The Marine Expeditionary Force is built to operate in a joint-control environment, so it’s natural they’re on the ground in Najaf with the First Cavalry. Really it’s the perfect match because these are two forces built the same way, and they fight the same way. The big difference is that the First Cav has more armor and tanks.

The well-supported force with air support is what we call a joint combat venture. We’ve established joint combat ventures because it used to be a difficult task to combine forces. If you go back to Vietnam, it used to be the Marines or any other arm would call on air support or other capabilities and find it was being tasked elsewhere. Now, the commander on site gets certain assets attached to his battlefield, a reserve of units that are specifically tasked to his troops. All soldiers are operating under the orders of the Iraqi government now. So there will be a commander on the ground that will consult with the Iraqi government regarding the hostile area and how much dispersion we need and what can we afford to assign.

There are Iraqi security forces with the Marines and the Cavalry too. My guess is that they were basically being held in reserve at the time. See, if anyone’s going to storm the mosque when the political parties say it’s time, it’s not going to be us. The Iraqi authorities don’t want American troops stomping around in the holy site. Having the Iraqis on board is a strategic reserve.

We do go in the cemetery, though, where we discover they’re not only using the graves as shelter from US forces but also hiding caches of weaponry inside the tombs. So this was a pre-staged event in very difficult terrain. There are so many empty doorways and lots of places to check out when they’re conducting a patrol. It’s an enormous environment; one that Saddam-era insurgents have known for years is physically difficult to maneuver through.

And we’ve got another disadvantage: the FEBA, forward edge of battle area, is complicated due to the cemetery’s being adjacent to the mosque. The troops are really constrained. The Coalition can come within about 400 yards of the shrine but can’t even fire their weapons in its direction. You’ve really got one hand tied behind your back when it comes to battling in the vicinity of a mosque.

So we use intellectual strategies. If you pay attention to what we did in Najaf, it shows a really interesting tactic. We go in with full force, and then we withdraw. We get a call it’s good to go, then we retreat again. We do this over and over as a show of force. I know it may sound strange, but what we’re doing is making it look like we can’t advance or that we’re really hesitant to move in. But this is just for show; a big fake-out. One minute we’re there, the next minute we’re gone. It’s something that’s psychologically tiring for the enemy.

We’re sending out squad-sized patrols all the time, moving from site to site. There’s a rally point, and soldiers use passwords to get back into where friendly troops expect them to be. During the day troops move around in Bradleys, mostly. There will be numerous daytime patrols rolling in as a large demonstration of force. Night patrols are different. When night falls, they prowl around to find where the bombs have been set up and locate any insurgent activity. Night vision really gives them the upper hand when they’re creeping around the graveyard.

Any combat situation creates a high degree of anxiety. But in a place like this cemetery, it’s particularly stressful. Here you are patrolling at night and there’s nothing but open doorways at your back everywhere you turn. That’s an uncomfortable feeling for a soldier. You like to have a clear range of vision at all times, to see everything around you. The problem is that there’s no clear field of fire here. You’re being shot at and you feel like you’re in a maze, in a dungeon-crawler match. Try to imagine. It’s like living in the game of Doom.

From an interview with US Army Staff Sergeant Dan Snyder