My Last War

Central Florida police officer Charles M. Grist is one of the few Vietnam veterans to have served as an enlisted soldier in the Iraq war. In 2004, he volunteered to be the sergeant-in-charge of the protective service detail for an Army Reserve general in Baghdad. Grist and his unit, the C.O.B.R.A. Team, were based inside Baghdad's Green Zone, but their travels with the general led them along the deadly roads of Baghdad, to the throne of Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon, and through the picturesque hills of Kurdistan. It was a fast-paced life of high adventure, filled with convoys, mortar or rocket attacks, and the constant threats of ambushes or improvised explosive devices. As a Vietnam veteran, Grist knew that Operation Iraqi Freedom would be his last war. He used his daily journal to record his team's wartime experiences, to document the events that shaped Iraq in 2004, and to preserve the heroic deeds of some of the Army Reserve and National Guard warrior-citizens with whom he served. That journal became the basis for this book.