Camp Victory was laid out in various “districts” or “neighborhoods”, called “pads”. Generally they’d try to put one Battalion per one Pad, although sometimes there was overlap. And while everyone else was running war stuff, someone had to make sure that the Pads were operating smoothly. Someone had to be the “Mayor”.

The “Mayor” was called by that title because he or she was, essentially, running a little village for the duration of their stay. They made sure the electricity was on, the troops had a place in the chow rotation, the poop trucks came to clean out the latrines (we’ll hear more about the poop trucks later, I promise), and so on. A good, smooth-running Pad reflected well on the Mayor; a Pad that was in shambles reflected poorly on the Mayor’s quarterly evaluations. Commanders appointed the Mayor, and it was an opportunity to shine.

And, of course, we reminisce about the destruction of the Saddam Hussein Statue in Firdoos Square on April 9th, 2003, by the 3rd Battalion/4th Marines:

For the record, no one that wanted to be Mayor actually made a statue of themselves from the melted remains of the Saddam statue, but I have no doubt that a few would have, if they could.