thedrifter
10-16-06, 07:36 AM
16 October 2006
EXCLUSIVE: DISPATCHES FROM HELL
Only Western journalist to witness the horror as US Marines gunned down innocent Iraqis
By Mirror's Chris Hughes
DAILY Mirror defence correspondent Chris Hughes was the first Western reporter into Iraq after 9/11 and the first to enter Saddam's secret bunker. He was also the only Western journalist present when US Marines killed unarmed demonstrators in Fallujah, sparking the savagery that is now tearing Iraq apart.
In his compelling new book Road Trip To Hell, he tells how he survived carjackings and missile attacks, watched mothers weep for their murdered sons and joined mercenaries flying crates of guns out of Baghdad. Here he describes the terrible moment US troops opened fire on a crowd of protesters in Fallujah.
'FEW people outside Iraq knew of Fallujah before April 2003. But the City of Mosques is home to dozens of ancient clans, renowned for their bloody feuds. No one crosses a Fallujan...
We were in Baghdad when we heard that US troops had opened fire on a crowd in the city.
Several hundred locals had apparently defied the American troops' curfew and were gathering outside a local secondary school being used as a base by the 82nd Airborne. They wanted Coalition forces to leave and the school reopened.
Some demonstrators are said to have shot into the air, the soldiers stationed on the roof of the building opened fire in response - and killed 13 civilians.
The next day Mirror photographer Julian Andrews and I travelled there to follow up what would become a dreadful turning point.
Fallujah is an hour west of Baghdad, a dangerous badland of gangs of robbers.
Our Iraqi translator, Adil, and driver Nibras, went quiet in the front of the car. Nibras whistled ominously, whispering 'Faaaaaallujaaaah'.
"Nibras says the people there will want revenge for what happened to their sons," said Adil, playing nervously with his worry beads.
Eventually we reached the city, driving over a bridge which spanned the Euphrates.
An American Apache helicopter thudded over us, while a Black Hawk chopper zoomed towards us, its fearsome guns pointing at our car.
In a tree-lined boulevard, we found a crowd of mostly young men waving their fists and chanting, "Death to America!".
We got out of the car and were ushered into the school. The US forces had left after the shooting, and we were able to look around.
In one classroom, some idiot Marine had chalked "I Love Pork" on the blackboard, an insult to Muslims. Magazines featuring topless women also lay around - pornography to Iraqi eyes - along with copies of the Koran which locals said had bootprints on them.
Outside, helicopters screaming overhead, we met a man whose son had been killed by the Americans when a bullet came through the window. His blood and brain matter still stained the white tiled floor.
The demonstrators were determined to go the hospital where casualties were being cared for. Despite the inflamed atmosphere, I didn't feel particularly threatened and didn't see a single gun. We rounded a corner, but instead of continuing towards the hospital, the marchers turned towards the new US base. The air was tense and, 200 yards in front of us, Marines took up firing positions behind sandbags.
The Imams struggled to hold back the students who were now goading the Americans by hurling sandals at them, an insult in the Arab world.
The tension was enormous... all that was needed was a spark. And then it came.
A convoy of about six US vehicles drove towards us. We jumped out of the way, towards the walls of the compound and just beneath the line of fire of the soldiers inside. A Humvee roared past, then a Jeep, and the student line broke. Everybody ran towards the speeding vehicles, hurling their sandals at the armoured sides. A soldier on the back ducked to avoid a flip-flop and, as he did so, unleashed the fire of his .50 calibre machine gun on the crowd. Immediately, dozens of M16s opened up from the roof and, for 20 seconds, there was a deafening rattle of bullets. I got as low as I could, a crouching heap beneath the wall, swearing to myself and watching the mayhem unfold.
Then the shooting stopped - and the moaning and screaming began.
Cordite and dust filled the air, the dead and injured lay everywhere and groans rang around. Ten yards away, a man in a white robe lay flat on his face, not moving.
