for a few days, so there’s a brownish-grey haze over the horizon. South of Baghdad, on the way to Kufa, cars are stopped on one side of the highway. My cab driver, following many other cars, crosses the median and drives on the other side, against oncoming traffic. This slows down both sides, so he turns into the town of Mohomedia, to bypass the highway.

We drive through small city streets, past a donkey cart with three-foot long blocks of ice gleaming in the scorching sun. Two young men kick what looks like a propane tank down the road. We then drive through a huge field of smoldering trash, breathing in fumes from burning plastic all the way, and finally turn back onto the highway and speed off down the road.

Twisted, lifeless Iraqi tanks line the side of the road. Between the two lanes there is an oil truck, which has flipped upside down and burnt. There is a hole blown in the side of it, probably from a roadside bomb.

When we reach Kufa, posters of Muqtada al-Sadr are plastered on walls, trees and road signs. This is his territory.

I want to take some photos of the city and it’s people, so I get out of the car, tell my cab driver to wait a few minutes, and start walking. Across the street from a market is a big blue and green mosque. I walk near the entrance and take off my lens cap. Almost immediately, a young man of about twenty is at my side asking my name. Two more men walk up and stand close to me. The one who spoke holds my arm and, with the other two, firmly leads me into the entrance. There are many men, of all ages, around me now and though they do not act aggressively, it is clear that I have no choice whether to stay or not. I am calmly told what to do.

They lead me to a small dark room, where all my belongings are taken and closely scrutinized, and I am questioned in detail. It is clear that I am thought to be a possible CIA agent, and all electronic devices are opened, down to my watch and a small flashlight.

They then move me to another room, this one a little bigger. I sit on the rug with six men while they continue to search and question me. I am made to pull the film out of my camera and empty a roll full of photos, ruining everything in the process. Several people look at all of the two hundred or so pictures I have stored in a small digital camera that was in my pocket.

Photos of people outside Abu Ghraib prison and of wounded Iraqis in the Kirkuk hospital seem to work in my favor, but when they get to pictures of the US Army patrol, I am treated with skepticism. Pictures of buildings and destroyed military vehicles have the same effect. I am not allowed to let my taxi driver know where I am and, in any case, the men around me say that they told him to leave.

They ask me what I think of Muqtada al-Sadr and the Mahdi Army. I tell them that I have come to learn, and am looking for information about both. It’s obvious to me now that they’ve caught me about to take pictures of a mosque that is a Mahdi Army base or office.

After about forty-five minutes, a man walks into the room and whispers something in Arabic to the man sitting across from me, then leaves. I am told, “You are now going to the office of Muqtada al-Sadr.”

Three men surround me. One of them wearing a beard and a baseball cap says, “Don’t be scared.” They walk with me to the street and there is my taxi driver, still waiting. He looks concerned, and when the three men tell him that we are all getting in the car, he co-operates.

The men in the back seat point the way, and we drive out of Kufa. With a nod from my new friends in the back seat, we don’t have to stop at police checkpoints on the way into the next city, Najef.

Once inside the main security gate, it is clear that Najef is an ancient city, and has not been modernized. Brittle looking sun-bleached buildings stand at odd angles over people in flowing robes.

I am ordered to sit down with my back facing an entrance to a cavernous alley. After about ten minutes, a man with a white Shia turban comes out and motions to those with me. I am brought around to meet Muqtada al-Sadr. I follow him and several other men into the alley, up some winding stairs, and into a small, carpeted room with a single table and computer. We sit down on the floor, Muqtada to my right.

He is a soft-spoken, gentle seeming man, and his eyes are piercing. We exchange pleasantries, and he asks to see my pictures in the digital camera. I go through them yet again, and he comments on them as I click through. He asks me if I’m from the CIA, and when I reply that I’m not, he says, “Good.” and laughs.

Since this resembles an interview, I begin to ask questions, almost all of which he decides not to answer. He tells me that, although the American government and military are his enemies until they leave Iraq, he wants to extend peace to the American people. He also warns me to be careful in Iraq. The more questions I ask, the fewer answers I get, until I am asked to stop asking them, at which point we talk about the American people being his friends and my being careful again.

