Soldier's Mail

Here are three postcards I received from a friend serving in Iraq a couple of years ago.  The fronts show various scenes of soldiers serving on patrols and the 'weapons of war'--helicoptors, tanks, an aircraft carrier and other various vehicles.  The most interesting part of these postcards to me is the three different postmarks they received--two different ones from a "Marine Post Office" and one from a "Certified Combat Zone".  Starting in WWI, a soldier would place his name, rank, serial number and APO [military post office number] and the mail would travel to the US for free (no stamps needed, except briefly in WWII for mail from the Pacific theatre--but that's another story!)


(the cancel reads: "Certified Combat Zone Free Mail" and "Army Postal Service" in the circular cancel.)

Well, I wouldn't say "already pumping out the cards", they make them for soldiers to send home, to keep in touch with family and friends.  And the soldiers don't have to use these, my friend knew I collected postcards and chose these for my collection. The postmark was what I was after; the pictures could have have anything.

Also, there have been postcards for every war since 1898.  This is not new. It's quite obvious some images are more propagandistic than others.  Take a look at the collection I'm putting up here and see how it's been done for 110 years.

War isn't fun, it's not a holiday.  Postcards are one way the soldiers try to feel normal.

It isn't all that unusual, I have several postcards with Italian and Egyptian themes from WW2.

They were issued to NZEF personnel while serving in North Africa and Italy.