Sheik blames outsiders for rocket attack

"Jesus, that's down by Warhorse," the 28-year-old Hassan spluttered as headquarters radioed the new instructions.

Each of the 1-25th Striker Brigade Combat Team's sub-commands wields responsibility over designated portions of Dilaya Province. The rockets took off from a grove less than 10 miles from the brigade's headquarters at Forward Operating Base Warhorse, near Ba'qubah . The 3-23rd's home borders Muqdadiyah, roughly 90 minutes north. It might have made sense for soldiers from the closer base to respond. But Iraqis call the shots on U.S. involvement since June 30, and the IA command in Diyala Province wanted the assistance of Hassan's Strykers searching the date palm grove linked to the attack.

Local police met the combined force of Americans and Iraqis, shortly after 8 a.m., in a village near the Shaki River. Hassan directed his soldiers down a narrow road, bordered with mud walls on either side, toward the grove targeted for searching. As the road emptied into a grassy field, the local sheik arrived with news.

"Guys were seen escaping when the rockets were launched," the sheik explained through a translator.

Local police pointed out the GPS-marked location where they had recovered a set of crude launch rails. The captain soon turned toward a thick patch of date palms, perhaps a quarter-mile away. "They could hide some stuff there," he said, studying the brushy stands.

A farmer, clutching a palm frond, made his way toward the group through tall grass. He saw the men responsible, the sheik said.

"The men wore uniforms-- like the IA," the farmer said through the U.S. translator. "And they wore masks."

The captain asked if the farmer saw the men setting up the launcher.

Following a brief conversation with the farmer, the translator explained: "When he saw people with masks and weapons, he went to the IP (police) and reported it."

It turned out that local police had seized not just one, but three launchers at the scene, one left in a clearing, the others stashed in bushes. An officer pulled out his cell phone and showed Hassan a picture of the homemade device, which used a car jack for elevation adjustments. "Yeah, I've seen this before," the captain said.

Faint tints of dawn had greeted soldiers that morning about 5 a.m. Bags of ice were the last step of preparation as they geared up for the scheduled weapons sweep. Soldiers slammed the bags on the Stryker ramps, then packed the loosened cubes into portable coolers loaded with personal sodas and bottled water.

The early start ideally paved the way for completion of a planned weapons sweep ahead of the day's heat. Instead, just as the sun began cooking, soldiers found themselves following the hefty sheik, the farmer and Iraqi soldiers through the high grass, over or around small canals, into the palms.

Dust coated the leaves of pomegranate trees and other shrubs growing beneath the date palm canopy. An Iraqi soldier grabbed a baseball-sized fruit, twisted it in half, and gobbled the seeds, hardly missing a step.

Pausing in a small clearing, the sheik sought to convince the American officer no one from his village was responsible for those rockets, which fell close enough to the American base to trigger automatic sirens.

"People from other neighborhoods-terrorists-come here to do it," he said, speaking through the translator.

Gesturing toward the farmer, the sheik said the man obviously wasn't making money assisting terrorists. "He's wearing winter clothes in the summer-that's because he doesn't have anything."

Hassan's platoon continued carefully winding through the groves indifferent to the body armor, guns, and ammunition weighing each man down. They paused as their captain and the sheik talked to other farmers. Most of the soldiers wore smiles despite the effort. Though one did vow, "When I get out, I'm never going anyplace with palm trees."

By midmorning, the platoon reached the edge of a village. "The worst thing isn't walking," Hassan quipped. "Its knowing we have to walk back."

Spec. Ryan Sorenson, a young soldier from New Jersey loaded down with a M-249 SAW light machine gun, somehow ended up hauling the platoon's shovel as well. He did so cracking jokes instead of digging, since soldiers never did find a likely cache.

It was that kind of day for Second Platoon, Charlie Company: No victories, no defeats, just buckets of sweat, one foot in front of the other, finishing a few steps closer to home.

O'Donoghue teaches journalism at University of Alaska Fairbanks. This month he and three students are embedded journalists in the 1-25th Stryker Brigade Combat Team in Diyala Province, Iraq.