on the move. Helicopters took off and landed less than a hundred metres away. Heavy trucks hauled containers and water bowsers. American voices yelled orders at each other.
As the businessmen got out their cameras, a voice barked and a young T-shirted soldier sprinted up, M16 in hand and Beretta strapped to his leg. ‘No pictures on base. Cameras away.’ He was enjoying this, and he didn’t care who knew it.
I stood with Jerry in the shade of a wing, watching the macho men slip their Olympuses obediently back into their waistcoats.
A military truck arrived. The American driver and a couple of Iraqis started to pull our bags from the luggage hold and throw them into the back.
Another soldier headed across the tarmac towards an enormous freight hangar, shouting, ‘Follow me, folks,’ and, like a bunch of sheep, we did.
Rob and whoever he was with were out in front, followed closely by the still jabbering Iraqi women. Jerry and I stayed in the shade as long as we could, then fell in behind. A couple more US squaddies brought up the rear.
Inside the grey steel building, a black guy in T-shirt and sunglasses appeared, the obligatory Beretta strapped to his leg. ‘Listen up, people.’ He waved a clipboard. ‘When that transport arrives, I want you to grab all your bags and bring them to the table. They’ll be checked before you move on to Immigration. Did you all get that?’
He got a few mumbles of assent, perhaps in recognition of the fact that he was the first soldier we’d seen who wasn’t still looking forward to his sixteenth birthday.
The truck arrived and our bags were dumped on the concrete floor. People started retrieving them and filing over to the table. I hung back until Rob and his guy had collected theirs, then picked up my daysack. Jerry had scoffed at how small it was, but why carry a whole suitcase of stuff if you can buy everything when you get there? One change of clothes and a toothbrush, that’s all you need. Everything else is excess baggage.
Rob turned and must have seen me, but we still didn’t have eye to eye. In fact nobody was talking much, apart from the four Iraqi women. Everyone looked apprehensive as the soldiers dug about in their bags, made them spark up their laptops and tried to look like they knew what they were doing.
I reckoned they were poking around just for the fun of it. If you were going to bring anything illegal into this country, you’d go the Ali Baba route. There were hundreds of miles of unpatrolled desert that everyone, from drug traffickers to armed militants, was pouring across.
After the checks were complete we had to move round to the other side of the table and collect our bags before being led through the hangar. Logistics people sat at tables, tapping busily on their laptops. This being the US military, the bulk of the hangar was stuffed with racks and racks of shiny new equipment. The kit would be rushed to whoever needed it. In the British Army, there’d have been six quartermasters guarding one ration pack, and even that couldn’t be claimed without a requisition order signed by the chief of the General Staff.
We reached a corridor and things got smarter. US soldiers sat drinking cans of Coke on old, recently liberated, gilded settees. It looked like this area had been the front office for whatever the hangar had once been used for. Right now it was home to the all-new Iraqi immigration service. Several officials in friendly blue shirts sat at desks, each equipped with a PC and digital camera. Behind them sat a group of Americans, some in uniform, giving everyone the once-over as they went through.
Beyond the tables was a blur of people in uniforms and civvies. It was obviously the ad hoc arrivals and departures zone, but it looked more like the reception area at the UN building. A bunch of Koreans in American BDUs stood around with a group of Italians. Every nationality had their flag stitched on to a sleeve. The smartest-looking troops were
As the businessmen got out their cameras, a voice barked and a young T-shirted soldier sprinted up, M16 in hand and Beretta strapped to his leg. ‘No pictures on base. Cameras away.’ He was enjoying this, and he didn’t care who knew it.
I stood with Jerry in the shade of a wing, watching the macho men slip their Olympuses obediently back into their waistcoats.
A military truck arrived. The American driver and a couple of Iraqis started to pull our bags from the luggage hold and throw them into the back.
Another soldier headed across the tarmac towards an enormous freight hangar, shouting, ‘Follow me, folks,’ and, like a bunch of sheep, we did.
Rob and whoever he was with were out in front, followed closely by the still jabbering Iraqi women. Jerry and I stayed in the shade as long as we could, then fell in behind. A couple more US squaddies brought up the rear.
Inside the grey steel building, a black guy in T-shirt and sunglasses appeared, the obligatory Beretta strapped to his leg. ‘Listen up, people.’ He waved a clipboard. ‘When that transport arrives, I want you to grab all your bags and bring them to the table. They’ll be checked before you move on to Immigration. Did you all get that?’
He got a few mumbles of assent, perhaps in recognition of the fact that he was the first soldier we’d seen who wasn’t still looking forward to his sixteenth birthday.
The truck arrived and our bags were dumped on the concrete floor. People started retrieving them and filing over to the table. I hung back until Rob and his guy had collected theirs, then picked up my daysack. Jerry had scoffed at how small it was, but why carry a whole suitcase of stuff if you can buy everything when you get there? One change of clothes and a toothbrush, that’s all you need. Everything else is excess baggage.
Rob turned and must have seen me, but we still didn’t have eye to eye. In fact nobody was talking much, apart from the four Iraqi women. Everyone looked apprehensive as the soldiers dug about in their bags, made them spark up their laptops and tried to look like they knew what they were doing.
I reckoned they were poking around just for the fun of it. If you were going to bring anything illegal into this country, you’d go the Ali Baba route. There were hundreds of miles of unpatrolled desert that everyone, from drug traffickers to armed militants, was pouring across.
After the checks were complete we had to move round to the other side of the table and collect our bags before being led through the hangar. Logistics people sat at tables, tapping busily on their laptops. This being the US military, the bulk of the hangar was stuffed with racks and racks of shiny new equipment. The kit would be rushed to whoever needed it. In the British Army, there’d have been six quartermasters guarding one ration pack, and even that couldn’t be claimed without a requisition order signed by the chief of the General Staff.
We reached a corridor and things got smarter. US soldiers sat drinking cans of Coke on old, recently liberated, gilded settees. It looked like this area had been the front office for whatever the hangar had once been used for. Right now it was home to the all-new Iraqi immigration service. Several officials in friendly blue shirts sat at desks, each equipped with a PC and digital camera. Behind them sat a group of Americans, some in uniform, giving everyone the once-over as they went through.
Beyond the tables was a blur of people in uniforms and civvies. It was obviously the ad hoc arrivals and departures zone, but it looked more like the reception area at the UN building. A bunch of Koreans in American BDUs stood around with a group of Italians. Every nationality had their flag stitched on to a sleeve. The smartest-looking troops were
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