Since he is one of the biggest figures in world news at this time, I hope for a news story of some kind, but not only do I get no new information, I’m also not allowed to take any pictures, nor record anything. Instead, what I have is a pleasant social visit with Muqtada al-Sadr; nice, to be sure, but rather surreal.

I ask for some of the al-Sadr posters that I’ve seen people holding at demonstrations, and that are hung up around the country. He seems flattered and sends one of the men to retrieve some. After asking for the digital camera again, he takes a photo of the front page of a pamphlet in the office. Even if I didn’t get a new photo of Muqtada al-Sadr, I do have the only photo I am aware of by Muqtada al-Sadr.

The man returns with the posters and Muqtada rolls them up, ties them together, and writes a small dedication to me in Arabic. He tells me that he considers me a friend; I shake hands with everybody, and am led out to my relieved taxi driver.

On the way back to Baghdad, there is a machine-gun firefight between bandits and the police in the city of Al-Haswa. Suddenly, loud cracks ring out from all directions, and there is a mad scramble for all of us on the road to get out of the line of fire. We do, and continue on.

July 7th 2004

Today, there were several attacks between insurgents of some kind or another and either US or Iraqi forces. It’s a confusing time in a confusing country.

I’ve checked into a smaller and cheaper hotel, and I sit, enjoying a cold Diet Coke, while young soldiers in US helicopters fire missiles into two buildings in downtown Baghdad. I overhear an American businessman telling an Italian photojournalist that he just found out that caviar is on the list of foods to request for an employee of Kellogg, Brown, and Root. I imagine Abdula Ghalib Ali still lies on his hospital bed in Kirkuk, a lesser employee of KBR.

If and when Patrick the National Guardsman returns home, he’ll have a hard time trying to figure out how to function in civilian life, and may have to take the antidepressants that are so kindly handed out.

Who knows what will become of millions of Iraqi youth when all the soldiers, businessmen, journalists and others have gone home, or to some other unfortunate country?

Another day in Kirkuk. I go out in the morning to speak to people about their reactions to Saddam’s first television appearance since his dental exam. While watching the broadcast, there was no sense of celebration, but a silence that was hard to interpret. Saddam-era television was rife with controlled propaganda, using his image repeated ad infinitum. One man with a particularly good command of English tells me that, with the sound edited, it’s very much like that now, only from a different source. It’s better than Baathist propaganda, but most mention that the United States is, of course, pulling the strings.

Most of the people I speak to are Kurdish, and there is absolute unity on the issue of his guilt. Everybody says he should be either killed or thrown in prison for life. The gassing of Halabja is not forgotten, and Saddam’s response to this charge with, “I read about it in the newspaper.” brings unanimous bitterness. Five thousand Kurds died in eight minutes and many want him to suffer, for this and countless other things. Adnan, the owner of a restaurant, says that the trial is too good for him.

I plan to go to Baghdad today, but by the time I am ready to go, I realize that I don’t have time. It will be dark before I get there, and traveling at night is not a good idea on the outskirts of the nation’s capital, or anywhere in the country for that matter. Though it takes four hours to get to Baghdad by car, at least another hour must be allowed to get to the part of Baghdad I am staying in. One business that can be safely said to have boomed since the war, is the car industry. The number of vehicles on Baghdad’s streets has multiplied several times in the past year, and traffic can be excruciatingly slow. It would merely be a little inconvenient, except for the fact that one can’t speed away from gunmen or kidnappers in a traffic jam. This could end up being extremely inconvenient.
I find a driver to meet me early the next morning, and hope I can get him to accept the fare.

July 3rd 2004
En route to Baghdad, some cities are safer to drive through than others. While the driver seems carefree for much of the drive, at times he seems to be constantly looking around, and encourages me to wear my hat, so as not to be too obviously a foreigner. The violence these days isn’t directed only towards foreigners though; it is now often inflicted upon those who help them.

