My Share of the Task(255)
momentary period of sympathy: Details of Shia-Sunni cooperation during Fallujah are drawn from several sources, especially Jon Lee Anderson, “The Uprising: Shia and Sunnis Put Aside Their Differences,” The New Yorker, May 3, 2004.
blood donations for Fallujah: Shadid, Night Draws Near, 451–53.
stop the offensive in Fallujah: For a description of the mounting political pressure on the Marines and the United States during the battle, see Malkasian, Signaling Resolve, 437–41.
Lakhdar Brahimi, threatened to quit: Paul Bremer III, My Year in Iraq (Threshold, 2006), 326–27; cited in Malkasian, Signaling Resolve, 440.
potentially fatal to a new Iraq: Interview with senior military official.
Bush ordered the assault stopped: David Cloud and Greg Jaffe, The Fourth Star (Three Rivers, 2009), 153.
the Marines’ Camp Fallujah: Ibid.
knowing they would be irate: Ibid.
one of his top aides: Patrick Cockburn, Muqtada al-Sadr and the Battle for the Future of Iraq (Scribner, 2008), 145; Shadid, Night Draws Near, 441.
in honor of Muqtada’s martyred father: Cockburn, Muqtada al-Sadr, 91.
continue fighting Sadr’s militia: The letter, dated April 8, was reported on April 9, though the story ran on April 10. Thom Shanker, “Letter Tells Soldiers Their Tour May Extend,” New York Times, April 10, 2004.
“one thug to replace another”: Ibid.
trucks stopped moving: “One day in mid-April during the Shia uprising in southern Iraq, all 122 Coalition convoys traveling the roads in Iraq were attacked. Worse was the fact that for a short period in April, CJTF-7’s supply lines were shut down, including MSR Tampa—the main supply route from Kuwait to Iraq” (Donald P. Wright and Colonel Timothy R. Reese, The United States Army in Operation Iraqi Freedom, May 2003–January 2005 (Government Printing Office, June 2008), 506.
more frequently that summer: Thomas Hegghammer, “The Iraq Hostage Crisis: Abductions in Iraq, April–August 2004,” Norwegian Defense Research Establishment, October 2004.
enemies with pig carcasses: See Donald Smythe, “Pershing and the Disarmament of Moros,” Pacific Historical Review (August 1962), 244–45 and relevant footnotes.
the Fallujah Brigade: According to the Marines’ history, “On 25 April, both Lieutenant General Conway and Major General Mattis met with former Iraqi Army generals to discuss the possible formation of a military unit in al-Fallujah. . . . By 28 April the Fallujah Brigade had begun assembling and on the 30th, a turnover led to the phased movement of the 1st Marine Division out of al-Fallujah.” Estes, “U.S. Marine Corps Operations,” 37.
ran six times: Details of the events on April 24 come from interviews with task force members, as well as Oren Dorell and Gregg Zoroya, “Battle for Fallujah Forged Many Heroes,” USA Today, November 9, 2006.
alone on the rooftop: Dorell and Zoroya, “Battle for Fallujah.”
acting like his Salafists: See Michael Ware’s report from that summer: “Meet the New Jihad,” Time, June 27, 2004.
AK-47 rifles and munitions: Additional details of the tracking and intercepting of the trucks come from interviews with task force members.
“get more aggressive here”: My recollection of the dialogue and details of the meeting with John Abizaid was aided by interviews with him, as well as other military members present.