The Easy Day Was Yesterday (41 page)

We made our way back to the headquarters location where the SCO had set up his tactical operations command (TOC). After a brew, I wandered over to the TOC and saw the Iraqi major on a stretcher next to the medic APC. Apparently they couldn’t push him back to the rear and better medical care as the roads weren’t yet secure, so he was stuck with us. I crouched down next to him and he again grabbed my hands and let rip with a mouthful of Iraqi. I had no idea what he was saying, so just nodded and smiled. He was probably asking why I hadn’t just let him die in peace instead of forcing him to go through all this agony. The doctor told me he wasn’t sure whether he would survive as he had a sizable chunk of metal stuck in the back of his leg and, every time he moved, he’d open an artery and blood would piss out of him. I patted his hand and said goodbye, but he pulled me back and reached into his pocket and pulled out his beret. He looked long and hard at it and then handed it to me. Of course I said ‘no’. I knew how precious a beret could be, but he insisted, so I took it with many thanks. I still have it and it sits next to my SASR beret. Both are very special for different reasons.

Over the next few days, things slowed down quite a bit and people started to wonder when all this was going to end. But the nights were interesting. The constant stream of jets flying over Baghdad left a trail of criss-crossing smoke very high in the sky. Their presence meant Baghdad was still copping a pounding and wasn’t yet secured. Actually, the nightly performance was a nice distraction as sleep was hard to find. I seemed to wake every 45 minutes or so to have a look around. I didn’t trust these guys to provide a secure perimeter and worried that someone might sneak into our position with a blade.

Later in the day, as I sat in the SCO’s Bradley talking shit, I heard that the city was surrounded — nothing could get in and nothing could get out. The 2nd Brigade was poised to sweep through the south-west corner of the city. Now we were getting serious. Maybe this thing would be over soon.

The next day, the SCO told me the 2nd Brigade had launched the attack on the south-west corner of the city and had met only light resistance. Apparently they were just testing the waters and the final assault through the city was imminent.

Captain Lyle told me he was going to Abu Ghraib prison later in the day to conduct a recon with a view to using the prison as a divisional headquarters. Frankly, I was beyond bored as nothing was happening, so I accepted his invitation to tag along. I piled into the back of his Troop Sergeant’s Bradley for the rough ride out to the prison.

When we arrived at the front gates they were closed and chained shut, but they were no match for an Abrams tank that just drove straight at the gates until they smashed open. It occurred to me that I was probably the first civilian to enter the gates of the now infamous Abu Ghraib prison. The prison was bloody interesting and sad at the same time. I found the Warden’s office and out the front two poor bastards had been buried up to their shoulders in the front lawn and had been stoned to death. The looks of agony on the faces of these poor bastards formed the basis of future nightmares. I entered the Warden’s office, which was palatial. There was marble everywhere and where there wasn’t marble, there was something gold-plated, and where there wasn’t gold-plating, there was a photo or painting of Saddam. Saddam was everywhere. I realised that there was a photo or painting of Saddam on every wall in this prison. I continued to explore the prison, but it never left the back of my mind that the place could be booby trapped, so I only entered buildings after I saw a soldier walk out. Cowardly maybe, but the soldiers were looting everything, so I guessed they would have tripped any booby traps for me.

The gruesome scenes continued. I found the gallows — a sight that sent a cold shiver up my spine. The room was a place of fear, desperation and death. It was clear the Iraqis had executed as many prisoners as they could before their hasty retreat as the bodies were all piled on top of one another in a pit below the gallows. The cells were miserable little rooms and all the walls seemed to be covered in blood or shit. Talk about being terrified into going straight.

The next night, as I prepared to bed down, I heard Walt on his satellite phone; he was obviously talking to CNN Atlanta. Walt seemed agitated when he came over to my army stretcher.

‘Hey Paul, Atlanta wants us to go to Baghdad as soon as we can. Apparently there are pictures all over the news of the US Army pulling down statues of Saddam.’

‘Right, well we can’t go tonight. Let’s go over to the TOC and have a chat with the SCO,’ I replied, as I dragged my arse out of my sleeping bag. I sort of felt bad that I was about to tell the SCO we were leaving. He was a great guy and one of the best commanders I’d worked with. He treated us far better than he really had to.

