RIDING SOUTH ON HIGHWAY 8 out of Baghdad, I scanned the sprawling collection of one-level, sand-colored buildings and their corrugated-steel fences that were cobbled together along the two-lane asphalt highway. In another moment, I could have been driving down the streets in my hometown, where the trailer parks and the junkyards provide a similar backdrop for the hardscrabble scenery. Unlike in Lumberton, Texas, though, in Iraq rusted cars lay beside goats and donkeys, while women draped in black robes from head to toe walked to the market. Here and there, smoke rose from the houses. Gray tendrils from burning trash and pungent compost mingled with household aromas of baking bread and freshly washed laundry. Caught by the breeze, the jumbled odors carried through the open windows of the Humvee. It was not as unpleasant as it was striking.
It was May 2004. I had been in Iraq for two months. Transplanted from my sterile, sanitized life in the United States, I was still overwhelmed by the raw reality of daily life in Baghdad. I had grown accustomed to measuring the severity of my day by the amount of time I spent in traffic or the tone of my boss’s latest e-mail. Somehow I had let those banal experiences desensitize me to the magnitude of man’s daily struggle, where under sweat-soaked brows he labored strenuously simply to exist. The rising smoke represented a day’s work—a small, successful step forward for all to see. I inhaled the sweet, earthy smell and savored the charcoaled hopes and burning desires that had stoked it into existence. I glanced sideways at a woman and a child struggling to carry an oversized burlap bag of produce to their flimsy roadside market stand. I admired their pride and sense of purpose, traits that had historically made Iraqis resistant to foreign occupation. I needed to find a way to give them hope and patience with the American soldiers and the fledging Iraqi government. If I could not give them a better opportunity to wait for, their determination and willingness to sacrifice would find a ready outlet in the insurgency that was eager to exploit their impatience.
Farther down the road, Iraqi children of all ages played soccer with shiny new balls that American soldiers had handed out during one of our patrols. Marked with logos of professional teams from Europe and America, soccer balls were our most popular item. Hundreds of children would routinely besiege the soldiers and ask for balls to replace the rolls of tape, plastic, and laundry with which they were currently playing. A cloud of dust enveloped the makeshift field as the nylon balls ricocheted erratically across the bare ground between the highway and an abandoned railroad track. The children had not adjusted to the new balls’ improved buoyancy. Occasionally, the kids would pause long enough to allow herds of goats and their transient herders to pass by. The goats scavenged over the trash caught along the rails and drank from the pools of raw sewage along the roadside. As we passed, the game stopped and a flurry of young hands flailed in the air. The children took turns waving or shooting imaginary weapons at us, depending on whether they were screaming requests or insults. Between the insurgents and the soldiers, the children received so many conflicting messages, they did not know what to believe. At least they had soccer to provide a refuge. In those friendly games no one asked them at gunpoint whom they were playing for or why they were playing. They could be kids without consequence, although, like everything else, that would eventually change.
Within minutes, our convoy of three Humvees passed beneath a huge pair of crossed swords, allegedly cast from a mold of Saddam’s own hands and enlarged to enormous size. The monument demarcated the southern city limit of Baghdad, and the row of Iraqi police vehicles just beyond its shadow marked a police checkpoint. Vehicles in the tightly packed traffic—freshly imported luxury sedans, worn-out passenger cars, and rusted freight trucks—aggressively jostled for position as each hoped to avoid a random stop and search by the police.
The police had motioned a truck filled with watermelons to pull over into a search queue as it trundled beside a bus full of Shi’a pilgrims traveling to the holy city of Najaf. Curious passengers pulled back the black curtains on the bus, eying our passing trucks with suspicion. Although the Shi’a had initially welcomed the invasion, there had been significant changes to the relationship. Disenchantment with the pace of American progress and the political flip-flopping in post-invasion power structures had allowed a charismatic rogue Shi’a cleric named Muqtada Al-Sadr to amass an army of disgruntled followers. One month ago, a battle between his followers and American soldiers in Najaf had angered most of the devout Shi’a, who saw the fighting as a religious transgression on sacred ground. Regardless of their personal feelings about the cleric, they blamed the United States and the American soldiers for bringing violence to a holy city. Although the coalition powers in the Green Zone had made numerous overtures to the Shi’a leadership, the icy stares and the tightly clutched fists on the bus showed me that these Iraqis had not regained their confidence in Americans, at least not yet.
