Chad Miller of Grant, Neb., was studying nursing at UNMC when he was deployed this past October to Iraq, where he serves as a National Guard medic. Read excerpts from e-mails Spc. Miller has shared with friends:
December 10, 2004
…i just wanted to let you know that the next time that i write you it will be from iraq. we are excited to get there and get situated. we received confirmation that we will be flying to our base in iraq, so that is good news. our base is called camp speicher. it is an old iraqi air base outside of Tikrit. you can all take solace in the fact that it is probably the safest compound in iraq, as long as you stay inside of the compound…
December 14, 2004
Greetings from the birthplace of civilization (Iraq to those of you not boned up on your history). We have arrived, and are already finding ourselves very busy. Almost instantly half of our company was tasked out to other camps around Iraq. That ended up being second platoon. I am in first platoon. We are all staying together and we will be doing medical support for convoys. The roles will switch after a set period of time which has yet to be determined. It is pretty much learn on the run. Luckily, the unit that we are replacing is staying here for two weeks with us in order to show us the ropes. They didn’t have that luxury.
The weather here is a little cooler than Kuwait. I actually have to scrape the windows of my ambulance in the mornings because it gets down into the 20’s at night. Days are usually upper 50’s. It is a little cramped, but I suppose I’m going to have to get used to it. We are sleeping 4 people in a hut that is 8’x20′. Hopefully, once all of our troops get tasked out there will be a little room to move some people around. You will be happy to know that the unit is in good spirits because we all got to use real porcelain toilets for the first time in almost a month. Happiness comes in things that we take for granted at home.
December 21, 2004
I am writing to let everyone know that I am all right, and that I was not in Mosul when it was attacked today. Many of our convoys do go there, and I was there about 4 hours before the attack. Fortunately, none of our soldiers were there. Unfortunately, many U.S. soldiers were casualties. I pray that it is no one that we know.Mosul is a very dangerous place right now. Everything is calm and fairly quiet here in Tikrit.
December 30, 2004
greetings from the desert.we didn’t have a white christmas here, but we did have a wet christmas. it rained nearly all day. i had 24 hour duty at the fire station, so i stayed busy all of christmas day and through the night.christmas dinner here was much nicer than i had ever anticipated. they really tried to make things like home for the soldiers. dinner included prime rib, ham, turkey, t-bone steaks, shrimp cocktail, breaded shrimp, lobster tails, and sparkling grape juice. if you would have told me before i got to iraq that i would be eating a lobster tail for christmas i would have told you that you were crazy.
like i have said before iraq is really nothing to look at, but since i have been here i have been trying to find the positives in things. I have found three things that I can look at, and forget that i’m in iraq. first is the stars. with the desert being so flat the sky seems even bigger than the big skies of western nebraska. next are the sunsets. i really wasn’t for sure that i would see a better sunset than i used to look at as a kid. here the sunsets are better.finally, the tigris river is really beautiful. it is a section of green that slices through an otherwise brown desert. i guess that it is better to look at than to swim in because the iraqis dump their sewage in it, so i will keep my distance.
January 13, 2005
Things are slow here with much change looming in the future. They are kind of slowing our convoys down in anticipation of danger on the roads during the elections. We are currently not running any convoys, but that will not be permanent. As I mentioned, things will be changing for me shortly. I will be leaving beautiful Camp Speicher for a destination further Southwest.
January 19, 2005
We made it to our new destination safely. We are now located by a little town called Al Asad. It is in the Al Anhbar province if anyone is interested looking it up on a map. We are about 40 miles west of Ar Ramadi, and probably 60 west of Fallujah. I am now stationed with the Marines, and we are helping to support them medically. The base that we are at is very fortified. You will hear of many Marine casualties in the Al Anhbar province, but those are mainly in the outlying operating bases. We do treat those patients, but they don’t get injured inside of our base.
It is a nice place, and the terrain is definitely different than Tikrit. We are in the middle of the sand dune desert. Our convoy here went pretty smooth. We started at 10:30 at night and arrived at 5:30 in the morning. We drove around Baghdad and Fallujah. We experienced no attacks. We did have to stop the convoy because the front vehicle spotted an explosive device in the middle of the road. It was a short stop and no others were detected. It sounds like we will be here at least 4 months, if not for the whole duration, so I am trying to make myself at home.
February 10, 2005
We made it through the elections without anything major happening. We were prepared for the worst, but thankfully nothing horrible happened. The time around the elections was actually slower than our normal days. We have entered sandstorm season here, so we get a sandstorm once every few days. They aren’t much fun, and they really aren’t fun when you are on a convoy. I thought that driving in a blizzard was bad until now.
As I have mentioned before, we are working in a Navy hospital supporting the Marines, so learning two new rank structures has been a little difficult. Things are taking shape nicely though. We run a very efficient hospital here. Injured soldiers receive top of the line treatment.
February 23, 2005
Things have been fairly slow around here, which is a good thing. When we are slow, then people aren’t getting injured. We do stay very busy with convoys whether we have patients or not. Members of our unit are beginning to head back to the states for their R&R. That means that we will have to pick up our duty in order to make up for the people that are gone. It should make time go faster though. My leave doesn’t come until September, so I have to wait for a while. I will be ready for it when it comes I can guarantee you that. The weather is starting to change a little bit. You can tell that the sun is getting brighter. It still isn’t hot. I don’t need a coat anymore, but the weather is getting up to around 70 during the day. Still in the 30’s to 40’s at night. I’m hoping that the Iraqi Farmer’s Almanac is wrong for this year, and the weather stays like this through the Summer.
March 7, 2005 (message shared with SPC Miller’s unit)
We have reached a milestone in the deployment. It has been 100 days since we first stepped on foreign soil. Thus far, we have had 77 days of continuous operations in Iraq. We have successfully completed 679 missions. Driven over 35,000 miles. Evacuated 1109 patients, treated 1089 U.S. soldiers and Iraqi citizens and supported over 140 convoy missions.
May 4, 2005
Things have been very busy here. Our operations tempo has increased, and we have started a convoy that takes us out on the road for 5-7 days at a time. We travel between the Jordan border and Fallujah. We have been competently treating casualties, and the medical experience that we are gaining here is invaluable.
The miles on the road are grueling, but the companies that we support are very thankful to have us along for the ride. They are used to going out on convoys without medical support. Overall, our unit is proving to be very competent in its job. As a company we have passed 100,000 miles of combat driving miles. I am nearing 10,000 myself, and there will be many more to come.
The weather is definitely starting to heat up. Last week high temperatures were between 105 and 110 degrees. A cold front has moved in this week, and temperatures have dropped to high 70s. We are hoping for many of those cold fronts in the upcoming months.
Well, the countdown is on. We are nearing the half-way point of our deployment, and it is definitely exciting to think about coming home.
June 29, 2005
With the mission that I am running right now, we really don’t get days off, so I will probably spend the 4th of July on a convoy around some part of Western Iraq. Of course back at home everyone looks forward to the fireworks, but I will be hoping for a fireworks free 4th of July, as fireworks are definitely a bad thing here!
The holiday definitely does hold a more special meaning for me. All holidays hold a more special meaning for me, and, actually, everything probably holds a more special meaning to me now. The 4th of July definitely has a new meaning for me. It was the time when we were fighting for our freedom, and I like to think that we are fighting that same fight, so the people of Iraq can experience that same freedom. No one should have to live the way that these people were living, and hopefully sometime in the near future they will experience a sense of safety and freedom that we experience everyday.