In 2018, on the 15th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, I wrote a lengthy thread on Twitter that told the story of what I saw from the moment I drove into Iraq from Kuwait on March 18 until I arrived in Baghdad on April 9. The day-by-day thread seemed to strike a chord, with more than 20,000 retweets and likes, and even a couple of articles written about it. So here are the first few tweets in that thread and a link to the whole thing (328 tweets in all) on Twitter.
Read the entire Twitter thread.
1) I’m not sure how to make people remember or care that 15 years ago the United States invaded Iraq, setting off a war that continues to this day, with several hundred thousand Iraqis dead, millions turned into refugees. I covered the invasion for the New York Times Magazine.
— Peter Maass (@maassp) March 20, 2018
2) Though I’m a writer, I shot photos during the invasion as I drove a rented Hyundai SUV from Kuwait into Iraq via Safwan, then up the spine of the country to Nasiriya, Diwaniya, Hilla, Kut and finally Baghdad. Here’s the Hyundai on March 19, 2003. It’s clean–that will change pic.twitter.com/E4mPpsPz5w
— Peter Maass (@maassp) March 20, 2018
3) The photographer I worked with, Laurent vander Stockt, drove his own SUV. After several failed attempts to get into Iraq, one time turned back at gunpoint by U.S. soldiers, we finally got through, via what we guessed was a minefield (I followed Lauren tracks). Here’s Laurent. pic.twitter.com/kFozhoHTbP
— Peter Maass (@maassp) March 20, 2018
4) Laurent was already a legend among photojournalists, and since the Iraq invasion he’s continued to do amazing work in Syria (among other warzones). But that’s another story for another day.
— Peter Maass (@maassp) March 20, 2018
5) We arrived in Safwan on the afternoon of March 19, 2003, just as Marines were taking down a placard of Saddam Hussein. pic.twitter.com/lgsqloNELJ
— Peter Maass (@maassp) March 20, 2018