My Year In Combat Zone

On April 5, 2003, I flew out of the United States on my deployment to Operation Iraqi Freedom. My unit was headed to Kuwait in order to prepare ourselves for the convoy into enemy territory.

The future was uncertain as we landed and took up camp at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait. Our mission was to take over an old Iraqi Republican Army Base near the current Saddam International Airport and serve as a Logistical Base to over 26,000 soldiers around the Baghdad International Airport area.

Our two day convoy north from Kuwait to Baghdad was a rough trip. On the middle of day one, I noticed my five ton cargo truck was having difficulty climbing hills. Eventually it slowed to a stop and died right on the side of the highway!

The lead mechanic drove up and asked what was going on. The entire convoy continued on and my driver and I stood guard by the vehicle. I was scared to death. The gun truck eventually came back and they towed us up to our base for the night where they could work on it.

As night fell on the second day, we made our way through the southwestern neighborhoods of the outskirts of Baghdad looking for the base that our advance party set out for. After turning around twice, we eventually found it and set up camp.

Within the first week we saw how the previous occupants had taken off uniforms and thrown them and equipment into piles within the walls of warehouses on our new base. Piles of uniforms, helmets, and other miscellaneous items filled the different warehouses on our base, which we would name Log Base Seitz. They even left one of the Iraqi Air Force jets on our base.