Letter from Bruce Jonas' Sister in Iraq

Deborah Ussery in Iraq (Director Bruce Jonas' sister)
Dec. 20, 2005

Happy Holidays Everyone! Well, not much new stuff has been happening in my world. (Well….at least not when I first started this letter. It changed on the 18th!) Pretty much the same stuff day in and day out. Some people liken it to the movie "Groundhog Day". But, I will admit that the days go by pretty fast. Or, at least, it sometimes seems that way.

Thanksgiving Day was pretty nice. I think I mentioned that in my last letter home. I am sending two pictures of the decorations that the Iraqi chow hall staff did. There are some things that you will see in the pictures that do not have anything to do with Thanksgiving (like a dinosaur), but they had a ball doing it and it looked pretty good.

I will admit that Thanksgiving Day was the first day that I really started missing home really bad. For the most part, I do pretty well. It helps that I can email family and friends. (And thanks to all of you who write!).

I do want to relate a funny story to everyone. Some of you might find it a little scary, but since I live with this day-to-day (along with my buddies over here) we all find it amusing. I will try to explain it in detail. As most of you already know I live and work on the Iraqi side of post. The other side of the post is the Coalition Side.

Most of the coalition forces never come over to my side of the base. It is like they are scared of the Iraqi's or something. If they only knew that we have Internet in our rooms, live in a wet trailer (meaning that we have a bathroom in our room), eat in a dining facility with cloth table cloths, real silver wear, cloth napkins, and glass glasses, they would try to come over here as well. We do things differently on my side of the base.

One of the main things is that when we have an impact on our side (meaning a mortar has landed and exploded) we continue on about our work like nothing has happened. (Since I have been here we have not had any injuries from a mortar attack - my side or the coalition side - and very little property damage. The insurgents are not very accurate when firing off mortars.) The coalition side bunkers down when they have a mortar attack. They sound the alarm and everybody gets kicked out of the chow hall and they have to go to bunkers until the all clear is given. I have never been on the coalition side when they have had an impact, so I have no idea what to really expect should one happen while I am over there. Well, not to long ago I got to participate in a mortar attack while eating in the chow hall over on the coalition side.

The mortar hit a good distance away. (Just didn't want you guys to think it was any where near where we were.) Let me describe the chow hall. It is very big. Imagine a table that seats four people. Two across from each other. Imagine two tables put end to end. Now line up about 10 of them leaving space between them for chairs and walking space. That would equal one row of tables.

The dining hall is set up in three sections with the two outside sections having only 2 rows of tables that I described above. The middle section has 3 rows of tables. Well, when I was there it was pretty packed. I was sitting in one of the end sections along with the Commander (Colonial) of my side of the base, the Executive Officer, the Command Sergeant Major (CSM), two Majors, and another enlisted soldier. All of a sudden we hear a noise. It sounded like everybody getting up really fast and scrapping their chairs on the floor in a rush to stand up. Like when there is a fight in a dinning facility and everybody jumps up to watch.

Well, that was what everybody at my table thought was going on. We all stand up and look over to the far side of the chow hall. I was sitting at the end of the table so I stepped into the isle to get a better look. The next thing I know I see everybody diving under their tables.

My first thought was that we had a crazy person in the chow hall with us threatening us in some manner. Well, of course, I am getting down as well. (Still holding my ice cream mind you!)

At the same time the CSM is pushing me down. Then I hear a lot of people locking and loading their M16s. (I found out later that the CSM had also locked and loaded his M9 and he was just behind me to my left.)

Well, the wild thoughts I had going through my head!! I see a few Iraqi chow hall workers running out the door. At this time I am thinking that a soldier has gone bonkers and is threatening to shoot someone.

Can you only imagine what would have happened if someone accidentally fire off a round? Well, we started getting up again (once again the CSM pulling me up). Everybody started heading for the door. The CSM has a hold of my left arm pushing me a long.

Once we get out of the chow hall we hear the sirens going off so we go into the bunker. I am asking around trying to find out if this is normal. It wasn't. (Oh, I still have my ice cream so I was able to finish it while waiting for the all clear to be given!) We later found out that a Sergeant Major came in the chow hall and yelled for everybody to hit the deck, so they did. The coalition side is having a change over so there are a lot of new 4th ID folks here who don't know what to do yet. We think the Sergeant Major was one of them. I also found out a few more things later on. One of things I found out was that someone at our table had knocked over a bottle of stake sauce and it fell to the floor and broke. It got all over the Colonial's boots and pants leg.

The Executive Officer and another Major made sure that he was protected and made sure he got out of the dining facility okay. The CSM started bragging how he was my protector.

I told him that I was in more danger from him than from anything else. Hell, he had a locked and loaded M9 near me! The Colonial told me a few days later that he yelled at the CSM for locking and loading. The CSM just laughs about it. We all do.

The same CSM is calling me sniper now. We went out a week ago to fire our weapons on the range.

The Colonial and his security team were there, the CSM, the Executive Officer and a few other folks. Since I got there late I ended up firing on a target that had already been fired at.

I was complaining that I wanted a fresh target so that I could tell my shots from someone else's shots.

The Range Safety NCO just told me to shoot at the head. I look up and notice that only one shot was in the head, so I agree. Well, all my shots were in the head. The Colonial said that he was going to make me his body guard since I out shot his security guys (who are Iraqi) and even him. Later on he said that nobody out shoots the Commander. The CSM just decided to call me sniper.

Now, On December 18th we had Vice President Dick Cheney come visit us at Taji. I have attached a picture that was taken by a friend. The professional picture was taken by someone else and I don't have it yet.

I will send it out once I get it. It is funny how the press played it up as a surprise visit and it really was. We had the White House communications guys and other personnel on our side of the base five days prior to his visit. I knew it was either going to be the President or the Vice President the day before the visit. I didn't find out until I was on the airfield waiting for him that it was going to be the Vice President. I ended up driving the control vehicle. I have no idea who the men were who were in the vehicle. I just know that I was the control vehicle. I was the second vehicle behind the VP (who was riding in an up-armored Hummer).

The vehicle behind him was the Secret Service vehicle; then my vehicle. I went where ever they went. In the group photo I was standing next to him on his right.

I ended up getting a coin from the White House Communications and a golf shirt from the Secret Service. In the picture starting from the back row on the left are: CSM Blanco, Colonial Linkenhoker (Base Commander), me, VP Dick Cheney, SSG Dicken, Major Niles, Major Goyne (Executive Officer). Front row: Major Wetmore, SSG Stahl, and SGT Wightman.

We have other people that we work with but they just weren't in the group photo. They probably had a picture taken with him by themselves. Any way, it was something different in my day-to-day routine.

Well, that is all for now. For all of you who sent me emails, cards, packages I thank you very much. Hopefully I have personally emailed you back. If not, I will soon! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Debbie