Thanksgiving in Operation Iraqi Freedom

I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was an ice sculpture. An ice sculpture! In the middle of the dessert!?!??! In fact, there were two of them sitting right there on a table in our chow hall at Camp Virginia, which boasted somewhere between 6 and 8,000 coalition troops at the time.

It was November of 2003, and I was in my eighth month as an Army Captain in the war zone. There wasn't much to distinguish Thanksgiving Day from any other day in the dessert. In fact, we really never knew what day of the week it was with the exception of Sundays, when fliers would be posted showing religious services.

We'd barely had a decent meal since the invasion began, let alone ice sculptures. Watching the glass-like statues of an eagle and a pilgrim (I'll post the photos when I find them) melt away quickly, I laughed out loud amongst the sea of dessert camouflage uniforms in line to eat. I took this photo outside our chow hall in the fall of 2003. The lines extend quite a distance and usually involve a wait of at least 30-45 minutes per meal.

Our laughs turned to smiles when we saw our food: real turkey, stuffing, potatoes, and pie. After going more than a month with marginal refrigeration and repetitive meals, we'd given up on the idea of seeing anything that resembled a home-cooked meal. Yet, here it was .. and it never-ever-ever looked so good.

We'd had quite a bit of activity earlier in the day. Working in transportation, my staff and I had been given a directive to re-route convoys to alternate routes near the Baghdad International Airport (BIAP) but we weren't told why. It wasn't unusual because U.S. troops were often conducting field operations there and would be on the offensive. Still, I remember thinking "can't we give our American fighting men and women a break on Thanksgiving day?"

Back to our meal now .. and I remember that we had a TV on in the chow hall that picked up the Armed Forces Network (AFN), which rebroadcasts American TV shows. It was a nice touch to see "real" TV as we ate our meals.

During a news break, we found out why we'd been forced to make our convoys adjust their routes. President Bush was arriving to make his first surprise visit for Thanksgiving dinner with the troops. The entire chow hall absolutely erupted with cheers. Hundreds and hundreds of us yelling and screaming and high-fiving in every direction. Our reaction wasn't geared by whether we supported the President's decision to send us to war or not .. but rather was simply a major release of built-up emotion that somebody, somebody out there cared enough to come see us.

We knew our families missed us .. but in that first year of the war, the lines of connection weren't yet strong enough for those of us with American flags on our right shoulders to feel that daily support 7,000 miles away.

I guess, the reason I share that story today is because I can vividly remember how depressed and lonely we felt at the beginning of that Thanksgiving day .. and how uplifted we became by a good meal and an actual, active show of support.

Someone cared enough to improve our meal for a day .. and someone cared enough to fly all the way over to see us.

So I guess .. no matter how nice it is when you display yellow ribbons in your windows and on your bumpers, our troops really feel support when people do something to help them and/or their families back home. Thanks for listening .. and for supporting our troops .. Eric