A heart breaking letter sent to Talking Points Memo's Joshua Micah Marshall from his friend in Iraq. The four abducted Italian bodyguards, including Fabrizio Quattrocchi, who was executed last week, worked for Marshall's friend. The closing:

So for now I am too grief stricken to assess whether this was worth the adventure that is Fallujah but all I ask is ... how can we assault a city of 300,000 and not have the largest east-west highway secure for logistics and commerce by Military Police?? Allah only knows how many people were killed by ignoring a basic military principle ... secure your lines of communications and supply!