1 00:00:02,000 --> 00:00:08,120 This programme contains very strong language and scenes which some viewers may find disturbing 2 00:00:26,720 --> 00:00:33,120 There was an SUV full of four Blackwater contractors who were, 3 00:00:33,120 --> 00:00:35,200 you know, driving around Fallujah. 4 00:00:35,200 --> 00:00:36,920 And they got ambushed. 5 00:00:36,920 --> 00:00:39,040 SHOUTING AND CHEERING 6 00:00:39,040 --> 00:00:42,760 The Iraqis gathered round, just like having a party. 7 00:00:42,760 --> 00:00:44,840 SHOUTING CAR HORNS BLARING 8 00:00:46,960 --> 00:00:51,080 Then they picked up what was left of the bodies and they take 'em 9 00:00:51,080 --> 00:00:54,720 up to the bridge on the Euphrates and, you know, string 'em up. 10 00:00:59,480 --> 00:01:01,560 It was like on television, beamed around the world 11 00:01:01,560 --> 00:01:03,400 and the Iraqis are partying, and they love it 12 00:01:03,400 --> 00:01:05,320 and they're making fools out of the Americans, 13 00:01:05,320 --> 00:01:07,000 they're hitting them with their shoes. 14 00:01:07,000 --> 00:01:10,840 And that was like... That was like the end, you know. 15 00:01:10,840 --> 00:01:13,720 I mean, it was, what a frigging nightmare. 16 00:01:16,320 --> 00:01:19,040 Major combat operations in Iraq have ended... 17 00:01:19,040 --> 00:01:23,240 It had been a year since George Bush had claimed the Iraq war was won. 18 00:01:23,240 --> 00:01:25,600 ..and our allies have prevailed. 19 00:01:27,320 --> 00:01:29,360 But the story was far from over. 20 00:01:31,800 --> 00:01:34,280 After the toppling of Saddam Hussein, 21 00:01:34,280 --> 00:01:37,200 the old regime lost its grip on power... 22 00:01:38,920 --> 00:01:42,520 ..but it was not about to give up without a fight. 23 00:01:42,520 --> 00:01:45,360 Terrorists and regime remnants have been attacking our forces 24 00:01:45,360 --> 00:01:47,880 and our forces have been going in and killing them. 25 00:01:47,880 --> 00:01:52,120 America found itself struggling to keep control 26 00:01:52,120 --> 00:01:56,040 as a violent insurgency took hold across the country. 27 00:01:59,160 --> 00:02:01,920 And there was worse to come. 28 00:02:01,920 --> 00:02:03,400 NEWS REPORT: London's morning papers 29 00:02:03,400 --> 00:02:05,880 are calling it a torture scandal, shocking pictures... 30 00:02:05,880 --> 00:02:09,400 Another bad news day for America in the Arab world. 31 00:02:18,680 --> 00:02:22,360 The battle to win hearts and minds had failed. 32 00:02:22,360 --> 00:02:25,240 The US Army was feeling the strain. 33 00:02:25,240 --> 00:02:27,560 I wanted to ask about the convoy campaign and to find out... 34 00:02:27,560 --> 00:02:31,200 HE BREATHES HEAVILY ..if you can confirm that yest... 35 00:02:31,200 --> 00:02:34,080 Get him out of the room, it's really embarrassing. 36 00:02:34,080 --> 00:02:37,480 The politicians have had their say about the Iraq war. 37 00:02:37,480 --> 00:02:42,200 I was going to start off tonight telling some self-deprecating jokes, 38 00:02:42,200 --> 00:02:44,520 then I couldn't think of any mistakes I had made to be 39 00:02:44,520 --> 00:02:45,880 self-deprecating about. 40 00:02:49,960 --> 00:02:52,800 In this series, civilians, journalists 41 00:02:52,800 --> 00:02:58,280 and soldiers tell their personal stories of the 2003 invasion 42 00:02:58,280 --> 00:03:02,720 and how the years of chaos that followed changed the world for ever. 43 00:03:16,720 --> 00:03:19,760 Who said that thing, was it Churchill? 44 00:03:19,760 --> 00:03:24,040 Said the thing, like you never feel so alive... 45 00:03:24,040 --> 00:03:26,520 ..as when you are being shot at or when you're... 46 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:29,880 Something like that, such bullshit. 47 00:03:32,480 --> 00:03:36,040 You know, call me or Dexter what you want, 48 00:03:36,040 --> 00:03:41,520 but going into risky situations and inviting danger, 49 00:03:41,520 --> 00:03:44,520 like almost inviting danger, 50 00:03:44,520 --> 00:03:47,480 certainly wasn't some, like, thrill-seeking mission. 51 00:03:47,480 --> 00:03:51,840 There were moments where both of us were scared shitless, erm, 52 00:03:51,840 --> 00:03:55,560 and that wasn't the point of the work. 53 00:03:55,560 --> 00:04:00,480 It was to try to find a story that we felt compelled that needed 54 00:04:00,480 --> 00:04:02,680 to be told. 55 00:04:02,680 --> 00:04:06,480 Ashley Gilbertson came to Iraq as a freelance photographer 56 00:04:06,480 --> 00:04:08,400 at the start of the war. 57 00:04:08,400 --> 00:04:11,160 After a photograph he took of an American soldier 58 00:04:11,160 --> 00:04:14,840 in one of Saddam's palaces was published in Time magazine, 59 00:04:14,840 --> 00:04:17,280 he began working with Dexter Filkins, 60 00:04:17,280 --> 00:04:20,640 a journalist attached to the New York Times. 61 00:04:20,640 --> 00:04:22,560 Working with Dexter was amazing. 62 00:04:22,560 --> 00:04:25,000 There was almost nowhere that he wouldn't go 63 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:27,120 and the same went for me. 64 00:04:28,520 --> 00:04:31,720 What gets me out of bed in the morning and what makes me continue 65 00:04:31,720 --> 00:04:36,880 to work is this absolute fury that I have that things are wrong. 66 00:04:40,040 --> 00:04:43,640 You know, he was like a kid. He was like so young. 67 00:04:43,640 --> 00:04:48,440 Erm, you know, I thought, huh, you know. 68 00:04:48,440 --> 00:04:53,280 But he's immensely talented and really fearless 69 00:04:53,280 --> 00:04:57,080 and very enterprising so we got along really well. 70 00:04:58,600 --> 00:05:02,520 In moments of extreme chaos, a bomb would go off, 71 00:05:02,520 --> 00:05:04,840 gunfire, 72 00:05:04,840 --> 00:05:08,200 I think my blood pressure goes down, not up, 73 00:05:08,200 --> 00:05:11,640 and I think very, very clearly about what I need to do. 74 00:05:11,640 --> 00:05:16,680 Was there a time when you thought you had pushed it too far? 75 00:05:16,680 --> 00:05:19,600 Definitely. Erm, 76 00:05:19,600 --> 00:05:22,520 more than once, erm, I felt that. 77 00:05:22,520 --> 00:05:25,320 I felt that in Fallujah. 78 00:05:25,320 --> 00:05:27,080 I definitely felt that in Fallujah. 79 00:05:30,080 --> 00:05:33,080 There's so much that happened there, 80 00:05:33,080 --> 00:05:37,480 like I've got 2,500 pictures or something from that week. 81 00:05:39,600 --> 00:05:41,480 I barely remember taking any of them. 82 00:05:43,920 --> 00:05:50,360 Up until November 2004, I'd been able to cover Iraq 83 00:05:50,360 --> 00:05:55,120 as somebody else's war, but in Fallujah, 84 00:05:55,120 --> 00:05:59,720 it turned into not just a war that I was covering, 85 00:05:59,720 --> 00:06:03,040 it turned into something that I was involved in. 86 00:06:03,040 --> 00:06:05,680 I am here today because another man died. 87 00:06:15,520 --> 00:06:20,560 A year into the war, Fallujah, 40 miles outside Baghdad, 88 00:06:20,560 --> 00:06:23,160 was a hotbed of anti-American insurgency. 89 00:06:25,840 --> 00:06:29,240 Fallujah was bad, like from the beginning. 90 00:06:29,240 --> 00:06:33,040 It just like wasn't a nice place to go if you were American. 91 00:06:33,040 --> 00:06:35,800 It had become like a giant car bomb factory. 92 00:06:35,800 --> 00:06:38,880 They were just like making car bombs and shipping them to Baghdad, 93 00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:40,360 you know, like every day. 94 00:06:40,360 --> 00:06:44,400 Go, go home! Go, go home! 95 00:06:44,400 --> 00:06:45,760 The place was a powder keg. 96 00:06:47,400 --> 00:06:50,200 Whether you were being robbed, whether you were being held up by 97 00:06:50,200 --> 00:06:52,640 armed bandits, whether somebody was trying to kidnap you, 98 00:06:52,640 --> 00:06:54,240 whether they were trying to kill you, 99 00:06:54,240 --> 00:06:56,920 or they were trying to get under your car to do who knows what. 100 00:06:58,560 --> 00:07:01,680 In Fallujah, the Americans were no longer just facing 101 00:07:01,680 --> 00:07:03,800 a home-grown Iraqi resistance. 