Julian had disappeared into the melee and I could see him on the other side of the road, photographing a man who was clearly dead, the top half of his head was missing.
Within a minute, a line of battered cars appeared and young men pulled the dead and wounded on to them.
From the top of the former Ba'ath Party building, the Marines looked down on the horror. Two young men had been killed and 18 others injured in those 20 seconds of fire.
We followed the bodies to the hospital and, as we stepped out of the car, a large crowd spilled into the grounds, carrying coffins and brandishing banners.
Several of the men had AK47s when suddenly a woman in black saw us and began to scream that we were "Jews".
"Chris, Julian!" said Adil, our translator. "We need to get back into the car immediately. Now!"
As we piled in, furious Iraqis ran towards us, faces contorted in rage. Skidding and sliding on the grass in front of the hospital, our car made it through the gap, mourners hurling stones at us as we made our getaway.
If the gate had been closed, we would have been dragged from the car, beaten and probably killed.
Later US forces claimed troops opened fire after someone fired an AK47. It's highly unlikely.
I didn't see a single weapon in the crowd. I didn't hear any shots. What I saw was a US soldier on a Jeep open fire when a rubber sandal was thrown at him.
Next day local tribal leader Ibrahim Hamad said in Fallujah: "Everyone here was happy at first that the Americans threw out Saddam - but these killings will make all our children go off with bin Laden."
The spark of future turmoil had been lit that day in Fallujah.'
Saddam's sad warriors
WE first arrived in Baghdad just weeks after 9-11 when Saddam was still in power.
We had a minder and a driver, a pair of spies who were friendly but there was a sinister steel to them. We persuaded them to take us to Saddam City, where young Iraqi men had been forcibly drafted into the Republican Guard .
In the propaganda war, these guys had been sold to us as evil, 10ft tall uber-warriors who would eat US Marines for breakfast and SAS men for tea.
In fact, I met only polite, diffident, skinny and limping men who had been marched at gunpoint to the frontlines in one of Saddam's stupid mistakes. Some told me they longed for the Americans to come so they could die for their country... Curiously, it was said with an eye on our minders.
Life in Baghdad
WE usually ate in a backstreet restaurant near our hotel in Baghdad where the all-male clientele busily shovelled food into their mouths. Julian and I would be stared at, but our driver and translator Adil and Nibras barked at anyone who said anything.
One day Saddam's name came up and Adil and Nibras grinned. Shrugging their shoulders repeatedly, they started guffawing, coughing out a strange "Huh, huh, huh" sound.
Apparently, Saddam was famed for this rather creepy laugh and this was an Iraq-wide mickey-take which came out only when the police weren't around. Now, in these days after his fall, men at other tables joined in and before long, the place was like a Tommy Cooper convention.
The Black Watch
I SPENT days with the Black Watch at their desert camp - Dogwood - renamed Camp Incoming because of the constant mortar attacks.
One day I was invited to a briefing by Colonel Cowan before their last major operation in Iraq - against a village of 100 hardened insurgents.
"It would be good if we can catch these people in their beds with not a single shot fired," he began. In the distance, a boom sounded... then another, closer still.
Cowan didn't flinch. The booms were drawing nearer, we saw squaddies diving to the ground. A loud "Take cover!" and another rocket smashed to the ground and exploded 100 yards away.
Cowan just coughed and looked irritated. "The press may sit down," he said. "But I am not allowing these bastards to interfere with my damned briefing. The rest of you lads will remain standing."
Another time I had to leave my tent in the night to go for a pee. It was like I had stepped out into the Arctic not an Arabian desert. It was boneachingly cold and I shook madly, trying to wee into a "desert rose" - a tube made from water bottles rammed into the ground so that urine sinks away.
As I looked down a red dot slid across my legs and on to the end of my... Well, I'm sure you can guess what. I could just make out one of the sentries aiming his nightscope at me 30 yards away.
