A Hundred and One Days: A Baghdad Journal (25 page)

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Authors: Asne Seierstad,Ingrid Christophersen

Tags: #Biography & Autobiography, #General, #Editors; Journalists; Publishers, #History, #Military, #Iraq War (2003-2011), #Language Arts & Disciplines, #Journalism, #Social Science, #Customs & Traditions, #Sociology

BOOK: A Hundred and One Days: A Baghdad Journal
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We go to the press centre to see if there is any news. There is. As we drive into the parking lot the whole press centre, like one great bounding monster, is on its way down to the Tigris. Ferocious shooting is audible from afar. We rush after them. Volleys of gunfire strike the water; the river gobbles up the bullets.
 
Five boats patrol the river bank; they search among the rushes and try to create waves to make it difficult for whoever is hiding. The alarm is sounded: An American helicopter has been hit and the pilot has ejected - into the Tigris. The story of the downed helicopter has moved from al-Kindi secondary school to the river bank.
 
Several divers are in situ. They reconnoitre, emerge, then search some more. Men in uniform pour oil on the rushes and set them alight. The flames and crackling are greeted with jubilation. From time to time someone calls out: Come here! The river bank is alive with spectators rushing here and there, following the call to come and see.
 
The bridge spanning the river is black with people. For hours they follow the drama, the only show in town. Isolated bomb blasts occasionally distract their attention away from the spectacle. Once there are seven bangs in a row. A white cloud of smoke rises up on the horizon, followed by loud discussion as to the whereabouts of the blast.
 
Where is the helicopter? And the parachute? Has anyone actually seen them? A little boy is sure he has seen them fall. An engineer is equally convinced. - They’re there in the water somewhere, or on the bottom, he says from his vantage point on the bridge.
 
The coalition forces deny that a helicopter has been lost: None is missing, the statement runs.
 
In the restaurants and teahouses of Baghdad the rumours run amok: American captives, downed planes, military victories, swingeing losses. And what about Saddam Hussein? Has he been wounded in the night’s attacks or not? Someone is said to have seen him leave one of his palaces in an ambulance.
 
Everyone has seen something, or knows someone who has seen something, or knows someone who knows someone who has heard of someone who has seen something.
 
While the town seethes with increasingly wild stories, Baghdad is hit several times. Powerful cracks cause windows to vibrate, but after four nights and days of bombing curiosity has overtaken fear and people want to see where and what has been hit.
 
In the dusk the last spectators leave the bridge over the Tigris. The river flows on peacefully as before, on its way to the Persian Gulf, as it did when God punished the people with the confusion in Babel, a long, long time and many, many wars ago.
 
 
It is not only rumours that haunt Baghdad this first week of war. Speculation and guesswork follow. Speculation about how it is really going. General Tommy Franks maintains that the coalition forces have made ‘dramatic advances’ and that they have met only ‘sporadic resistance’. The troops move on Baghdad at a steady pace, he says. The Iraqis, on the other hand, boast about their victories. Each day at 2pm we are roped in to listen to Information Minister al-Sahhaf. Each day the press briefings are equally soporific, as are the TV broadcasts translated by Aliya.
 
- The enemy has been weakened, the anchorman says every evening. By now he is wearing the military-green Baath Party uniform. - We are triumphant on every front.
 
We never find out when or where these battles take place, how many are killed, or how far into the country the Americans have advanced. The broadcasts are coated with a thin skin of information and are otherwise pure propaganda. They are designed to make the man in the street feel that he is part of the struggle against the Americans. The front pages of the papers promise a handsome reward to anyone who strikes down the enemy. One hundred million dinars to anyone who brings down an aircraft, fifty million to anyone who hits a helicopter, the same if the pilot is captured alive. Only half if he is killed.
 
One day Saddam Hussein appears on TV again. The message is that the Americans are about to fall into a trap.
 
Many believe his words have come true when a ferocious sandstorm blows up that same afternoon, halting the advance on Baghdad. It turns out to be the worst sandstorm in forty years. The wind howls round street corners, whistles outside people’s doors and knocks over everything that is not fastened or bolted down.
 
- Allah has come to our rescue, the mosques resound. - He stopped the infidel with His power.
 
The desert storm bathes the town in a magical light. The squalls carry with them thin, yellowish sand dust from the south. It blends with the huge pillars of smoke that rise in a circle round the town. The lowering clouds, the smoke, the dust and the sand lie over the city like a lid.
 
One afternoon while we are waiting for al-Sahhaf, the heavy soup is being whirled around by strong gusts of wind. Through taped windows we see the palm trees swaying menacingly. Suddenly Kadim comes crashing in.
 
- Go to Shaab market, he calls. - The press conference is cancelled.
 
We run to the cars, fearing that he might change his mind and nail us to the hard chairs in the press room, and tear off north. The majority of Baghdad’s inhabitants have stayed indoors on this grim day and the few who are around huddle into their jackets and coats. A few empty crates bounce along the road.
 
It is midday but it is difficult to see. Above us the sky looms black with soot from oil fires and desert sand.
 
We stop by the market.
 
Charred buildings gape at us. Twisted car wrecks lie abandoned in the middle of the road. People are crying. Pools of blood have percolated through the layer of sand on the ground. With the help of eye-witnesses, neighbours and relatives I try to reconstruct what happened on this stormy Wednesday in March.
 
