U.S. troops always on the watch in most dangerous city in war

Insurgents attack numerous times each day.
RAMADI, Iraq (AP) -- On the roof of a ruined hotel-turned-observation post nicknamed "the Ramadi Inn," two U.S. snipers listen to Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" on an iPod and watch a firefight through holes knocked out of a penthouse wall.
Marines at another sandbagged outpost up the road are firing grenades at insurgents, sending clouds of smoke rising above a hazy midday skyline of rusting water towers, minarets and an exquisite blue-domed mosque.
"It's a never-ending war," says one of the snipers, 22-year-old Spc. Jarrod York of Mansfield, Pa., as explosions boom in the distance.
Ramadi, populated by Sunni Arabs 70 miles west of Baghdad, is the most dangerous city in Iraq for U.S. forces. Commanders say there are more insurgent attacks here than anywhere else in the country, with militants and American troops exchanging fire several times a day -- at least.
American troops seized "the Ramadi Inn," known officially as OP Hotel, in 2004 to protect a road through the heart of the city. Two years later, they are using the building and others like it to secure Route Michigan, a key supply road for U.S. forces.
Importance of building
This four-story structure is one of the tallest in town, offering panoramic views over an urban wasteland crawling with insurgents. The troops say the militants are also watching them -- casing their positions in vehicles, peeking around corners, looking from afar through binoculars and video cameras.
It's difficult to imagine the hotel ever had a place in Ramadi's hospitality industry. Rocket blasts have pummeled the building, a truck bomb nearly destroyed it and human hands have stripped it bare of furnishings.
The rooms on one dusty, darkened floor have been converted into sandbagged machine-gun nests manned by U.S. and Iraqi forces.
With boxes of ammunition and spent bullet casings at their feet, troops sit with binoculars 24 hours a day. They brace for attacks, watch for guerrillas and keep an eye out for battles -- muzzle-flashes, explosions, plumes of smoke.
'Nothing's normal'
"We watch for anything that's not normal. But nothing's normal around this place," said Spc. Joe Sommer, 20, of Lawrenceville, Ga., his belt-fed machine-gun poking out a hallway window.
Past dreary halls draped with camouflage nets, soldiers sleep in cot-crammed quarters with no electricity, running water, phones or Internet.
Iraqi forces arrived a couple weeks ago and sleep on their own floor. A few promptly installed a satellite on the roof so they could watch TV in their rooms.
Every window has been sealed with leaking sandbags. Troops joke the weight of the bags may bring down the building. Scrawled on one wall: "Ramadi Inn, aka OP Sandbag."
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