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In this episode of Trint’s “A Photo A Story”, Jeff takes his mind back to 2003 during the Iraq war when he was stationed in Baghdad reporting for ABC News. The US Marines offered a handful of journalists access to a behind-the-scenes tour of the infrastructure they were building to support Iraq’s reconstruction. Commanders had decided to build their base in one of the most unlikely places: Ancient Babylon, a place inaccessible to visitors during Saddam Hussein’s rule. 

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The Marines had chosen to make the UNESCO World Heritage site part of their base to protect it from looting. Saddam in his obscene vanity, had rebuilt the walls of Babylon in his own image and even constructed a palace overlooking the archeological site. Even so, what was left intact was 4,000 years of history that will always be an enduring and unexpected memory for Jeff of his time as a war correspondent in Iraq.

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Watch the video above or see Trint in action by viewing a read-only link of this transcript, with playback features to read-along with the video. Or if you’d just like the text, you’ll find Jeff’s story below.

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Jeff: [00:00:00] But it was such an unexpected backdrop when I was embedded with the Marines at that point. I didn't really know that when the helicopter land that we were going to be surrounded by 4000 years of history. 

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Jeff: [00:00:21] This is ancient Babylon, one of the most important archeological sites in the world. It is July 2003, just a few months after Saddam Hussein has been overthrown. 

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Jeff: [00:00:30] The U.S. Marines chose to make the UNESCO World Heritage site part of their Marine base for operations in Iraq after Saddam was overthrown, in part to protect the UNESCO's World Heritage site from looting. This is a place that no one could see under Saddam's rule. So for decades, it was cut off from the world. And what you see here is quite unexpected. 

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Jeff: [00:00:56] Saddam, in his limitless vanity, chose to rebuild the walls of Babylon as he and his henchmen imagined, really destroying the integrity of the archeological site. And in the walls were stamped, built by Saddam, son of Nebuchadnezzar, the great founder of Babylon. And in fact, Saddam's portrait sits over one of the gates next to Nebuchadnezzar's. I mean, it is this obscene vanity. He actually built a palace on an artificial hill called Saddam Hill, so he could gloat as he looked over his own nation's possessions, which he ruled. There had been a plan, in fact, to put in a cable car from his palace down to the site, but that was disrupted by the invasion in 2003 and his overthrow. 

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Jeff: [00:01:45] One of the things that was also really interesting was that because the place had been cut off for so long, everybody from the West wanted to see it. And so you had this odd thing of these aid workers coming in, being granted access to the Marine base and touring ancient Babylon to see these artifacts that simply had not been seen by anybody in the West for decades. 

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Jeff: [00:02:10] But what an unexpected backdrop to a war. We slept under these date palm trees at the forks of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. And here you are surrounded by 4000 years of history. And it was so hot that we had these cots that the Navy gave us and we just slept on outside under the date palms. And you could see the moon through the leaves of the palms. And I just, it's an enduring memory of my time in Iraq. 

‍Jeff: [00:02:38] And when people say, what was it like being a war correspondent, I don't think that that's what people imagine. And of course, that was just one moment in that assignment. But it's one that I'll never forget.