 
It is nearly midday. Zahra will be home soon. She and her family have decided to move back to the house in the Shaab district of Baghdad. In order to escape the bombs they have been living with relatives in a Baghdad suburb for a week. Now that the ground war is drawing near they feel it would be safer to live closer to the town centre.
 
Zahra sits at the back of the minibus holding the baby in her arms. With her are her husband, sisters, mother and three children. The bus stops and they get out.
 
A tanker is parked nearby. The driver wants to have his lunch in Restaurant Ristafa, one of the few to stay open. The premises are half-empty. A bunch of children play in the dust that covers the ground after the last days’ sandstorms.
 
Before the driver has made it across the street the bomb goes off. A missile hits the pavement close to the lorry. Flames shoot up. The driver and those standing close by are killed instantly. The air pressure causes Zahra’s entire family to fall to the ground.
 
Out of a house close by Muhammed comes running. He heard the noise and wants to see what happened. A further missile zips past, hits the ground and radiates deadly fragments in every direction. The twenty-two-year-old falls, screaming. One leg is a bloody pulp, the other peppered with metal. Around bodies fall to the ground from the air pressure, the shards, the shock. The tanker is blazing and twenty other cars catch fire. Anyone who was passing by when the missile hit perishes in their burning cars. The market shops lie in ruins and ten or so apartments are a total loss. Ristafa is crushed; those partaking of lunch are killed.
 
Screams rent the air. Blood runs into the sand on the street and pavements. Those who can, get up.
 
Zahra and her family lie still; they are all unconscious. Muhammed is on the ground bellowing with pain. By his side lies a man whose artery has been severed; blood pumps from his body. They are both conscious when the ambulance arrives.
 
About thirty wounded are brought to al-Zahrawi hospital close by. The man with the severed artery dies on the way. Those killed are taken to al-Kindi hospital from where their bodies are collected by their families to be buried the same day.
 
Torn off body parts are removed from the street. After a few hours only the blood in the sand remains.
 
Then the rain comes and the puddles are filled with blood. Burning oil wells, desert sand, soot and smoke descend as raindrops. Cars, houses, windows, faces - all are coated in yellow-brown spots. The rain draws the blood out from the sand and fills the puddles with red, muddy water.
 
Angry, frightened and soaked to the skin, people remain standing there. Their neighbourhood has been attacked.
 
- Bush said he would only attack military targets, but what is this? someone screams. - They want to destroy us, someone else calls out. - This is no military target. It is revenge for our advances on the battlefield. He should be ashamed of himself!
 
Zahra wakes up. She has shards of shrapnel all over her body and four broken ribs. Her daughter Aisha stands by her bed. Aisha’s hair is matted with mud but she is unhurt. She pats her mother’s shoulder, caresses her arm.
 
Zahra gives her daughter a faint smile. Her husband lies in the bed next to hers; he has wounds all over his body. Her younger sister is nearby. She has leg and chest wounds. Grandmother lies by the wall. Her ear was ripped off and she wears a bloody bandage round her head.
 
- Where is Hamudi? Aisha asks.
 
- Hamudi is at home. He’s alright, Zahra says. She has just been told what happened and that ten-year-old Hamudi and the baby escaped injury. Her tears flow.
 
- Three babies have been seriously wounded; one has deep cuts in its head, the other was hit by shrapnel. A tiny baby whose mother lost hold of it in the blast was thrown against a wall and is seriously wounded, Doctor Sermed al-Gailani says. He is treating the first patients following the missile attack.
 
- Awful, the doctor sighs. - These are innocent people and did not deserve this. But such is war. More will be killed, more will be wounded. To believe anything else would be to deceive oneself. This will be far worse than anything we have previously seen, he says quietly.
 
The sandstorm continues to rage on outside the hospital walls. Darkness falls; people disappear indoors and only the charred cars remain. The boom of bombs falling on the outskirts of Baghdad is audible. The war carries on while the blood in the puddles is washed away by the rainwater.
 
 
It is pitch black when we return to the hotel. We hear explosions but do not know where the bombs hit. There are hardly any cars on the road. If I were to imagine the Day of Judgement this would be it: violent storms, drifting sand, smoke blotting out the sun, blended with screams, blood and severed limbs.
 
Drenched and covered in mud I reach my room.
 
I turn on the computer to write. An email from the
Politiken
’s foreign editor appears on the screen. Subject: Advice.
 
Dear Åsne,
 
 
 
Hope all is well, appalling about the bombing at the market today.
 
 
I would just like to give you a word of advice in this time. Make sure your bed and desk are away from the window so you will not be exposed to broken glass if your windows blow apart during bombardments - after all, they happen at night when one is sleeping.
 
 
Put a glass of water on the windowsill. When the water moves it might mean that a plane is approaching.
 
 
Make sure you soften the mental strain by getting enough sleep and reading about things other than war and Iraq. - I would suggest Barbara Cartland (however, if you make your face up the way she does your TV career is over, so look out). Your thoughts must be clear and precise.
 
 
Always carry the protection gear and mask, you might find you need them very suddenly - the danger of being overcome by chemical weapons is more severe when the wind is blowing away from the American positions and in towards Baghdad, but just be careful about everything.
 
 
Best wishes,
 
 
Michael
 

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