US SOLDIER: “It’s a joke. We’ll have spent 14 months in Combat, basically. Fighting all 14 months. They sent us right into Baghdad, when we got to Iraq they sent us right into Baghdad, our Battalion. First week we were in Baghdad, we lost 2 guys in our battalion. And then fuck, I mean, it hasn’t stopped since.”

Superimposed title over soldier freeze-frame: SPC Lake – 4th platoon apache company strykers.

STILL PIC 1
Saturday May 19th (Voice-over begins)

STILL PIC 2
It’s late afternoon in Baghdad.

STILL PIC 3
Photojournalist Sean Smith captures this image - that resonated across America. Inside a Bradley Armoured car - 6 US soldiers and their translator are burning to death.

FRONT ROOM
This is Sean’s account of the horrific events of that day – and the following two weeks. His footage starts with a rare moment of calm for Apache Company, in Amariya – Western Baghdad. Then in the distance what sounds like an IED.

INSIDE HUMMER
This is 4th Platoon. Specialist Lake is among them. They rush out to investigate.

BURNING BRADLEY
Sean films the soldiers as they discover the target of the blast - the Bradley upside down and on fire. It’s been blown up by a roadside bomb. But 4th Platoon are too late to help their 7 trapped colleagues. Live ammunition explodes inside the Bradley.

HOUSE SEARCH SEQUENCE
Seconds later, and nervous, they raid a nearby house looking for the bomb-maker.

(Sequence shows the soldiers aggressively entering a house screaming for the people inside to “get the fuck down”. An old woman inside is visibly distraught and keeps repeating the words “Allah, Allah, Allah”)

They detain several men - and leave them with Interrogators. The search for suspects continues. 4th platoon are exhausted.

US SOLDIER: ‘You’ve got grenades going off, you’ve got IED’s blowing up your vehicle, and then you’re expected to go back in those 4-5 hours and relax, to come back out and do another 6 hours. You just don’t have time to do it, your body never has time to come down, and you’re always on that higher, heightened sense of alertness. You just don’t have that rest, that comfort zone. We’re not given that time to recuperate from being out there for 6 hours and then deal with having to go back out there for another 6 hours. It’s just constant. You never get a break. ‘

FOLLOWING SPECIALIST LAKE

48 hours – and Specialist Lake’s unit are back in the neighborhood. They are conducting random house checks. They’re jumpy, but this time all they find is a frightened – and elderly woman.

ELDERLY IRAQI WOMAN SCENE SCREAMING AND CRYING

SUBTITLES 1: 'what are you looking for? I'm not a terrorist'

SUBTITLES 2: You upstairs! Get out of my home

SUBTITLES 3: God have mercy on Iraq. Give us love and peace in Iraq.

SUBTITLES 4: I am so paralyzed with fear, I cannot even get up.

SUBTITLES 5: Look at my medicine all over the floor.

LEAVING PIX
The 4th platoon find nothing and leave – but the next morning, a new horrible visit will befall this woman. A different apache company patrol, by coincidence takes cover in her home. They just shot a man dead.
Sean took this photo (STILL) as they dragged him onto her porch. The man lying in her porch has just been shot dead by American troops.

START OF TAXI SEQUENCE
And this is what happened. 2nd platoon are now are now on patrol. They’re suspicious a car circling their position might be a lookout for nearby snipers. Still nervous after the Bradley attack – they order the car to stop – and when it doesn’t, they open fire.

UPSOT
Worried they could be shot at in the road, 2nd platoon look for somewhere less exposed.
They drag the driver through the nearest front yard – and try to revive him. It’s the old lady’s house. She has no choice but to let the soldiers in – again.
The soldier’s attempts to keep him alive fail. A neighbor turns up – she thinks she knows who he is.

(DISTRAUGHT FEMALE NEIGHBOUR WITH CHILDREN IS CRYING, AS INTEPRETER EXPLAINS TO THE US SOLDIERS THAT SHE IS TELLING HIM THAT THE MAN THEY JUST SHOT DEAD WAS JUST A TAXI DRIVER)
The man was killed because he failed to stop.

VASSELL
2nd platoon’s Specialist Vassell was there that day.
SPECIALIST VASSELL INTERVIEW: ‘I challenge anybody in congress to do my rotation. They don’t have to do anything, just come hang out with me and go home at the times I go home, and come here stay 15 months with me.

Specialist Vassell was also there when this happened – the aftermath of an explosion in a munitions dump. The man on the ground is an Iraqi soldier being tended by an American.
The day starts with 2nd platoon called to investigate a blast at an insurgent bomb factory. They pick their way through the rubble – moments later there’s a secondary explosion.

Chaos, debris, and flying shrapnel.

An Iraqi soldier has taken the worst of it.
Neighbors – both children and adults - are hurt too.
The Americans set up an emergency first aid operation – they try to help the wounded.

(A STREAM OF GRAPHIC STILL IMAGERY OF WOUNDED MEN AND CHILDREN)

A Young boy has shrapnel wounds in his face and his body.

It’s an ordinary day for the people of Baghdad – and from apache company there’s this message for the politicians back in Washington.

SPECIALIST VASSELL INTERVIEW: ‘We’re supposed to be on the way home right now. We were supposed to be flying home in 6 days. But, because we have people up there in congress with the brain of a 2-year old, who don’t know what they’re doing – They don’t experience it. I challenge the president, or whoever has us here for 15 months to ride alongside me. I’ll do another 15 months, if he comes and rides along with me everyday for 15 months.

They don’t even have to pay me extra, I just want him to come out here and ride with me for another 15 months.’

END