The scenery alternates from brown rock and dirt, to lush green palm trees and houses, and then back to brown rock and dirt. As we approach Baghdad, there is a more modern, yet unmistakably Middle-Eastern feel to everything. Minarets of Iraqi-style mosques shoot higher out of the ground and are more numerous than before. Roads are better made and have more lanes, but there are large holes to be swerved around from time to time. This is recent damage from mortars or roadside bombs.

Once in the city, traffic is slow, and routes circuitous, with so many streets closed or inaccessible. Though this is for security reasons, having to zigzag around blocks to get from point A to point B hardly feels secure. The only discernable rule of the road is ‘whoever gets there first, has the right of way’, except for when armed traffic guards yell and point.

I have trouble recognizing a hotel that I stayed at last time I was in the city, and after a while, I realize why: There are huge, grey cement barriers lined up in front of it and so the entire first floor isn’t visible from the street any more. After I get out of the cab (and actually pay for the ride) and enter, I find it’s different on the inside too. One year ago, the Hotel Burj Al-Hyaat was bustling with UN workers and folks working for Bremmer, but now they’re all gone. I don’t see another guest during my brief time there. However, there are many armed teenage guards to speak to every time I enter or leave the hotel, while I’m stepping through barriers, around razor wire, and over tire spikes. These are the new jobs for Iraqi youths, and they want me to take pictures of them posing with their guns whenever I pass; that’s one way I can say that Iraq is different from a year ago; security is higher than ever, yet it’s more chaotic.

I walk around the city for a few hours, down block after block, where cars are repaired and parts for them sold. Even in the shade, the temperature is almost unbearable. If there’s a breeze, it’s hot. Stacks of tires block the sidewalk and parts of the street, and everywhere are pools of oil and the smell of gasoline. Little girls, wearing rags, approach cars, which spew black exhaust into the air, and they beg for money. I speak to several men who are working, and they all say the same thing: Life in Baghdad is hard’ very, very hard.

July 4th 2004

In the late morning, I walk in a different direction. It’s so hot outside that my eyes hurt and I have to avoid rolls of rusty razor wire, which always seem to be underfoot. The constant, deafening roar of massive oily generators, attached to almost every building, sounds like helicopters, and then I see the real thing flying low overhead. When a convoy of US troops drives by, all traffic has to stop, and the huge gun barrels are often, insistently, pointed at them. Tension, fear and fatigue seem to be on both sides of the gun.

Though opinions about current events were somewhat predictable in most areas of northern Iraq, this is not true of Baghdad, and people don’t mince words. They question me, too.

“What do you think of Muqtada Al-Sadr?” asks Ahmed, a twenty-two year old Pharmacology student at Baghdad University. He is a bright, personable young man, who is immediately friendly toward me and has many hints for keeping myself safe.

He speaks of the fiery Shia cleric with pride. The first time most Americans heard Muqtada Al-Sadr’s name was this April, after the death of four American contractors, and the later uprising in Falluja, where pictures of Al-Sadr were held up by the crowds.
“He is our leader,” says Ahmed. “He was not chosen by the US to do what they want; he is for the people.”

Ahmed lives in Sadr City, which was known as Saddam City until after the war, when it was renamed after Muqtada’s father. It is a sprawling collection of slums; the worst in Baghdad.

“We don’t like the US Army in our city, and we make it difficult for them.”

This is true. Whenever US troops or foreign contractors go to Sadr City, they are almost invariably shot at by locals, and now seldom enter at all.

Ahmed is working outside a government office at a little desk, to which people bring papers for him to staple and notate. He stops often to make time to talk to me, and occasionally gets yelled at by his bosses.

“The Mahdi Army are good people and want peace. The Americans have killed many Iraqis and that is why they fight them.”

Though he is a Shia, he says that his allegiance to Al-Sadr is not for religious reasons. It is because Sadr has stood up against “the foreign occupiers”. He sees Saddam as a tyrant, and the US as the main force that put that tyrant into power. Then they turned against him, when he wouldn’t do as they told him to do. It’s a historic account, which is difficult to argue with.