102 00:07:03,800 --> 00:07:07,560 GUNFIRE AND SHOUTING 103 00:07:09,520 --> 00:07:13,120 Since the war began, foreign Islamic extremists had begun 104 00:07:13,120 --> 00:07:16,800 entering Iraq, bringing with them a jihadist mentality. 105 00:07:22,960 --> 00:07:26,600 Led by a Jordanian named Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, 106 00:07:26,600 --> 00:07:29,760 they would organise themselves into Al-Qaeda in Iraq. 107 00:07:33,280 --> 00:07:37,200 Zarqawi was a bloodthirsty psychopath 108 00:07:37,200 --> 00:07:40,880 but, man, he knew had to run a group like Al-Qaeda. 109 00:07:40,880 --> 00:07:44,600 He set up this kind of a perfect organism. 110 00:07:44,600 --> 00:07:46,760 Very few people who were in Al-Qaeda 111 00:07:46,760 --> 00:07:49,160 knew other people who were in Al-Qaeda. 112 00:07:49,160 --> 00:07:51,000 You could kill individual parts of it, 113 00:07:51,000 --> 00:07:52,800 but the rest of it would just continue. 114 00:07:52,800 --> 00:07:57,200 He kind of turned this thing loose, this perfect organism, 115 00:07:57,200 --> 00:08:00,800 on Iraq and it was just a gigantic killing machine. 116 00:08:02,920 --> 00:08:04,720 By November 2004, 117 00:08:04,720 --> 00:08:07,400 al-Zarqawi had taken control of the city of Fallujah. 118 00:08:09,440 --> 00:08:11,080 For the Americans, 119 00:08:11,080 --> 00:08:15,600 an Al-Qaeda base just 40 miles from Baghdad was a propaganda disaster. 120 00:08:20,080 --> 00:08:23,080 If our country shows any uncertainty or weakness 121 00:08:23,080 --> 00:08:26,720 in this decade, the world will drift towards tragedy. 122 00:08:26,720 --> 00:08:29,480 This is not going to happen on my watch. 123 00:08:29,480 --> 00:08:31,480 CHEERING 124 00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:36,160 Buoyed up by an election victory, 125 00:08:36,160 --> 00:08:39,680 the Bush administration began making preparations 126 00:08:39,680 --> 00:08:42,440 for a full frontal attack on Fallujah. 127 00:08:57,400 --> 00:08:59,360 Civilians mostly cleared out, 128 00:08:59,360 --> 00:09:02,200 I mean, certainly from what I witnessed. 129 00:09:02,200 --> 00:09:06,440 It's very strange because usually when an army attacks, 130 00:09:06,440 --> 00:09:09,320 it wants to have surprise. 131 00:09:09,320 --> 00:09:12,280 You're not going to announce when the attack begins. 132 00:09:12,280 --> 00:09:14,120 The Americans essentially did that. 133 00:09:14,120 --> 00:09:18,960 They were like, on the bullhorns, we are going to attack. 134 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:20,520 The city will not be safe. 135 00:09:21,880 --> 00:09:24,800 There's a good chance you will die if you stay. 136 00:09:24,800 --> 00:09:27,160 ANNOUNCEMENT IN ARABIC 137 00:09:27,160 --> 00:09:29,920 BOYS SHOUT 138 00:09:33,040 --> 00:09:34,200 TRANSLATION: 139 00:09:51,400 --> 00:09:54,720 Nidhal Abed, a young wife and mother, 140 00:09:54,720 --> 00:09:58,120 was one of 50,000 citizens who didn't leave Fallujah. 141 00:09:59,800 --> 00:10:04,000 Like many other working-class families, hers was too poor to go. 142 00:10:44,400 --> 00:10:46,440 CHEERING 143 00:11:19,480 --> 00:11:20,960 Action! 144 00:11:20,960 --> 00:11:22,640 What do you want me to do? 145 00:11:22,640 --> 00:11:26,040 ..admire my dress? Yeah. 146 00:11:26,040 --> 00:11:28,320 Do you like my dress? Yes. 147 00:11:28,320 --> 00:11:29,920 Why are we whispering? 148 00:11:29,920 --> 00:11:32,000 Billy's still asleep. 149 00:11:32,000 --> 00:11:33,640 Billy! 150 00:11:36,000 --> 00:11:38,120 Did you have a good night? Huh? 151 00:11:45,160 --> 00:11:47,600 Oh. Oh, you want to get in the pictures too? 152 00:11:47,600 --> 00:11:50,480 Smile. Come on, smile. 153 00:11:50,480 --> 00:11:52,400 You're on candid camera. 154 00:11:54,520 --> 00:11:59,040 Billy was born on November the 24th, 1981. 155 00:11:59,040 --> 00:12:02,040 He just sort of popped out. 156 00:12:02,040 --> 00:12:04,920 I was in labour for 53 painful hours with Sabrina 157 00:12:04,920 --> 00:12:08,000 so this one was like a cakewalk. 158 00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:11,680 I was excited. He was excited because it was a boy. 159 00:12:11,680 --> 00:12:15,320 A man always wants a boy, carry on the namesake. 160 00:12:16,400 --> 00:12:20,880 I think he's Mom's favourite. She'll say no, but...he was. 161 00:12:20,880 --> 00:12:22,120 Hi! 162 00:12:23,320 --> 00:12:27,360 He was very outgoing, very busy. 163 00:12:27,360 --> 00:12:29,720 He always looked for adventure. 164 00:12:29,720 --> 00:12:31,880 He was always pushing his limits. 165 00:12:33,640 --> 00:12:37,000 He definitely wasn't college material. 166 00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:38,760 You know, he struggled in school 167 00:12:38,760 --> 00:12:42,400 and that would have been good for him, you know, 168 00:12:42,400 --> 00:12:44,040 to go into the Marines. 169 00:12:48,760 --> 00:12:51,160 Miller was a great guy. 170 00:12:51,160 --> 00:12:54,840 He was someone that could talk to you without the typical marine 171 00:12:54,840 --> 00:12:57,520 yelling and calling you an idiot, you know. 172 00:12:57,520 --> 00:13:01,880 Christian Dominguez joined the same company of Marines as Billy Miller. 173 00:13:03,200 --> 00:13:04,840 I was really scrawny. 174 00:13:04,840 --> 00:13:09,280 I was 130lbs and I thought that I was just going to become tough. 175 00:13:10,600 --> 00:13:12,880 I was one of the first people from my high school 176 00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:15,120 to join the Marine Corps and it was really great. 177 00:13:15,120 --> 00:13:16,760 MILITARY MUSIC PLAYS 178 00:13:16,760 --> 00:13:19,360 APPLAUSE 179 00:13:19,360 --> 00:13:22,600 I was proud of the fact that this was what he wanted to do. 180 00:13:22,600 --> 00:13:24,600 I was also very scared. 181 00:13:24,600 --> 00:13:29,440 When he joined, it was just a peaceful little world. 182 00:13:29,440 --> 00:13:33,080 It wasn't a peaceful little world any more so... Yeah. 183 00:13:33,080 --> 00:13:38,360 ..just over a week after 9/11 when he graduated from Boot Camp. 184 00:13:38,360 --> 00:13:41,520 After he graduated and he left us, he went to Spain. 185 00:13:41,520 --> 00:13:45,680 He came home December 2003 and we surprised my parents. 186 00:13:45,680 --> 00:13:49,400 Is Billy in that box? No. 187 00:13:49,400 --> 00:13:51,960 And I said, "Is Billy in that box?" 188 00:13:51,960 --> 00:13:53,360 She said, "No, Mother." 189 00:13:53,360 --> 00:13:55,920 I said, "Did y'all buy me a dog or some animal 190 00:13:55,920 --> 00:13:57,800 "because I don't want any animals?" 191 00:13:57,800 --> 00:14:00,760 "No, Mother, we didn't buy you any animals 192 00:14:00,760 --> 00:14:02,640 "but you need to open it up now." 193 00:14:05,240 --> 00:14:09,320 SHE SQUEALS HAPPILY 194 00:14:14,200 --> 00:14:17,600 It was probably her best Christmas ever and her last Christmas... 195 00:14:19,200 --> 00:14:20,680 ..with him. 196 00:14:24,640 --> 00:14:27,680 In October 2004, Billy Miller 197 00:14:27,680 --> 00:14:30,280 and Christian Dominguez were deployed with 198 00:14:30,280 --> 00:14:32,000 the 1/8 Marine Battalion, 199 00:14:32,000 --> 00:14:35,440 just outside Fallujah, to prepare for the assault on the city. 200 00:14:38,720 --> 00:14:42,760 Accompanying them would be Ashley Gilbertson and Dexter Filkins, 201 00:14:42,760 --> 00:14:44,640 representing the New York Times. 202 00:14:46,160 --> 00:14:49,680 No journalist likes to embed with military, it's too confining. 203 00:14:49,680 --> 00:14:52,640 You know, imagine you're walking through an Iraqi village. 204 00:14:52,640 --> 00:14:54,200 You know, I'm a journalist, 205 00:14:54,200 --> 00:14:57,120 I want to know what's going on inside people's heads, 206 00:14:57,120 --> 00:15:01,760 in their hearts, like what are you feeling over there, you Iraqis? 207 00:15:01,760 --> 00:15:04,120 Um, and you're standing with a group 208 00:15:04,120 --> 00:15:07,200 of 19-year-old Americans with giant guns. 209 00:15:07,200 --> 00:15:10,960 And you ask an Iraqi guy, "Hey," you know, "How's it going?" 