Iraqi Police having their vehicles checked prior to entry to the base. We trusted the Iraqi Army in our area better than the police.

Me in the office. 'BDOC' stands for Base Defense Operations Center.

Me practicing shooting an AK47. As you can tell, it was a hot day. It was fun shooting the AK on full auto, but I still prefer the M4.

I was able to visit the Ah Shaw(sp) palace in Baghdad - one of Saddam's old haunts and now the home of MNC-I. These columns were huge.

House clearing training.

This is me getting the upper hand on one of the guys in my unit. We were learning search techniques for a hand-cuffed suspect.

This is a rocket that landed on our base, detonated underground, and did no damage. I believe this is actually a rocket designed to be fired from an aircraft, but Hajji will use anything they can get to shoot.

In this photo, I'm in the lower right pulling perimeter security during a short halt in training.

This is a UH60 refueling. I don't recall what base this is on. They kick the passengers off while they're doing this, which is when I got this picture.

Here's my section training in house clearing.

Here's a couple of the Iraqi Army soldiers we had living on our base. Not exactly Western standards, but they tried.

Here's one of my soldiers manning the gunner's post. This was during one of our trips into Qayyarah.

A McDonald's sign I saw at Ali Al Salim base in Kuwait.

This graffiti showed up on some walls in a local national parking lot not long before I left. I was told it is a memorial to locals who had worked for the USA and been killed.

This photo was making the email rounds while I was in Iraq. Reportedly, it was a wolf captured in or around Baghdad. I don't know that wolves are indigenous to Iraq, so it could have come from the zoo.

This is a mural I saw on Victory Base Complex in Baghdad. Obviously, it's supposed to show the heroic former Iraqi army. There's a painted-over figure on the left. I'm guessing that was Saddam.

The extension on the front of this HMMWV is used to set off IEDs prior to the HMMWV actually passing by. These have been used in Iraq for some time, so I don't think I'm giving away any secrets here.

I would love to tell you what this mural says, but I never got it translated. I'm pretty sure it dates back to when the Iraqi Army and Air Force were still under Saddam. It was located in a building on our FOB.