No Door / Blue Work Truck

The blue cab fills nearly the entire photograph. Its windshield occupies the right side, while the missing near-side door exposes the seats and both occupants. Tim Jones is closest to the camera, seated sideways with his legs extending toward the open doorway. He wears a green short-sleeved shirt and camouflage trousers and holds an AK-47 across his lap, pointing toward the viewer's right.

Kenny Bass sits farther away at the steering wheel, deeper in shadow. Beneath his forearms, a second AK-47 crosses his lap and points out through the driver's-side window. The bright blue body and irregular doorway edge frame the shaded interior. A larger gray vehicle is partly visible beyond the cab on the right beneath a washed-out sky.

The missing door turns the blue metal shell into a frame around the two occupants. The nearer body and diagonal rifle sit in front of the shadowed driver; the windshield then opens a brighter plane at the right.

The Marines later used the faster Kia Bongo to pursue looters and combatants at the weapons-manufacturing complex.

We confiscated the Kia Bongo from a looter who had stolen it from an Iraqi government building. Later, we chose it for pursuing looters and combatants because it was much faster than our Humvees.

Tim and I chained the near-side door to a massive concrete gate pillar and drove forward to tear it away, then cut the remaining hinges with a hacksaw.

Photograph by Jamie Herman.

Photograph 5 of 15.

• The concrete pillar used to remove the door formed one side of the entrance to the inner bunker compound. Hallway / Resting Marines shows the small gate building opposite it, where Bass and Jones slept.

The Kia Bongo's exact generation remains unresolved.