210 00:15:10,960 --> 00:15:12,800 You're not going to get a real answer. 211 00:15:12,800 --> 00:15:17,520 But what happened in Iraq was it became essentially impossible 212 00:15:17,520 --> 00:15:21,600 to work unless you embedded with the military 213 00:15:21,600 --> 00:15:23,880 for the simple reason that you would get killed. 214 00:15:28,040 --> 00:15:32,200 If you could picture young buck warriors, we're very tribal. 215 00:15:32,200 --> 00:15:34,760 And anybody's who's not in our tribe is basically the enemy 216 00:15:34,760 --> 00:15:37,440 as far as we're concerned, you know, just to varying degrees. 217 00:15:37,440 --> 00:15:41,640 Sam Williams was Sergeant of 1/8 Bravo Company. 218 00:15:41,640 --> 00:15:45,600 Sure enough, when the press starts showing up, we didn't like 'em. 219 00:15:45,600 --> 00:15:48,640 Turns out they're sleeping in our squad bay with us. 220 00:15:48,640 --> 00:15:51,560 And when I first saw Ashley, he had one of those... 221 00:15:53,400 --> 00:15:57,720 ..sleep things that covers your eyes, like a sleep mask? 222 00:15:57,720 --> 00:15:59,480 He's got long curly hair. 223 00:15:59,480 --> 00:16:02,000 I was just, like, "Really?" 224 00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:04,520 You know, "Who's this guy, and why is he even here?" 225 00:16:04,520 --> 00:16:07,480 And you see Dexter, Dexter looks like a frat boy 226 00:16:07,480 --> 00:16:11,000 who just woke up from the biggest party ever, you know? 227 00:16:11,000 --> 00:16:14,480 Just kind of this blown-away look on his face all the time. 228 00:16:14,480 --> 00:16:17,480 So we were all just, like, super judgy, 229 00:16:17,480 --> 00:16:20,640 and like, "Look at these guys. I'm not talking to them." 230 00:16:20,640 --> 00:16:25,080 You see right here, I'm standing on a model of our battle space. 231 00:16:25,080 --> 00:16:26,840 Whenever, like, something changes 232 00:16:26,840 --> 00:16:30,280 or there's gonna be, like, a significant operation, 233 00:16:30,280 --> 00:16:33,200 the military gets a briefing from a legal officer 234 00:16:33,200 --> 00:16:36,720 who will tell you, essentially, "Here are your rules of engagement," 235 00:16:36,720 --> 00:16:39,640 which is to say, "Here's when you can pull the trigger. 236 00:16:39,640 --> 00:16:41,520 "Here's when you can't." And... 237 00:16:42,960 --> 00:16:45,440 ..I had never been invited into one of those. 238 00:16:45,440 --> 00:16:47,360 I think they brought us in because they thought, 239 00:16:47,360 --> 00:16:49,080 "We're going to be killing a lot of people, 240 00:16:49,080 --> 00:16:51,160 "so we're going to want the reporters 241 00:16:51,160 --> 00:16:53,640 "to kind of understand what the rules are here." 242 00:16:53,640 --> 00:16:55,320 So normally rules of engagement 243 00:16:55,320 --> 00:16:58,080 would be, "Don't shoot unless you're being shot at." 244 00:17:00,120 --> 00:17:02,680 That's a general conflict rule of engagement. 245 00:17:03,800 --> 00:17:05,280 These ones were really different. 246 00:17:05,280 --> 00:17:06,600 The rules were like... 247 00:17:07,840 --> 00:17:11,480 ..dialled really far back. Like, really loose, you know? 248 00:17:11,480 --> 00:17:14,640 Guy picks up a cellphone, you can kill him. 249 00:17:14,640 --> 00:17:17,200 If, you know, if you fire one warning shot at a car, 250 00:17:17,200 --> 00:17:19,480 if it doesn't stop coming at you... 251 00:17:19,480 --> 00:17:20,880 ..you can kill. 252 00:17:20,880 --> 00:17:23,880 The expectation was, and I think it was correct, 253 00:17:23,880 --> 00:17:25,520 "We're going in to attack 254 00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:28,560 "and anybody who resists us is going to be an enemy. 255 00:17:28,560 --> 00:17:31,400 "It's not going to be a civilian, because the civilians are gone." 256 00:17:31,400 --> 00:17:33,760 Hey, how you doing? THEY SHOUT 257 00:17:33,760 --> 00:17:36,040 How you doing, soldiers? THEY SHOUT 258 00:17:36,040 --> 00:17:38,120 How you doing, sailors? THEY SHOUT 259 00:17:38,120 --> 00:17:42,760 RECORDING: This is a whole can of whoop-butt, all combined, OK? 260 00:17:42,760 --> 00:17:45,680 And I'm going to tell you one thing. It is an honour 261 00:17:45,680 --> 00:17:49,520 for me to be able to serve with each and every one of you hard chargers. 262 00:17:49,520 --> 00:17:53,880 I mean, I look out here and it's no different than when we took... 263 00:17:55,280 --> 00:17:57,200 ..the damn war over in Korea. 264 00:17:57,200 --> 00:18:01,200 We raised the flag in Iwo Jima. It's no different. 265 00:18:01,200 --> 00:18:03,600 I'd go to Fallujah right now after hearing that speech. 266 00:18:03,600 --> 00:18:06,120 I mean, this stuff was... It was motivating. 267 00:18:06,120 --> 00:18:09,680 But it's disheartening, at the same time, looking at it now. 268 00:18:09,680 --> 00:18:11,520 And, you know, one part they don't show is, 269 00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:14,160 oftentimes they start off with the speech and saying, 270 00:18:14,160 --> 00:18:15,840 "I want you to look to your brothers 271 00:18:15,840 --> 00:18:18,640 "to the left and the right, and behind you, and realise that 272 00:18:18,640 --> 00:18:21,040 "some of them aren't going to make it out of there." 273 00:18:21,040 --> 00:18:22,760 And you don't really look, right? 274 00:18:22,760 --> 00:18:23,960 Like, it's part of a speech, 275 00:18:23,960 --> 00:18:26,440 and you're just sitting there like, "OK, yeah, we get it." 276 00:18:26,440 --> 00:18:29,280 And I just watch that video now and I can point out 277 00:18:29,280 --> 00:18:30,880 everyone that was killed. 278 00:18:30,880 --> 00:18:32,720 And they were almost in every clip. 279 00:18:32,720 --> 00:18:35,480 Kick some butt. All right? THEY SHOUT 280 00:18:38,760 --> 00:18:41,400 You're always worried about your child, 281 00:18:41,400 --> 00:18:47,000 but knowing that he's in a war zone 282 00:18:47,000 --> 00:18:49,920 is a different kind of worry. 283 00:18:49,920 --> 00:18:53,840 But it's not a worry that you can... 284 00:18:53,840 --> 00:18:58,240 At least, I couldn't allow, myself, to overwhelm me. 285 00:18:58,240 --> 00:19:01,000 Being a police officer for 32 years, 286 00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:05,200 you have to live every day at a time, as you live it. 287 00:19:06,280 --> 00:19:07,960 And you can't worry about it. 288 00:19:07,960 --> 00:19:10,600 If you worry yourself, it'll just worry you sick. 289 00:19:16,160 --> 00:19:20,920 After a month of waiting, on the 7th of November, 2004, 290 00:19:20,920 --> 00:19:24,960 1/8 Bravo Company were given the order to move into Fallujah. 291 00:19:31,000 --> 00:19:34,480 As we were assembling, they opened fire. 292 00:19:34,480 --> 00:19:36,000 GUNFIRE 293 00:19:36,000 --> 00:19:38,640 It was just...like a symphony. 294 00:19:40,240 --> 00:19:45,040 Then the voices came over from the mosques, which were... 295 00:19:45,040 --> 00:19:49,360 ..in Arabic, "Come to the fight." You know, "Come. Defend the city." 296 00:19:50,640 --> 00:19:53,120 And there were so many mosques and so many loudspeakers, 297 00:19:53,120 --> 00:19:54,880 the intensity of their voices - 298 00:19:54,880 --> 00:19:57,080 they were screaming into the loudspeakers. 299 00:19:57,080 --> 00:19:59,800 Um, "God is great, God is great," like, "Come to the fight." 300 00:19:59,800 --> 00:20:02,040 Um, "They're here. The Americans are here." 301 00:20:02,040 --> 00:20:03,960 OVERLAPPING VOICES 302 00:20:07,160 --> 00:20:09,040 I could see the tracers coming out. 303 00:20:09,040 --> 00:20:10,400 OK. They're shooting at us, 304 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:12,720 just kind of spraying machine-gun fire at us. 305 00:20:12,720 --> 00:20:16,520 You know, and it felt a lot like, if you've ever seen Star Wars, 306 00:20:16,520 --> 00:20:18,600 where they're attacking the Death Star, 307 00:20:18,600 --> 00:20:20,720 where they're flying through this trench 308 00:20:20,720 --> 00:20:23,440 and there's, like, laser guns just shooting at them 309 00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:25,040 from all over the place. 