Our blood and treasure

Holiday feasts for hundreds of U.S. families will feature a conspicuously empty seat this year. In Fallujah and beyond, U.S. Marines, soldiers, and their families make the ultimate sacrifice to win the war on terror | Lynn Vincent

Time flies when you're getting shot at," Marine Lance Corporal Abraham Simpson, 19, wrote in an August letter to his parents. A suicide bomber had that day killed two of his squad-mates at a checkpoint near Najaf. Abraham addressed the letter "To Dad Only," as he did whenever he sent disturbing news from Iraq to his home in Chino, Calif.

"A car blew up at the checkpoint just 50 yards away, and later on some guys tried to run the gate," he wrote. "We blew up their cars, one with a . . . missile, and shot [the men] as they ran away. One guy was burning as he ran out of his car. They cleaned up the bodies this morning, but the burnt-up, shot-up cars are still out there." Abraham knew both U.S. soldiers killed by the car bomb. One was a friend from boot camp, "a nice guy from L.A. named Hannon."