As someone who has to cover the Iran nuclear deal, I don’t feel it’s my place to offer personal opinions on its merits. But after spending so much time listening to the pros and cons, delivered in passionate terms with hypothetical outcomes, I wanted to put a human face on the issue.
It belongs to Micah Jones.
I first met Jones in December outside a county courtroom. He was sitting on a bench.
Pensive and withdrawn, he reached into his pocket for a round tin of Grizzly chaw, put a pinch in his mouth, and looked down at his feet as the moments ticked away toward a pending appearance before a county judge.
Jones, 37, faced charges of assaulting his girlfriend.
It was the culmination of a difficult reintegration for the Army veteran, who saw too many bad things during his time in Iraq.
A lot of those bad things can be traced to Iran’s military influence.
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In 2008, Jones was a specialist, deployed to Iraq and assigned to the battle of Sadr City, a sprawling Baghdad neighborhood and home to the Mahdi Army, created by Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
At some point, al-Sadr had gone to Iran, ostensibly for religious training, Jones says. But he apparently came back with more than just Quranic verses.
A devastating weapon, called explosively formed penetrators, started showing up in Sadr City when al-Sadr returned, Jones says.
Known as EFPs, the weapons were a type of improvised explosive device that sends molten metal speeding through space at such high velocity and scorching temperature that it melted its way through the thick, bullet-resistant armor of U.S. vehicles. Used before by militaries after World War I in anti-tank hand grenades, the EFPs used in Sadr City were placed along roadsides in cans camouflaged to look like pieces of wall or curb, or in the so-called “muffler tree” sculptures made out of old chassis, mufflers and other vehicle parts.
The issue of the EFPs and U.S. troop deaths has recently played out against the backdrop of the Iranian nuclear arms deal with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican presidential candidate, claiming Iran was responsible for 500 deaths from IEDs.
A wide variety of Iranian activities have resulted in roughly that number of U.S. troop deaths, according to the Senate testimony by Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford, who ultimately was confirmed as the new commandant of the Marine Corps.
That represents about 14 percent of the 3,490 U.S. troops killed in action during Operation Iraqi Freedom, according to Pentagon figures.
About 200 deaths were directly related to Iranian EFPs, according to data from U.S. Central Command covering a period from July, 2005, to the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom in December 2011. Nearly 900 troops were wounded by the weapons during that same time period.
On Aug. 8, 2008, Jones saw what happened when such a device hits a human — in this case, one of his fellow soldiers.
It was one of 15 such explosions that month, according to the Centcom data.
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Jones says that the captain in charge of his unit “was spooked” by the prevalence of EFP attacks, which had peaked a few months earlier, according to the Centcom data. So much so that at one point, he was on a mission to pick up another 10 or so lumbering vehicles called MRAPs or Mine Resistant Ambush Protected.
One of Jones’ main jobs with Bravo Battery of the 202nd Field Artillery was helping build what was known as the “Golden Wall” — a structure around the slums of Sadr City to keep the bad guys in.
On Aug. 8, Jones was in an MRAP leading a convoy to Sadr City when he saw a flash of bright light.
“It was white, then orange-colored,” says Jones.
Then the radio blared urgent voices. There was yelling. Screaming. Arguing.
“I turned around and of course I could see the glow of flames,” he says.
As the lead vehicle, Jones says his MRAP tried to turn around and provide security for the stalled convoy that had come under attack in bad guy country.
“But we were blocked by the trucks behind us,” he says. “We flip around, and drive down sidewalk and end up pulling security while they cleaned up the mess.”
The mess included Sgt. Jose E. Ulloa of New York City, the commander of the last truck in the convoy.
He was 23.
“The EFP went right through him,” says Jones, adding that it also hit the gunner’s left and the driver as well, both of whom survived. “My roommate was the one who put him in the body bag.”
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Jones says the experiences in Iraq changed him forever.
A football player at the University of Central Florida whose father was a Marine, he had considered himself the “All-American-type guy.”
But when he got home, he experienced what thousands of troops returning from the war zones have gone through.
Difficulty adjusting. Guilt feelings over killing people, even though they were attacking him. Even simple things like driving became problematic.
“One thing that kept me alive was my ability to look all over the place and see everything going on around me,” he says.
Potholes would anger him. Seeing bags of garbage or other debris reminded him of roadside bombs and he would try to veer around them.
“A motorcycle went by me on I-4. It backfired right beside me. It was by Ybor City, with the wall on the side. He went up in front of me and backfired again. I found myself having a physical reaction.”
For Jones, life was spiraling downward, problems exacerbated by a tour in Afghanistan and then, back home, frequent assignments around the country. There were two divorces. Then, in December, rock bottom. He assaulted the woman who was his girlfriend at the time and wound up living in his car.
Jones says life is improving, thanks to Hillsborough County’s Veterans Treatment Court program, where he is working through the charges against him, and a therapist named Carrie Elk, whose Elk Institute for Psychological Health and Performance specializes in treating military and veterans suffering from the mental wounds of war. Upon completion of the program, the misdemeanor battery charge against him will be dismissed.
So, I ask, what do you think about Iran, in the context of what happened then and what is happening now?
“Iran is the China of the Middle East,” he says. “They stay out of active conflict, but they sure as heck have supported everyone who wants to fight, sending money, troops for training. That’s what it seems like to me.”
Jones says he hasn’t paid much attention to debate over the Iran nuclear deal or the back and forth over the number of troops killed by Iranian EFPs.
Still, his could be considered a face of the arguments.
Those opposed to the deal can point to him and say, “Ah-hah, the Iranians do despicable things. We can’t trust them to stop their nuclear ambitions.”
Those in favor can point to him and say, “Ah-hah, the Iranians do despicable things. We need to bring them back into the tent and find a way to make them stop.”
“It must be hard to be in that debate,” Jones says.
Harder still to have been in Sadr City in 2008.
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The Pentagon announced no deaths last week in support of ongoing operations.
There have been 2,347 U.S. troop deaths in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, seven in support of the anti-ISIS campaign Operation Inherent Resolve, and five U.S. troop deaths and one civilian Department of Defense employee death in support of the follow-up Operation Freedom’s Sentinel in Afghanistan.