Mercenaries, Gunslingers, and Outlaws is the story of 2½ years as a security contractor in Iraq. It’s not just a story about firefights and surviving IEDs while protecting American contractors, although those kinds of stories are there, it shares an account that covers the full spectrum of some of the most profound experiences of his life.Rather than a chronological account, the book is broken into sections covering an amazingly wide range of experiences and topics. The chapters within each section are relatively short and tell complete stories, much like vignettes, that keep the reader turning the pages. The reader experiences IEDs, high-speed crashes, firefights, run-ins with Iraqi security forces, the stress and uncertainty of being surrounded by locals, any one of whom could be an insurgent or suicide bomber, the tactics used to stay alive on the roads, and the inevitable human cost in lost and destroyed lives.Some sections tell the stories of the people he met and worked beside: former U.S. Army Green Berets, British Royal Marines, a former Lebanese Christian Militiamen captured by the Syrians when he was 16, British Gurkhas from Nepal, South African counter-terrorist commandos, a former member of the French Foreign Legion, and even a Buddhist monk. There are stories of heroic figures who were larger than life, of outlaws who came to Iraq because they didn’t fit in anywhere else and ended up not fitting in there either, and then there are the Iraqi people who invited the author into their homes.

During the Iraq War, the U.S. Army found itself in a very similar situation to the 1st Air Mobile Cavalry Division during the Vietnam Conflict—facing an enemy who knew the terrain and was determined to fight for their cause. The difference between the two conflicts is that American forces could not take full advantage of armor superiority in Vietnam. For the infantry to truly be effective and dominant, they need to have the backing of tanks, enabling them to continue dismounted operations overwatched by tanks.The history and battle techniques of the army’s armored core have been discussed in other military conflicts in depth, but this will be the first full discussion of the role and usefulness of the tanks in Iraq, analyzing battles that were completely shaped or significantly aided due to the presence and efficiency of armor units. These units were well-trained and well-equipped and provided armored support and devastating firepower that the enemy could not easily counter. They were such a powerful force that the insurgents in Iraq had to completely change their tactics to account for the Abrams that they were facing. This work will attempt to illuminate the importance of the tanks themselves as well as the tankers who fought inside of them and show how valuable they were to the army and Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2003–2009.

In 2004, most areas of Al Anbar province in Iraq exploded into widescale insurgencies and attacks on US and allied forces. In both Fallujah and throughout Al Anbar province, elements of the 1st Marine Division engaged in a wide range of operations, ranging from control of border crossings in Western Iraq, to infantrycentered urban combat in Ramadi, the provincial capital.Unique to many of these actions was the use of the Marine Corps’ Light Armored Vehicle, the LAV 25. These vehicles screened large areas of desert, searched for hidden IEDs along highways, and provided extra firepower for infantry units in combat. Using LAVs, the 1st LAR Battalion, with attached infantry company Echo 2/7, patrolled large stretches of the borders with Syria and Jordan as well as highways used for commerce and smuggling. In addition to providing camp security and raid elements for the 1st LAR Battalion, Echo Company also dispatched two infantry platoons to supervise border crossings with Jordan. During Operation Vigilant Resolve the 1st LAR Battalion drove from the Western border areas to Fallujah to support the Operation when Marine forces isolated the city in April.An LAR company from Camp LeJeune—Delta Company 2nd LAR Battalion—under Captain Ladd Wilkie Shepard, provided added firepower to the fighting on the outskirts of Fallujah. This company suffered its first deaths from a large vehicleborn IED that destroyed one of its LAVs during a routine patrol near the city. Delta Company supported the efforts of Regimental Combat Team 1 in Fallujah. In the city of Ramadi, insurgents created a hostile environment for the infantry Marines of the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, almost as soon as they arrived. These Marines, assisted by a US Army mechanized brigade, fought nearly daily, culminating in a particularly deadly ambush for the Marines of Echo Company, 2/4, in April 2004.The Marines of the LAV and infantry units tell their stories of preparations for deployment to Iraq, early actions on arrival, and fighting under a variety of locations and conditions in the early part of 2004. They have created a remarkable legacy of their actions, highlighted by their own words.

In 2006, the shock and awe campaign of securing the major cities had ended, and the Iraq War had moved into an alien phase for the clandestine operators of Blackflag1. Their motto "swift, silent, deadly," the Marine operators of 2nd Reconnaissance Battalion were not intended for conventional warfare but they were now tasked with holding the Zaidon region of Iraq. In this deadly zone, where even Saddam would not send his most elite troops, the operators were faced with the war on a new front; fierce local tribes who proclaimed they would kill any who entered their lands, foreign insurgents or Marines alike.

“The Devil’s Playground” was anything south of the second canal to the men of Charlie Company’s 2nd Platoon—Two Charlie—during their 2009–2010 deployment to the Arghandab River Valley in Afghanistan. The valley had been a notorious hot spot throughout history, with the Russians unable to maintain a foothold in the 80s and Coalition forces now facing the same problem during Operation Enduring Freedom.The Two Charlie paratroopers deployed as part of the 2-508th PIR, Two Fury, of the 82nd Airborne Division, but always seemed to be on their own. They started their deployment attached to Canadian forces in Panjwai but were shortly moved into the Arghandab with one of the battalion’s biggest Areas of Operation. They inherited a bare bones outpost that they worked hard to turn into the defendable position known as COP Tynes, while patrolling the grape fields and orchards of the valley. Little did they know that when the leaves returned to the valley in the spring, so too would the fighting.As the fighting picked up in the valley, the men of Two Charlie continued to sustain casualties as they fought day in and day out. There was never a dull moment in the Arghandab, and the fact that Two Charlie had to patrol, act as a quick reaction force, and secure their outpost on their own ensured that they never stopped. The men were constantly brought to their breaking point as their numbers dwindled and the fighting intensified. The men all started to believe that they weren’t going to make it out of the valley alive. The one rule of the valley would be proved time and time again: in the end, the valley always wins.This book shares the story of the men of Two Charlie and their fight for survival in the Arghandab River Valley, the Devil’s Playground.