The SCO reported skirmishes along the road to Baghdad, but said it was up to us to decide when we dis-embedded. I suggested we meet again at first light and decide what we’d do. That agreed, we all hit the sack.

Just before the sun’s first rays made their appearance, I was out of bed and had my gear packed away. As the crew slept, I wandered over to the TOC to see how secure the road to Baghdad was. The lads on duty said nothing had been reported through the night, so all was quiet. They also said they could alert the other units along the road of our expected arrival. I felt pretty good about all this and, knowing how important it was to get the crew to Baghdad to start reporting, I thought the risk level acceptable, so decided to make that recommendation to the crew. When I got back to Old Betsy, Walt and the guys were up and packing their kit away. I told Walt I thought we should go for it and outlined the reasons for my decision. He agreed and went to say his goodbyes to the SCO, Captain Lyle and the troops. Jeff, Charlie and I loaded all the gear on board and then I drove Old Betsy over to the fuel truck for one last top-up. The SCO and Captain Lyle were there, so it was nice to say a final goodbye to these two solid soldiers. They had been very generous to us and, while we were leaving to do other things, they probably had a few more months in this place. They explained that, under the rules of embedding, to dis-embed meant you could not come back. They told us to disregard this and come back if we ran into trouble.

The road to Baghdad was lonely. There were no other vehicles on the road except burnt-out tanks and vehicles and, of course, the charred remains of some poor souls on the road. We all had eyes like dinner plates as we scanned both sides of the road for trouble. This was the first time in four weeks that we had travelled without a protection detail of 400 armoured vehicles and we all felt quite naked.

We’d heard about the deserting Iraqi soldiers and the roads were littered with evidence of this. There were soldiers’ uniforms and AK47s everywhere, and I’d never seen so many boots. They were all over the place.

We forged ahead down the lonely road and eventually came across an American checkpoint. The soldiers told us to park the car and report to the Operations Officer (OPSO). The OPSO told us it was too dangerous to continue and that we should wait with them. We asked what the problem was. The OPSO said that parts of the city were still being fought over. I told him that we were going to the Palestine Hotel which seemed to be in the cleared area of the city. Eventually he agreed — he didn’t have the authority to detain us — but urged us to stay with him a little longer. Walt and I decided to keep going.

At 11.00 am we arrived at the Palestine Hotel — the first CNN crew in Baghdad. Walt was thrilled and the crew went straight to work broadcasting live from the footpath in front of the hotel. I went to the hotel to secure rooms for the crew and find something cold for everyone to drink.

An hour later, another crew drove in and, by the end of the day, the media circus was in full swing. There were journalists, cameras and satellite trucks covering every spare piece of ground. When we first arrived in Baghdad, I had my own room in the hotel. By the end of the day, I was sharing my room with five other security guys. I didn’t mind; I’d spent the last weeks sharing the desert with 1,000 men. But what did piss me off was the lack of hot water. In fact, the water was arctic and I was screaming for a decent wash.

My stay in Baghdad was short and the crew and I separated quite soon after arrival. Jeff was flat out building satellites and generators and whatever else was needed to make CNN look good. Jeff was the coolest person I’ve ever been with under fire and probably one of the hardest working lads I’ve worked with. He never stopped and never complained. Three days later, Walt, Charlie and I said goodbye to Jeff and drove back to Kuwait.

It took us 21 days to get to Baghdad driving north and eight hours to drive back heading south. I was relieved to cross the border into Kuwait late in the afternoon and even more relieved to arrive back at the CNN hotel. All the CNN personnel were waiting for us and cheered as we drove up. It was a nice touch. They also threw a party that night for us, but all I wanted to do was to soak in a bath and drink a cold beer. In fact, I drank three beers and topped up the bath with hot water three times. Two days later, I flew home to Australia.

Sallie and the team spent a few hours getting the police to accept that my release to the Australian High Commission also meant I could be released to Rajeesh, who was the Australian High Commission representative. So now that was sorted, and I was no longer taking the death train to New Delhi.

It was 1.00 pm and there was still no word of movement for me. I sat waiting in the heat, constantly glancing at the main entry to the hospital for the car, but it didn’t come. All this stuffing around because I crossed into India by a few metres —extraordinary, unbelievable. What a dickhead I was.

