IRAQ WAR: "The real story" via Marine General Mike Sullivan

Marine General Mike Sullivan sends this: "The information for this message came from Marine Corporal, Brian Taylor, who is in Baghdad to his brother, Gregory, via phoncon. It's nice to read a message that hasn't been politicized or sanitized by higher authority. Paragraphs 6 & 7 are especially noteworthy as these were the folks that many WAISers thought were going to increase terrorist acts in the US and abroad when we attacked Iraq. People that are too polarized politically to watch Fox News are missing the best "embedded reporter" accounts/experiences (I watch all four cable news channels regularly and always end up going back to Fox) because Kelly, North and Leveanthal are truly in the middle of the frontline action and free from all the "talking heads" and psuedo "military experts" in the studios. They may not always see it the same way as the Marines or soldiers doing the fighting but they're in the thick of it. As an example, I saw Greg Kelly on camera being treated for his bleeding nose and face wounds after getting hit by shrapnel during a fire fight It's reassuring to see that the spirits of our Marines and soldiers are high and that the Iraqis appreciate what they're doing. Here is the message:

If you've been watching Fox News you know that they have a reporter, Rick Leventhal, currently embedded with my brother's battalion, 2nd Battalion 23rd Marines. This morning Leventhal reported that 2/23 had captured the former UN headquarters in Baghdad. The place was overrun with looters, whom they dispersed.

Apparently the phones there at the old UN are still working, because Corporal Brian Taylor gave us a call today (a bit after 10 AM Chicago/Dallas time, April 10). He tried his wife first but she wasn't home so he called my dad. He only had about 2 minutes. Here is what we learned from him:

1. The Iraqi citizens love them and treat them like kings.

2. 2/23 has been involved in the heaviest fighting of the war, both in An Nasiriyah and Baghdad. His company, Fox Company 2/23, has taken several casualties, one of them KIA and a couple of others gravely injured. [We already knew about the casualties from the news reports.]

3. Spirits are very high.

4. Any time anybody shoots back at all, embedded reporters call it "fierce resistance."

5. Reports from Leventhal that 2/23 is walking the streets intentionally trying to draw fire to smoke out the enemy are false; they are not intentionally exposing themselves to fire, but they are patrolling Baghdad in an attempt to find those that want to fight and then engaging and killing them.

6. Most of their heavy fighting is against the Fedayeen, who are rarely Iraqis but rather volunteers from other Arab countries.

7. The 2/23 and Brian personally (he acknowledged after being asked) are killing the Fedayeen "by the bucketload."

8. Brian captured an Iraqi general himself at a checkpoint. A man trying to get through a checkpoint that they had set up to allow civilians to leave didn't look right to Brian. Brian searched his stuff and found a very ornately engraved plated pistol. The man insisted that he was just a farmer. Brian wasn't having it, so he called over his battalion intelligence officer who actually is a farmer (remember that the 2/23 is all reservists). The farmer/intel officer said, "Show me your hands." Upon seeing the general's silky smooth hands, he said, showing his own hands, "Those aren't farmers hands; THESE are farmer's hands!" They handcuffed the general who proceeded to bawl like a little girl as they carried him away. Brian later learned that the pistol engravings indicated that it was a gift from Saddam. [PLEASE tell me that he's bringing home that pistol!]

9. Despite the serious nature of the work, Brian is having a lot of fun.