As the traffic came to a standstill, I directed our convoy to the shoulder of the road, and we bypassed the checkpoint with a quick wave to the police and to the pilgrims. If my plan succeeded today, at least the Shi’a in my neighborhood would have a reason to believe in American promises again.
We were traveling a few miles farther south of the checkpoint, beyond the edges of the sprawl created by legions of impoverished Shi’a who had arrived in the last few months to look for opportunities in Baghdad. We were going to a junkyard created by the initial American invasion force, which was nothing more than a mountainous collection of Iraqi army vehicles abandoned and piled together as scrap. Many were tanks and armored personnel carriers destroyed by American air strikes in the invasion. Scavengers had begun devouring these piles of metal, cutting them and piling them onto trucks for export to Turkey, Iran, and Jordan—even as far away as China. Made of high-quality alloy, these vehicles represented a sizable return on investment for the looters who were daring enough to orchestrate the pillaging. Although there was technically no law against this activity, many members of the local community had expressed outrage that they were not receiving a percentage of the proceeds, nor were they given a chance to work on the dumping sites. Their dissatisfaction came not from the idea that a potentially illegal activity was taking place, but rather from the fact that the profits were not being shared locally. After they made their case at a recent neighborhood council meeting, I had vowed to intervene on their behalf, if only to bolster my standing as the new governance officer for the area.
The council comprised secular and religious leaders and was chaired by a senior tribal sheik named Said Mallek. I met with the council every week to listen to its members’ grievances and offer them solutions. At first, it seemed odd that I would be involved in a plan to extort money from a quasilegal operation like this smuggling venture, but my credibility with the council lay not in my military authority but in my ability to quickly and satisfactorily resolve the council’s problems. On its behalf, I had agreed to investigate and, if possible, help the neighborhood derive some revenue from exporting the scrap. Said Mallek had previously tried to get a piece of the action but had been outgunned and out-muscled by the smugglers. He had appealed to me to restore the dignity of his tribe and the authority of the council by returning to the councilmen a right to benefit from these “resources” located within their tribal boundary. At first, I had been skeptical of his true intentions. Said Mallek’s chiseled, gray-bearded olive face never betrayed his emotions. The man was a survivor. He had shown me his aged, tattered Communist Party membership card, but he had also told me that he was a Ba’ath Party believer. His shifting allegiances were those of an opportunist who might become an ally if I could prove to be a worthy partner.
He was also a man who emanated authority. Every time I gripped his hand, he shook my confidence. His empty black eyes bored into my naive blue ones, staring directly at the scared kid from East Texas underneath. I always sought to mimic his cold demeanor but never succeeded. Once, in a desperate attempt to flush emotion onto his face, I had donned a redcheckered shemagh and tied it around my face in my best impression of a mujahideen fighter. As he sat with his back to me at a table, I crept up slowly behind him and put a gun to his head. With characteristic stoicism, Said Mallek turned and calmly looked at me, “Salaam, ahouya. Minoo?” (Hello, my brother, who are you?)
Perhaps because of his calculating demeanor or his pivotal presence on the council, I felt obligated to help him in any way that I could. This scrap metal business could have been a purely personal ploy for most Iraqis, but any plan to line his own pockets would adversely affect Said Mallek’s reputation and label him a thief. His status as a sheik was his foremost possession, and he did not seem like a person who would exchange a lifetime of pride and honor for personal gain. No stranger to sacrifice, he had forgone the relative security of staying uninvolved with the council in favor of having a chance to advocate directly for his people and his neighborhood. Said Mallek, like all council members, risked his life merely by being on the council and attending the meetings, which were perceived by many as traitorous acts, in and of themselves. Yet he went further than passively attending meetings; he had openly advocated for nonviolence during a recent volatile incident.