The decision to not deploy reoriented, trained Iraqi divisions and other allied forces in numbers significant enough to adequately stabilize the situation in Iraq in 2003–04 resulted in significant shortages of manpower and equipment that eventually led to a less-than-satisfactory ending to the campaign, and significantly challenged the entire Coalition effort in the first year of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The roles and missions assumed by allies were vitally important in the under-resourced effort to bring order to the chaos of Iraq but would remain relatively unheralded throughout most of the campaign.Colonel Tiso’s account of this time offers unique insights into the challenges of planning the Iraqi campaign and the intricacies and challenges of multinational service through the lens of his assignments as a war planner at U. S. Central Command, Senior Military Adviser of the Arab Peninsula Shield Force and the Polish-led Multinational Division (Central-South), and Chief of Staff and Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations (C-3) of the Coalition Military Assistance Training Team tasked to develop the New Iraqi Army. His observations cast significant light on the missions these units undertook and the challenges they confronted.His firsthand account of operational planning for war in Iraq captures the concerns of the military planners and senior commanders to liberate and stabilize the country, enabling the reader to better understand the challenges of operational war planning, coalition warfare, the difficulty of stabilizing Iraq after the fall of Baghdad, the development of the New Iraqi Army, and ultimately a deeper understanding of America’s “long war” in Iraq.

The most eye-opening, and terrifying, story in Chip Reid's career as a journalist was the six weeks he spent with 3d Battalion, 5th Marines, during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, as a correspondent for NBC News. Traveling shoulder-to-shoulder with the young Marines, he had unparalleled access, witnessing them in combat, and interviewing as many as he could persuade his bosses to put on air, allowing them to tell their war stories in their own words. It took only 22 days for the Marines of 3/5 to fight their way to Baghdad, but the effects on those who fought have lasted a lifetime. They lost a number of their own in battle, and others suffered life-threatening injuries. Of those who returned - even if they avoided physical scars - many have had to find their own way through survivor's guilt and the nightmare of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, with all its attendant miseries. Twenty years on, Chip sat down with the Marines of 3/5 once more. They told Chip inspiring stories of heroism in battle, of camaraderie and comrades lost, of patriotism and belief in mission, of recovery and success in both military and civilian life, and of the new appreciation for life that results from Post-Traumatic Growth. Visceral and searingly honest, this book is a tribute to the Marines for their service, and for the many sacrifices they made then, and that many still make today.

In March 2004, the unprovoked ambush, killing and desecration of the bodies of American civilian security contractors in Fallujah, Iraq, caused the National Command Authorities in Washington, DC. to demand that the newly arrived Marine Expeditionary Force there take action against the perpetrators and other insurgent forces. Planned Stability and Support Operations were cast aside as insurgent fighters dared the Marines to enter Fallujah. Marine infantrymen, tankers, helicopter crews, and amphibious vehicle drivers all pitched into high-intensity battles and firefights during the first fights of Fallujah in April 2004. Across the board cooperation and innovation marked these fighting Marines in combined arms fights that no one expected. Marines fought in the streets, conducted house-to-house searches, cleared buildings of enemy, and used tank main guns in direct support of urban environment operations. Helicopter crews supported operations on the ground with rockets and machine-gun fire, and Amtrac Marines transported forces to face enemy RPG and machine-gun fire. Marines from infantry squad members to a battalion commander were interviewed by Marine Corps field historians within days or weeks of the events at nearby combat outposts and camps.This book combines these interview notes and the words of the men themselves to create a unique narrative of Marines in this combat.

Codenamed Operation Telic, the British component of the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was the largest gathering of British troops since the Second World War. Whilst the British public prepared for the worst as its soldiers were facing weapons of mass destruction, most servicemen and women were under no illusion that they were invading Iraq to rid the people of Saddam Hussein.While much has been said about WMD and Tony Blair’s government, not nearly enough has been heard from those men and women that took part in Operation Telic. Based upon dozens of veteran interviews, personal diaries and archival material, this book tells their stories, in their own words.From controlling the vast Allied Air Forces at 34,000 feet in an AWACS plane down to submariners beneath the warm waves of the Persian Gulf firing Tomahawk Cruise missiles, from the steaming hot turret of a Challenger Tank as it is peppered with RPGs, to being on your belly in a sandstorm disarming unexploded bombs – these veteran accounts cover the whole spectrum of experiences.Polarised public opinion and the post-war media portrayal of the war has detracted from what was achieved by these forces, when tasked to do so, often with insufficient or inadequate resources. These are their stories of courage, fortitude, pride, and brotherhood amidst the harsh realities of modern asymmetric warfare.

During the April 2004 fights throughout Iraq, most media attention was focused on the city of Fallujah. However, at the same time, out on the border with Syria in and around the city of Husaybah, fighting was equally intense. This book tells the story of that period through many first-person accounts of intense fighting in the town of Husaybah, Iraq, during. It is based on interviews with Marines at all levels of the fight, from battalion commander Lieutenant Colonel Matt Lopez, USMC, to infantrymen and squad leaders. When the Lima Company commander Captain Richard Gannon (Call sign Lima 6) was killed on entry to an enemy-held building, the company’s executive officer, Lieutenant Dominique Neal (Lima 5) informed his Marines that he had assumed command with the radio message, “Lima 5 is now Lima 6.” It also details the heroic actions of Corporal Jason Dunham who saved the Marines around him by covering an enemy grenade with his body.