I Lost My Love in Baghdad

by Michael Hastings

  January 17, 2007

  Andi sits in the back of the car. She is satisfied that the meeting went well. Nothing concrete, no progress, but more meetings lined up, the ball in motion. This is Iraq after all. What’s progress? She feels cold for a moment. She had left her blue blazer back on her chair in her office. She has her folder, her work phone, her badges. Her body armor is on, snugly. The car is running; Yonni, from Hungary, gets in the front seat. An Iraqi man is behind the wheel. The day is still sunny, though it’s not warm. It’s January 17, 2007. Still winter in Iraq, or what passes for it. The sun comes in through the windshield, warming the inside of the car, the stale air.

  She watches the first car leave the compound, out of view down the narrow street.

  A minute or so passes. Her car goes forward. The guards at the Iraqi Islamic Party do not acknowledge them as her car passes through the gate.

  The street is empty.

  Or so it seems for a moment.

  A car pulls in front of her vehicle; her driver has to stop. The noise begins. It takes only a second to know the noise is gunfire. The bullets hit the car. The driver cries out. The bullets hit the engine; her car jerks forward; the tires seem to explode; Yonni yells Get down, get down, get down.

  She inhales. She moves down in her seat. She hears yelling. The words are not clear. She looks out the window. Men are rushing toward her; they are wearing bandannas tied around their faces and pointing AK-47s at the car. She is down in her seat now. Does she scream? Does she cry out? The men have grabbed the door handle and are yanking it, yelling; the noise has not stopped, not yet. They are pointing and waving the guns and trying to open the doors. The car is not moving. Why isn’t the car moving?

  She is now an observer. She is watching. It is all very clear to her.

  This does not seem real. Why is it when things do not seem real, that’s when they get real? When it is real it becomes unreal. She knows she will be safe. She knows that. No matter what happens.

  It is happening so fast. It is so chaotic.

  The men cannot get the doors open. They cannot get into the car. They cannot get her. They are like insane panhandlers in a traffic jam, in a nightmare, faces pressed against the glass. Distorted, excited, screaming. They decide to blow the car open.

  The grenade doesn’t make a sound when is it is dropped. The men run.

  The explosion. In less then a second, the gas tank will catch fire.

  Yonni sees the grenade. He somehow—he doesn’t know how, he just does—he throws himself in the backseat. He covers her up, protects her from the blast.

  Andi doesn’t make a sound. She sees her guard do this; she sees him move to the backseat and cover her. The seat actually breaks as he climbs back. Crack. She is calm. She is looking at nothing now. She closes her eyes.

  She sees her life. It all comes at once.

  In her front yard, her mother calling. Her dad watching in the bleachers at a softball field in Perry, Ohio. She crashes against the centerfield wall. The room she stayed in during summers with her grandmother. The red dress she wore at her sister’s wedding. Chasing her two younger brothers around the couch.

  There is more noise; there is a loud noise.

  What is faster, sound or memories?

  Her two nieces hugging her on the front porch, her sister snapping a digital picture. Her sister’s husband serving swordfish just for her. A field of pine trees, snow covered, rows of white candles.

  The flames are hot. It is so hot now.

  What burns faster, memories or flames?

  Ice skating. Raising her hand in a high school classroom. Graduation day. First day of college. Crossing the state line in a Ford. Moving into an apartment in Boston. At her desk in the governor’s office, late at night, busy. An apartment in New York; a view of Central Park. Turning to tell her best friend the most recent crisis in her new office. She sees her friends; she sees her stones and her angels.

  It is all there, it is coming.

  There is her boyfriend, her significant other, the man she will marry. Seeing him that first night. Standing on the Charles Bridge in Prague. Standing at a glass counter looking at diamonds. Holding hands over the ocean, in a plane, through turbulence. Squeezing, twice for love. Staring into each other’s eyes. Falling asleep, together.

  She sees what happens.

  Her father on a reclining chair in the living room crying, holding a picture of her, inconsolable. She sees her mother shaking softly in church, looking at her face, framed in a picture. She sees her sister on a bitter cold night alone in a snow-covered field screaming why, why, into the wind. She hears her niece ask where’s Andi? She hears her brothers, playing music, loud, very loud, for her. She watches her fiancé writing with tears in his eyes.

  It is almost over now.

  She sees the rest of her life. She sees the ring. She sees a pure white wedding dress and an aisle. She sees her parents and brothers and sisters and friends smiling proudly. She sees the children and the house. She sees the reunions in Ohio; she feels the warmth and hears the laughter and feels the love for her.

  The noise continues, but she is gone.

  Note on Names, Security Procedures, Sources

  Due to the deadly nature of working in Iraq, I’ve changed or used only the first names of the Iraqi security guards and interpreters employed byNewsweek. The exception is Mohammed—his full name is Mohammed Heydar Sideq, and he is currently studying in the United States on a Fulbright scholarship. I have changed the names of the men and women working for NDI and URG. The name of the Mortuary Affairs officer has been changed. The names of the Western security managers working forNewsweek have been changed. Also, Tony is not the real first name of Crazy Tony the German.

  I have slightly altered one aspect of aNewsweek security procedure described in the book: the color of cars we drive in Iraq. The cars are currently in use, and I do not wish to put anyone’s life at greater risk by giving out those details.

