[91B]

I'm telling you the dust and sand is freakin' unbeleivable (but, hey, what do I know? I was only up there for seven weeks). In ten minutes you were covered and any oily spot on your weapon was turning brown. I suspect that most of these troopers had their weapons pointed downrange while they were driving up MSR Tampa (more or less like most American interstates) and didn't notice how filthy they were getting until it was too late.

Secondly, very few troops were (or for that matter are) keeping their weapons covered with a condom (they are kind of a rare comodity). I saw a few who had rigged a brown t-shirt around the muzzles and down to the ejector port, but that isn't practical in combat.

[Chad Fairbanks]

Well, I was never in Nasariyah, so I wouldn't know the local climate. I can relate to the desert dust though, but as I said - my weapon was a priority and ANY downtime was spent maintaining it. And I wasn't on the 'front lines'. I just can't for the life of me understand the mentality of any soldier or sailor or airman or marine or whatever who would allow their weapon to get dirty and not notice it - nor can I understand the mentality of any NCO or Officer who would not make this a priority for those under their command...