Haunted Tank #2 is an issue of the series Haunted Tank (Volume 1) with a cover date of March, 2009. It was published on January 7, 2009.
Synopsis for "Freedom Fried"
The Haunted Tank crew are still lost in the desert without any electronic contact as Jeb Stuart regales his war days which greatly annoys Jamal due to the overt, yet harmless, racy tone in his story. Just as they stop to figure a way to reach their destination, they are then attack by a cadre of Iraqi technicals. The tank crew take action and hold their ground as they manage to annihilate their attackers while Jamal continues to argue with his ancestor about race.
After the carnage is over, Jamal have a private discussion with Jeb as the tank crew discuss about their commander's family relation to the historical Confederate. When learning that Jeb was very popular with the women of his day through poems, Hot Rocks grew interested in this and shared his "poem" through rap.
Jamal manage to reach command, but is cut short by Jeb's discovery of a still alive Iraqi combatant. The crew take the soldier as their prisoner and decide to interrogate him for intelligence. The soldier, who is named Jassim, understands English and confess that the reason that he is fighting against the western coalition forces was because they are simply invading his country to enrich their respective nations. The crew are in disbelief to hear it and answer that they only wanted to overthrow Saddam Hussein and finding the "W.M.D.s" (weapons of mass destruction) the dictator suppose to possess. When Jassim inquired the meaning of the latter and soon understanding it, he divulge that there are suicide bombers being trained to resist the invaders. Jamal immediately sees this as a actionable intelligence and set this as a first priority for his crew to hunt down the bombers before rejoining their company. Jamal's initiative, however, is taken for granted by Jeb, who warily tells him not to as this action is not too dissimilar to his days during the Civil War.
In 1863, Jeb and his brigades were sent on a daring raid into Northern lines and were given order to track down the Union Army and report on its disposition. But his overly zeal in disrupting Union supply lines brought him far into enemy line to unable to find the Union Army, in which he failed to report back to General Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Gettysburg, where the Confederate Army suffer its devastating defeat to the Union due to Jeb's personal ego.
Jeb wisely advise Jamal to not be too consume by his pride and to share his intelligence with his superiors in the hopes of saving more lives and avert an even greater tragedy. Jamal accepts the elder Stuart's lesson. He then decide to release Jassim much to the surprise of his crew as he share his belief that the United States has no quarrel with the Iraqi people and only wanted to build a better Iraq in which their former prisoner is very grateful. As a share of his sympathy, Jamal provides some MRE's for Jassim, who he now shares some kinship with Hot Rocks over rap music.
Appearing in "Freedom Fried"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- J.E.B. "Jeb" Stuart
- Beauregard "Babe" Johnson
- Hot Rocks
- "Chop Chop" Kim
Antagonists:
- Iraqi soldiers
Other Characters:
- Confederate States Army
- General Robert E. Lee (Flashback only)
- Lo Armistead (Dies in flashback)
- Union Army
Locations:
Items:
Vehicles:
- U.S. Army M1 Abrams tank
See Also