Caution

Downtown Tikrit was pretty restive yesterday. A nephew of the mayor, a member of the provincial council, was killed recently and a funeral ceremony attracted a large crowd. I wasn't going to catalog all the various dangers here, but I know many of you want to know what its really like here. And after something like London, we're all reminded again that bad things can happen anywhere. Gunfire into the air is common, and despite our repeated advice explaining that things that go up must come down injuries are often sustained by falling bullets. There are probably several cells of local insurgents that bribe or coerce local hooligans to engage in the most dangerous attacks; either burying and detonating IED's, or find the suicidal willing to drive a VBIED into a police checkpoint or army patrol. These are daily threats across Iraq, but locally only a couple of times a week. We also periodically get mortar fire, which is rarely effectively aimed but sometimes they get lucky. Saddam's army was nearly two thirds artillery, so there's a lot of experience and leftover material available to the insurgents. They'll pop a couple of shots off from some field and take off before our counter-batteries can track them and return fire. Arab soldiers have never been known for their marksmanship, so attacks against patrols with AK-47's and other small arms are more of a nuisance than a danger. However, a troubling trend recently reported indicates a rise in the use of sniper attacks, ironically much like the set-up of that duo that perpetrated the attacks in the D.C. area. By and large, we are very well protected- we wear body armor and helmets nearly 24 hours a day (which sucks by the way)- and my unit has the all new armored humvees, which are truly fantastic, life-saving vehicles. The news generally focuses on the unrest in Baghdad, and as a huge metropolitan area, it deserves the coverage. But there are many cities that are far more docile. Tikrit has a fairly well run police force and the Iraqi army units here are progressing well. Nearby cities such as Samarra and Bayji are far more troublesome and attacks are more brazen. In this Sunni area, most attacks are against the coalition forces and local police and are attacks of revenge against the occupation, whereas in Baghdad the attacks are more often targeting the wider population of different civilian groups and political leaders, aiming to delegitimize the political process and create civil unrest. So what happens on a typical day? People are out shopping, working, going to school and going about their lives as best they can. Sometimes something bad happens, and somebody gets hurt. And sometimes it doesn't and that's a good day.