Martin mentioned further conversations with the Australian Embassy in Kathmandu. Apparently, once we crossed the border, I could drive four hours to another town and get a new visa, or apply when I got to Kathmandu. But if I went to Kathmandu, the Immigration Office might blacklist me for future entry into Nepal. Damn, why were we still doing this? My visa was current and my passport indicated that I hadn’t actually left the country, so I wanted to leave it alone. ‘Leave it be,’ I said, ‘I’ll go to Kathmandu and take my chances.’

It was now 4.00 pm and I learnt that the Chief Justice Magistrate who had replaced Triparthy had decided to take two days off. We had spent time and money getting permission for his replacement to sign my release and now he had gone too. Of course this would happen to me. Now we had to get permission for the other guy to sign my release. Having secured this, the Magistrate decided he didn’t want to sign today — he’d do it tomorrow. Martin and Sallie went off. Sallie stormed into the District Magistrate’s office and let rip. He was in the middle of a meeting and was damned surprised when Sallie stormed in and opened up. The other people in the room also contributed to the discussion and the District Magistrate called the interim Magistrate and told him to sign the thing, but he still refused to sign my release, citing a technicality. Sallie was furious and couldn’t go with Bala and Martin to see the Interim Magistrate. Bala and Martin went in with both barrels blazing — particularly Bala. As it turned out, the technicality was that the court closed at 3.30 pm and he had been presented with the release order at 3.45. Following threats from both Bala and Martin, the Interim Magistrate agreed to sign my release during the first 15 minutes of court tomorrow.

So I was here for another night. I knew something would go wrong and I was glad I hadn’t got my hopes up. The team left very late tonight and Bala had to call the immigration guys at the border to ask them to stay until the team arrived otherwise they’d be stuck at the border all night. The immigration guys at the border felt suitably embarrassed about the whole situation and agreed to do whatever was needed to help.

Bala sent over a nice letter with my dinner. He referred to the Interim Magistrate as a sadistic man who was out for himself. Bala was a great guy and one of many who had made this nightmare tolerable.

The kids came by for a visit as I sat out the front. I asked if they were allowed to go to the shops on their own. ‘Of course,’ said the eldest. I had a craving for chocolate, so I asked the kids to go to the shop and buy me some. Twenty minutes later, they returned with a handful of chocolate and the exact change. I told them to keep the change, but they refused.

‘We have our own money, thank you,’ they said. Then I told them it was a gift from one friend to another. Then they accepted the money. I put the chocolates in the fridge, then went back outside. It was a nice night and I wanted to stay up as late as I could. I had a good feeling about tomorrow.

Tuesday 17 June

The guards knocked on the door at 6.30 am and asked if I wanted chai. This translated to ‘we want chai so get off your arse and give us some money to go and buy some and then we’re going to keep your change without even offering to give it to you.’ I had them trained (as they had me) and they knew to buy me two glasses, as one just wasn’t enough. In fact, if I’d bought the equivalent of the jug of tea I normally drink in the morning, I’d have 12 glasses of their stuff. Their chai is really tasty. It’s sweet, milky and scented with cloves.

I thought about my kids again. I thought about them a lot. They were great people and I wished I had been a better father to them. I missed them like crazy and couldn’t wait to hug them all. When I first arrived in gaol I couldn’t think about the kids without getting teary. Now I could handle it because I was getting out, but I loved them more than ever — they provided the meaning in my life and I was so proud of who they were.

By 7.00 am the waiting had begun. It wouldn’t be like yesterday when I gazed at the main gate all day waiting for the team or the police to arrive, but they hadn’t. However, Bala had been at the hospital yesterday with a heap of police. I had panicked and had been certain they were here to charge me with some other offence. Then I heard that a doctor had murdered a nurse on Sunday afternoon. Apparently he had drugged her then cut her throat — poor woman, but I’m glad the reception wasn’t for me. Later, Bala mentioned that the police had charged a doctor with murder. He said the doctor was from Forbes-Gange. I told him I had met a doctor the day before from Forbes-Gange. ‘He was a nice guy, we had a long chat and some chai,’ I said. ‘This is a different doctor, Paul. This man is a murderer,’ Bala told me. I walked into my cell and found the piece of paper with the doctor’s name on it and returned to Bala, who was seated outside my room.