310 00:20:25,040 --> 00:20:27,600 MACHINE-GUN FIRE 311 00:20:31,040 --> 00:20:34,680 It never looks or feels like what you imagine. 312 00:20:36,440 --> 00:20:40,160 But in this case, it looked remarkably like a movie. 313 00:20:41,600 --> 00:20:44,520 I was on the ground and I was kind of looking up 314 00:20:44,520 --> 00:20:47,480 and I thought, you know, "That looks like a bottle rocket." 315 00:20:47,480 --> 00:20:50,960 You know, it looks like fireworks from 4th of July. 316 00:20:56,720 --> 00:20:58,120 And then from out of nowhere... 317 00:20:59,520 --> 00:21:02,720 ..we hear these pops above our head. 318 00:21:02,720 --> 00:21:05,800 And you look up, and it's these shells that have exploded, 319 00:21:05,800 --> 00:21:09,120 and it's like an octopus and tentacles coming down from the sky. 320 00:21:13,360 --> 00:21:15,200 This bright white light, 321 00:21:15,200 --> 00:21:17,480 with a trail on it, like a comet, 322 00:21:17,480 --> 00:21:21,480 comes sailing in and then it explodes right above us. 323 00:21:21,480 --> 00:21:26,880 And... And these flaming sort of chunks of rock 324 00:21:26,880 --> 00:21:29,640 were coming off, and they were... 325 00:21:29,640 --> 00:21:32,760 People were just scrambling and, like, trying not to get hit, 326 00:21:32,760 --> 00:21:35,080 and, you know, "What the hell is that?" 327 00:21:37,240 --> 00:21:40,640 I got hit in the back, in my pack, 328 00:21:40,640 --> 00:21:42,680 and it just burned right through my pack. 329 00:21:42,680 --> 00:21:44,760 It burned through my sleeping bag. 330 00:21:47,840 --> 00:21:50,320 As I learned later, it was phosphorous, white phosphorous, 331 00:21:50,320 --> 00:21:54,000 and those are our - meaning American - rounds. 332 00:21:54,000 --> 00:21:57,040 I mean, those were fired by American guys. 333 00:21:58,920 --> 00:22:01,280 Like, at what? For what? 334 00:22:01,280 --> 00:22:04,160 Uh, at whom? Like, I had no idea. 335 00:22:08,400 --> 00:22:10,280 We go from there, 336 00:22:10,280 --> 00:22:13,600 still on this road, like, 200 metres into Fallujah. 337 00:22:13,600 --> 00:22:18,160 We're right on the edge of the city, and it's... It's a big city. 338 00:22:21,560 --> 00:22:25,120 And then they get to this road that they called Phase Line Cathy, 339 00:22:25,120 --> 00:22:28,360 and it's this big east-west road that crosses Fallujah. 340 00:22:28,360 --> 00:22:31,360 And just to get to that road, 341 00:22:31,360 --> 00:22:33,120 it took them all morning. 342 00:22:33,120 --> 00:22:34,560 Hours and hours of fighting. 343 00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:36,960 Like, every step of the way, they had to fight. 344 00:22:38,240 --> 00:22:41,040 Spread out, squallers! Spread them out! 345 00:22:41,040 --> 00:22:42,680 Like, you're running down the street, 346 00:22:42,680 --> 00:22:45,240 and you can hear the bullets ricocheting around you, like, 347 00:22:45,240 --> 00:22:47,440 bouncing off the street, coming off the concrete. 348 00:22:47,440 --> 00:22:49,360 GUNFIRE, BULLETS RICOCHET 349 00:22:51,880 --> 00:22:53,560 And then it stops. 350 00:22:53,560 --> 00:22:57,080 And you get up to this area that the fire was coming from, 351 00:22:57,080 --> 00:22:58,840 and there's the Marine Scout team up there 352 00:22:58,840 --> 00:23:00,960 and three dead insurgents on the road. 353 00:23:08,400 --> 00:23:10,240 Whoo, yeah! 354 00:23:10,240 --> 00:23:12,400 EXPLOSION 355 00:23:15,240 --> 00:23:18,000 The first house we cleared was a little bit of chaos. 356 00:23:18,000 --> 00:23:20,040 A lot of adrenaline rushing. 357 00:23:20,040 --> 00:23:22,600 Fortunately there was no insurgents in that house. 358 00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:26,080 But it wasn't exactly how we planned. There was a lot of people 359 00:23:26,080 --> 00:23:29,400 in there, we were congested, and it's not how we do things. 360 00:23:29,400 --> 00:23:31,800 But we wanted to make entry, and... 361 00:23:32,880 --> 00:23:36,040 ..in Fallujah, the safest place you can be is inside a cleared house. 362 00:23:38,120 --> 00:23:41,080 And now we're in this house on a corner 363 00:23:41,080 --> 00:23:43,160 and we had to cross this road to get to the cultural, 364 00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:45,000 what they were calling the cultural centre - 365 00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:47,320 this big, like, five-storey, four-storey building 366 00:23:47,320 --> 00:23:48,760 on the other side of the street. 367 00:23:50,320 --> 00:23:54,000 And so one of the lieutenants stands at the gate and says, 368 00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:56,720 "All right, go. First platoon go." 369 00:23:56,720 --> 00:23:59,240 And these 40 guys like, 370 00:23:59,240 --> 00:24:02,040 stacked, stream out and just run across this street 371 00:24:02,040 --> 00:24:03,720 and then it begins. 372 00:24:03,720 --> 00:24:05,360 GUNFIRE 373 00:24:07,840 --> 00:24:10,320 All of this gunfire starts. 374 00:24:10,320 --> 00:24:12,560 A guy falls on the street. 375 00:24:12,560 --> 00:24:15,240 Second platoon goes out. 376 00:24:15,240 --> 00:24:18,920 Some guys drag this guy out of the street... 377 00:24:18,920 --> 00:24:21,200 ..and another guy gets dropped. 378 00:24:31,680 --> 00:24:34,200 And then I'm with this last platoon sitting in this house 379 00:24:34,200 --> 00:24:37,600 and I remember saying to Dexter, like, "I really... 380 00:24:37,600 --> 00:24:39,360 "I don't know if I can do this." 381 00:24:39,360 --> 00:24:41,760 Like, you're running straight into gunfire. 382 00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:45,720 And I don't remember what he said, but... 383 00:24:45,720 --> 00:24:48,920 I remember them just shouting, like, "Third platoon, go, go, go!" 384 00:24:48,920 --> 00:24:51,600 so I watched everybody go out and then just ran. 385 00:24:51,600 --> 00:24:56,160 And they say time slows down, but it really, it really does. 386 00:24:56,160 --> 00:25:00,800 Like, you can feel every step that you're taking. 387 00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:04,320 You can see everything taking place in slow motion around you. 388 00:25:07,520 --> 00:25:12,000 I saw so many bodies and I saw so many marines go down, 389 00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:14,760 but I never saw an insurgent. 390 00:25:14,760 --> 00:25:18,040 Like, I never saw an insurgent alive, with a gun. 391 00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:19,400 They were ghosts. 392 00:25:19,400 --> 00:25:21,040 GUNSHOT 393 00:25:21,040 --> 00:25:24,480 They blended in with this environment so perfectly. 394 00:25:25,680 --> 00:25:27,040 GUNFIRE 395 00:25:28,840 --> 00:25:30,000 Where is it? 396 00:25:30,000 --> 00:25:32,720 It's coming from in there. 397 00:25:32,720 --> 00:25:33,920 Aah! 398 00:25:36,840 --> 00:25:38,760 Is he inside? GUNFIRE 399 00:25:38,760 --> 00:25:40,040 Watch out! 400 00:25:41,320 --> 00:25:42,800 GUNFIRE 401 00:25:42,800 --> 00:25:44,080 You got him! 402 00:25:44,080 --> 00:25:46,400 GUNSHOTS 403 00:25:50,200 --> 00:25:54,280 Hey! He's wounded, in between these two houses. 404 00:25:54,280 --> 00:25:56,320 GUNSHOT 405 00:25:56,320 --> 00:25:57,520 He's done. 406 00:25:57,520 --> 00:25:58,920 Hold on, I got one! 407 00:26:03,880 --> 00:26:07,920 Our mission was to clear the city of insurgents. 408 00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:12,080 It's not right to use the term seek and destroy, but... 409 00:26:12,080 --> 00:26:14,520 ..it was a full-on frontal assault, 410 00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:16,480 into the city of Fallujah, 411 00:26:16,480 --> 00:26:19,840 and you don't stop until everybody stops shooting. 412 00:26:24,360 --> 00:26:27,280 EXPLOSION 413 00:26:29,040 --> 00:26:31,400 When you have 8,000 of them 414 00:26:31,400 --> 00:26:34,680 moving into a town like that with all their firepower, 415 00:26:34,680 --> 00:26:37,720 it's a terrifying, uh, force. 