When the army deployed the ram rods to Iraq in February 2004 we had a basic idea of where we'd be going inside the country. We ended up at FOB Normandy which by the way I got corrected by one of my Vietnam veteran friends that they say he's like it's FOB so I don't know I've said FOB the whole time. Our AO looked more like Vietnam in 1968 thick palm groves grew in low spaces between and open rugged terrain when Americans think of Iraq war the images conjured up are the street scenes in Baghdad or the flat expanse of open desert in the western part of the country.