He seemed to be laughing but I couldn't be sure.
SADDAM'S BUNKER
SADDAM'S underground hideout was in Ab Dawr, a lawless town near his birthplace, Owja. Myself and photographer Ian Vogler were dispatched to find his bunker.
After days of travelling I found myself in Saddam's last home - a stinking underground chamber.
Saddam had been sweating literally as well as metaphorically. A cockroach scuttled past, making me jump. It was more like a coffin, a tiny dungeon. I stooped back towards the rough-cut steps before I crawled out into the fresh air.
A soldier pointed out a pair of Saddam's undies, a shabby pair of long-legged black and yellow boxer shorts.
On the drive back to Baghdad we stopped for petrol. Our driver sampled the fuel an Iraqi kid was selling from a barrel, taking a sip, gargling then spitting it out as if it were a fine Chateaux Margaux.
THE DAY IN EARLY DIED
WE'D reached the outskirts of Baghdad when two white Toyota pick-ups drew alongside. In the back of each were masked men armed with AK47s.
They tried to box us in, aiming at our front windscreen. My brain was fried with fear. Then a third vehicle came up at speed on our right, a people carrier with men inside waving at us to stop. The closest gunman was squinting along the barrel of his rifle, fingering the trigger. He lifted the gun and shouted in anger as the people carrier came between us. They were trying to force us off the road but it saved our lives.
At that moment, I felt our car lurch violently to the left. I was thrown hard against the window as Nibras hurled the car through a 20-foot gap in the central reservation and handbrake-turned on to the other carriageway.
We swerved crazily for a second then accelerated away, engine screaming. Behind us the three vehicles were already speeding towards Iran - the bandanna-wearing shooter waving in fury.
ROAD Trip To Hell by Chris Hughes (£7.99) is in book stores now. Copies can also be ordered at www.mondaybooks.com (p&p free) or from Amazon. Or send cheque payable to Mirror Direct to PO Box 60, Helston, TR13 0TP or order online at www.mirrordirect.co.uk
Ellie
EXCLUSIVE: DISPATCHES FROM HELL
Only Western journalist to witness the horror as US Marines gunned down innocent Iraqis
By Mirror's Chris Hughes
DAILY Mirror defence correspondent Chris Hughes was the first Western reporter into Iraq after 9/11 and the first to enter Saddam's secret bunker. He was also the only Western journalist present when US Marines killed unarmed demonstrators in Fallujah, sparking the savagery that is now tearing Iraq apart.
In his compelling new book Road Trip To Hell, he tells how he survived carjackings and missile attacks, watched mothers weep for their murdered sons and joined mercenaries flying crates of guns out of Baghdad. Here he describes the terrible moment US troops opened fire on a crowd of protesters in Fallujah.
'FEW people outside Iraq knew of Fallujah before April 2003. But the City of Mosques is home to dozens of ancient clans, renowned for their bloody feuds. No one crosses a Fallujan...
We were in Baghdad when we heard that US troops had opened fire on a crowd in the city.
Several hundred locals had apparently defied the American troops' curfew and were gathering outside a local secondary school being used as a base by the 82nd Airborne. They wanted Coalition forces to leave and the school reopened.
Some demonstrators are said to have shot into the air, the soldiers stationed on the roof of the building opened fire in response - and killed 13 civilians.
The next day Mirror photographer Julian Andrews and I travelled there to follow up what would become a dreadful turning point.
Fallujah is an hour west of Baghdad, a dangerous badland of gangs of robbers.
Our Iraqi translator, Adil, and driver Nibras, went quiet in the front of the car. Nibras whistled ominously, whispering 'Faaaaaallujaaaah'.
"Nibras says the people there will want revenge for what happened to their sons," said Adil, playing nervously with his worry beads.
Eventually we reached the city, driving over a bridge which spanned the Euphrates.
An American Apache helicopter thudded over us, while a Black Hawk chopper zoomed towards us, its fearsome guns pointing at our car.