“The United States didn’t care about all the people dying for years when they were friends with Saddam. Now they care so much that they want to liberate us. It is only so they can put someone in power, who they like”

“Do you want to go to Sadr City? He suddenly asks. I tell him that I do, and that I was there a year ago, but wonder if I’d survive it now. He talks with some friends about the possibility of me going there with him, but they conclude that I would be mistaken for an intelligence agent, and be killed. I ask him if bringing me in would be bad for him, as well.

“Yes, problems for me. I think maybe I would be killed, too.”

When I ask about the situation in Iraq now, as opposed to before the invasion, he laughs and gestures around us, implying that I simply look at my surroundings for the answer.

A middle-aged man who has been silently listening chimes in, “Saddam was bad for the people’s rights, but good for security; the United States is bad for the people’s rights, and bad for security.”

July 5th 2004

I am in a small section of Baghdad where most foreigners stay, and security is much higher than in the rest of the city. I’m feeling comfortable now. It’s hot and dangerous out on the street, but at least the taxi drivers can be trusted not to make me feel uncomfortable.

The majority of those staying at the Palestine Hotel, where I’ve just checked into, appear to be journalists and businessmen. I meet many of the latter, who are openly ecstatic about the amount of money to be made in Iraq. Some of the less talkative of these are employees of the Halliburton subsidiary, Kellog, Brown, and Root, or “KBR” as it is commonly referred to.

I immediately think of Mr. Abdula Ghalib Ali, who I met in the Kirkuk hospital. I decide to try to talk to someone here at the company’s Iraq headquarters to inquire into his well-being. After all, he was an employee of theirs, wounded on duty.

It is easy to find the floors reserved for KBR, because they have extra private guards blocking the hallway. When the elevator door opens on a KBR floor, it is their job to make sure that nobody, who isn’t an employee, gets off.

I ask to speak to someone who may be able to give me information about wounded employees, and compensation offered to them. The guard doesn’t seem to like me. He tells me there’s nobody to speak to, and to get back in the elevator. I ask if I could speak to someone concerning KBR’s policy, concerning medical treatment of wounded employees. For example, would a wounded American employee be sent to an Iraqi hospital for substandard treatment, or is that just for Iraqi employees? No answer.

I take a taxi to an infamous prison outside a town one hour west of Baghdad called Abu Ghraib. It used to be infamous as Saddam’s torture prison, but its reputation has been redefined recently.

By the side of the highway there are two entrances; one paved road that leads to heavily guarded gates, and one dirt road that leads to a makeshift earthen parking lot, for those who wish to visit their loved ones inside. The immense facility itself isn’t visible from the road; only barricades, sandbagged sniper towers, and walls of more razor wire. A US sergeant tells me that I can walk freely around the outside of the perimeter.

It is dry and windy, and dirt blows into my eyes. The temperature is 120 degrees, and since there are no structures outside the wire, there is no shade from the unrelenting sun. About forty people wait, crouching or standing. I’m told that family visitors have a minimum of a five-hour wait to get inside, if they get in at all. There are several children that are just simply hanging around, waiting for the guards to give them candy.

Two women with covered heads approach me, holding snapshots of their teenage sons. They want me to take photographs of the snapshots, and tell the government that their sons are innocent.

Four men, wearing white robes, then want me to look at notarized documents, written by the National Alliance of Iraqi Clans and Tribes, and addressed to ‘the American General in Abu Ghraib’. They state that the research by American forces about certain inmates is flawed, and that those inmates should be set free.

As I get closer to the visitor entry point, a tall, quiet, slightly disheveled man in his twenties, named Saddam Hussein (“Not that Saddam Hussein.”, he laughs) tells me he is there to visit his brother.

“Many Iraqis in Abu Ghraib are innocent, and shouldn’t be here. They were captured by Americans who can’t tell the difference between one Iraqi and another. A large percentage of them were just in the wrong place. I personally know examples of this.”

“What is your brother accused of?”, I ask, trying to be sensitive about the way I word the question.

He laughs again, “Oh him? He’s guilty. He was selling more guns than he was allowed to sell. When he gets out, I will make sure he won’t do it again.”