416 00:26:37,720 --> 00:26:43,080 I mean, 50 marines is a terrifying force. 417 00:26:43,080 --> 00:26:45,440 8,000 is just a massive killing machine. 418 00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:05,080 Target! 419 00:27:26,840 --> 00:27:29,000 TRANSLATION: 420 00:28:32,800 --> 00:28:34,560 EXPLOSION 421 00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:40,480 For a few long days, Ashley and Dexter moved with 1/8 Company 422 00:28:40,480 --> 00:28:42,800 as they pushed deep into Fallujah, 423 00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:45,800 clearing houses and coming under sustained attack. 424 00:28:45,800 --> 00:28:47,960 GUNFIRE 425 00:28:47,960 --> 00:28:50,640 Once you start getting shot at, it all changes. 426 00:28:50,640 --> 00:28:53,040 Once you start getting shot at and don't run for the hills, 427 00:28:53,040 --> 00:28:55,320 then you start building trust really quickly. 428 00:28:55,320 --> 00:28:56,600 Because they realise... 429 00:28:56,600 --> 00:28:59,240 And I heard this from multiple different military units - 430 00:28:59,240 --> 00:29:02,520 they think that the way we work as journalists, 431 00:29:02,520 --> 00:29:06,400 is we have a template, an idea of what they're doing, 432 00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:08,880 and we are going out there to show how bad they are. 433 00:29:10,320 --> 00:29:12,520 But once you cross the wire with them, 434 00:29:12,520 --> 00:29:15,480 then they start saying, "Ah, OK. 435 00:29:15,480 --> 00:29:18,160 "You're here to see how it really is." 436 00:29:18,160 --> 00:29:22,920 And I think that as the war dragged on, 437 00:29:22,920 --> 00:29:25,680 the marines, and, like, the grunts, 438 00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:27,800 these door-kickers, the trigger pullers, 439 00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:31,000 they realised nobody gave a shit what they were doing in Iraq. 440 00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:35,160 So we would come out and actually tell stories, their stories. 441 00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:39,480 Well, it turns out Dex and Ash held their ground pretty well. 442 00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:42,920 They kept themselves out of as much trouble as they could 443 00:29:42,920 --> 00:29:45,520 and the times where they got themselves into trouble 444 00:29:45,520 --> 00:29:46,840 we were there to help them, 445 00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:49,640 and it was never really a burden on us to have them there. 446 00:29:49,640 --> 00:29:52,960 I mean, these guys were, like, in the thick of it, 447 00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:54,600 terrified just like we were. 448 00:29:54,600 --> 00:29:56,240 We'd been trained for it. 449 00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,080 We have weapons to defend ourselves 450 00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:00,120 and body armour and that type of stuff. 451 00:30:00,120 --> 00:30:03,320 Those guys were just... thrown right into it, 452 00:30:03,320 --> 00:30:06,000 like, "Go get 'em." You know? "Go tell the story." 453 00:30:07,360 --> 00:30:11,560 Ashley and I just... It was so hard trying to file our stuff, you know, 454 00:30:11,560 --> 00:30:13,320 like, I'm trying to write my story 455 00:30:13,320 --> 00:30:15,840 and Ashley is trying to file his pictures, 456 00:30:15,840 --> 00:30:17,920 and I was always looking for electricity. 457 00:30:17,920 --> 00:30:19,960 And so I remember, it was like the first day, 458 00:30:19,960 --> 00:30:22,520 I don't know what I was thinking, but I ran into the street 459 00:30:22,520 --> 00:30:25,440 because there was a car out there, and, you know, pulled the lid up 460 00:30:25,440 --> 00:30:28,600 and tried to put my little battery clips on the car battery. 461 00:30:29,720 --> 00:30:31,440 I don't want to think about that, 462 00:30:31,440 --> 00:30:34,000 cos there were snipers everywhere. 463 00:30:34,000 --> 00:30:37,560 I remember thinking, like, "This dude is insane. That is crazy." 464 00:30:37,560 --> 00:30:39,840 Like, he's in the middle of... 465 00:30:39,840 --> 00:30:44,360 Like, so many guys have just been shot on this exact corner. 466 00:30:44,360 --> 00:30:46,160 The insurgents are everywhere. 467 00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:47,440 And Dexter's out there 468 00:30:47,440 --> 00:30:49,840 trying to pull a car battery out of a burnt-out car. 469 00:30:49,840 --> 00:30:51,360 Of course the battery doesn't work. 470 00:30:51,360 --> 00:30:53,640 Cos it's a fucking bombed, burnt-out car. 471 00:30:53,640 --> 00:30:55,200 But it... 472 00:30:56,440 --> 00:30:58,640 It was classic Dexter. 473 00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:00,920 Like, he will file, no matter what. 474 00:31:00,920 --> 00:31:02,360 GUNFIRE 475 00:31:02,360 --> 00:31:07,160 I remember one night I decided to sleep on the roof 476 00:31:07,160 --> 00:31:09,480 and a couple of hours later I woke up 477 00:31:09,480 --> 00:31:12,320 because there was something hot on my neck. 478 00:31:12,320 --> 00:31:15,040 I tried to brush it off and then it was hot in my hands, 479 00:31:15,040 --> 00:31:16,960 and it's brass casings. 480 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:19,080 There was... While I was sleeping, 481 00:31:19,080 --> 00:31:21,640 a machine-gunner had come up above me. 482 00:31:21,640 --> 00:31:24,680 Somehow I'd slept through this machine-gun automatic fire. 483 00:31:26,240 --> 00:31:28,120 So, then, like, I stretch, I wake up, 484 00:31:28,120 --> 00:31:30,680 like, "OK, I gotta get out, gotta go, gotta work." 485 00:31:33,040 --> 00:31:37,320 And then I'm like, "Shit. My sleeping bag is wet. 486 00:31:37,320 --> 00:31:40,040 "Some asshole must have spilt water on me." 487 00:31:40,040 --> 00:31:44,200 No. I had also pissed myself in my sleep. 488 00:31:44,200 --> 00:31:47,640 And I get out of my sleeping bag, I was wearing blue jeans. 489 00:31:47,640 --> 00:31:50,280 And I had this, like, huge wet patch on my jeans and like... 490 00:31:51,600 --> 00:31:54,920 Why I'm embarrassed in front of all these marines, I don't know - 491 00:31:54,920 --> 00:31:57,720 I shouldn't give a shit. But I did. I was so embarrassed. 492 00:31:57,720 --> 00:31:59,880 So I went downstairs. 493 00:31:59,880 --> 00:32:01,760 "Morning, lads." 494 00:32:01,760 --> 00:32:03,600 Kept going downstairs to see what they were doing, 495 00:32:03,600 --> 00:32:05,160 like, what are they shooting at? 496 00:32:06,800 --> 00:32:09,640 And they've got these guys 497 00:32:09,640 --> 00:32:12,640 with no shirts on, who are coming in off the street. 498 00:32:12,640 --> 00:32:14,240 And the sun is rising. 499 00:32:15,720 --> 00:32:18,800 And it was in that moment that I shot the only picture 500 00:32:18,800 --> 00:32:20,760 of the Iraq war that I think 501 00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:23,040 even comes close to being a successful picture. 502 00:32:23,040 --> 00:32:25,520 Like, I regard the work that I did in Iraq as a total failure. 503 00:32:25,520 --> 00:32:28,400 People look at all my Iraq pictures like, "Wow, looks like a movie" - 504 00:32:28,400 --> 00:32:29,800 like, fuck you. 505 00:32:29,800 --> 00:32:31,680 Or fuck me. I failed. 506 00:32:31,680 --> 00:32:34,000 If you think that my work looks like a movie, 507 00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:35,560 it means that you're disassociating 508 00:32:35,560 --> 00:32:38,320 from the reality that is in those pictures. 509 00:32:38,320 --> 00:32:40,560 But this one picture that I made in that moment 510 00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:43,600 while I was trying to dry piss off my jeans so I wasn't embarrassed... 511 00:32:44,960 --> 00:32:48,560 ..is the only time that I think that I inched towards 512 00:32:48,560 --> 00:32:50,800 understanding how we fight. 