My 23 Days In Iraq--A War Story

[Ed Note: This is a diary from the internet from a U.S. Marine who spent 23 days in the Iraq war zone. Certain words have been censored in the interest of propriety.]

Bang-Bang-Bang-Bang-Bang...Hell yeah! I think I killed the f*****r! Oh f***. I'm out of ammo. Time for a mag-change. As I changed my magazine, little did I know, a hajji (In this case a Fedayeen Guerilla) had moved out of the bunker in the back yard that I was in. He moved up to where the guy I just wasted was now lying, dead. As I put another magazine in my M-16 A-2 service rifle, he was aiming in on me...from a short 40 ft. away. I racked another round in the chamber, then looked up to see a hajji aimed in at me. And before I could even raise my weapon, I saw an orange muzzle flash. Then I saw black. I slowly opened my eyes and realized I was on the ground and my rifle was about 5 ft away from me. I was sitting kinda on my knees. Then I realized...I was shot. And not only that, I was paralyzed from the neck down. And then I saw the Hajji still shooting in my direction. "Holy shit", I thought. "I'm a f*****g gonner".

If you all could do me the favor of recommending this so that others will read my story, I would appreciate it.
Just 22 days earlier, my unit, 1st MarDiv, 2nd Bat 5th Marines (The most highly decorated battalion in the Marine Corps) had kicked-off the invasion of Iraq. Part of Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi freedom. Actually, the last 22 days were full of sleep deprivation, hunger and boredom mostly. We only fired off a few not-so-well-aimed shots in a few minor engagements prior to the 23rd day there. Our tank and Marine Air attachments got most of the action. We were so frustrated that we hadn't seen any major combat that we were almost praying for it. And boy did we get it.

First of all, this won't be a political type diary. Its only a story. My story. Nothing fancy really. I've just always wanted to tell it to people. My friends say I should write a book. But I was only there for 23 days...Not much to write about. So here goes. This is my story of an ambush that took place on April 12, 2003. The wounds I recieved on that day left me paralyzed from the waist down. T-12, L-1, complete, if you want to get technical about it. From this point on I'm going to write this story from the point of view of my thoughts and some spoken words between myself and my squad-mates. Hopefully you'll all be able to understand it. I'll try my best.

April 12, 2003. We just crossed a pontoon bridge into the city of Al Tarimya. Just my platoon in our three Amtracs. We were there because the next day a convoy would be going through the city and we had to make sure they wouldn't get ambushed. Instead, it was us who got ambushed. We dismounted and set up security. There were a lot of Hajjis standing around for about 20 min. Then, next thing I know, they were all gone and it was just us there.

Boom..Boom...Boom...3 RPGs shot up our Amtracs and we all took cover and laid down suppressing fire. A few more RPG rounds went off all around me and then ceased. I could see some in my platoon punching out toward where the firing had come from. They were starting to counter-attack. About 20 minutes went by and then I looked around and didn't see anybody. It was just me and my buddy Loggins in a foxhole that we jumped in when the firing started. And the 3 Amtracs were still there. But no one else was there. "Holy shit dude", I said to Loggins. "They fucking left us here and went to attack without us!" Loggins agreed and we were kinda scared, because we didn't know the Amtrac guys that well, and we didn't know if we would get attacked again, this time by ourselves. I finally said "fuck this" and we started off in the direction that we saw 2nd squad go in.

We "bumped-and-bounded" (Leap-frogged) from house to house until we heard some M-16 fire past some trees. I was afraid that when we went through the foliage that our own guys would lite us up if they saw movement coming towards them. So I yelled out "Marines comin' out! Don't f****n' shoot me or I swear to god I'll shoot your f****n' dicks off, okay?!". They heard me and told me to get the fuck over here and that's when I saw Cpl Tim Tardiff, 2nd squad's squad leader, sitting against a house that had a huge f****n hole in it from a TOW missle the demo-guys had blown in it, and about 10,000 (give or take) bullet holes all over the damn house. Then I saw a blood running from Cpl Tardiff's body. Shit. He was hit. I later found out that when he entered the house, a Hajji had thrown a hand grenade down the stairs at him and it exploded pretty close to him. He had shrapnel in his thigh and hip. Pretty nasty wound.

I didn't have time to talk to Tardiff about it, because one of the team leaders, Cpl Martinez, took over the squad and told me to follow him and some other guys. We went across the street and in the backyard of another house, where some Hajjis fled into a bunker there in the backyard. Everyone started firing and shooting there grenades launchers mounted on their M-16s. All hell broke loose. I didn't even know what the fuck I was doing, since this wasn't my squad, which was o the opposite side of the town right now. Then, right there in front of me I saw my first Fedayeen fighter. He was low-crawling out of the bunker. I lined up my sights...Then I preceded to fire about 12-15 rounds into his body. As I pumped round after round into him, his body just kinda flopped around like a fish does out of the water. I didn't need to shoot him 15 times. I probably killed him with the first 5 rounds.