American soldiers permit me to get close to the building, as long as I’m accompanied by one of them. It is surprisingly calm on the inside of the wire. My escort tells me about how sad it is when masses of poor Iraqis show up every day to fight over garbage, when trucks bring it from inside the prison, and dump it on the ground outside.

After returning to the secured hotel area, a young national guardsman on duty strikes up a conversation with me. His name is Patrick, and he sits atop an armored vehicle behind a mounted gun. He’s bored, so as a joke, he has tree leaves attached to his helmet as extra camouflage. Most of the US soldiers I’ve met are understated, if not stoic, but Patrick is immediately talkative and somewhat manic.

“I joined up for the college money. I didn’t think I was going to see kids getting blown up!”

Patrick got married two days before he shipped out to Afghanistan for nine months. He’s been in Iraq for longer than that.

“When my mom calls and asks me how I’m doing, what the fuck am I going to say? You can’t tell your mom that you just saw women and children’s body parts scattered on the street; that you just found a hand still holding something in it. I say, ‘I’m fine, mom.’ My dad’s deployed too, and my sister just went to college, so she’s alone now. She’s been a stay-at-home mom for twenty years, and now she’s alone and has to work at a fuckin’ department store.”

He speaks about the difficulty many US solders have, re-acclimatizing to civilian life.

“They’re giving us antidepressants now, when we go on leave, so we don’t go into a deep depression. My brother-in-law is home for a while, but he calls me every day. It’s like he’s still here. He’s my wingman. On patrol, it’s his job to protect me. He has to call all the time to make sure I’m okay.”

He looks down, puts his hand on his wrist, and says,”Shit, my arm’s shaking again.” “When one of our guys, my friend, died, the chaplain put it to us in a really good way. He said, “you know, you’ll never be able to talk to anyone about this, when you get home. They just won’t understand.” That made a lot of sense. Now I know why my uncle never told me one single story about ‘Nam. He’ll probably be one of the only ones I can talk to, when I get back.”

June 27th 2004

I arrive at Attaturk International Airport in Istanbul. This is the fourth time I’ve flown into Attaturk from New York, but I’ve never seen such a high level of security, which is due to the NATO Summit being held here. TV monitors show mass demonstrations on the streets of Istanbul, protesting President Bush’s attendance, but here at the airport, the main indication of his presence (besides the heightened security which follows him everywhere) are two blue and white planes parked on the airfield, marked ‘The United States of America’. I’ve never seen Air-Force 1 before, and both are bigger than I thought, actually dwarfing some passenger planes. The percentage of the tarmac reserved for them, and subsequently unavailable to other aircraft, seems inordinately large; thus allowing me to begin my writing with a clever analogy for the US presence in the Middle East.

June 28th 2004
After taking a domestic flight to Diyarbakir (the closest major, Turkish city to Iraq), my original plan was to grab a taxi, make it over the border as quickly as possible, and then try to reach Baghdad in time for the power handover on the 30th. Before leaving Diyarbakir, I decide to go into town to re-establish contact with a few people, to leave open the option of a side trip I hope to make, time permitting, to a hidden Guerrilla camp in the mountains of Northern Iraq.

When I meet with my friend, he tells me that he just heard a newsflash: Power in Baghdad was handed over early!

I don’t mind not being there the very minute it happened, what I’m interested in, is the Iraqis’ reaction to it. My immediate concern is whether I’ll be able to get over the border now.

After the Iraqi government was to take power on July 1st, it had been reported that a visa would be required to get into Iraq, reportedly, to restrict the inflow of foreign insurgents. Not a bad idea, but I didn’t have one. Since the actual war had ended, the border was, although inconvenient and time-consuming, largely open and unregulated, as long as a passport was shown, and I had planned to squeak in a few days before this all changed. Now the power had been handed over early, but would the visa rule begin early as well? I couldn’t find out, so I’d just have to go and see what happens.