513 00:32:50,800 --> 00:32:53,120 Which was what my intention was 514 00:32:53,120 --> 00:32:56,320 in spending that much time with angry men with guns. 515 00:32:58,320 --> 00:33:01,240 It's called The University Of Jihad, Motherfucker. 516 00:33:01,240 --> 00:33:02,920 Cos when the guys were detained, 517 00:33:02,920 --> 00:33:05,440 the marine said, "What are you doing here? 518 00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:08,240 And the detainee said, "We're here studying." 519 00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:11,640 And the marine said, "Yeah, University of Jihad, Motherfucker." 520 00:33:13,640 --> 00:33:15,480 A couple of days goes by, 521 00:33:15,480 --> 00:33:19,160 and, like, I settle into some rubble on another night, next to Dexter. 522 00:33:19,160 --> 00:33:23,280 And I say, "Goodnight," and he says. "Goodnight. 523 00:33:23,280 --> 00:33:25,120 "Don't piss yourself." 524 00:33:27,800 --> 00:33:29,720 Smart arse. 525 00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:55,440 SHELL FIRE 526 00:33:57,960 --> 00:34:00,200 EXPLOSION 527 00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:01,840 TRANSLATION: 528 00:35:00,560 --> 00:35:03,200 Many local men fled Fallujah, 529 00:35:03,200 --> 00:35:07,720 but Nidhal's husband Ahmed decided to stay with her and their son. 530 00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:43,880 EXPLOSION 531 00:36:43,280 --> 00:36:45,000 CHILD CRYING 532 00:37:31,440 --> 00:37:33,080 EXPLOSION 533 00:38:34,040 --> 00:38:35,880 GUNSHOT 534 00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:50,480 When I was 13 years old, I killed this deer 535 00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:54,920 in Centerville, Texas, and it was a real long shot. 536 00:38:56,280 --> 00:38:57,840 17 steps. 537 00:38:59,320 --> 00:39:01,720 17 steps! 538 00:39:01,720 --> 00:39:03,640 Why don't you go hunting any more 539 00:39:03,640 --> 00:39:05,880 and fishing any more like you used to? 540 00:39:05,880 --> 00:39:09,680 I don't know. It just doesn't do anything for me any more. 541 00:39:09,680 --> 00:39:13,320 And after Billy died, I just lost a lot of, um... 542 00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:15,920 ..get up and go. 543 00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:19,440 This is a Corsican ram. 544 00:39:19,440 --> 00:39:21,040 Billy killed that one. 545 00:39:22,960 --> 00:39:26,240 And Billy killed this one here. 546 00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:30,920 Look here, Billy. 547 00:39:34,680 --> 00:39:37,200 Look at it again. Billy. 548 00:39:37,200 --> 00:39:38,720 GIRL LAUGHS 549 00:39:51,320 --> 00:39:54,480 By the 15th of November, 2004, 550 00:39:54,480 --> 00:39:57,400 just a week after entering Fallujah, 551 00:39:57,400 --> 00:40:00,960 Bravo Company had almost finished the first part of their mission. 552 00:40:04,800 --> 00:40:07,960 Fallujah's this weird town. It looks like a movie set. 553 00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:10,280 And there's these very defined borders 554 00:40:10,280 --> 00:40:12,560 and then after those borders, it's just desert. 555 00:40:13,800 --> 00:40:16,680 So, we went from the top of the city all the way to the bottom, 556 00:40:16,680 --> 00:40:19,400 one end to the other, and we got to the end, 557 00:40:19,400 --> 00:40:23,840 and, like, the street ended and then the desert started. 558 00:40:23,840 --> 00:40:26,640 MACHINE-GUN FIRE 559 00:40:28,160 --> 00:40:32,080 Fallujah is the City of Mosques. It's called the City of Mosques. 560 00:40:32,080 --> 00:40:34,360 And the insurgents knew that the Americans 561 00:40:34,360 --> 00:40:35,880 couldn't go into the mosque 562 00:40:35,880 --> 00:40:39,000 so they would use them to stage and attack the marines 563 00:40:39,000 --> 00:40:40,880 cos they knew that they had more safety there 564 00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:42,320 than they did in a regular place. 565 00:40:43,760 --> 00:40:48,240 So this mosque just short of the southern edge of Fallujah - 566 00:40:48,240 --> 00:40:51,200 a tank fired a shell through the minaret. 567 00:40:53,600 --> 00:40:57,600 And they apparently killed the insurgent who was inside, 568 00:40:57,600 --> 00:41:00,240 and I said, "I've got to go and see that." 569 00:41:00,240 --> 00:41:05,120 I needed...a photograph as evidence, as a reporter, 570 00:41:05,120 --> 00:41:08,280 to show that these mosques were being used as staging grounds. 571 00:41:08,280 --> 00:41:11,200 A picture of a dead insurgent inside a minaret 572 00:41:11,200 --> 00:41:13,280 showed that without question... 573 00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:16,360 ..these spaces were being violated 574 00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:19,640 and were therefore no longer protected by the Geneva Convention. 575 00:41:19,640 --> 00:41:23,640 So we went to the Captain and said, "Hey, man, can you please," 576 00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:25,320 you know, "radio everybody and tell them 577 00:41:25,320 --> 00:41:27,800 "that we're gonna be running up the street to this mosque 578 00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:29,720 "and just tell everyone not to shoot us." 579 00:41:31,240 --> 00:41:33,640 And this time Reed said, "No. 580 00:41:33,640 --> 00:41:36,080 "If you wanna go, this time you gotta go with the squad 581 00:41:36,080 --> 00:41:38,040 "because it's too dangerous out there." 582 00:41:38,040 --> 00:41:42,560 And I said, "No, I've got a policy against... 583 00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:44,160 "like, this non-intervention policy 584 00:41:44,160 --> 00:41:47,560 "where, like, stuff shouldn't happen on account of me." 585 00:41:51,840 --> 00:41:54,480 So, the Captain said, "Well, you can't go." 586 00:41:55,600 --> 00:41:57,480 And I said, "Well, I need the picture." 587 00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:03,760 Dexter and I agreed to it. 588 00:42:03,760 --> 00:42:05,480 That we would go with the squad. 589 00:42:08,080 --> 00:42:13,280 I was chosen to lead a patrol, along with my Lieutenant, 590 00:42:13,280 --> 00:42:18,040 out down to this minaret that was 400m away, maybe, 591 00:42:18,040 --> 00:42:20,160 that had this dead sniper in it. 592 00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:23,120 What did you think about doing this job? I was angry. 593 00:42:24,440 --> 00:42:26,880 I did not want to do it in the first place, 594 00:42:26,880 --> 00:42:29,040 because we were pretty much done with the city, 595 00:42:29,040 --> 00:42:31,800 so for me it was like that one last patrol thing 596 00:42:31,800 --> 00:42:34,000 and I'm just like, "I don't want to do this," you know, 597 00:42:34,000 --> 00:42:35,480 just so he could take a picture? 598 00:42:36,600 --> 00:42:39,360 You know, all right, if that's the job and that's the mission 599 00:42:39,360 --> 00:42:42,320 then that's what I'll do, but I don't agree with this at all. 600 00:42:42,320 --> 00:42:43,920 WHISTLES 601 00:42:47,200 --> 00:42:52,440 I remember the moment I thought, "Maybe this isn't a good idea." 602 00:42:52,440 --> 00:42:55,160 We were walking towards the minaret. 603 00:42:55,160 --> 00:42:59,960 And, you know, Fallujah had been so violent, 604 00:42:59,960 --> 00:43:02,520 so destructive, 605 00:43:02,520 --> 00:43:05,800 smoke and ruin everywhere. 606 00:43:05,800 --> 00:43:09,000 And we were walking to the minaret. 607 00:43:09,000 --> 00:43:13,000 And for the first time in a week. it was quiet. 608 00:43:13,000 --> 00:43:14,680 There was nothing. 609 00:43:20,840 --> 00:43:24,160 If you could picture, you kind of enter a compound 610 00:43:24,160 --> 00:43:30,840 and the main mosque is kind of to your direct front and left. 611 00:43:30,840 --> 00:43:34,480 The minaret is to your direct front and right. 612 00:43:34,480 --> 00:43:37,360 And there's two groups of auxiliary buildings. 613 00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:42,320 So we clear out these auxiliary buildings, 614 00:43:42,320 --> 00:43:43,880 we clear out the mosque... 