No True Glory: A Frontline Account of the Battle for Fallujah"This is the face of war as only those who have fought it can describe it."–Senator John McCain Fallujah: Iraq’s most dangerous city unexpectedly emerged as the major battleground of the Iraqi insurgency. For twenty months, one American battalion after another tried to quell the violence, culminating in a bloody, full-scale assault. Victory came at a terrible price: 151 Americans and thousands of Iraqis were left dead. The epic battle for Fallujah revealed the startling connections between policy and combat that are a part of the new reality of war. The Marines had planned to slip into Fallujah “as soft as fog.” But after four American contractors were brutally murdered, President Bush ordered an attack on the city–against the advice of the Marines. The assault sparked a political firestorm, and the Marines were forced to withdraw amid controversy and confusion–only to be ordered a second time to take a city that had become an inferno of hate and the lair of the archterrorist al-Zarqawi. Based on months spent with the battalions in Fallujah and hundreds of interviews at every level–senior policymakers, negotiators, generals, and soldiers and Marines on the front lines–No True Glory is a testament to the bravery of the American soldier and a cautionary tale about the complex–and often costly–interconnected roles of policy, politics, and battle in the twenty-first century. |
Contents
| 1 | |
| 9 | |
| 11 | |
A Broken Chain of Command | 20 |
You work with the Americans you die | 26 |
A Backwater Problem | 36 |
Valentines Day Massacre | 45 |
SIEGE March to May 2004 | 53 |
Many Die They Are Gone | 124 |
Easter with the Dark Side | 134 |
A Symptom of Success | 156 |
Lalafallujah | 172 |
The Jolan Graveyard | 194 |
A Deal with the Devil | 208 |
The Bomb Factory | 223 |
All of This for Nothing? | 244 |
They cant do that to Americans | 55 |
Mutiny | 65 |
The Tipping Point | 74 |
Faint Echoes of Tet | 89 |
Farmers or Shooters? | 94 |
Avoiding the Perfect Storm | 112 |
MerryGoRound at the Jolan | 268 |
The House from Hell | 293 |
Epilogue By Inches Not Yards January to May 2005 | 317 |
Notes | 333 |
| 357 | |
Common terms and phrases
Abizaid Al Jazeera Allawi alley American Anbar April Arab armored army attack Baathists Baghdad Battalion 2/1 battle block Bremer Bronzi bullets burst called Capt cars CentCom civilian Colonel commander Company Connors Conway courtyard division door Drinkwine drove east Fallujah Brigade fight fire forces forward Government Center Grapes grenade Highway Humvee hundred meters imam inside insurgents Iraq Iraqi Governing Council Iraqi National Guard Iraqi soldiers Janabi Jazeera Jolan Kasal killed kilometers Lance Corporal Latif LCpl leaders Lieutenant LtCol LtGen machine gun MajGen Marines Mattis McCoy medevac military mortar mosque Najaf National Guard officers patrols platoon police pulled radio Rajiv Chandrasekaran Ramadi rifle rocket roof Rumsfeld Sadr Sanchez Sergeant sheikhs Shiite shooting shot side sniper squad SSgt staff street Suleiman Sunni tanks Toolan truck vehicles wall Washington Post weapons Weemer wounded yelled Zarqawi Zembiec