June 29th 2004
After a five-hour drive, much of it along the desolate, barbed wire-decorated border of Syria, I see a long line of transport trucks. As we pass them and get closer to the entry point, the huge vehicles extend, motionless, over the horizon in both directions. My fear of being refused entry proves unfounded, and the whole process takes under two hours; even the Turkish guards are pleasant. I feel extreme relief, and then have a realization:

The two weeks before my trip had been incredibly hectic, and I had been so fully preoccupied with catching all my flights, and then worrying about the visa problem, that I hadn’t time to think much about what it was going to be like when I crossed the border. Now I’m here and breathing a sigh of relief, it hits me. “Jeez, I’m in Iraq alone again.” All right. Here we go…
In the border town of Zakho, I find an Iraqi taxi that’ll take me to Dohuk, and then another for Kirkuk, my first destination.

Most areas of the Kurdish-controlled north do not have the same chaos as cities in central or southern Iraq, but there are still hot spots nonetheless. On the way to Kirkuk, we pass through Mosul, likely the least safe place in Iraq’s north for an American travelling alone. About three months ago, while driving through the city, a pickup truck with a gun mounted in the back passed by the cab I was in, without noticing me. It could have been some sort of police vehicle, but that’s one difficulty about war-torn countries; you can’t always tell who’s on which side. This was probably the same day that Nick Berg was taken into custody in Mosul. Still, it’s better than Baghdad.

I arrive in Kirkuk and get dropped off at a hotel. As I check in, the security guards are changing shifts, and a pile of six AK-47s is on the counter. The sun is beginning to set over the brown buildings of Kirkuk, so I drop off my two bags and head out to walk around a bit. My trip thus far has mostly been in transit, and I am anxious to see what I came here to see, the people.

It is good to be back on the fast-paced, busy streets of the Middle East. Smoke fills my eyes and nose as I walk past men cooking ground lamb on skewers, over a big black iron grill. A mix of Iraqi, Egyptian, and Kurdish music blasts from the shops I pass, as well as from the beeping cars and trucks, which I gingerly sidestep when crossing the street. I pass by stacks of cold soda bottles, piles of fresh produce, huge hanging racks of meat, and tables filled with audiocassettes and pirated DVDs.

Many people speak to me, and I am first struck by the concern for my well being by almost everyone I meet. I’ve experienced this in Baghdad and Kabul, but Kirkuk has been considered somewhat stable, at least compared to other Iraqi cities. Not that there isn’t violence here, but it’s mostly factional, and wouldn’t be directed at me. The situation has apparently deteriorated.

Kirkuk is an interesting place. It has three major ethnic groups; Kurds, Arabs, and Turkmens, all of whom claim the city as their own. (There is a fourth and smaller Christian group, the Assyrians, who by necessity are largely neutral.) During Saddam’s time, the Kurds and Turkmen were oppressed, and forced out of jobs and homes to make room for incoming Arabs. Now with a new power structure being established, everyone is clamouring for control. Add to that, the whole city is sitting on what is thought to be Iraq’s largest oil reserve, so the stakes are huge, classifying Kirkuk as a potential powder keg. How things go here could well decide if civil war looms in Iraq’s future, and it’s a good example of how messy things are throughout the country.

As I walk around, it is insisted by many that I sit down to have scalding tea, served in little glasses. Kurds warn me to be careful of Arabs and Turkmen, Turkmen warn me to be careful of Arabs and Kurds, and Arabs warn me to be careful of everybody.

I ask people for their opinions concerning the handover of power. Everyone has an answer, but some seem more concerned with local issues.

Mohammed, a man in his late thirties who I speak to in his photocopy office (consisting of one photocopier) tells me that he is happy for any power at all in Iraqi hands, but perceives the handover largely as a coalition public relations exercise. He sees L. Paul Bremmer and his cronies leaving the country two days early after a surprise five-minute ceremony as cutting and running. “Maybe the (new) Iraqi government will be good anyway. We have to wait and see what they do,” he says. When asked whether he’s better off now, than a year ago, he says, “Yes, I have a mobile phone now.”

Most people here in the north, where stability is more or less present, seem to have a favourable opinion of Saddam being taken from power, but the more I ask about it, the more they will tell me that they are critical of who did it and how it was done. Mohammed’s brother stops in to visit, and tells me, “After the US don’t need the Kurds, they will forget us again.”