  There are a number of books I’ve read that have served as a source for inspiration. In chapter 1, the actual quote from Kapuściński’sImperium is: “But experience has taught that whenever people are taking me on a hazardous, uncertain improbable expedition, it is inappropriate to ask questions. If you ask, it means you don’t trust them; you are uncertain; you are afraid. But you said you wanted to do this. Make up your mind—are you ready for anything or not? Besides—there is no time! It is too late for indecision, for hesitation, for alternatives.” Other books:Once Upon a Distant War by William Prochnau,If I Die in a Combat Zone by Tim O’Brien,Slightly Out of Focus by Robert Capa,Born on the Fourth of July by Ron Kovic, Neal Sheehan’sA Bright and Shining Lie, Bernard Fall: Memories of a Soldier-Scholar, a memoir by his wife Dorothy Fall, and Timothy Findley,The Wars.

  The events recounted in this book are largely drawn from my own notes, observations, and conversations over a two-year period, from August 2005 when I first arrived in Iraq to August 2007 when I completed the reporting for this book. But I also relied on day-to-day news accounts. For this, I am indebted to the excellent work of the Baghdad press corps—The New York Times, The Washington Post,theL.A. Times, The Wall Street Journal, AP, AFP, Reuters,Newsweek, Time, The New Yorker, CNN, and the other networks. I also found the Brookings Institute’s Iraq Index website very helpful for chapter 14, as well as the Iraq Coalition Casualties website. The scenes describing my relationship with Andi are how I remembered them. The emails, text messages, and instant messages are all real. The scene that the book opens with—and the one it closes with, that of Andi’s death—is what I imagined happened, based on the reporting I was able to collect.

  Acknowledgments

  There are many people I’d like to thank for support for me and for this book. First, I’d like to thank my editor Nan Graham at Scribner for her incredible insights, her amazing guidance, and her uncompromising standards. To my agent Sarah Chalfant at the Wylie Agency for her calming voice, her friendship, and for believing in this from the
beginning. I am especially grateful for the support ofNewsweek magazine. It has been a privilege for me to work for, and learn from, Jon Meacham, Fareed Zakaria, and Dan Klaidman. I would also like to thank Lally Weymouth, Don Graham, and Rick Smith, for treating me like a member of the family. To Scott Johnson, Babak Dehghanpisheh, and Rod Nordland for teaching me how to report in Iraq. To my editors at the magazine, Nisid Hajari, Jeff Bartholet, Andrew Nagorksi, and Sam Seibert, who week after week always asked the right questions. To Jon Darman for being a great friend willing to hear me vent. To my other editors and colleagues at the magazine (former and current) who I learned so much from over the years: Tony Emerson, Fred Guterl, John Wojno, Christian Caryl, Jack Livings, David Kammerman, Christopher Dickey, Mark Whitaker, Alexis Gelber, Michael Hirsh, Dave Friedman, Cathy Ruggiero, Sharon Sullivan, Jamie Cunningham, Nancy Cooper, Ranya Khadri, Mark Miller, Marcus Mabry, Malcolm Beith, Michael Meyer, Sarah Childress, Stryker McGuire, Silvia Spring, Will Dobson, Richard Ernsberger, Dan Ephron, Kevin Peraino, Joanna Chen, Nuha Musla, Debra Rosenburg, Deidre Depke, Arlene Getz, and Carl Sullivan (for putting my stories up on the website, no matter the hour). I also need to thank my translators in Iraq, especially Mohammed Heydar Sideq, and I hope one day I can give you all the credit you deserve. I owe a debt of gratitude to the staff at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad: Lou Fintor, Nicole Sanders, John Sullivan, John Roberts, Clinton Carter, Armand Cucinello, and Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. For theNewsweek security managers I can’t name—thanks as well. To my friends from the Baghdad press corps: Louise Rouge, Solomon Moore, Phillip Shiskin, Larry Kaplow, Borzou Dargahi, and Ned Parker. To Lucian Read for keeping me company with the 172nd and beyond. To all the U.S. soldiers and marines I met—there are too many to name, and I thank them for keeping me safe and letting me ride along. Captain Brad Velotta, LTC John Norris, LTC Steven Duke, LTC Barry Johnson, Captain John Grauer, Captain Gregory Hirschey, Staff Sergeant Jason DeMoss, Lance Corporal Andrew Gladue, Sergeant Brian Patton, and all the men of the 172nd Stryker Brigade. To Joel Lovell for getting me to the finish line with excellent editorial skill. To Edward Orloff at the Wylie Agency for his always good advice and willingness to listen to me ramble. To Lauretta Charlton at Scribner for making sure I got all the right pages at the right time. To my friends Sanjay Reddy, Raja Reddy, Michal Hanuka, and Nick Braccia. Thanks to Pat and Charlie Bresnahan and Suzie and Wendell Cook for the hospitality, and room with a view. To Sarah Raimo and Keri Bertolino. To Matt Hiltzik and Al Franken for keeping Andi’s memory alive. To Jaime Horn for her friendship and love of Andi. To my family, Brent, Molly, Jeff, Jon, Margaret, and Ruthgram. To Joe, Marci, Kayla, and Abby Zampini. To Cory and Chris Parhamovich. And to Vicki and Andre Parhamovich for your love, your strength, and for bringing Andi into this world.