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War in Iraq

at around evening time on Monday, the 12th of May 2003 by Capt Jake Fortune

I’m only going to do one post on the entire war in Iraq.
I was there the first time we went through all this. I was in Safwan and Rahfa doing refugee flights. I remember having to hose out the back of a C-130 because the flight had been rather bumpy. And another one that stalled on the runway and couldn’t start up. We didn’t have an APU to start up the engines either. So we parked another C-130 in front of it and it spun up its propellers fast enough to start the stalled planes engines spinning, kind of like a fan blowing a fan. But mostly I remember the people that were flown out if Iraq. I remember one woman in a red dress. Not sure why she didn’t have on a burqa.
I hope the remaining refugees can finally return in peace. Its hard to believe they have been in the camps this long. But every Iraqi I had met knew the answer. Very few parts of the world are so far in the darkness that they do not know what freedom is, even if they do not have it themselves. I firmly believe Iraq is now a better place. It may be difficult, things may be chaotic, but this is their release. This is also thier “interesting times…”

This is me as Boater Romeo in Rafha, Saudi Arabia, being an Air Traffic Controller because I knew how to work the crypto gear on the radios…