These are the opinions of some, and more are coming, but I would like to strongly assert that there is no unified Iraqi opinion; nor two, nor three. Just like everywhere else, impressions of the day’s events vary widely from region to region, group to group, and person to person. Also, people I speak to in America always want to know “What the Iraqi people think”, and seem to expect some special simple wisdom from me, by virtue of having walked Iraqi streets. There is no such wisdom, any more than an Iraqi walking the streets of America would be able to solve domestic political issues for us. As I read fewer articles targeted for the American public, and spend more time here, everything just gets more and more confusing.

June 30th 2004
I awake to the sound of screaming. I haven’t slept much in three days, so by the time I realize where I am, I hear a car speeding off with the screaming person, and it is eerily silent again. I go downstairs and the reception clerk tells me that a young teenage boy working at a restaurant next to the hotel was burnt with cooking oil, which somehow caught on fire, a testament to third-world working conditions. Since there is a curfew, nobody could drive him to the hospital, so the clerk called the police, who showed up in only a minute or two. They helped the wounded boy into the back seat and drove him to the hospital.

I had joked around with three or four boys there hours earlier, and wonder which one it was.

In the morning, I walk to another part of town to return to a newspaper office, I once visited. Ra’ad, the editor, had been very nice to me and told me three months ago to let him know if I ever needed any help. Not having many connections myself, I go there hoping he can get me on a patrol with the new Iraqi police force, but when I get there, the office has been closed down.

I’m told that the police headquarters is close by, so I decide to just go there and ask. On my way there, I meet some policemen having lunch in front of a restaurant, and two of them insist on walking the rest of the way with me, for my protection.
When we arrive at a large building, surrounded by iron gates and guards, I am referred, by an Iraqi, to a US soldier on site. It turns out that any requests have to go through them. I don’t have the US Military’s press pass, so I’m not sure how it’s all going to unfold.

I walk to the “safe-house”, which turns out to be a palace, turned US base. Upon reaching the twenty-foot high concrete barriers and piles of sandbags at the entrance, I am searched and questioned (with good reason, having shown up at a military base unannounced, without the correct credentials), and then told to wait for 1st Sergeant Jennings. When he arrives, he looks over my passport, asks some questions to feel me out, and tells me to follow him. I am shown past several military vehicles to a surprisingly inviting garden and relaxation area at the front of the ex-palace. Five or six soldiers sit around eating, talking, or reading. Jennings tells me to have a seat in the shade while he goes inside to speak to someone on my behalf. I am encouraged to have some breakfast, which I do.

I scoop scrambled eggs and bacon out of big green plastic bins that are lined up opposite a refrigerator, from which I get an apple and a container of grapefruit juice. It’s actually pretty good. It seems to be a big thing that they have bacon that day, so very little of it is given to the local dogs, which are running around inside the perimeter. The dogs seem to enjoy the company and all the food that they’re regularly given.

Everyone is friendly (or at least cordial), and when Jennings returns and sits down with me, I am a bit more comfortable than I was when I first approached the barricades out front. He has some cereal, and we talk for a while.

I hear many interesting things from him and others. There is an insurgent cell leader who was captured, sent to Abu Ghraib Prison, released because of the scandal, and then actually paid them a visit to say that he was back. After a badly aimed insurgent shell missed the base and hit a school, locals found the man responsible, beat him up, and turned him in. A sign was put up in front of the base saying that any US soldiers who turned themselves in would be treated fairly.

Anyway, I am told to come back at six or seven o’clock, and Jennings will have something set up for me. I walk back to the hotel, and on the way I walk through a market, which is on two bridges, over the remains of a river, filled with garbage. I’ve been told by many to stay away from the other side of the river, and for the first time in Kirkuk, it feels a bit chaotic, and as though I’m really somewhere I ought not to be. With tables, animals, and people cramped so close together, it feels claustrophobic. People seem on edge, and at least three arguments are audible. After crossing the river on one bridge, I cross right back on the other, smiling and making eye contact with as many people as possible.

