Cross posted on Daily Kos
Brief history:
My mother was renting a summer house last year near a military base. She befriended several of the soldiers in a local restaurant. She became friends with one in particular who wanted to write to people “stateside” while in Iraq.
For obvious reasons, I will not identify where my mother was living at the time or the base this soldier was assigned to.
She told him I would love to be a pen pal so he and I have been exchanging emails for some time now. This is the first one I’ve received from him with any real information about what is going on in Iraq.
My reaction:
U.S. Military cannot provide our troops with drinking water?
U.S. Military cannot provide our troops with adequate plumbing facilities?
E coli in the drinking water?
How are our brave men and women of the armed forces supposed to fight the global war on terror living in these sub-standard conditions?
We know many soldiers do not have adequate body armor. Now we learn they don’t have clean drinking water either.
Well Eve,
My life here is verry different than I ever wxpected to be living that is for sure. I dont even know where to start. I also dont want you to feel bad for me when I tell you some of this stuff. First of all we hardly ever have hot water. That is when we still have water because they have to truck all of our water in from the local villages. Next the septic system here is set up for about half of the people that use it. That leads to the weak link which happens to be in the bathroom that is in my section of the berthing. You know what that means. That means that when she is full the overflow comes up our sinks and spreads poo all over the floor. Also with the water they test it and every time it comes up with ecoli. They had three kinds of bottled water here for us and two of the three kinds have bacteria in them. The last thing that bugs me about this place is there is all kinds of mold on the walls where we sleep. There is mold right next to my head throught the whole night.The whole civil war thing is not affecting us yet except for the mail. We cannot go and get the mail because of that crap.
I am sorry that I am rambeling but I have to cut myself off right now I could go on all night long!!!!
Given the circumstances I think that we have pretty high spirits!!!
I will write later
Your Friend in Iraq,
There’s nothing I can add.
In spite of everything, he writes their spirits are high. Makes you want to weep.
Can you imagine George Bush living with shit all over the floor?
The whole miserable situation speaks for itself.
Have you tried to contact any of your local media about this? Then again, you can’t reveal his identity.
Damn, damn.
George Bush is made of the same stuff that’s coming out of your soldier friends sink. Only his shit has a smirk.
I don’t know where he is and I would not do anything to compromise his identity.
It’s on the Kos rec list so maybe a media type will read it and do some follow up.
is going on in Iraq with our soldiers.
We are at a level of insanity with regards to all of this that is far beyond what I recall of the news of the past 40 years. Troops without decent water, WTF?
A big FUCK YOU to Halliburton!!
.
WASHINGTON (New York Times) Feb. 27 — Under the type of contract awarded to KBR, “the contractor is not required to perform perfectly to be entitled to reimbursement,” Rhonda James, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, was quoted in the report as saying.
Halliburton said in January that audits on potential overcharges for KBR’s dining services and fuel supply costs had been wrapped up in 2005, resulting in additional income from fees. The company did not specify how much income it had received.
KBR has reported about $15.4 billion in revenues from its operations in Iraq since the U.S. invasion in 2003.
BAGHDAD, Iraq Feb 27, 2006 (AP)– Sunni Arabs are ready to end their boycott of talks to form a new government if rival Shiites return mosques seized in last week’s sectarian attacks and meet other unspecified demands, a top Sunni figure said Monday.
Four mortar rounds exploded Monday on a Shiite neighborhood, killing four and wounding 16, police Maj. Moussa Abdul Karim said. U.S. helicopters fired on three houses 15 miles west of Samarra and arrested 10 people.
U.S. soldiers patrol in west Baghdad, Iraq. The curfew emergency measure was relaxed on Monday after unrest last week claimed nearly 200 lives. AP Photo/Khalid MohammedMeanwhile, there was no word on the fate of Jill Carroll, an American journalist seized last month. The Sunday deadline set by her kidnappers in a message this month to a Kuwaiti television station passed without any new message from her abductors.
“But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.”
▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
After reading this diary and your links, I am now thinking “unbelievable–this has got to be the absolute worst that this administration has done!” But I have said that about Medicare D(isaster), Hurricane Katrina and so on…
Really hope that idredit’s diary is right. (Have a feeling that it is as idredit is one of the people who is dead on, IMO.)
This country can’t take much more of this. Something’s got to give!
more
Let’s see, that it the same type of planning that this administration has repeatedly demonstrated with Hurricane Kartina, Medicare D(isaster), the actual invasion of Iraq…what next…?
link to reconstruction report (PDF)
So, now it appears that Iraq is in a state of war and reconstruction at the same time?
This admin is nuts!
They don’t get good food or water and KBR = Hallibruton gets reimbursed for not providing.
Wonder what ever happenned to “accountability”?
Bush Stinks! Impeach the whole lot of them Damn it and bring the soldiers home.
Can it get any more evident than this? I read something about this about a week or so ago. Cannot remember where sorry. It disgusts me to the depths of my being that The Cabal of Fascists continue to “kill” our fine young men and women. Oh maybe not right out but down the road, you watch. These kids will have untold helath problems to the long time exposure to having to sleep next to a moldy wall or drink poisonous water. Keep writing those checks to KBR though. Can’t stop the money machine now because, as like a sports star, their time is limited and the ATM machine Bush has got going will dry up in three years(hopefully).