16 square mile fortress

antarchi's picture

The U.S. military base in Balad, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, is rapidly becoming one of the largest American military installations on foreign soil. About 40,000 troops, contractors and Defense Department civilian employees live there.
The base is one giant construction project, with new roads, sidewalks, and structures going up across this 16-square-mile fortress in the center of Iraq, all with an eye toward the next few decades... The base is so big that there is a regular bus service within its perimeter to ferry around the tens of thousands of troops and contractors who live here.