Gunner Palace

SPC Billie Grimes:
The kids are really funny 'cause at first they'll be like 'Mr., Mr.' and then they'll realize, oh, 'Mrs., Mrs.' and then they want to talk to you even more. Like you get swarms of kids just right in front of you. You try to be friendly to 'em while looking around, making sure no one's gonna shoot you. But the guys are even funnier. You have 'em walk by you and then you see 'em, their heads still turnin', about to trip over themselves tryin' to walk. Then you have some people lookin' and about to crash their cars. I don't know, I don't think they'd ever seen a woman in a uniform.

SPC Stuart Wilf:
Part of our eighty-seven billion dollar budget provided for us to have some secondary armor on put on top of our thin skinned humvees. This armor is made in Iraq, and it's high quality ... metal ... and it will probably slow down the shrapnel so that it stays in your body instead of going clean through. And that's about it!

SPC Tom Susdorf:
This morning, um, the Shiites were having their holy day, doing their usual walks around Baghdad, and their pilgrimmage to some of the holy shrines in the area and they went over to Kadhimiya, and, uh, a couple explosions went off. The doctors at the hospital say at least seventy-five people were killed, thus far. When the QRF from the Knights and Dakota went over to assess the situation and try to help with medical support they got there only to be pelted by rocks and sticks and bottles and chairs and anything the Iraqis could pick up and throw. It was a wonderful morning.

PFC Michael Commisso:
IEDs are the scariest. I mean, by far, have got to be the scariest. You know, gunfire and crap like that, that sh*t don't bother me or anyone else. Whatever. IEDs, find that sh*t in the garbage, man, this whole country's garbage. Everything is just trash, and it could be anywhere, you know. You see us when we're going around the corner, and there's a box on the side of the road, and it's just cringe, and take the turn, and hopefully you don't hear a bang.

Soldier:
I don't think ... anywhere in history has someone killed someone else and something better has come out of it. It's just ... not possible.

SGT Beatty:
When you sit on your couch and you watch the TV, and you go to your 9 to 5 job and you complain about the pizza being late ... there's no way you're gonna know how to live here.

SGT Beatty:
Someone being sympathetic to this? I don't know if I'd be sympathetic if I wasn't in the army. After you watch this, you're gonna go get your popcorn out of the microwave and talk about what I said, and you'll forget me by the end of this.

SGT Beatty:
Only people who remember this is us.

SPC Devon Dixon:
I couldn't sleep for a while, you know, the first time I ever had to kill somebody, so I know for me ... you know, it tore me up pretty bad. But after a while, you know, I learned to deal with it, 'case you gotta look at it as, you know, it's either gonna be him or it's gonna be me, and, you know, I'm not doin' the wrong thing, I'm just following orders, so I'd rather it not be me. So, I had to, you know, I learned to live with it.