We landed at al Asad Air Base after midnight, and checked in at a plywood office inside a converted aircraft hangar.  Out in the main area rows of chairs faced what should have been, given the cavernous space and scores of seats, a big-screen TV.  Instead it was an old and ratty model perfectly sized to sit on top of the mini-fridge in a freshman’s dorm room.  Instructions stenciled onto the wall in spray-paint warned against touching the TV, moving the chairs, and generally treating the area like a lounge instead of a passenger terminal.

That hangar and the giant tents around it are the landing zone for al Asad Air Base, but they’re also the gateway to a city.  I don’t know exactly how many men and women live on al Asad, but it has to be several thousand.  It takes a lot longer to drive from the Public Affairs Office to the trailer where I’m now living that it did to drive from my childhood home to my high school in suburban Chicago.  And my high school was two suburbs away.

My first couple days here were with Squadron 269:  pilots, crews and ground support for Huey and Cobra helicopters (lighter Marine equivalents to Blackhawks and Apaches).  They work far away from the heart of the base, and at night the distant lights shine bright and hard in the clear desert air.

The shops where Marines trouble-shoot and fix dented panels, worn-out wiring and dozens of other little problems look like ad hoc versions of Stateside auto garages.  The floors are concrete, the interior walls are plywood.  There are inboxes, manuals and task-lists on tables, desks and walls.  Yesterday was slow; it was rainy and windy and not a great day for flying.

One of the staff sergeants was hotwiring a fluorescent light for his office.  This was Avionics (where they “fix anything that has a wire attached to it”), and I was waiting to be picked up by the PAO and delivered to another unit.  Some of the more junior non-commissioned officers were joking about rigging the light to shock their sergeant.

Staff Sergeant:  If you do that you better hope it kills me.

[Long pause]

Casual voice from the other side of a plywood wall:  Okay.

I’ve never been to a boot camp, so I don’t know how accurate the Full Metal Jacket stereotype is in that environment.  But at least out in the field Marines, like the US soldiers I’ve hung out with, are pretty relaxed about rank.  That doesn’t mean they don’t take it seriously; maybe they take it so seriously that they can take it for granted and not make a big deal out of it.  With very rare exceptions I haven’t heard a lot of yelling out here.  Of course, I’m sure there’s a lot that goes on that I never see.  But I don’t think it’s possible to fake, for days on end, the way friends and co-workers interact with one another.  The ease with which these guys live and work together seems genuine.  One Marine was typing something on the office computer that apparently included “Hooah,” a catch-all word that can mean anything from “Okay” to “Hello” to “Awesome!”

Marine One:  You know Hooah has an H.

Marine Two:  I don’t give a fuck.

Marine One:  Hooah.

The Marines, some of whom have been on this base twice now, say it’s getting more comfortable.  In the center of town there is a recreation center complete with big screen TVs, leather couches, and poker tables (you can win chips but not money—gambling is prohibited on base).  The six pool tables are dark wood and real felt.  Above the pool tables are low-hanging lights like the ones over pool tables in American bars.  Instead of “Miller Lite” the glass reads “Al Asad MWR,” for Morale, Welfare and Recreation.

Even the Marines, who have access to a network of rumor, gossip and sometimes reliable information, are occasionally shocked when they arrive here.  Many have told me they didn’t expect to be living in “Can Cities,” the nickname for rows of air-conditioned trailers where men live two-to-a-room.  Some didn’t expect hot running water in the shower trailers, or (mostly) reliable phone and internet connections.  There is a Subway sandwich shop in the same building as a Starbucks clone coffee franchise.  There is a Pizza Hut, a Burger King, and a gift shop where you can buy t-shirts emblazoned with the base name and a skull and crossbones. 

Out on the airfield they’re improving the runways.  They’re laying state-of-the-art fiber optic cable to replace the temporary communications system.  Private construction companies have their own trailers, with earth-moving equipment parked on the gravel out front.  This belies the idea that American reverses in Iraq will force a US  pull-out.  The Americans on this base are planning for the future, not preparing to leave town (unless these improvements are the most inexplicable act of benevolence one country has ever bestowed on another).  Presumably the military is either preparing for a long fight against the insurgency or looking to a future in which it can station men and machinery here in relative peace.