A few weeks earlier, an errant insurgent rocket had damaged a key Shi’a mosque near our base, not far from Said Mallek’s home. Immediately, rumors that the rocket had come from an American helicopter electrified the local populace and injected rage into countless devotees who thought the strike was a deliberate American action. Within minutes, a revenge-minded mob surged forth and began to coalesce around the damaged mosque. I responded to the scene with the hope that I could locate Imam Al-Jaferi, who had attended council meetings on occasion, to appeal to him to help alleviate the tension. The imam was not receptive, preferring instead to bask in the anger of the crowd, inciting them to further violence to avenge their religion and force the American occupiers from their homeland.
The tension created a palpable barrier between the mob and the American soldiers who had arrived as reinforcements. Both sides were eyeing each other warily. Hundreds of Iraqis surrounded the mosque, moving between rooftops, appearing in windows, and clustering in alleys. The crowd began a hostile chant. I noticed the menacing glint of metallic weapons changing hands amid the throng.
The army’s rules of engagement prohibited us from clashing with unarmed civilians, and their weapons were not raised or even clearly identifiable. Unfortunately, any minute now the weapons might find their way to someone who could, in the heat of the moment, decide to fire at the soldiers and turn a tense standoff into a tragedy. Precisely at that critical moment, Said Mallek emerged from the crowd. I quickly walked over to him and handed him a piece of metal that I had collected from the exploded rocket. It was stamped with an Iraqi seal and “Made in Iraq” in Arabic. He listened to me explain how the rocket had come from a hostile Sunni area and had been meant for the American base. He placed the scrap in his pocket, then turned, draped his arm around the imam, and led him inside. The imam returned and addressed the crowd, assuring them of the missile’s Iraqi origin and encouraging people to return to their homes. As the crowd dissipated, I asked Said Mallek what he had told the imam. He smiled and said, “I told him you would pay for it to be fixed.”
As we pulled off the highway almost fifteen miles outside of Baghdad, I replayed the scene from the mosque and thought about the obligation that Said Mallek created for me, an obligation that I had tacitly accepted. I had requested a disbursement of emergency money from the army, but the army would not pay for damage done by insurgents. It would be up to me to deliver. This was my chance to prove to the council that I could reciprocate its cooperation and help. If I could successfully engineer this small plan, it would win enormous currency with the council going forward. The council members’ continued participation and intervention in local affairs had become increasingly pivotal to combat the escalating number of religious fanatics who were operating in our neighborhood. It was essential to make the council as effective and powerful in the eyes of the people as I could.
As the dust from the Humvees cleared and we slowed into the driveway of the junkyard, I found only a lone office building. There was no activity, only a few scattered workers who ran to the back of the yard as we drove in. The sounds of slamming doors and diesel engines roaring to life alerted my soldiers and me to something beyond the back fence. As Ali, my interpreter, and I jumped out of our Humvee, the other two Humvees in my patrol roared past us toward the noise. I heard some shouting and a few gunshots. Over the radio, one of my soldiers gave a quick update, “Warning shots.” As Ali and I entered the one-room building, a middle-aged Iraqi was running out the back door, a pistol clearly showing in the back of his waistband. While Ali yelled for him to stop, we caught up to him, and I reached for my Taser.
Tasers had just been issued to our unit a few days earlier. After several minutes of talking about their use, we took turns stunning one another and laughing at the temporary paralysis we could inflict on our friends. This was the first time that I had used it on someone who was not expecting it, and the results surprised me.