615 00:43:46,400 --> 00:43:49,440 And the last building left is the minaret, 616 00:43:49,440 --> 00:43:51,480 so we're going to go clear the minaret, 617 00:43:51,480 --> 00:43:54,160 see if we can get up and find this sniper, dead sniper. 618 00:43:58,800 --> 00:44:00,920 And when we got to the base of the minaret, 619 00:44:00,920 --> 00:44:04,440 Lance Corporal Billy Miller was stacked at the door. 620 00:44:04,440 --> 00:44:07,360 And he said, "Hey, Dominguez, come stack on me." 621 00:44:07,360 --> 00:44:10,640 Stack means "get behind me and let's go up there together." 622 00:44:14,240 --> 00:44:16,600 Ashley Gilbertson was there 623 00:44:16,600 --> 00:44:19,040 and with his Australian voice he was trying to tell us, 624 00:44:19,040 --> 00:44:21,440 "Hey, you stay back, I'm just going to go run up there 625 00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:23,360 "and take a quick picture." 626 00:44:23,360 --> 00:44:25,480 I wanted to get the picture and just leave. 627 00:44:25,480 --> 00:44:28,480 Get out of there as soon as we could so that nothing happened. 628 00:44:29,800 --> 00:44:33,040 Before we went there, a marine stopped me 629 00:44:33,040 --> 00:44:35,840 and said, "I've got to go ahead and clear it." 630 00:44:35,840 --> 00:44:39,160 So...that was Lance Corporal William Miller. 631 00:44:39,160 --> 00:44:41,600 He went up first. 632 00:44:41,600 --> 00:44:45,160 He was followed by Christian Dominguez, 633 00:44:45,160 --> 00:44:46,720 then me, 634 00:44:46,720 --> 00:44:50,120 and Dexter was apparently behind me. I didn't turn around to see. 635 00:44:53,320 --> 00:44:55,400 Itself, the minaret was scary. 636 00:44:55,400 --> 00:44:57,400 It was dark, the stairs were creaky, 637 00:44:57,400 --> 00:44:59,560 you know, the bricks were... 638 00:44:59,560 --> 00:45:02,320 It just seemed like the whole thing was going to fall apart anyway. 639 00:45:03,720 --> 00:45:07,920 We're climbing and it's just the sound of rubble, 640 00:45:07,920 --> 00:45:11,360 like crunching concrete under our feet when we're climbing. 641 00:45:11,360 --> 00:45:15,040 There was a whole bunch of rubble on these stairs, 642 00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:17,320 like, it was such a confined area. 643 00:45:17,320 --> 00:45:19,920 I mean, it wasn't much wider than this chair. 644 00:45:19,920 --> 00:45:21,920 And we're walking up there and... 645 00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:26,920 The steps were pretty big in that Billy Miller was going up 646 00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:29,880 and he was almost a full step ahead of me. 647 00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:33,400 And we kept tripping, 648 00:45:33,400 --> 00:45:37,600 and he almost said something. He almost said... 649 00:45:37,600 --> 00:45:38,760 "Shit." 650 00:45:44,640 --> 00:45:49,360 And just as you start to get a little bit of light 651 00:45:49,360 --> 00:45:50,720 through a hole in the wall, 652 00:45:50,720 --> 00:45:53,520 from where the tank shell went through and killed this insurgent... 653 00:45:54,960 --> 00:45:58,640 ..and I'm thinking, "This is almost over. Get my picture and get out." 654 00:45:58,640 --> 00:46:00,520 Then there was a gunshot. 655 00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:03,720 Maybe multiple gunshots. GUNSHOT 656 00:46:05,720 --> 00:46:07,160 And I felt water all over me. 657 00:46:08,560 --> 00:46:11,560 You know, immediately I thought, shit, somebody released their rifle 658 00:46:11,560 --> 00:46:13,880 by accident and shot these CamelBaks that they all wear, 659 00:46:13,880 --> 00:46:16,720 it's like these little backpacks filled with water. 660 00:46:18,000 --> 00:46:19,800 Then I heard Dominguez screaming. 661 00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:31,680 We basically walked into this guy's muzzle. 662 00:46:33,480 --> 00:46:35,680 I saw a guy's hand laying down, 663 00:46:35,680 --> 00:46:38,520 and he was laying down the stairs 664 00:46:38,520 --> 00:46:42,080 and we basically walked right into his gun. 665 00:46:42,080 --> 00:46:44,600 He shot Miller in the face... 666 00:46:45,680 --> 00:46:48,920 ..and then Miller's body kind of turned and then he shot. 667 00:46:48,920 --> 00:46:51,880 And at this point Miller kind of fell down 668 00:46:51,880 --> 00:46:56,960 and I was standing just below Miller 669 00:46:56,960 --> 00:47:00,280 and the shots.... This guy was lighting up the wall, 670 00:47:00,280 --> 00:47:02,400 shooting relentlessly, 671 00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:04,480 and the rocks were exploding in my face, 672 00:47:04,480 --> 00:47:08,280 and it was so loud because of how confined the area was. 673 00:47:08,280 --> 00:47:09,880 And then I just remember, like, 674 00:47:09,880 --> 00:47:12,240 all of us starting to run down these stairs. 675 00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:15,720 And I remember falling 676 00:47:15,720 --> 00:47:17,280 and just rolling. 677 00:47:21,400 --> 00:47:23,040 We rolled out of this minaret... 678 00:47:25,720 --> 00:47:29,080 ..and I looked down at my camera 679 00:47:29,080 --> 00:47:30,440 and my hands... 680 00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:34,120 ..and it wasn't water. 681 00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:37,480 It was blood, and brain, and... 682 00:47:40,480 --> 00:47:42,120 It was Billy, like, just... 683 00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:46,120 ..all over me. 684 00:47:47,600 --> 00:47:50,680 Ashley was just, like, in a complete state of shock. 685 00:47:50,680 --> 00:47:56,560 He... I just remember him sitting there kind of mumbling to himself. 686 00:47:56,560 --> 00:48:00,040 His helmet was on crooked and he was just saying, 687 00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:02,280 "My fault, my fault, my fault, my fault, my fault..." 688 00:48:06,760 --> 00:48:08,560 I couldn't breathe. 689 00:48:08,560 --> 00:48:11,240 And Sam Williams was down there, 690 00:48:11,240 --> 00:48:14,080 and he said, "Dominguez, what happened?" 691 00:48:14,080 --> 00:48:17,480 And out of some... I remember hearing my voice was weird, 692 00:48:17,480 --> 00:48:20,320 and saying, "Miller's dead," 693 00:48:20,320 --> 00:48:23,680 and the look of confusion on his face, like, "What?" 694 00:48:23,680 --> 00:48:26,240 SHOUTING 695 00:48:26,240 --> 00:48:28,160 Everybody came running out of the building. 696 00:48:29,560 --> 00:48:31,080 Except Billy. 697 00:48:32,800 --> 00:48:36,000 So obviously we were going back in to get him. 698 00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:39,280 I don't care about that picture or anything at this point - 699 00:48:39,280 --> 00:48:40,800 we've gotta get Billy out of here. 700 00:48:40,800 --> 00:48:42,480 We've gotta get our wounded out of here. 701 00:48:42,480 --> 00:48:43,960 GUNFIRE 702 00:48:46,280 --> 00:48:48,920 And it was a relentless effort to go up there 703 00:48:48,920 --> 00:48:52,560 and retrieve Miller's body and take out the threat that was up there. 704 00:48:54,200 --> 00:48:55,920 SHELL FIRE 705 00:48:57,880 --> 00:49:00,200 They tried to go up there a couple of times. 706 00:49:01,680 --> 00:49:03,440 And on like the second or third time 707 00:49:03,440 --> 00:49:05,960 they were able to go up there and get his body out. 708 00:49:05,960 --> 00:49:07,320 They dragged Billy out. 709 00:49:09,000 --> 00:49:10,520 They put him onto a stretcher. 710 00:49:12,440 --> 00:49:14,320 And I remember thinking... 711 00:49:14,320 --> 00:49:15,720 "Don't look. 712 00:49:16,960 --> 00:49:18,640 "Because what you see will... 713 00:49:20,920 --> 00:49:24,200 "What you see, you did, and what you see will... 714 00:49:25,480 --> 00:49:27,120 "You can't look." 715 00:49:31,360 --> 00:49:33,040 So I turned around and looked. 716 00:49:40,520 --> 00:49:43,440 He said, you know, "Please tell me he's not dead, please tell me, 717 00:49:43,440 --> 00:49:45,720 "please tell me, please tell me he's not dead." 718 00:49:45,720 --> 00:49:48,360 And so it fell to me to tell him that he was. 719 00:49:51,600 --> 00:49:54,640 I had stashed Dexter and Ashley in the mosque 720 00:49:54,640 --> 00:49:56,600 because it was the most secure building. 