BLACKFIVE: Back to Iraq- Dispatch from Kuwait

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Back to Iraq- Dispatch from Kuwait

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

. Shawn Bryan Reports

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August 3 08

Packing luggage, it's no big thing except when you know that you are packing to go to a place that you should not be going to. A place that you survived already and where you lost a lot of friends.....48 to be exact. A place that I promised myself that I would never go to again, even though I have had a recurring dream for almost 3 years that I was back, it was only a dream that my wife would calm me down from.

Well the luggage is packed. The miserable goodbye to my family is done. We leave for the airport early in the morning. My wife and 14 year old drive me, we have to leave my 12 year old because she is to upset by my leaving. Old miserable feelings. Saying goodbye is a bitch.

My final destination in America Ironically is DC. The heart of the greatest nation in the world. My pride as an American is now balanced against the misery of hearing my wife's voice quiver with tears on the phone. We drive by Arlington where so many badass Americans rest and watch over us eternally. Men like Travis Youngblood, a Navy corpsman with 3-25 who paid the ultimate price. Or Maj Doug Zembiec a local Marine from Albuquerque who is and always will be a hero. As I think of all of the Marines and Sailors from 3-25 and other units that I have known from the war, my pride level rises. My feelings about returning to Iraq are unnerving but I am reminded passing Arlington that so many Great Americans have payed the ultimate price during this war on terrorism and I have a unique opportunity to show our readers and country my perspective on what has happened in Iraq. Game on.

In 2003 after a 10 year absence from the Marine Corps I was reactivated with 4th Recon D Co. I had felt that someone started a fight with my brother down the street and just couldn't ignore what was happening in the months after 9-11. We finally deploy on 1-3-05 and joining 3-25 from Ohio. This group of Marines was awesome, minus the hordes of Buckeye fans, they were an incredibly talented bad ass group. Over the next ten months we would go through a lot of things together. We would travel the Anbar province and see all of the shit that war has to offer, both good and bad. My last convoy into the gates of Al Asad I remember taking a picture and saying never again. Life is some funny shit. As I start this correspondence I am in a hotel in Kuwait, on my way back to Iraq.

Back to the Anbar. Back to Haditha, the same place that is always in my nightmares. Back to Hit and all of the other little bumps in the road that make this province. I am going back to give a perspective on progress. Progress that we all know has occurred but for some reason is not being put out to the people. Mainstream media says that we have been in this war for 6 years and it's endless....well the way I see it is our guys have been busting their asses for six years and it's time Americans see what has really gone down and maybe we can get some insight on the manipulations that have occurred over the past few years. I believe that Americans deserve to know the truth about what happened in Haditha, that the families of 3-25's fallen deserve to know what their sons gave their lives for as well as all of our brave warriors families from all units and services. So let's go find out and I will do my best to let you know during every update. The next week should be interesting from the Haditha Dam to Hit here we go.

Shawn