The metallic clack of the Taser fired in a staccato voice; the twin fangs of the Taser launched and found the back of the fleeing Iraqi at equidistant points from the red laser dot that had appeared on his back as soon I had partially pulled the trigger. The sound of the Taser evaporated within a few seconds, its full venomous dosage discharged into the crumpled form that now lay screaming by the door. Although the paralyzing effect of the Taser is short-lived, the psychological paralysis lasts a while longer.
Standing over the Iraqi, sweat now pouring profusely from his bald head, his thick waist laboring to pump enough air to his startled lungs, Ali and I began a series of rapid-fire questions and insults. After pulling him to his feet and removing his gun, we led him toward the back of the junkyard and onto a smaller street.
I could see that my soldiers had corralled all of the would-be drivers into a group and were standing watch over a convoy of twelve tractor-trailers full of former Iraqi army vehicles from the junkyard. The tractor-trailers, each festooned with tributes to Imam Ali and Imam Hussein, the key martyrs of the Shi’a faith, stretched across the rust-colored dirt road in front of me. The bright yellows and greens of the trucks stood out as a backdrop to the dirt-colored drivers, who now knelt in front of me touching their eyes and the tops of their heads, swearing and pleading in their incomprehensible dialect. Not even Ali could understand some of the rural phrases that they were using to advocate for their freedom. To me, it looked like a carnival parade was preparing to begin with the explosion of color and the odd array of vehicles—more like Mardi Gras in New Orleans than a smuggling collection point inside the recently named “Triangle of Death.”
Ali and I learned from the Tasered Iraqi that the organization in which he was an underboss moved scrap metal into Turkey by bribing local officials and police officers, which allowed black-market profiteers to take advantage of the lack of an enforceable law. The trucks, each carrying around twenty-four tons of steel, would arrive at the border, where the steel could be sold for $50 to $120 a ton. The gross profit from each convoy often to fifteen trucks could range from $30,000 to $50,000, and several convoys left every day. The drivers each earned $100, and the bribes along the way were not much more. That seemed like a pretty good deal for the mastermind of the operation, who was known simply as the Turk. I understood why the council members had wanted to take a bite out of the apple.
I decided to have the underboss, who was still coming to his senses, call the Turk for a meeting. As we waited for the meeting with the Turk, I became increasingly nervous. With my soldiers standing guard over his convoy, I had something the Turk wanted, and I thought it was appropriate to discuss my terms. Yet I did not like to stop in one place for too long, because it gave potential adversaries time to encircle us and set an ambush.
As I thought through my options, the drivers had started alternately pleading and crying, as they bombarded me with tales of starving children and forlorn wives. Already I had heard enough of their prayers, received too many compliments, and begun to grow uneasy with this entire scheme. I ordered my soldiers to get the drivers out of the office and bind each of them to their vehicles. My paranoia grew from a gnawing voice to a roaring admonishment. “Get out now,” I thought. “We have been here way too long.” It had really only been an hour, but time slows under the stress of the unknown.
I stood in the makeshift office, which was really nothing more than an abandoned culvert—a cement cylinder, whose cool gray cement offered plenty of respite from the heat but little relief from my conscience or the sporadic firing of my stressed-out synapses. Holding steel-laden trucks hostage as leverage for a negotiation with a stranger did not seem like something worth dying for. I did not even know what the Turk would bring with him, how hostile this might become, or if it was all a setup.
Ali, a successful underworld opportunist in his own right, was talking rapidly into his cell phone as I grew more and more agitated. “The Turk will be here in a few minutes,” he said, motioning for me to relax. I took some comfort in his manner. As a moneychanger during the Saddam era, Ali had a sixth sense for these types of encounters. It was because of his seedy past, and not in spite of it, that I found him trustworthy. On paper, he was a criminal, but by my side he had redeemed himself time and time again with his quick thinking and uncanny knowledge of the underworld of bribery and influence. More than once, he had alerted me to a possible ambush, and with AK-47 drawn he had once dispersed a mob that formed around one of our trucks when it broke down on a particularly dangerous stretch of road. If he said to relax, I guess I could relax.
