Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader must admit that he doesn’t read Michael Yon as much as he would like. It is hard to keep up with all the things out there that one might want to read. Information overload is really a problem of the “information age” afterall…

Anyhoo…

If you haven’t read Michael Yon’s latest about his travels with the Queen’s Royal Lancers in Iraq, you ought to. It is excellent. Indeed, the link above takes you to the first published part of his work. This is part 1 of 4.

Excerpt:

The Queen’s Royal Lancers have been living out in the desert for about six months, like nomads moving from place to place, sleeping under the stars, getting much of their resupply of food and water by nighttime parachute drop as they patrol the Iran-Iraq border. They were living out there, as some officers had told me, in true Lawrence of Arabia style, wearing shamals, sometimes taking camel rides when Bedouins would wonder through their camps with great herds of camels. Some soldiers would go for weeks without bathing, while others would wash-down with a bottle or two of water. Water is strictly rationed.

LTC Nixon-Eckersall would say that their job was to melt away into the desert, providing the eyes and ears that monitor the border. They’d apparently done their job well. I had been on many patrols with American forces along the Iranian border, but had no idea that Brits were out on desert safari. Although there had been some fighting, the Queen’s Royal Lancers had not lost a single soldier to combat during this tour.

Read the rest.

And one more thing… God bless the all the soliders in Iraq.

Carry on.