I take a taxi to a hospital, and for the fourth time since arriving, a cab driver won’t let me pay him for the ride. When I try to press the point, he says, “No, no. You are friend. You are welcome here.” And pushes the money away. It’s very nice, but I feel kind of funny about it.

When I get there, two guards take me to the head of security, who allow me in to see the hospital. He also complains of not having enough weapons for all the guards. I heard the same thing earlier in the day about the police, too. This is perplexing to me. Of all the problems facing Iraq, I didn’t think that the lack of availability of guns was one of them.

The hospital is a frightening, loud place. There doesn’t seem to be anywhere near enough staff or resources. Many guards are visible, but I see almost no health workers. Groups of crying women and distraught men sit in the halls and stand in rooms. I see people with all manner of injuries, from head wounds to gunshot wounds, crowded together.

Abdula Ghalib Ali (above) lies in bed with bandages in his arm and chest, not able to move much. Eight worried-looking family members stand around his bed. He smiles, but is obviously in a lot of pain. The truck he was driving came under attack and he was shot, while transporting lights for Kellogg, Brown & Root, the engineering and construction division of Halliburton.

This company isn’t apparently concerned with its Iraqi employees as much as with its Western ones. When he finds out that I am an American, he eagerly gets a young woman to show me his proof of employment, which entitled him to drive through checkpoints. I guess it doesn’t entitle him to anything after the shipments get there.

In the early evening, I return to the base and 1st Sergeant Jennings tells me to come back just before the 11:00 PM curfew, and that I will be going out with US troops on foot patrol. Tomorrow morning, I could drive around with the Iraqi Police.
When I return, payment for a taxi ride was refused by yet another driver.

“Why?” I ask.

“You are welcome in my country.”

I try to give him some money anyway, and he still refuses.

He drives away, and I see there isn’t anyone around in front of the safe-house. I’m not sure if I should just walk in. I do, slowly, and a guy with a gun up in a tower yells for me to stop. Someone comes out to meet me and I am led in and told to sit down near the garden.

At close to midnight, I meet the six guys I am to go out with. One goes inside and gets me a bottle of water to bring with me on the patrol. Adnan, an armed translator from Turkey (in Kirkuk, a translator has to speak Kurdish, Arabic, Turkmenish, and English) shows up and we walk out the back gate.

For over two hours, we walk around the city, them patrolling, me taking pictures. I was interested in comparing the US and Iraqi patrols to get some idea of the progress of the Iraqi police and the extent that power has been handed over to them, two of the most crucial issues facing the nation. The US foot patrol gave me a good idea, at least in Kirkuk, and I have no reason to think it’s much different elsewhere.

The theme for the night was the unprofessional nature of the Iraqi police. Everywhere we went, the soldiers I was with, asked Iraqi police that we met for identification; told them what they were doing wrong, and walked on. They would get yelled at for being caught playing their radios loud and sleeping on the police cruisers in the middle of the street, or for not having their guns set on ’safe’.

As far as I can tell, the criticism given was all warranted, but in no way could it be said that there was cooperation between the two forces. As far as the security goes, no power seems to have actually been handed over. The US soldiers were telling the Iraqi police what to do. With no visible decision-making authority, and the Iraqis still just following coalition orders, it’s difficult to see how and when they’d take any initiative.

July 1st 2004

I return for the fourth time to the safe house, and I still have no luck making the taxi drivers take my money for the ride to Kirkuk Police Headquarters.

“No. I want to pay.”

“Please, you are my friend. Welcome.”

Inside, I speak to Lieutenant Kamaran Khidhir, who talks about the problems with foreign terrorists, who come over the borders freely because no visa is needed. He also tells of how the different racial groups in Kirkuk get along except for a few bad guys, and the strength of the local Iraqi Police.

I ride around in the front seat of a police cruiser with some friendly policemen for a while, and then am dropped off at my hotel. I grab some food at the restaurant where the young man was burnt, watch Saddam get charged on TV, and go to my room to write this all out and catch up on sleep. After that, I’m off to Baghdad.