The underboss sat listlessly nearby. A round with the Taser clearly had established that he was no longer in control here. His khaki chinos and braided leather belt made him look more like a suburban father of four than an underworld boss, and I almost felt sorry for having humiliated him earlier. He sat alone and dejected and, no doubt, contemplated his lost profits. As I turned to look back down the dirt road, I heard the drone of the unmanned aircraft that the Green Zone used to survey the area. I ducked back inside the culvert; I hated those spy planes as much as the Iraqis did. Often I felt as if I had to avoid both the mujahideen and the Green Zone, just to keep my sanity. Countless times, reports from the Green Zone would inquire as to specific activities that the operators had observed from their planes’ surveillance equipment. “Why did your trucks use that road?” “Why were your trucks stopped here for so long?” The insinuations and the accusations were nonstop, and the air of superiority from those who spent their days monitoring us from the comfortable confines of the Green Zone made me sick. When would they learn that you could not fight this war from an overhead view on a monitor?
“Amerikayee!” yelled a young boy, pointing at the plane. Ibrahim was a street kid whom I had befriended early on. His English was nearly perfect, learned from watching pirated DVDs and chasing after American soldiers. He had ridden here with his father, an Iraqi police officer I brought along to represent the council and who was also Said Mallek’s brother. It had been the father’s tip that brought us to this junkyard. Ibrahim had a particularly strong command of hip-hop lyrics and some of our more colorful phrases. Given the fact that I was also “Amerikayee,” I thought it was funny that we shared the same distaste for the spy plane. I waved dismissively. “Fuck tha police,” Ibrahim proudly exclaimed, in a musical reference to the West Coast rap of the 1980s, which still enjoyed a faithful following among Iraqi youths.
“Is that any way to get into college?” I replied.
My running commentary to Ibrahim was that a guy with his life story should have an easy time getting accepted at Harvard. A mujahideen youth would be a compelling diversity applicant, and I am pretty sure Ibrahim had more than only American role models. He had once showed me a plastic AK-47 that he received for attending an insurgency rally. It was a sad fact that this was a war for children’s allegiance, and toys were just as important as bullets on this battlefield. Ibrahim smiled, gave me the finger, and then ran off to hunt for more trouble.
His father chuckled. “Captain Whiteley, you are great man.”
Unlike Ibrahim, his father did not have a strong command of English. I had heard this flattering remark used in a dozen different contexts, and only in one or two was the phrase even approximately relevant. You did not need to do much in Baghdad to be a “great man.” Apparently, showing up for the meetings with the council was enough on most days. “La, la, habibi,” I responded. (No, no, my friend.) Today, however, I did feel like a great man. I’d caught some of the opportunistic scavengers who were capitalizing on the lack of a central government and the general lawlessness to profit off something that rightfully belonged to the neighborhood as much as to anyone. Moreover, the people of the neighborhood revered Said Mallek, the religious leaders accorded him their favor, and it would serve me well to be in his good graces. He was a true leader and a rare find.
Lacking the stony characteristics and the patience of his brother, Ibrahim’s father paced back and forth, growing increasingly irritated. Then several vehicles appeared on the horizon. It was the Turk and his entourage, barreling toward us in luxury BMW sedans. I was expecting a contingent of thugs to step out of the cars, so I double-checked the safety on my gold-plated Desert Eagle pistol and unlatched the safety on my Taser. I had swapped my army-issued Beretta 9mm for the Saddam-autographed .50 caliber a few days ago. I enjoyed the respect that Saddam’s legacy still commanded in the street. Iraqis respected the Desert Eagle’s gold-plated image of Saddam, and I respected its heavier bullet and solid-metal composition, both of which could be great for making a strong point in a difficult negotiation.
