By Julien Ferrat, BuenosAiresHerald.com staff.

US troops in Iraq started to leave the country. Although it will be a long process (US-led combat operations are due to end by September 2010, with all troops gone from Iraq by the end of 2011), one man in the City of Buenos Aires is particularly happy about the withdrawal, as his friends will return safely to their homeland: Rob Brucker, a US citizen who served as a combat engineer in Iraq between 2004 and 2005.

The 26-year-old Brucker came to the Argentine capital almost immediately after he was allowed to leave Iraq, in 2005. A woman was the reason: "I was dating a German woman whose father worked at the Embassy in Buenos Aires. This is why I came in the first place. Then I found a job I liked so I stayed after we broke-up."

When asked about the withdrawal, Rob Brucker answers with a smile on his face: "I think it's very good. Our soldiers are going to get a chance to rest and they won't be getting fired on anymore. They have been pushed to their limits for so long..."

But, to him, it's not only good news for the US troops but also for Iraqis who, according to him, will probably be capable of handling the situation: "I think that they'll do well. They did when they formed the neighbourhood militias and took out the people that were destroying their homes."

Of course, Rob thinks about his friends: "A lot just came home, but a few more are still over there. Some others went to Afghanistan. But most of them changed jobs and are doing humanitarian work there. They build schools..."

Iraq instead of Afghanistan

Rob Brucker's history in Iraq started at the end of 2003. He was 21 and had just entered the army "to do something different after high school." One day, his sergeant told the troops from his native Virginia that they were "going to Afghanistan." "He asked us to pack our stuff and meet the next day. Which is what we did, and then he told us we were actually going to Iraq," Rob told BuenosAiresHerald.com.

After some training in New Jersey, they were sent to Kuwait, "to adjust to the heat", for a month. In the beginning of 2004 ("January or February, I can't remember", says Rob), they were sent to Iraq. It didn't start well: "We arrived at 10pm and we had to go to a base that was a few kilometers away. The problem was that we had to go down what everyone called ‘Sniper Alley', to get to the base..." Eventually, they made it to the base.

"It was very loud. I could barely sleep the first night. Helicopters and shootings could be heard all night long," Rob remembers. It didn't take long before he faced his first combat situation: "We were driving back to our home base, somebody set up an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) on our convoy, on my truck. From there, it was very chaotic, people were running off everywhere."

Worst moment

But this was far from being the worst situation he faced. Rob recalls: "My worst moment in Iraq was when the marines went into Fallujah. The terrorists left and took over Mosul. They completely destroyed it. Killed the policemen and destroyed all the buildings. We were the first ones sent there to secure a bridge. We were there for four days. That was the worst time. We got attacked a lot. All night... Sniper Fire, Mortars, Drive-bys... Dead people on the road... Nobody on my team was killed. Nobody got hurt on my team. On other teams, it was different. Ambulances didn't stop, as things were so... chaotic."

Having to face situations like this one, Rob was obviously happy to leave Iraq in February 2005, even though the relationship with Iraqis wasn't bad: "For the most part, the Iraqis were pretty nice to us. They waved, they played. The very old people wouldn't say much. I guess young people kind of liked us."

Now, Rob is very happy in Argentina. He is engaged with a Peruvian woman. They plan to leave in a year and a half, when she finishes her studies. "We will go to the US or Peru. But probably the US...," he says. A country whose troops in Iraq will have returned home by then.