Not long after I first started at Military Times, I had a conversation with a colleague, Andrew Tilghman, about a particular memory he had of an embedded assignment in Iraq. Covering Army operations in violent Mahmudiyah in 2006, he had several striking conversations with Army Pfc. Steven Green, who offered a simple statement: “I came over here to kill people.” Tilghman, not yet employed by Military Times at the time, later wrote about the encounter for the Washington Post. The memory became especially vivid after Green was convicted of raping a 14-year-old Iraqi girl, then killing her and her family.…
Browsing: Embedded journalism
SPRINGFIELD, Va. — The journey is over. After six weeks in Afghanistan, three of which came in some of the most violent sections of Marjah, I’m back in the office at Military Times headquarters. The main focus today for me is pitching in on an in-depth print story about Gen. James Amos likely becoming the next commandant of the Marine Corps, while combing through notes and anecdotes collected in Afghanistan that I haven’t yet reported. Wearing a shirt and tie for the first time in nearly two months, I’m still struggling to put my trip in perspective, but I’m grateful…
KABUL, Afghanistan — The slower pace of things here in the last few days have given me a chance to reflect on some of the more unexpected things that I’ve seen in the last six weeks while reporting from the southern half of this country. One of those things is just how prevalent animals are — and how differently they are treated than in the U.S. Marines on patrol regularly pass sheep, goats and cattle grazing through the area. When we were in Marjah with 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, several things caught me off-guard. Some were sad, while others were…
KABUL, Afghanistan — The end is near. Photographer Tom Brown and I made it here yesterday, arriving on a Canadian C-130 plane from Kandahar Airfield during one of the last travel legs of our six-week assignment in Afghanistan. The flight put an end to a bumpy 36-hour travel process that began at Camp Leatherneck, where we were summoned Saturday morning for an 11:30 a.m. flight from adjacent Camp Bastion to Kandahar, the home of Regional Command-South’s headquarters. Unfortunately, there was confusion somewhere along the way. It became evident that we were dropped off at 9:30 a.m. for a flight that took…
CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan – I went to the gym today at 3 p.m. That may not exactly sound like breaking news, but the time signifies something bigger: Camp Leatherneck’s gym controversy is finally over. About a week ago, Capt. Thano Pravong, Leatherneck’s camp commandant, made the decision to close the gym from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. after it was discovered that the midday temperature inside was edging toward 120 degrees. Helmand province cracks triple digits regularly now, and when you add in a few hundred men (and a few women) pumping iron in an enclosed tent, it can get…
CAMP BASTION, Afghanistan – This morning, I was escorted to this British base, which connects to Camp Leatherneck and serves as the home for nearly all things related to aviation on both sides of the base. I went to talk Ospreys with members of Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 261 for a forthcoming story in Marine Corps Times. While I was there, however, I also met someone who appears to be an unofficial artist for I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward). Cpl. John Coble, an aviation support mechanic with 3rd Marine Air Aircraft Wing (Fwd), was hard at work on a colorful sign…
CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan – Two weeks ago, this base went up like the Fourth of July, with 14 acres of supplies and trailer-sized shipping containers essentially burning to the ground in a spectacular fire. As is common, rumors ran rampant for the next few days, eventually reaching families in the U.S. and combat outposts in locations like Marjah, where I was embedded at the time with 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines. Rumors were spread that the fuel farm at Leatherneck exploded. It didn’t, although there was one nearby the Supply Maintenance Unit that burned. Rumors were spread that the dining hall…
First Reconnaissance Battalion is on its way to Camp Leatherneck, Afghanistan, and the 1,000 Marines will soon be joining the fight in Marjah. The battalion’s area of operations will include the Sistani Desert, to Marjah’s west, and Trek Nawa, to Marjah’s east. For more information check out this story by Marine Corps Times Staff Writer Dan Lamothe, who spoke with Brig. Gen. Joseph Osterman, commander of 1st Marine Division (Forward) at Leatherneck.
CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan — This forward operating base might have a chow hall and shower trailers, but no one will confuse it with Beverly Hills anytime soon. With some Marines, soldiers, sailors and airmen all spending entire deployments here, however, it should come as no surprise that they’d do whatever they can to make things more comfortable. Take their furniture, for example. Camp Leatherneck has a mixture of cots and rickety old bunk beds to sleep on, but they didn’t exactly put lounge furniture on the list of needs when they started building this base from scratch in 2008. So,…
CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan – It was a sobering reminder in more ways than one. Marines here marked Memorial Day this morning with a ceremony honoring veterans of all wars, but with a special emphasis on those who have sacrificed their lives here in Afghanistan. With the flags of the U.S., Afghanistan and Great Britain flying overhead, a single bell tolled once each in the name of 15 Marines and a Navy corpsman who have died since I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) took over April 12 as the command element of Marine operations in southern Afghanistan. Fifteen of those 16 service…