To my surprise, the man who stepped out of the best-looking car was dressed in a suit and was not actually Turkish. He had been an Iraqi air force pilot in the Iran-Iraq War and had been held prisoner in Iran for several years. He lived in the lawless border region between Turkey, Iran, and Iraq, and he had developed a lucrative business dealing among the three countries. His slender frame and cool demeanor were disarming, and the casual nature of our conversation eased my fears of impropriety. There was no real law against moving the steel, and my authority to stop him was limited, a fact we both acknowledged.
Yet I could also make his life very difficult by impounding his trucks and his drivers, both of which remained under the watchful eyes of my soldiers. Eager to avoid a conflict and salivating at the idea of striking a semilegitimate accord, the Turk offered to pay Said Mallek a 5 percent tribute on each truck. Ali’s opportunist streak got the better of him, and he became so excited that he started to bargain of his own accord. I silenced him and guided him back to simply interpreting my words. Talking through Ali, I laid out the situation of absolute poverty in the area and the need for a cash infusion. If money was being made, then there would be at least a 20 percent kickback locally. That meant two deftars, using the Iraqi slang for a $10,000 bundle, per shipment. The Turk considered his options carefully. Each minute that passed cost him money. Ali and Said Mallek’s brother were already talking about the resale prices of the impounded trucks themselves.
While trying to conceal his Rolex as he reached into his pocket, the Turk tried to convince me of his own money problems. Nonetheless, he produced twenty thousand dollars still in their brown U.S. Treasury wrapper. Ali, whose past life as a money trader always came in handy, quickly counted the bills and confirmed their authenticity. Satisfied that he had paid his taxes, the Turk asked for nothing in return save the release of his cargo, which I promptly granted. We shook hands and wished each other well. I reminded him that his arrangement was between him and Said Mallek and that he should be careful to honor this obligation, lest I have to make a return trip and double the tax. He smiled and agreed as he jumped back into his air-conditioned Beamer and drove away.
I smiled, too. This was not hard. Shaking down quasilegal operations for money to hand back to my council members could be my solution to the army’s slow bureaucracy. When the army could not deliver cash to ease the troubles of the soldiers in the field, I could find a way. Every day our soldiers collided with cars, raided the wrong houses, broke furniture, and, sometimes, shot the wrong person. These cases all generated paperwork, and it took months to pay the victims. The army’s lack of efficiency meant that the months of anguish, anger, and frustration among the Iraqi people served to solidify their resentment at our presence. The endless forms for a simple claim fueled their anger and feelings of helplessness and drove them into the waiting arms of religious fundamentalists who could use their international financing networks to pay cash for working against the Americans.
The appeal was dramatic. The Iraqi people longed for a way to avenge their families and restore their pride. The sting of the invasion and the disbanding of the Iraqi army had created legions of young men looking for a cause to believe in or, more simply, a way to earn money and provide for their families. In order to combat the fanatical influence, I needed to prove that the council system could deliver results as quickly as the insurgents in the mosques. Now, with an on-the-spot payment courtesy of the Turk delivered into the waiting hands of Said Mallek’s brother, I completed the first installment of my plan to make the council system an effective local governance tool.
“You are Abu Floos,” he said. I turned to Ali for a translation. “He says that you are the Father of Money, Captain Whiteley.” The nickname stuck. With the money sticking out of his bulging pockets, Ibrahim and his dad headed for Said Mallek’s house, and we followed shortly behind. When we arrived, almost fifty people were gathered. Sitting around in their odd collection of velour tracksuits and sandals, most of the young men were brandishing newly polished AK-47s. As we stopped, they began clamoring for the boxes of “Iraq Peace and Prosperity” T-shirts that I had in my truck. The shirts represented the most recent public relations initiative sponsored by the Green Zone leadership. Written in both English and Arabic, the inspirational motto was supposed to communicate a sense of optimism among the people that would offset the growing despair and violence in the street. As it turned out, the army had printed the optimistic logos on black T-shirts, a favorite color of the Shi’a insurgent militias. It was another of those moments when you think that the U.S. Army should be better at realizing the possibility of unintentional coincidences, but you resign yourself to the fact that we do not fight this kind of war well. The insurgents simply wore the shirts as part of their all-black insurgent uniforms. In effect, the U.S. taxpayer had supplied thousands of mujahideen uniforms in sizes ranging from extra small to extra large. I think the mujahideen must have appreciated that we had given them enough sizes to accommodate all of their members.