In a tree-lined boulevard, we found a crowd of mostly young men waving their fists and chanting, "Death to America!".
We got out of the car and were ushered into the school. The US forces had left after the shooting, and we were able to look around.
In one classroom, some idiot Marine had chalked "I Love Pork" on the blackboard, an insult to Muslims. Magazines featuring topless women also lay around - pornography to Iraqi eyes - along with copies of the Koran which locals said had bootprints on them.
Outside, helicopters screaming overhead, we met a man whose son had been killed by the Americans when a bullet came through the window. His blood and brain matter still stained the white tiled floor.
The demonstrators were determined to go the hospital where casualties were being cared for. Despite the inflamed atmosphere, I didn't feel particularly threatened and didn't see a single gun. We rounded a corner, but instead of continuing towards the hospital, the marchers turned towards the new US base. The air was tense and, 200 yards in front of us, Marines took up firing positions behind sandbags.
The Imams struggled to hold back the students who were now goading the Americans by hurling sandals at them, an insult in the Arab world.
The tension was enormous... all that was needed was a spark. And then it came.
A convoy of about six US vehicles drove towards us. We jumped out of the way, towards the walls of the compound and just beneath the line of fire of the soldiers inside. A Humvee roared past, then a Jeep, and the student line broke. Everybody ran towards the speeding vehicles, hurling their sandals at the armoured sides. A soldier on the back ducked to avoid a flip-flop and, as he did so, unleashed the fire of his .50 calibre machine gun on the crowd. Immediately, dozens of M16s opened up from the roof and, for 20 seconds, there was a deafening rattle of bullets. I got as low as I could, a crouching heap beneath the wall, swearing to myself and watching the mayhem unfold.
Then the shooting stopped - and the moaning and screaming began.
Cordite and dust filled the air, the dead and injured lay everywhere and groans rang around. Ten yards away, a man in a white robe lay flat on his face, not moving.
Julian had disappeared into the melee and I could see him on the other side of the road, photographing a man who was clearly dead, the top half of his head was missing.
Within a minute, a line of battered cars appeared and young men pulled the dead and wounded on to them.
From the top of the former Ba'ath Party building, the Marines looked down on the horror. Two young men had been killed and 18 others injured in those 20 seconds of fire.
We followed the bodies to the hospital and, as we stepped out of the car, a large crowd spilled into the grounds, carrying coffins and brandishing banners.
Several of the men had AK47s when suddenly a woman in black saw us and began to scream that we were "Jews".
"Chris, Julian!" said Adil, our translator. "We need to get back into the car immediately. Now!"
As we piled in, furious Iraqis ran towards us, faces contorted in rage. Skidding and sliding on the grass in front of the hospital, our car made it through the gap, mourners hurling stones at us as we made our getaway.
If the gate had been closed, we would have been dragged from the car, beaten and probably killed.
Later US forces claimed troops opened fire after someone fired an AK47. It's highly unlikely.
I didn't see a single weapon in the crowd. I didn't hear any shots. What I saw was a US soldier on a Jeep open fire when a rubber sandal was thrown at him.
Next day local tribal leader Ibrahim Hamad said in Fallujah: "Everyone here was happy at first that the Americans threw out Saddam - but these killings will make all our children go off with bin Laden."
The spark of future turmoil had been lit that day in Fallujah.'
Saddam's sad warriors
WE first arrived in Baghdad just weeks after 9-11 when Saddam was still in power.
We had a minder and a driver, a pair of spies who were friendly but there was a sinister steel to them. We persuaded them to take us to Saddam City, where young Iraqi men had been forcibly drafted into the Republican Guard .
In the propaganda war, these guys had been sold to us as evil, 10ft tall uber-warriors who would eat US Marines for breakfast and SAS men for tea.
In fact, I met only polite, diffident, skinny and limping men who had been marched at gunpoint to the frontlines in one of Saddam's stupid mistakes. Some told me they longed for the Americans to come so they could die for their country... Curiously, it was said with an eye on our minders.
