Four players, one political, the press, a world famous financier and radical Muslims want control of the United States. They have entered into the most dangerous game imaginable.
It was a battery of Marine artillery men who had been trained in stability and security operations that were assigned to a small outpost called Flea, a few miles from Al Asad in the Al Anbar province. Their job was to secure some 350 tone of explosives which would have otherwise been dug up and used by the bad guys for years to come. This meant alternatively digging shells out of the ground where they had been hastily buried, spending mind numbing hour sin guard towers or keeping watch over their facility and the surrounding countryside. Sometimes they would conduct patrols just to keep their presence kinown to the locals.
For the most part, these Marines kept their vehicles painted forest green instead of desert pink. Their reason was that the locals would know that they were Marines. It seemed to work because there was little or no trouble when the green vehicles were on the road.
One day per week they would head for Al Asad to shop but most importantly it was to make that call home. Armed with calling cards and credit cards, they lined up to get their turn at the phone before having to return to their duty stations.
There were nine hours difference between Al Asad and their homes in the United States. It didn’t really matter though. They knew that they could call anytime. Most of the time the voices at the other end of the call were somewhat sleepy because it was the middle of the night there but it never dampened their enthusiasm one bit.
The Marines would talk to their fathers a bit and discuss a few military things. The most difficult part was in talking to their Moms. Moms would always watch the news for the latest information from the war. The news worried them. It seemed that the insurgents were gaining the upper hand and that we were incapable of defending ourselves against them. The message from the news was that we were in a fight that we could not win. The very thought of their sons and daughters being placed in such a situation caused the Moms a lot of anxiety and grief.
The Marines would tell their Moms and their families to quit watching the news and quit reading the papers. They were seeing the same stories being broadcast in their barracks and knew that they bore not a single thread of truth. What was being shown to the public was not what was happening in their part of the world. This caused the Marines a lot of grief because their families were being lied to by the Press.
Copyright 2008 Thomas Parker. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
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