Already the news of our successful black-market intervention had traveled to Said Mallek, who was presiding over this chaotic throng. As I walked in, he greeted me with a kiss on both cheeks in front of the entire group—a true sign of acceptance. We went to his living room, where Ibrahim emptied his pockets. I reminded Said Mallek that some of the money needed to go to the mosque to rebuild the dome. As a sheik, Said Mallek knew this obligation well, and it was a role he embraced. Every person he helped owed him loyalty. With his newfound wealth, his influence and his tribe would grow, and already people were walking from the little cinder-block houses across the muddy fields to plead their cases for his aid.
As we shook hands, we acknowledged the growing allegiance between us. I had promised him the money and delivered it within a week. I had kept my word, which had earned me an additional level of respect. I started to understand the Inshallah, “God willing,” attitude. Maybe this was how the Middle East worked—a benevolent Allah dropping timely bits of fortune along your path. After the night at the mosque, I had realized that Said Mallek’s influence would be central to my survival. Where it did not exist, I had to create it. I would make him as powerful as possible, and he would protect me as well as he could. This had to be the way. Find allies and make them stronger.
It seemed that neither the U.S. Army nor the State Department understood this necessary dimension of power in Iraq. Handing out soccer balls and backpacks full of school supplies made great photos to send back home, but these actions had little impact on the local balance of power. After weeks of council meetings and bureaucratic impotence, I had finally found a way to meaningfully accomplish my mission and to help the Iraqi people. With one day’s work, I had earned the blessing of an influential sheik and provided the money to repair an important Shi’a shrine. I had endeared myself and, by extension, my fellow soldiers to scores of previously adversarial people.
Regardless of how the ubiquitous PowerPoint presentations may have described it to visiting politicians, life outside the Green Zone was run by a feudal system of money and power. To make a difference here, I needed to learn the contours of the power structure and where I could best insert myself for an immediate and dramatic effect. While the army dragged its feet and worried about photo opportunities, Said Mallek and Abu Floos would stabilize Al Dora, one payoff at a time. These thoughts drifted beyond the boundaries of my military education and dangled tenuously close to an ethical abyss. Yet the goals of progress and prosperity, as stated on the T-shirt, washed away my doubts about propriety and legality. There was a pressing mandate to understand Iraqis and their society and to provide them with an opportunity to rebuild their lives. There were different methods, but the sense of urgency and the race against the growing fundamentalist threat made the more bureaucratic methods unrealistic.
My flexibility and initiative had just paid off, and they rapidly transformed my understanding of how I could succeed at making my area safer for everyone. I felt as if this was the way out of the maze of streets that defined Al Dora. The exit was not found by patrolling endless dead-end roads and trails; it was by going straight through the sun-baked walls into the damp, carpet-covered sitting rooms of the tribal leaders. By breaking through the rules and the layers of bureaucracy, by redefining what was acceptable, I absorbed the raw power that flowed through ancient tribal veins every time I shook hands with a new ally.
Yet a gnawing feeling kept eating at my conscience and prevented me from enjoying the moment. I wondered how sustainable this could be. How many opportunities would present themselves that were this easy? Already I feared that I had overstepped my bounds in pursuit of a promise that I had made to the council. My military instruction, even my hallowed ethical indoctrination at West Point, did not have a clear definition or guideline for the murky relationship that was forming between me and the Iraqi leaders. As the demands of the council became greater and the opportunities to satisfy them grew scarcer, how far could I go without succumbing completely to this Robin Hood mentality of power that already seemed so tempting? I knew I would eventually have to say no. I feared the consequences of that day and found that only “Inshallah” could keep my worried thoughts at bay.