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wearing his military backpack and carry his stuff in a plastic trash can...he had military flight tags on his backpack...told me that he had just arrived back from northern Iraq...so, of course, I asked him a lot of questions and thanked him for his service to our country...I live in metro DC area, in a complex with short-term furnished apartments and lots of other leasing arrangements...
He told me that the Iraq situation is grim. There is only tense talk with the citizens of Iraq, only a few translators. The translators are brought over when needed, but at the same time, all guns are pointed at the citizens, even at children, because our soldiers might get attacked, and our soldiers shoot citizens all the time, who come around a corner and our soldiers just shoot to kill, all the soldiers are very nervous and shoot in error just to protect themselves...this soldier was in three cities, all have only very limited power, rationed, only one or two hours a day....or even, just a generator in one area of the city...they have no TV's or internet, except if they want to leave their homes and come to the American-soldier guarded central locations, where American broadcast TV can be viewed...temperatures were way high over 115 degrees F day and night...he said he lost a lot of weight...and is glad to be here...
he could not see the situation improving any time soon, and just was glad to be here...but sad that his fellow soldiers remained in that mess....
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