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An insider’s understanding of Iraq

Call him Jamal.

“Jamal” is the nickname Marine 1st Lt. Wesley Gray is given when Iraqi soldiers are delighted to discover he knows their language.

Not only does Gray understand and speak Arabic, he learned to understand the social and military culture of Iraq while an adviser to the Iraqi army in the Hadithah area from July 2006 through February 2007.

He is now a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Chicago School of Business. And if the future Dr. Gray persuades corporate- and academic-speaking clients to open up in the same way he gets Arabic-speaking clients to talk, listen up.

His ability to allow his Iraqi comrades to speak to him in their words results in engaging conversations and makes parts of his book, “Embedded: A Marine Corps Adviser Inside the Iraqi Army,” essential reading for anyone who is trying to understand how a historically stressed population survives.

When Gray asks why a Kurd soldier will not join him for a PT run, he hears an unforgettable answer:

“I have five bullet wounds in my legs from snipers in the Iran and Iraq War,” the soldier said. “I have shrapnel in my body and hands and I have a bullet wound on my head from a friendly Iraqi aircraft round that ricocheted off my head.

“I have a hard time moving my body.”

No more questions. Gray learns that “Iraqis operate in an environment unimaginable to outsiders.”

When Gray is baby-sitting (his word) at a local police department, he learns why one Iraqi wants to get rid of the bad guys.

“Jamal,” says Capt. Arkon, “let me show you what the insurgents have done to my family.”

“He pulled out his cell phone,” Gray writes, “and showed me the pictures and video eulogies of 15 close family members who have been killed in the past few months.”

Obviously, the Marine knows that good listeners get good and readable answers.

However, when he relies on phrases such as “pins and needles” and “our hearts’ content” he is less clear. A female U.S. Army sergeant is “manly.” How?

In transit he sees “hardened combat vets on their way out of Iraq [half of whom are mentally warped].” Warped vets? The presumed joke fails. Before he explains that Arab “men have much tighter relationships,” he says homosexuality “is like trying to play football with a baseball bat.”

Besides querying Iraqis, he could query Americans. He is “not sure why the U.S. Army decided to use the acronym BIOP [for Baghdad International Airport] and not BIAP.” Why not ask?

He says one U.S. newspaper reporter “either made stuff up or cut and pasted propaganda.” But he doesn’t ask the reporter how she got her story. Nor does he mention that the newspaper published a correction, which would prove his point.

But “Embedded” is worthwhile because Gray is interested in finding out how the other guy, the Iraqi one, thinks. And his observations are based on experience in two worlds:

“The hypothesis that once Iraq is secure and peaceful it will sprout cooperation among the people and democratic institutions is false.

“I think this is because Americans apply their logic and reasoning to the situation.”

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Embedded: A Marine Corps Adviser Inside the Iraqi Army, by Wesley Gray, Naval Institute Press, $28.95, 288 pages