Life in Baghdad
WE usually ate in a backstreet restaurant near our hotel in Baghdad where the all-male clientele busily shovelled food into their mouths. Julian and I would be stared at, but our driver and translator Adil and Nibras barked at anyone who said anything.
One day Saddam's name came up and Adil and Nibras grinned. Shrugging their shoulders repeatedly, they started guffawing, coughing out a strange "Huh, huh, huh" sound.
Apparently, Saddam was famed for this rather creepy laugh and this was an Iraq-wide mickey-take which came out only when the police weren't around. Now, in these days after his fall, men at other tables joined in and before long, the place was like a Tommy Cooper convention.
The Black Watch
I SPENT days with the Black Watch at their desert camp - Dogwood - renamed Camp Incoming because of the constant mortar attacks.
One day I was invited to a briefing by Colonel Cowan before their last major operation in Iraq - against a village of 100 hardened insurgents.
"It would be good if we can catch these people in their beds with not a single shot fired," he began. In the distance, a boom sounded... then another, closer still.
Cowan didn't flinch. The booms were drawing nearer, we saw squaddies diving to the ground. A loud "Take cover!" and another rocket smashed to the ground and exploded 100 yards away.
Cowan just coughed and looked irritated. "The press may sit down," he said. "But I am not allowing these bastards to interfere with my damned briefing. The rest of you lads will remain standing."
Another time I had to leave my tent in the night to go for a pee. It was like I had stepped out into the Arctic not an Arabian desert. It was boneachingly cold and I shook madly, trying to wee into a "desert rose" - a tube made from water bottles rammed into the ground so that urine sinks away.
As I looked down a red dot slid across my legs and on to the end of my... Well, I'm sure you can guess what. I could just make out one of the sentries aiming his nightscope at me 30 yards away.
He seemed to be laughing but I couldn't be sure.
SADDAM'S BUNKER
SADDAM'S underground hideout was in Ab Dawr, a lawless town near his birthplace, Owja. Myself and photographer Ian Vogler were dispatched to find his bunker.
After days of travelling I found myself in Saddam's last home - a stinking underground chamber.
Saddam had been sweating literally as well as metaphorically. A cockroach scuttled past, making me jump. It was more like a coffin, a tiny dungeon. I stooped back towards the rough-cut steps before I crawled out into the fresh air.
A soldier pointed out a pair of Saddam's undies, a shabby pair of long-legged black and yellow boxer shorts.
On the drive back to Baghdad we stopped for petrol. Our driver sampled the fuel an Iraqi kid was selling from a barrel, taking a sip, gargling then spitting it out as if it were a fine Chateaux Margaux.
THE DAY IN EARLY DIED
WE'D reached the outskirts of Baghdad when two white Toyota pick-ups drew alongside. In the back of each were masked men armed with AK47s.
They tried to box us in, aiming at our front windscreen. My brain was fried with fear. Then a third vehicle came up at speed on our right, a people carrier with men inside waving at us to stop. The closest gunman was squinting along the barrel of his rifle, fingering the trigger. He lifted the gun and shouted in anger as the people carrier came between us. They were trying to force us off the road but it saved our lives.
At that moment, I felt our car lurch violently to the left. I was thrown hard against the window as Nibras hurled the car through a 20-foot gap in the central reservation and handbrake-turned on to the other carriageway.
We swerved crazily for a second then accelerated away, engine screaming. Behind us the three vehicles were already speeding towards Iran - the bandanna-wearing shooter waving in fury.
ROAD Trip To Hell by Chris Hughes (£7.99) is in book stores now. Copies can also be ordered at www.mondaybooks.com (p&p free) or from Amazon. Or send cheque payable to Mirror Direct to PO Box 60, Helston, TR13 0TP or order online at www.mirrordirect.co.uk
Ellie