To Topple a Tyrant

Army First Lt. Kenneth M. Ballard
July 27, Baghdad

Things have really started to calm down [ ... ] One of the areas we patrol is largely Christian. They made/make up the middle class. We have little to no anti-American activity, [although] there is a lot more Iraqi on Iraqi violence. With more and more public services coming back on line, people are slowly getting back to normal. [But] no matter how hard we help to get the services back up, it is not fast enough. They don't understand that after 12 years of decay it will take some time, plus they don't want to work. Life is slowly getting better for us as well. Our new base camp (Kamp Krusty) will be finished in October. It is at their old War College. It will have a full-size pool. Our barracks building, which 3rd Infantry Division is still in, will have a private gym for us, [illegible], an Internet café, and last but not least, AC in every room [ ... ]

Marine Capt. Alan Rowe
Summer 2003, Najaf (audio recording)

Right now I'm getting ready for bed. It's been a long day. Got to go out in town, I saw some interesting things [ ... ] I had a meeting at a restaurant and ate Iraqi food, which was very good. We had rice, and we had shish kabobs and we had an interesting meat, kind of a sausage thing, called tikit. [ ... ] There were some beans and some sauce, and we had some yogurt and some cucumbers and tomatoes. And it was really very good.

[Then] we went over and visited some families who didn't have a place to live and we talked to them about finding a new place to live and they had a lot of kids and I had some candy and I gave it to the kids and they really liked that. There was a little girl about your age, Caitlin, and a boy, about your age, Blake, and they were cute and they smiled and I took my pictures of you and Caitlin out and I showed the pictures of both of you to the kids and they thought that was very nice and they actually kissed the pictures and that's one of their ways of showing respect and kinda like saying hello to you.

Rowe, 35, and two other Marines were killed by an improvised explosive device on Sept. 3, 2004, in Anbar province. He was promoted to major posthumously.

Ballard
August 2003, Baghdad