721 00:49:56,600 --> 00:49:59,280 I tell the Lieutenant, "OK, we're getting out of here. 722 00:49:59,280 --> 00:50:02,640 "The mission's over. We're going home." 723 00:50:02,640 --> 00:50:06,400 I've got Billy's weapon in my hand and my weapon is slung, 724 00:50:06,400 --> 00:50:08,680 so I come around the corner into the mosque, 725 00:50:08,680 --> 00:50:12,400 and I was like, "You're gonna take this and hold it," 726 00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:14,040 I said, "And when I count to three 727 00:50:14,040 --> 00:50:17,400 "you and you are gonna run out this door and stay right behind me." 728 00:50:20,440 --> 00:50:22,360 GUNFIRE 729 00:50:22,360 --> 00:50:26,720 And we ran down the street back to the firm base. 730 00:50:26,720 --> 00:50:28,280 The second we started running, 731 00:50:28,280 --> 00:50:32,000 a machine-gun opened fire from insurgents behind us. 732 00:50:32,000 --> 00:50:33,960 MACHINE-GUN FIRE 733 00:50:37,440 --> 00:50:41,040 And at that point I felt like we were surrounded. 734 00:50:41,040 --> 00:50:43,000 There were shots coming from everywhere. 735 00:50:43,000 --> 00:50:45,360 We had been there for a little bit too long. 736 00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:48,680 And...I remember our tactics 737 00:50:48,680 --> 00:50:51,080 not living up to what they should have been at that moment 738 00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:53,920 and we kind of lost a little bit of discipline. 739 00:50:53,920 --> 00:50:57,240 MACHINE-GUN FIRE 740 00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:01,240 We made it back to the base. Nobody else was shot. 741 00:51:02,400 --> 00:51:03,560 Sam... 742 00:51:05,200 --> 00:51:06,680 ..told us.... 743 00:51:09,560 --> 00:51:11,720 ..that this is what happens in war. 744 00:51:16,080 --> 00:51:18,240 That it wasn't our fault. 745 00:51:18,240 --> 00:51:19,720 We went to the Lieutenant. 746 00:51:19,720 --> 00:51:21,840 I said, "I'm sorry, it's my fault, I know." 747 00:51:21,840 --> 00:51:23,400 He said, "Yeah, it's your fault." 748 00:51:30,040 --> 00:51:31,960 CRYING: And then I called my editor and said, 749 00:51:31,960 --> 00:51:33,360 "I have to get out of here." 750 00:51:47,040 --> 00:51:48,720 TRANSLATION: 751 00:52:04,440 --> 00:52:08,240 According to the UN, around 600 civilians 752 00:52:08,240 --> 00:52:10,760 died in the attack on Fallujah. 753 00:52:10,760 --> 00:52:12,880 Mustafa was one of the lucky ones. 754 00:52:16,880 --> 00:52:20,920 He was among ten children identified by a US NGO 755 00:52:20,920 --> 00:52:24,560 who paid for them to come and live in America for a few months 756 00:52:24,560 --> 00:52:28,960 so that they could receive treatment for their injuries. 757 00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:30,960 Get ready! You better get ready! 758 00:52:30,960 --> 00:52:32,600 Get ready, here it comes. 759 00:52:34,400 --> 00:52:36,280 Whoa! 760 00:52:36,280 --> 00:52:37,920 TRANSLATION: 761 00:52:47,400 --> 00:52:51,000 OK, so can you ask Mustafa to watch me? 762 00:52:51,000 --> 00:52:53,280 NIDHAL TRANSLATES 763 00:53:08,640 --> 00:53:10,280 MUSTAFA LAUGHS 764 00:53:45,520 --> 00:53:48,640 NEWSREADER: A private graveside service happening now 765 00:53:48,640 --> 00:53:50,760 with the closest of family 766 00:53:50,760 --> 00:53:54,640 as they bid their final farewell to their patriarch, 767 00:53:54,640 --> 00:53:56,800 President George HW Bush. 768 00:53:58,280 --> 00:54:01,160 "Let future generations understand 769 00:54:01,160 --> 00:54:04,400 "the burden and the blessings of freedom." 770 00:54:04,400 --> 00:54:09,920 It means that all the people in this country that don't understand 771 00:54:09,920 --> 00:54:15,000 what the men and women are dying for - they need to understand it. 772 00:54:15,000 --> 00:54:19,360 My son was one of the ones that didn't come back. 773 00:54:19,360 --> 00:54:22,040 But in some ways... 774 00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:24,400 ..he's better off, 775 00:54:24,400 --> 00:54:27,120 because he doesn't have to live with the guilt 776 00:54:27,120 --> 00:54:29,360 that so many of them are living with, 777 00:54:29,360 --> 00:54:33,200 because they did come back and their buddies didn't. 778 00:54:33,200 --> 00:54:37,200 I know that Ashley has a lot of guilt. 779 00:54:38,640 --> 00:54:43,040 But...he was doing what he was supposed to do, 780 00:54:43,040 --> 00:54:45,120 and Billy was doing his job. 781 00:54:45,120 --> 00:54:48,000 He loved being a Marine. He really, really did. 782 00:54:50,200 --> 00:54:53,200 ASHLEY: I waited so long. I was so scared to call the Miller family. 783 00:54:54,760 --> 00:54:57,120 I thought that they would be, understandably, 784 00:54:57,120 --> 00:54:58,800 really angry with me. 785 00:55:01,960 --> 00:55:04,480 So eventually I called and saw them. 786 00:55:06,360 --> 00:55:09,040 Lewis... SWALLOWS 787 00:55:09,040 --> 00:55:10,440 and Susie... 788 00:55:11,720 --> 00:55:13,640 ...were absolutely beautiful. Like... 789 00:55:14,600 --> 00:55:15,840 ..amazing people. 790 00:55:18,240 --> 00:55:20,200 I mean, I still love talking to Susie. 791 00:55:22,600 --> 00:55:24,880 E-mailing with her, calling her. 792 00:55:27,880 --> 00:55:31,400 And I wish it was easier than it is, but I feel like... 793 00:55:33,040 --> 00:55:34,280 ..I owe her... 794 00:55:37,400 --> 00:55:38,640 ..her son. 795 00:55:48,320 --> 00:55:51,560 Fallujah was the deadliest battle the Marines had fought 796 00:55:51,560 --> 00:55:54,000 since the Vietnam war. 797 00:55:54,000 --> 00:55:56,600 Billy was one of 71 servicemen 798 00:55:56,600 --> 00:56:00,360 who died in clearing the city of Al-Qaeda. 799 00:56:00,360 --> 00:56:02,280 At the time we took over the city 800 00:56:02,280 --> 00:56:05,480 and we did what our mission told us to do. 801 00:56:08,560 --> 00:56:10,400 On paper, it's a success. 802 00:56:11,680 --> 00:56:13,080 For me? 803 00:56:13,080 --> 00:56:14,400 It's difficult. 804 00:56:14,400 --> 00:56:17,720 Looking back, you know, 14, 15 years now, 805 00:56:17,720 --> 00:56:21,400 it's difficult for me to define that, 806 00:56:21,400 --> 00:56:24,520 because I hold on to my friends 807 00:56:24,520 --> 00:56:27,640 and the ones that were killed in our memories. 808 00:56:28,720 --> 00:56:30,360 And you look back at the instability 809 00:56:30,360 --> 00:56:32,240 of what's going on in Fallujah now... 810 00:56:33,360 --> 00:56:34,920 I'll take my friends back. 811 00:56:38,400 --> 00:56:39,760 Ten years after the Americans 812 00:56:39,760 --> 00:56:42,760 had declared the city free of insurgents, 813 00:56:42,760 --> 00:56:47,200 Fallujah would once again fall into the hands of Islamic extremists, 814 00:56:47,200 --> 00:56:50,880 when ISIS took over huge areas of Northern Iraq. 815 00:56:52,680 --> 00:56:54,680 For the next 18 months, 816 00:56:54,680 --> 00:56:58,280 Mustafa and his family lived through another occupation. 817 00:56:59,720 --> 00:57:01,480 TRANSLATION: 818 00:57:23,440 --> 00:57:25,360 MUSTAFA: 819 00:58:22,440 --> 00:58:25,240 Ladies and gentlemen, we got him. 820 00:58:25,240 --> 00:58:26,320 CHEERING 821 00:58:26,320 --> 00:58:29,000 The door opens. The first thought that came to my mind 822 00:58:29,000 --> 00:58:32,720 was, "Holy shit, it's Saddam. It's actually him." 823 00:58:32,720 --> 00:58:34,160 TRANSLATION: 824 00:58:39,200 --> 00:58:42,760 There was rumours that the Americans asked Saddam, 825 00:58:42,760 --> 00:58:47,120 "How much time do you need to make the situation in Iraq better?" 826 00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:48,920 He said, "I will need one hour. 827 00:58:48,920 --> 00:58:50,600 "45 minutes to shave, 828 00:58:50,600 --> 00:58:54,040 "and 15 minutes to say my speech on TV." 829 00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:55,520 He could do it.