War in Iraq doesn't stop for holiday

For most U.S. troops at war, Christmas is just another day.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Pfc. John Alonzo knew Christmas would be his toughest time in Iraq.
"Ever since I volunteered, I haven't been looking forward to it," said the 27-year-old, from Lubbock, Texas. "My son wants to know why I can't be home for the holidays. He doesn't understand that I can't just quit."
Before dawn on Sunday, Alonzo and the rest of the 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment rolled through muddy, unpaved streets in a volatile corner of east Baghdad, hunting house-to-house for Shiite militia leaders and bomb-making materials.
Although they did not know it, a roadside bomb in the same neighborhood had killed three U.S. soldiers the day before; a fourth died in an explosion in Diyala province east of the Iraqi capital.
As the sun came up over the city Sunday, a soldier sang "Silver Bells" while others smashed windows in a tall residential apartment building to get a better look at the street below. "It's Christmastime in the city," he crooned.
A mortar round landed in the area. Later, a rooftop sniper fired a single shot that penetrated the helmet of a U.S. soldier, grazing his head. The lightly injured soldier was treated at his base camp.
The troops will spend Christmas raiding another section of the city.
Work goes on
"It's hard. But we've still got work to do. The mission doesn't stop," said Alonzo, who left his job as a beer salesman and enlisted because the Army provided better health care benefits for his three small children, and money for his wife to finish college.
There are small signs of the season across Iraq, where thoughts of the friends and loved ones they miss weigh heavier than usual on the minds of U.S. troops. But for most, Christmas is just another day.
"In the back of your mind you think about it, but there are no holidays in Iraq," said Staff Sgt. Brandon Scott, a 35-year-old from Woodbridge, Va., and the 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment, which is part of the Army's 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division.
A 16-year veteran of the Army, Scott said he was spending his third Christmas in four years away from his four children. "We don't really have time for Christmas," he said.
But that doesn't mean there aren't gifts.
Care packages stuffed with cookies, candy canes and Christmas cards penned by children from coast to coast have flooded every U.S. military outpost across the country.