NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq – The new patients at the field aid station screamed in agony as they were gently laid on stretchers. Fresh from the battlefield, flies swarmed around their infected wounds. American army medics barked out orders beside the makeshift triage beds.

But the four men being treated were not American soldiers. Blindfolded, stripped to the waist, and each with a number felt-tipped on his torso, the tags tied to their stretchers identified them as “EPWs”- the American military acronym for enemy prisoners of war.

Disoriented and perhaps bewildered, they were surrounded not only by doctors and nurses but American Marine Corps interrogators and their translators seeking to gain intelligence that might be of use in the continuing battle.

The four were all foreigners – three Jordanians and a Sudanese. “These were the guys shooting RPGs [Rocket Propelled Grenades] at us,” said a burly military intelligence noncommisioned officer.

“They came out of their holes and just surrendered. We can’t get any straight stories. They all say they came to work.”

This was the same Task Force 2-2 field aid station where a mortally injured lieutenant had been brought just 24 hours before. Suffering from a direct hit to the abdomen with an RPG, he died shortly after being evacuated the Bravo Surgical Hospital at Camp Fallujah.

Prisoner 14/3 cried out as his shattered left leg was bandaged. It had been broken several days earlier, and doctors said it might have to be amputated.

He said his name was Abbas Yousef, an 18-year-old Jordanian. “I was brought to Baghdad in a truck to work in a hotel,” he claimed when asked why he had been fighting the Americans.

“The mujahedeen asked me what I was doing here. They forced me to fight. They wouldn’t let me call anyone for help. I wanted to go back to Jordan.” He said that a “man from Tunis” had been in charge of him. “I was paid $100 a month and given food and supplies.”

Asked about an alleged leader of foreign fighters in the city, Omar Hadid, he at first said he was dead. “You killed my boss.” But he quickly changed his story, saying he was injured in the shoulder. “I have never seen him. I saw him only once. What do you want? I can help you. I will tell you everything you want. I can get you any information you want.” He was asked if he had been involved in kidnappings. “He didn’t give me this operation,” he replied.

Prisoner 14/5’s story was equally incoherent. Suffering from a gunshot wound to the shoulder that left an ugly exit wound on his bicep, he said he was Mohammed Khalid, a Sudanese who had been living in Saudi Arabia.

“I know nothing about Iraq,” he shouted as a medic pressed a dressing on his arm. He came to the Iraqi town of al-Husayba on the Syrian border simply to work in a gas station, he insisted.

Between moans as his wound was irrigated, he said he was in Fallujah to find work but had been stranded when his money and passport had been stolen. “They’re all liars,” said the military intelligence NCO.

Lieutenant Gregory McCrum, the Task Force 2-2 medical officer, said treating prisoners showed American forces had “a higher moral compass” than the insurgents. In addition, fighters could provide valuable intelligence if captured rather than killed.

“I have a sense of animosity against these individuals due to the fact they’ve taken up arms against us. But by the same token it’s important to get them better so they can contribute information that might be able to save the life of an American.

“I don’t know what their fellow insurgents tell them or what the Arab media tells them but certainly we don’t rape women and children and torture them or any of those things.”

Beside the aid station, battle-weary Task Force 2-2 soldiers debated whether prisoners should be helped. “They made a mistake not shooting those guys,” said one.

“We can’t do that, dude,” another said angrily. “That would make us barbarians. We’re Americans. They’ll go to Guantanamo Bay and have a nice little stay at our facility there.”